A Start to
Revealing the Face
of African
American
Achievement in
the 7-12 Science
Classroom
Ed P&L 834 Spring 2010
[email protected]
Branson
This project is an attempt to show a small piece of the
contributions to science of some very influential African
Americans throughout the history of the United States and
to elicit a dialogue amongst 7-12 students and their
teachers on racism and struggle.
Contents
Page
1.
Cover page
2.
Contents
3.
Introduction and note to teacher with background information
4.
Goal of project and list of featured African American Scientists
5.
Lewis Latimer
6.
Meredith Gourdine
7.
Meredith Gourdine cont…
8.
Patricia Bath
9.
Patricia Bath cont…
10. Neil Degrasse Tyson
11. Joycelyn Harrison
12. Lesson plan topic suggestions and associated questions for critical thought on racism
13. References
2
Bringing to Illumination the Hidden Faces of African American Scientists
Note to Teacher: This project was created in an attempt to bring awareness to the fact that throughout the short
history of our country, stemming from practices of the major empirical powers of the 16th and 17th centuries,
Africans (and now their descendants) were and are disenfranchised in many overt and covert ways. The central
effort of this group of adaptive lesson plans and biography’s is to enter the process of bringing into common
knowledge a larger variety of the contributions of African American Scientists that have been left out of many
curriculums throughout this country’s public education system. This work is in no way comprehensive and should
only be used to enrich the current curriculum that you the teacher are working on.
Brief Background: It is good for the reader to realize that inequalities that are present in society today come
directly from social and governmental practices dating back to the foundation of our country and prior. Slavery in
America effectively created a mindset amongst the white Anglo-Saxon protestant (WASP) population that Africans
were sub-human and therefore allowable to be treated as such. This mindset didn’t just originate from America but
from the need of empirical powers (prior to the founding of the United States of America) to justify the continued
domination and subjugation of foreign populations and land for the benefit of their own culture at the expense of
other human cultures. Slavery in America was a continuation of the abuse of different cultures for the benefit of
those that had the power to enslave them. This practice has developed devastating effects for those populations’
descendants that are citizens here in their country now (as well as others).
Traditionally education has been and still is a huge barrier to the success of disenfranchised populations.
The withholding completely of educational opportunity or the offering of an inferior education throughout our
country’s brief history has elicited the unclaimed but desired effect of a class of power brokers continuous
subjugation of a population that has historically been viewed as sub-human by those that have benefited from their
enslavement. One of the many insidious methods accomplishing this embarrassment has been the deliberate hiding
of the African American history and culture in current curriculum within our country’s schools.
The facts speak for themselves. In recent history, for example, “…in the 21st century, Blacks were 11.3%
of the labor force, but only 4.2% of natural scientists, 7.6% of math and computer scientists, and 4.6% of engineers.”
(Johnson, Kieth V., Watson, Elwood D. 2005) The statistics on the disproportionate level of professionally educated
3
African Americans belies the disgrace of our countries inability to correct the mistakes of its past. That is not to say
that things today are as bad as they were during slavery or the antebellum period in the South where it was common
to kill for the crime of being educated. It is a shame however that it took until the latter half of the 20th century civil
rights movement to engage in an attempt to bring issues of inequality into the public forum and open discussion.
African Americans have played crucial roles in the development of critical advances in technology and science
within this country yet we hardly hear of these except for a few token stories within primary and secondary
education.
Goal: It is the goal of these few (and entirely inadequate in terms of the volume of contributions) lesson plan
additions to enrich the historical perspective of the hugely important contributions of just a few African American
scientists and inventors. It is obviously not meant to be comprehensive but can be a step in the right direction to
help our young students realize that the African American culture has a hugely beneficial history in the development
of the country and that it is entirely possible to reach levels of success that our media and latent social attitude tell
young African American students isn’t possible for them.
These brief biographies of five African American scientists are to be used as additives for a historical and
contemporary perspective of science within the scope of general concepts in secondary school science classes. The
brief biographies of these influential people can be incorporated in many different ways to many different topics and
it is not the intent of this project to limit how these biographies are to be used but to offer examples of lessons that
they can compliment. Please feel free to incorporate them as seen fit to enrich the historical and contemporary
perspective of what all humans are capable of since it is integral to let our students know that they have the ability to
achieve in life regardless of the obstacles in front of them even in the face of something as intimidating as
institutionalized racism.
Scientists Featured: (photos from The Black Online Inventors Museum and about.com)
•
Lewis Latimer (1848-1928)
•
Meredith Gourdine (1929-1998)
•
Patricia Bath (1942- )
•
Neil Degrasse Tyson (1958- )
•
Joycelyn Harrison (1964- )
4
Biography: Lewis Latimer
Lewis Latimer should be a name heralded alongside his contemporaries
Alexander Graham Bell and Thomas Alva Edison. His genius was great and his
inventions were many. He was born in Chelsea, Massachusetts on September 4, 1848.
His parents were ex-slaves who had emancipated themselves from a Virginia
plantation owner in 1842. His parents went through unimaginable ordeals to gain
their liberty and eventually settled in Massachusetts after a failed attempt of the
plantation owner to regain his dominion over them.
Lewis fought for the union army during the American civil war. He was
stationed on a gunboat the U.S.S. Massasoit. On July 3rd of 1865 Lewis received an honorable discharge from the
union Navy. After his service to his country Lewis took up work in Boston working for a patent law firm earning
three dollars a week. Within a few years he was working as head draftsman earning twenty dollars a week. Some
inventions that Latimer worked on included an improved water closet for trains, the telephone, and the electric
incandescent light bulb. During his time working with the light bulb Latimer worked alongside the greatest
inventors of his time. In fact two of the greatest inventors competing over providing electricity in their own names
to the country vied for Latimer’s ingenuity and expertise. Henry Maxim asked Latimer in 1880 to help modify
Edison’s electric bulb to last longer and be more reliable which Latimer accomplished. Within the decade Edison
himself convinced Latimer to come work for his company (now known as General Electric). While working for
Edison’s company Latimer led the planning team that wired government buildings, train stations, and other
community areas in cities such as London, Montreal, Philadelphia, and New York. He also led the process to erect
the first electric power plants in these major cities. After his service to these communities Latimer wrote the most
inclusive book of the topic of the day, “Incandescent Electric Lighting: A Practical Description of the Edison
System”. Latimer is the only African American that was included in a group called The Edison Pioneers. This
group is largely regarded as being the handful of men that created the ability for the world to start using electricity in
a way that proved to be immeasurably beneficial to human kind. Latimer’s later life was spent fighting for civil
5
rights for the African American population as well as continued efforts at inventions to improve human life. He
died, one of the most positive influential Americans, on December 11, 1928.
Biography: Meredith Gourdine
Dr. Meredith Gourdine was born in Newark New Jersey on September 26th,
1929; the end of the roaring twenties and the beginning of the Great Depression. He
was lucky in that he had a supportive father who worked as a handy man and tried
to instill in the young Dr. Gourdine the importance of a strong work ethic.
Frequently Meredith was told by his father that to avoid being a laborer the rest of
his life he needed to concentrate on his academics. The young Dr. Gourdine took
his father’s advice to heart and developed into a very promising student athlete in
High School. Where he competed at track and field and swimming until graduating. Meredith was offered a
scholarship for swimming to the University of Michigan after High School but he decided on Cornell University
instead. For the first two years of College Meredith Gourdine had to work hard to pay his own way. He was
eventually offered a track and field scholarship at Cornell winning many titles and competing in NCAA
competitions as one of the best track and field athletes of his time earning him the nickname Flash. Dr. Gourdine
even won a silver medal in the 1952 Olympics in Helsinki for the Long Jump. Despite his amazing success as an
athlete Dr. Gourdine’s passion was not for physical feats. He was more inclined to working with his mind to create
new technologies that would benefit his fellow man.
Gourdine graduated from Cornell with a degree in engineering physics then Meredith entered the Navy.
After leaving the Navy Meredith earned his title of Dr. with a Ph.D. in 1960 at Cal Tech in Engineering Science
with a Guggenheim Fellowship award. After leaving Cal Tech with such a distinguished academic background
Gourdine started working as Lab Director for Plasmodyne Corporation and within two years he took a better job as
Chief Scientist with the Curtiss-Wright Corporation. Even with all of his successes Dr. Gourdine was not satisfied.
Two years after joining as Chief Scientist for Curtiss-Wright Gourdine put his faith in his family and friends as well
as asking them to put their faith in him as he started his own company Gourdine Laboratories in Livingston, New
Jersey. His company was Dr. Gourdine’s crowning achievement until 1973 when the unstoppable man started his
own public corporation as CEO of Energy Innovation Inc. in Houston Texas.
6
Through his corporation Gourdine invented machines designed for direct energy conversion from coal, he
pioneered the field of electrogasdynamics, and over 70 patents of which 27 dealt with his revolutionary field of
electrogasdynamics. One of his crowning inventions (the Incineraid) allowed for the negatively charging of
particulate matter in air to electrostatically attract to the earth’s surface effectively creating a way to clear smoke and
or fog from a given area. Another invention of note was used by Toyota to help reduce emissions from their
vehicles exhaust systems. More recently Dr. Gourdine had patented what was called “Focus Flow Heat Sink” which
is used to cool computer processors and many other applications.
Dr. Gourdine was honored for his amazing achievements and contributions to the world with an induction
into the Engineering and Science Hall of Fame in 1994. Dr. Meredith Gourdine passed away on November 20th,
1998 leaving behind a changed world for the better. His inventions and developments in his self made field of
electrogasdynamics will continue to benefit society in ways known now and developments in the future.
7
Biography: Patricia Bath
Patricia Bath, a distinguished African American Scientist was born on
November 4th in 1942. Harlem was her hometown growing up and she pulled no
punches as describing difficulties she faced such as racism, sexism, and poverty as
serious obstacles she had to overcome. A helping hand was given to her by her caring
parents. Her father was an educated worldly man who had worked as a merchant
seaman and was the first African American motorman for the New York City subways.
Her mother was a strong woman descended from an African and Cherokee heritage.
Patricia’s parents helped influence her into a life of science by getting her a chemistry set when she was younger and
saving money to help her pay for school. Bath attended Charles Evans Hughes High School and in 1959 she was
distinguished by being chosen over countless peers to attend Yeshiva University in New York to study cancer.
Among numerous theories on the growth of the disease, Patricia developed a formula to predict the rate of growth of
cancerous cells. This accomplishment was so impressive to the professors she was working with that they included
her work into a shared scientific paper. The new publicity resulted in Patricia receiving a merit award from
Mademoiselle Magazine enabling Patricia to complete High School early and finish her bachelor degree at Hunter
College in New York by 1964. Patricia then went on to graduate with honors from Howard University in 1968 after
which she worked as an intern at Harlem Hospital. One year later Patricia accepted a fellowship to work in
ophthalmology at Columbia University. While studying at Columbia and working in Harlem Patricia brought to
light a glaring result of entrenched racism within our society that mirrors several other health conditions when
comparing African Americans to their European counterparts. Blacks in our society were twice as likely to go blind
from cataracts or glaucoma due to lack of proper health care compared to the general population. Black citizens are
also eight times more likely to go blind than white citizens. This disparity allowed Patricia to champion the idea of
community outreach programs to help poorer communities that might not be able to afford ophthalmologic care.
Patricia Bath completed her residency New York University after completing her studies at Columbia. She
became the first African American woman to be on the board of UCLA’s Julia Stein Eye Institute as well as the first
African American faculty member at UCLA’s Julia Stein Institute. Patricia is also the first African American
8
woman ophthalmology surgeon. Another first for Patricia was being the first African American woman to patent a
medical device. The device is called the Laserphaco Probe. This device uses a laser to remove a patients cataract
while cleansing with solution and removing the liquid all at once. This device is a step above the previous method
that used painful physical instruments to remove the cataract material. Other achievements of note include her
founding and being the first president of the American Institute for the Prevention of Blindness, being inducted into
Hunter College Hall of Fame in 1988, and elected as Howard University Pioneer in Academic Medicine in 1993.
Patricia Bath retired in 1993 and continues to advocate for the universal right for ocular health for everyone.
9
Biography: Neil Degrasse Tyson
If there is anyone that can claim the title of rock star scientist Neil
Degrasse Tyson could. His presence in modern media has influenced countless
people to become interested in astronomy, physics, and other topics in science.
Tyson was born in New York City on October 5th 1958. He grew up in the Bronx
where he had to deal with stereotypical ideas of what male black students should
be good at, sports not school. Despite these pressures Dr. Tyson continued to
pursue his passion for astronomy by attending an astronomy camp at the age of
thirteen. He attended the Bronx High School of Science within the public school district. Tyson was considering
Cornell University for his bachelor studies and was even recruited by Carl Sagan who was a professor at Cornell at
the time. Neil decided on Harvard for his bachelor studies despite urgings from the famous Sagan. Tyson earned
his doctorate in astrophysics from Columbia University in 1991.
Dr. Tyson has accomplished many things during and since his doctorate work at Columbia University. He
is a visiting professor at Princeton University and spends a lot of his time researching around the world with any
telescope he can find at his disposal. Since 1988 he has published six books about the universe, galaxies, and stars.
A book of his, “One Universe: At Home in the Cosmos” has won Tyson a distinguished award the 2001 American
Institute of Physics Science Writing Award. Tyson is the host of a PBS series Nova: Science Now and co-host of a
national radio program Star Talk. Dr. Tyson also offers his expertise on the world of Science to many different
organizations with interviews and visitations. In 2000 Neil was even voted the Sexiest Astrophysicist Alive in the
November issue of People Magazine. He even has an asteroid named after him.
Tyson doesn’t claim to adhere to any sort of discipline other than the natural sciences and does what he can
to promote scientific literacy within the population. In an interview with The Humanist Tyson remarks,
“I've never identified with any movement. I just-am what I am and occasionally a movement claims me because there is resonance
between my writings and speeches and what they do, and that's fine; I don't mind that. But no, I have never been politically or
organizationally active in that way. Astrophysics--that's what I identify with.” (The Humanist 2009)
10
Tyson has achieved with science what some strive for through traditional roles of fame such as acting, sports, or
music. His example should speak loudly to those who fear the stigmas associated with a love of science.
Biography: Joycelyn Harrison
Joycelyn Harrison is an accomplished engineer for the NASA Langley
research center. She was born in 1964 and since her graduation from the Georgia
Institute of Technology has accomplished list of patents dealing with polymers and
the electrochemical functions they can perform. Dr. Harrison received her bachelors
degree, masters degree, and PhD in Chemistry from the Georgia Institute of
Technology.
One of Joycelyn Harrison’s major achievements so far in her career is her work on THUNDER. Thunder is
a name standing for Thin-Layer Composite-Unimorph Piezoelectric Driver and Sensor. This is a mouth full but
even more astounding is what this technology can achieve. Some applications for this technology are polymers used
for electronics, motion suppression in satellite devices, optical equipment, noise cancellation materials, pumps and
valves that can be used in the biomedical field, and many other applications being developed for use on unmanned
space craft as well as new technologies here on earth. The THUNDER material is at the most basic a ceramic
material capable of producing a charge layered with itself to form different items such as wafers used in material
construction.
Joycelyn was awarded the 1996 Research and Development100 award from R&D Magazine for her work
with THUNDER along with fellow researchers from Langley. New projects that Joycelyn is using THUNDER
technology for include many outer space vehicles and satellites. Joycelyn remarked in a CNN interview,
‘"We're working on shaping reflectors, solar sails and satellites," Harrison said. "Sometimes you need to be able to change a satellite's
position or get a wrinkle off of its surface to produce a better image."’ (Black Innovators, 2010)
Joycelyn continues her work with NASA as well as helping with exposing opportunities for scientific research
funding. She has been an integral part of recent technologies that will be used for space exploration and medical
developments for the future of those fields.
11
Lesson Plan Topic Suggestions for Inclusion of Specific Biographies
Lewis Latimer:
•
•
•
Conductivity – Latimer found a way to use cardboard to extend the life of the light bulb filament
Electricity – Latimer headed the group that brought electricity to the major metropolitans of the world
Power and Joules – Possible chance to compare energy usage from one time period to another
Meredith Gourdine:
•
•
•
Molecules and Polarity – Relate how charging gas particles can make them attracted to the earth’s surface
Ionic vs. Covalent Bonding – Talk about how the “Ionic Breeze” filters air
Colloids and Suspensions – Discuss how the “Incineraid” interacts with the former to help clear air
Patricia Bath
•
•
•
Optics and Lenses – Discuss and demonstrate lenses and their differences
Lasers and their applications – Show how lasers work and how focusing and power levels effect them
The Eye and Sight – How the eye functions and how the eye uses its lens to gather light signals for sight
Neil Degrasse Tyson
•
•
•
Spectroscopy – Use a spectroscope or variation of it to show absorption and emission lines w/ their uses
Stars, Galaxies, and the Universe – Cover formation of atoms within theories the universe formation
Optics and Telescopic Application - Use telescopes to describe how refraction and reflection work
Joycelyn Harrison
•
•
•
Polymers and Carbon Nano-particles – Use Harrison’s ideas to discuss new uses for carbon nano-particles
Piezoelectricity – Theorize about how piezoelectricity would manipulate future robotic musculature
Space Exploration – Have students write a narrative about space exploration and vehicles
Suggested Questions to Include During the Lesson or Unit to Elicit a Deeper
Understanding of Inequality for Minority Groups:
1.
2.
3.
4.
What do you think (insert scientist name)’s childhood was like? What similarities and differences can you
think about? – Try to link similarities for a connection and inform students of inequalities and problems
these scientists faced.
Do you think it was just as easy for (insert scientist name) to earn his/her degrees as most other non
minority students? Why do you think this is? – Try to create dialogue about entrenched power structures
within our society and the tendency to resist change.
After Achieving a level of professional education what barriers do you think (insert scientist name) had to
overcome to continue with a successful career? – This could give a good opportunity to talk about gender
and race inequality in the workplace.
What types of struggles have you had to overcome in your lives? How do those struggles differ from
struggles associated with race or gender? – Try to make a connection here between minorities and the
12
5.
student’s struggles and possibly create a dialogue between the students to elicit mutual respect and
understanding for each other’s differences and problems.
What can we do to try and battle prejudice so that society can benefit from the gifts everyone has to offer?
– Try to bring about a sense of self responsibility for the individual student’s actions.
13
References
Bardi, Jennifer. (2009). The Humanist Interview with Neil Degrasse Tyson. Humanist. Volume
69. Issue 5
Carmody, Sherri. Mraz, Stephen J. (2004). 75 Years of Innovators. Machine Design. Volume 76.
Issue 1, pp. 62-72.
Fouche, Rayvon. (2003). Ingenuity vs prejudice. Black Inventors in the Age of Segregation:
Granville T. Woods, Lewis H. Latimer and Shelby J. Davidson. Baltimore, MD: Johns
Hopkins University Press.
Johnson, Kieth V., Watson, Elwood D. (2005). A Historical Chronology of the Plight of African
Americans Gaining Recognition in Engineering and Technology. Journal of
Technology Studies. Volume 31. Issue 2, pp. 81-93.
Lawrence, Aaron. (2006). African Americans who have done New Jersey proud. The Record.
17th February 2006. North Jersey Media Group Inc.
Wynter, Sylvia. (2003). Unsettling the Coloniality of Being/Power/Truth/Freedom. Towards the
Human, After Man, Its Overrepresentation- An Argument. The New Centennial
Review, Fall. Volume 3 #3, pp. 257-337.
BLACFAX. (2004). Volume 11. Issue 45, p20-21.
Ebony. THE EBONY POWER 150 SCIENCE & TECH. Volume LXV. No 2. pp. 99.
“Black Innovators”. (2010). Cable News Network. Cable News Network. Turner Broadcasting
System, Inc.
http://www.cnn.com/fyi/interactive/specials/bhm/story/black.innovators.html
The Black Inventor Online Museum. (1998-2009). Adscape International.
http://www.blackinventor.com
14