Dr. E. Babette Edwards

Dr. E. Babette Edwardsa groundbreaking educator, community activist, and Harlem’s beloved othermother.

Read Dr. E. Babette Edwards Biographical/historical information below from the Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture, Manuscripts, Archives and Rare Books Division, The New York Public Library, which houses Dr. Edwards archive:

Dr. E. Babette Edwards
began her career as a parent leader and advocate for school reform in
New York City in the 1950s. Born and raised in Harlem, she remained in
the neighborhood working to improve the education system and to raise
awareness about educational issues, specifically those affecting
African-American and Latino students.

In 1958, Edwards became
involved with the negotiating committee to establish a new public school
in Harlem, the Arthur A. Schomburg Intermediate School 201 Complex
(I.S. 201), whose purpose was to alleviate overcrowding conditions in
the neighborhood. The new school was conceived with the intention of
having an integrated student body, and to offer a higher quality of
education than the existing neighborhood schools. However, the Board of
Education was unable to recruit white students to attend the school, and
although it was slated to open in 1965, the school remained closed amid
protests from parents.

In December 1966, Edwards participated in
an occupation of a New York City Board of Education hearing in
Brooklyn, in what was known as the People’s Board of Education. At the
hearing, members of the community were symbolically elected and took the
seats of current Board of Education members, remaining in the hearing
room for three days until they were arrested. The sit-in was an action
to raise awareness about demands for decentralization of neighborhood
public schools, and to promote a greater level of participation in
educational matters by parents and community groups.

In 1967,
Edwards served as co-chairperson on the East Harlem Task Force for
Quality Education, which advocated for I.S. 201’s independence from
Board of Education management, and petitioned for an elected governing
board of parents and community members to be put in place to run the
school. In April of 1967, the school was opened to students when an
agreement was reached with the Board of Education for I.S. 201 to be
operated by a community-elected governing board that included parents,
teachers, and community representatives. In the fall of 1967, Governing
Board elections were held, and Edwards was elected as a community
representative.

In September of 1968, I.S 201 received funding
from the state of New York as one of three Community Education Centers
known as “Demonstration Districts,” whose purpose was to demonstrate how
community control of a school district can improve the school. However,
in 1970, Edwards and the Governing Board of I.S. 201 called for a
boycott of the community board elections in response to the
Decentralization Law of 1969. The new law placed control of the school’s
budget, staff hiring, textbook selection, curriculum, and construction
under the jurisdiction of the New York City Board of Education, and
created much larger school districts. In 1971, Edwards resigned from the
Governing Board, and soon after the Board of Education voted to
eliminate the demonstration districts.

Edwards went on to
co-found and work as executive director of The Harlem Parents Union
(HPU) in 1969. HPU’s mission was to improve schools in Harlem and the
education its students received. HPU performed advocacy services such as
escorting parents to student suspension hearings, assisting students at
the hearings, aiding students in gaining admissions to selective
enrollment schools, meeting with school administrators, educating parent
groups in school selection, communicating with local community school
boards, and participating in citizen-led efforts to improve the public
school system.

In 1974, Edwards and the HPU organized a New York
City public schools boycott to protest conditions at neighborhood
schools. The parents of eleven students withdrew their children from
school and demanded that the Board of Education reallocate funds that
would have been spent on public schooling to the families to spend on a
higher quality education of their choosing. Edwards operated an
alternative school from HPU’s Harlem community center, which offered
education to students participating in the boycott and to those
dissatisfied with New York City’s public school education.

Edwards
was a strong proponent of implementing a voucher system for students
enrolled in underfunded public schools. As chairperson of the Harlem
based organization, Citizens Committee for Effective Education, she
argued that vouchers would give the students at failing schools the same
opportunities as those from more affluent backgrounds. In 1975, she
presented her argument to the New York State Board of Regents at the
Regents Legislative Conference in a statement entitled, “Education
Vouchers for Blacks and Hispanics.” In 1976, as a member of the National
Board of Trustees with Citizens for Educational Freedom, Edwards spoke
in support of education vouchers to members of the Democratic Platform
Committee of the Democratic Party.

In 1993, Edwards and the HPU
participated in an ACLU/NYCLU-authored amicus curiae in the case of
Campaign for Fiscal Equity, Inc. (CFE) v. State of New York. The case
brought by the CFE contended that state funding for education in New
York City was inadequate, unequal, and resulted in inferior education
for students attending New York City public schools. The litigation
asserted that these inequities were in violation of anti-discrimination
provisions of the New York State Constitution, and Title VI of the
federal Civil Rights Statutes.

In 2000, Edwards helped found the
Harlem Education Roundtable, where she served as both chairperson and
Board president. In 2002, the organization proposed building a public
charter school in central Harlem called The Harlem Roundtable Academy
for Excellence in Education. They also hosted workshops for parents and
public school students about education policy.