Nairobi College

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Not to be confused with University of Nairobi.

Nairobi College was a small

East Palo Alto, California, active from 1969 until 1981. Nairobi College had satellite campuses throughout the San Francisco Bay Area.[1] It was affiliated with the Nairobi Day School, a private preschool founded in 1966.[2]

Background

It is necessary for us to develop a new frame of reference which transcends the limits of white concepts. It is necessary for us to develop and maintain a total intellectual offensive against the false universality of white concepts.

Lerone Bennett, Jr., qtd. in Ferguson 2015
, p. 41

The College was part of a movement for ethnic minority groups in the United States to have dedicated academic programs to train themselves in the theory and practice of liberation, resistance, and revolution. These programs were referred to as "

Center for Black Education,[3] and Thurgood Marshall College.[4]

Description

Nairobi College began classes in the fall of 1969 with initial funding of $100,000 donated by area residents and

community organizers.[1]
Based out of a small private home in East Palo Alto, Nairobi College operated out of stores, church buildings, and homes[1][5][6] throughout black, Latino, and Asian neighborhoods in the San Francisco Peninsula.[1] The college leadership hoped that spreading classes out in these existing structures would integrate it with the needs and reality of their surrounding community, calling it a "college without walls" in contrast to the perceived "
academia.[1][7] It was a two-year college.[1][5]

The students were primarily African American and Hispanic, although

working-class white students were also included.[8] Most of them worked full-time and took classes in the evenings.[9] All students were required to utilize their training to provide skilled volunteer work three hours per week in support of area social organizations, such as schools, community health centers, and legal aid.[9][6][a]

Instructors included Ed Roberts, a disability rights activist,[10] Tello Nkhereanye, a leftist from South Africa, Frank Omowale Satterwhite, a community organizer, Aaron Manganello, a Marxist minister of education for the Brown Berets, and Mary Hoover, a Stanford academic advocate for African-American English.[9]

In 1966, Nairobi College launched an affiliated preschool through high school program called the Nairobi Day School.[5] By 1971, a $500 tuition charge was instituted, but was usually paid by federal student financial aid and was often waived.[1]

See also

Notes

  1. ^ Van Deburg (1992, p. 80) reports the requirement was four hours per day, which seems unlikely.

Citations

  1. ^ a b c d e f g h i Rickford 2016, p. 205.
  2. ISSN 0022-2984
    .
  3. ^ Ferguson 2015, p. 40-41.
  4. ^ Turner 2013.
  5. ^ a b c Jet 1971.
  6. ^ a b Van Deburg 1992, p. 80.
  7. ^ Van Deburg 1992, p. 79-80.
  8. ^ Ferguson 2015, p. 40.
  9. ^ a b c Rickford 2016, p. 206.
  10. ^ Kent & Quinlan 1996, p. 130.

References

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