| It was hard to think of Dr. Charles Taylor, dean of Herzing College and Urban League of Greater Madison board member, as anything but a respected African American educator as he addressed the students and parents at the Urban League's King Holiday breakfast January 14. And yet, if it weren't for the education that Taylor earned through hard work, his life would be vastly different than it is today. Taylor was born on the wrong side of the tracks in Cape Girardeau, Mo. during the 1950s. He grew up in the same town that conservative talk show host Rush Limbaugh did. "Of course, he lived on the better side of town," Taylor recalled during an interview with The Capital City Hues. "And when you hear some of his diatribe; it almost makes it sound as if he struggled. Well, his struggle was nothing compared to our struggle. If you looked at his house and our shacks, you would see that he lived in a mansion compared to what we lived in." Segregation and Jim Crow were still the norm in Cape Girardeau, located on the Mississippi River in the "Boot Heel" of Missouri and on the fringe of the Old South. "Cape Girardeau was a part of The Trail of Tears when they marched the American Indians from Florida to Oklahoma," Taylor said. "There were lynchings there. It wasn't as bad as some of the places like Mississippi, but there was strict segregation in the poor side of town. It was many years later before we integrated our schools and other facilities." Taylor and the people his age were content during his youth of living the life that people on the other side of the tracks had created for them, playing sports and listening to music. But then along came Bobby Williams, a Vietnam vet who wasn't content to leave things the way they were and came to Cape to direct the local community center. "He was a master at planting seeds," Taylor emphasized. "He related with us and spent time with us. He showed us by example what could be done while at the same time, he was moving us toward a specific goal. He was politicizing us. He was taking us from A to C and we didn't even know it. During the journey, it was a very fond thing, but at the same time, things were getting pretty serious because for the first time in our hometown, we began to question policies, discrimination, and segregation. He had just a wealth of experience and a wealth of information. He was our civil rights leader. And he really took us to the next level in terms of politics and civil rights." Ten years later, Taylor also became the director of a community center in Cape Girardeau. "I looked back to how he led the center when he was the director," Taylor recalled. "I did all kinds of good things with young people in the community. I engaged them and I took them on all kinds of field trips and got them out of the Cape. We gave them experience they never had before. All of that was because of the training that Bobby gave me." And Taylor has been educating young people ever since. He is concerned about the priority that sports and music is given by young people today and the illusion that all can ride them to fame and wealth. "Sports are important, if nothing else, for the students' health," Taylor said. "But to think that sports are going to be your ticket out is wrong. We worship sports in our country. Sports players are our heroes. While kids see that -- and the messages we send are clearly 'If you want wealth and fame, sports and music is the way to get there' -- the truth is only a very small percentage will ever achieve that. But education is a sure thing. If students study hard, education will give them a good life. Not only that, it opens up their minds to other types of possibilities. It tells them they are connected to this wider world. That's why I stress education because it's a proven method to achieve a better life. It can take you away from poverty and give you the type of life that most people desire." "What is the surest way to get out of poverty?" Taylor asked. "It's been proven that education has created the Black middle class, the White middle class, and other middle classes. Education will lift people to the middle class more so in the future than in the past. We have to emphasize it more. Sometimes our students don't take their studies as seriously as they should. And they think they need to fluff off when they are in high school. But if they take it as seriously as they take some of these rap songs and some of these other extracurricular activities, they'd be amazed at where it would take them and the choices it would give them in terms of colleges and even jobs." Taylor is sold on education. He is a life-long learner who enjoys enriching his own life while he enriches the lives of others. Taylor walks the walk. Education was his ticket out of poverty and he knows that it can lift many students of this generation out as well. All aboard? |
| Riding the education train out of poverty By Jonathan Gramling |
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| (Left) Herzing College Deam Charles Taylor grew up in Cape Girardeau, Missouri as did conservative commentator Rush Limbaugh. |
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