An authority on adverse effects of poverty on urban education

Educator, author and social justice activist Jonathan Kozol will speak at Wayne State University's Community Arts Auditorium, 9:30 a.m. Friday, Sept. 26, about his decades-long passion for bringing equal access in quality public education to children of all racial and economic backgrounds. The title of his presentation is "Still Separate, Still Unequal: A Teacher's Struggle to Transform Our Public Schools."

New Wayne State University President Jay Noren will deliver welcoming remarks, and Hilary Ratner, vice president for research, will be program moderator. A brief audience question-and-answer session will follow the speech.

The program is part of WSU's Forum on Contemporary Issues in Society (FOCIS) series that was initiated last year by Irvin D. Reid, who now holds the Eugene Applebaum Chair in Community Engagement at the university and is director of FOCIS. Admission is free but advance registration is required.

Kozol, who The Chicago Sun Times called "today's most eloquent spokesman for America's disenfranchised," is a strong advocate for integrated public education and an outspoken critic of the voucher system. He points to low graduation rates, particularly in major cities, poor performance on standardized tests and the proliferation of charter schools as evidence that the public education system is failing students to whom it should be giving hope and the tools for success. And he rails at the inequities he sees between rich and poor school districts.

The Boston native is the author of several award-winning books on public education, including Death at an Early Age, which won a National Book Award in 1968. Among his other books are Amazing Grace (1995), a best-seller about his visits to schools in New York City's South Bronx, and The Shame of the Nation, an expose of conditions he found while visiting nearly 60 public schools in 11 states. Another best-seller, Savage Inequalities (1991), explores the extremes of wealth and poverty in the nation's public school system. In Kozol's most recent book, Letters to a Young Teacher (2007), he relates many experiences from the years he spent in public schools. His thoughts are revealed through a series of letters to a first grade teacher at an inner-city Boston school.

Paula Wood, dean of WSU's College of Education, notes that it is virtually impossible to become an accredited K-12 teacher in the public education system today without having come in contact with Kozol's work at some point during the training process.

A summa cum laude graduate of Harvard University, Kozol earned a degree in English Literature and was awarded a Rhodes Scholarship. He has been deeply involved in social justice work during much of his career. One of his books, Rachel and Her Children, focuses on the tragedy of homeless families in America. It received the Robert F. Kennedy Book Award in 1989.

A book-signing session will follow the formal program. For program registration and more information about FOCIS visit www.focis.wayne.edu or call 313-577-5550.

Wayne State University is a premier institution of higher education offering more than 350 academic programs through 12 schools and colleges to more than 33,000 students.