Jonathan Kozol

UNC Asheville’s Distinguished Speaker Series welcomes acclaimed author Jonathan Kozol to Lipinsky Auditorium at 7:30 p.m. Wednesday, Nov. 8, to discuss “The Shame of the Nation: The Restoration of Apartheid Schooling in America.” A book signing and reception will follow Kozol’s talk. The events are free and open to the public.

Working with inner-city children for more than four decades, Kozol has found that conditions have actually grown worse in the 15 years since federal courts began dismantling Brown vs. the Board of Education. His talk, which draws from his noted book of the same name, will give a first-hand report of the state of our classrooms, as well as pay tribute to the undefeated educators who teach in America’s challenged urban school systems.

A native of Boston and a graduate of Harvard, Kozol has received numerous awards, including a Rhodes Scholarship, two Guggenheim Fellowships, two fellowships from the Rockefeller Foundation, and fellowships from the Field and Ford Foundations. His first book, "Death at an Early Age" described his first year as a teacher and received the 1968 National Book Award. Since then he has written 12 more books, including "Rachel and Her Children: Homeless Families in America," which received the 1989 Robert F. Kennedy Book Award, and "Amazing Grace: The Lives of Children and the Conscience of a Nation," which received the 1996 Anisfield-Wolf Book Award, an honor previously granted to the works of Langston Hughes and Martin Luther King Jr.

Kozol’s talk is made possible by Asheville City Schools, Buncombe County Schools, Buncombe County Schools Foundation, Education Coalition, Lend-A-Hand (Gannett Foundation), National Endowment for the Humanities, and the Western Region Education Service Alliance in cooperation with UNC Asheville’s Africana Studies Program, Belk Distinguished Professor of Humanities, Education Department, Honors Program, Humanities Program, Office of Cultural & Special Events, Sociology Department, Student Activities & Integrated Learning, Teaching Fellows Program, and USTEP (University School Teacher Education Partnership).

For more information about Kozol’s speaking engagement or the Cultural & Special Events season, call 828/251-6227.