In the early morning of Thursday, Feb. 16, five Aragon students and one teacher, along with scores of students and teachers from surrounding Bay Area High Schools, embarked on Sojourn to the Past, a ten day journey throughout the Southeastern United States to study the African American Civil Rights Movement, focused in that area of the country from around 1954 to 1968. These Aragon students follow in dozens of fellow Don’s footsteps who have embarked on Sojourn in previous years.
Along with the help of many volunteers, Sojourn is run by founder and former Capuchino High School History teacher Jeff Steinberg, who left Capuchino to run Sojourn full time. Steinberg not only runs Sojourn as a nonprofit organization but also is the main instructor in the frequent lessons throughout the trip.
“If [there was] one word [to describe Steinberg], it’s going to be passion,” says social studies teacher Jennifer Seif, who attended Sojourn this year. “If he was alive at that time, could you imagine all of the things he would have been involved in?”
An average day on the Sojourn Trip begins with all students, teachers and staff gathered together for a lesson which often span multiple hours. These are taught with thorough lectures, various readings and worksheets from the binders distributed at the beginning of the trip while also supplemented by documentaries that are frequently paused at significant points for Steinberg and the class to discuss in greater depth. These lessons take place daily, and often provide the background knowledge for the activity everyone will take part in that day.
After the lessons, everyone piles on buses to go to one of the many Civil Rights landmarks in the south to experience the Civil Rights movement firsthand in the exact locations that it happened. A few of the many landmarks the students visit include Selma, Alabama, where hundreds of peaceful protestors attempting to march to the Alabama State Capitol were beaten and turned back by police on “Bloody Sunday,” March 7, 1965; Ebenezer Baptist Church in Atlanta, Georgia, where Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. regularly preached and led services at until his death; and Little Rock Central High School in Little Rock, Arkansas, where the “Little Rock Nine” became the first black students to integrate into an All- White School in 1957.
Each day, the visits to historic landmarks are followed with students meeting one of many speakers, all of whom played a vital role in the Civil Rights movement. Some of these guests included “Little Rock Nine” members Minnijean Brown-Trickey and Elizabeth Eckford, as well as Reverend Billy Kyles, who was good friends with Dr. King and with him in his final moments of life.
The ways in which the students thoroughly learn about the Civil Rights movement are intended to provide a much more not only intricate and detailed but also firsthand and personal learning experience than anything that could ever be taught only in a classroom, and to instill vitally important morals and values in the students, such as the intense importance of voting, nonviolence and fighting for what is just and right.
“[Sojourn is different from a classroom because] the combination of actually being there with people who are willing to learn [and] actually want to learn, with the actual experience of being where history took place,” says Derrick Leong, a junior who attended Sojourn this year. “It’s just a different feel in it of itself. We have so many more resources and materials that help so much and create a better picture of what we’re trying to learn, and it’s just different. It really is.”
On why Sojourn ends up for most people to be a really emotional trip, senior Dominique Hebert says, “It was a mix of different things, like being in the places where the actual events that were learning about happened, and also not only learning about the history but learning about what your duty is, who you are and what changes you need to make in your life to be a better person.”
U.S. History teacher William Colglazier, who attended in 2009, says, “What it did is open my eyes to the people that don’t get a lot of press in history books. A lot of us like to focus on the MLK’s and the Rosa Parks’ [of the movement], but it helped me understand that the Civil Rights Movement would not have happened unless it was a mass movement.”
“It’s definitely not a white apologizing sort of thing; it’s really to educate people more about what people have fought and died for,” says Leong, regarding one of the more common criticisms of Sojourn.
Another common criticism of Sojourn is that it seems not worth its $2600 price tag. “Honestly, you shouldn’t let price be a factor,” Leong continues, “[When I first showed interest in Sojourn,] I first told my mom: ‘Mom, this is kind of expensive, I don’t know if I want to go,’ and she told me: ‘this is one of those once in a lifetime things. One of those things that you can look back on and say ‘this is what defined me, this is who I am.’ I really do believe that … it’s definitely worth it.”
