Dr. Michelle A. Purdy is an Assistant Professor of Education in Arts and Sciences at Washington University in St. Louis
Michelle Purdy will discuss her recently published book, Transforming the Elite: Black Students and the Desegregation of Private Schools (The University of North Carolina Press). Combining social history, policy analysis, and oral history, Purdy will detail how and why historically white elite private schools, the most prestigious of K-12 schools, opted to desegregate when not legally obligated to do so during the civil rights movement and how black students who desegregated such schools courageously navigated institutional and interpersonal racism. Further, she will examine the work’s implications for deepening and expanding the history of school desegregation and black educational history, and the questions the research raises for contemporary educational reform and diversity and inclusion initiatives.
Dr. Michelle A. Purdy is an Assistant Professor of Education in Arts and Sciences at Washington University in St. Louis and Director of Undergraduate Educational Studies. She is also an affiliate faculty member with the Interdisciplinary Program in Urban Studies and the Center on Urban Research and Public Policy. With research, teaching, and service commitments to race, culture, and equity in education, her specialties include the history of U.S. education, the history of African American education, and the history of school desegregation. Her recently published book, Transforming the Elite: Black Students and the Desegregation of Private Schools (University of North Carolina Press), analyzes how and why historically white elite private schools, or the most prestigious independent schools, opted to desegregate when not legally obligated to do so during the civil rights movement.
