Education Along the Emerald Necklace

The Emerald Necklace is one of the dominating features of Boston. It extends from Boston Common in Downtown Boston all the way to Franklin Park, through the Fens and Riverway. The park system brings much-needed green space to an urban setting. Each park is unique, having something for everyone, and the spread of the park system allows it to serve communities all across Boston. Boston is also known for being a center of higher education in the United States. It has numerous colleges and universities, as well as smaller institutions. Educational institutions have a huge impact on Boston because they bring people and resources into the city. Students come from all over the world for higher education in Boston, and spend a great deal of money to attend these universities. Boston’s history with education goes far beyond what is seen today, and it is closely tied with the Emerald Necklace. Many of the universities have buildings and campuses along the park system, and even more make use of the public parks for their students and academics. The Emerald Necklace and Boston’s universities also work in tandem to shape the spaces around them. Some of the changes they make to the city are good, but others are harmful. 

My transect will guide the user through the theme of education along the Emerald Necklace in Boston, starting at Boston Common. Each site will shed light on a different aspect and impact of Boston’s educational institutions, and the sites are scattered not just along the Emerald Necklace, but also time. I picked sites that would allow me to paint a broad picture of education in Boston, not just focusing on the renowned universities, but also smaller or nontraditional schools. The transect will teach about the complex histories of several educational institutions, from universities to Freedom Schools, while also highlighting my personal experiences with Boston, the Emerald Necklace, and education as a student at Northeastern University. The mix of historical profiles and personal narratives will demonstrate the relationship between the park system, learning, and institutions, and the role they have played in the gentrification and racialization of Boston. 

The most important site on the transect, at least in terms of looking at the major themes of relationality and racialization discussed in class, is the Elma Lewis School of Fine Arts. The school is a product of the intersection of arts, education, and racialization in Boston. It has been crucial to helping build a Black art community in Boston, and teaching Black people about their ancestral culture and heritage (2). It has also had a huge impact on Franklin Park, helping with the cleaning up of the park in the 1960s and maintaining the park for years to come (2). Within Franklin Park, the school established the Playhouse in the Park, which had a huge impact on the community (2). It gave the students a place to perform, but it also invited Black artists from across the country to perform and share their cultural heritage (2). It has also had a national impact, hosting national conventions. The strong presence of the school in Boston was actually the reason that the National Center of Afro-American Artists decided to set up in Boston (2). And the school and the playhouse were models for other arts schools across the country. The Elma Lewis School of Fine Arts filled a niche within the educational community, and despite facing challenges it persevered and has since had an enormous impact. 

Racism in education in Boston is not something that only existed in the 1960s. While my research of the Elma Lewis School of Fine Arts and Freedom Schools showed the past of Boston’s racism in education, the Globe’s Spotlight series showed Boston’s present racism in education, particularly higher education. The Globe looked at some of Boston’s top universities, including Northeastern, and found data on student ethnicities that showed that the percentage of Black students has barely changed since 1980, which is incredibly disappointing to see. Today, the focus of many colleges and universities has been recruiting international students. This shift can be seen in some of the historical sites, such as the College of Public and Community Service, that I found through A People’s Guide to Greater Boston. The college began to serve local working class students, primarily of color, and today it is a ghost of what it once was as UMass Boston looks abroad (1). It can also be seen in Northeastern University, one of the narrative sites. As a student at Northeastern, I have seen first-hand the impact the university has. I see the statistics for student ethnicity, but I also see the way Northeastern is shaping the communities of colors around it. Rather than boosting those communities by educating their students, Northeastern is pushing into the communities to build new international student housing, causing gentrification and isolating community landmarks.

During the creation of this transect, from researching for historical profiles and exploring Boston for narrative profiles, I have gained a new perspective on education in Boston and the Emerald Necklace. Doing the research made the theme looser than I had intended, as I found information and sites. Some sites have only small ties or mentions of education, focusing on other things, such as community impact, that I found more relevant to painting a picture of Boston. The different institutions and other sites have shed light on aspects of Boston I had not considered before. On one hand, it has shown me a side of Boston that the city does not like to advertise, but on the other I have learned about amazing things within the educational institutions. I also saw what is the more accurate picture of education in Boston, with much more than just famous institutions of higher education like Northeastern or UMass Boston. My understanding of Boston is broader now, and I have made more connections between the city and the wider world. I have also become more aware of the impacts educational institutions can have, positive and negative. 

References

1. Elma Lewis School of Fine Arts records, M043. Northeastern University Archives and Special Collections. https://archivesspace.library.northeastern.edu/repositories/2/resources/827.
2. Moodliar, Suren, Eleni Macrakis, and Joseph Nevins. 2020. A People’s Guide to Greater Boston. N.p.: University of California Press.

Grace Ruddy

Education Along the Emerald Necklace

This transect uses the Emerald Necklace as a geographic guide to focus on the broad theme of education, encompassing everything from colleges to parks, touching on gender, race, and class issues over the course of Boston’s history.

Key words: education, colleges and universities, Freedom Schools, community