Personal Narrative: Booker T. Washington High School
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It is quite typical to walk into a high school cafeteria and see jocks sitting at one table, ‘nerds’ at another, and the popular kids all crowded up in their little group probably discussing the latest gossip. When it comes to Booker T. Washington High School, none of that exists. BTW is such a unique school and I was very grateful to be a part of it. You walk in the doors and it’s as if you get an instant feeling of family. There are short people with tall people, mixtures of ethnicity, blue-haired with blond-haired, and freshmen with seniors. It is absolutely incredible to see the diversity that roams the halls. It promotes academic excellence and embraces diversity. It’s an unreal feeling to be able to be the person you truly are without…show more content… Washington High School. I knew that if I was depressed one day anyone would stop, even if they did not know my name, and would ask if I was okay. Booker T. Washington was the very first school to be integrated in the Tulsa area and ever since then it has grown to be an all around incredible place. It is more than just your average high school and is probably why there are over a thousand kids who apply to attend it every single year. I previously attended a private Christian school. I had a total of 17 people in my whole entire grade. A person can only imagine the extent of diversity at a place where kids’ families spend $15,000 a year for their education. I remember walking in on my first day at this school and I saw the girls wearing Coach tennis shoes and had Michael Kors purses. I began to notice as I walked down the halls each day that I probably had the only racially diverse kid in the whole entire school. I honestly did not think much of all of that until I walked through the doors my first day at Booker T. It was quite the culture shock seeing that there was probably more black and Mexican people than there was white…show more content… It was named after a civil rights activist Booker Taliaferro Washington. He was born in a period of time when slavery was an issue. Considering his mother was a slave, he became one himself as soon as he old enough and physically capable to perform the labor intensive activities that the slave-owners required of him. After the Civil War, Booker T. was fortunate enough to get a job as a houseboy for Viola Ruffner who said that he was especially mature and intelligent for his age. She understood his desire for an education and allowed him to attend school for an hour a day during the winter months. With his education that he gained, he became a leader of a “colored” school named Tuskegee Normal and Industrial Institute. As he traveled around promoting his school and raising money, he made sure to reassure whites that nothing in his program would threaten the white supremacy nor pose any economic competition. Washington worked to teach his fellow African-Americans to accept whites and work hard to Again their respect. It slowly began to work, making a giant movement in the acceptance of their race. Booker T. was given the honor of being the first African American to be invited to the White House. His education program of teaching acceptance and hard-work caused Tuskegee to