SPRINGFIELD — As three teams of students sat on stage in the auditorium of Springfield Southeast High School Sunday, tensions were running high.
In the first hour, students gasped and cheered as they learned the answers during the Springfield Black History Bowl. But by the second hour, it was clear that last year’s winners of the bowl would claim victory once again.
“This will be my fourth year participating in the Black History Month bowl and every single year we’ve won,” said Springfield High School senior Josephine Oke.
“I don’t go into the bowl thinking that we’re going to win. I go in with the intention of learning and building connection with the other high schools in the school district.”
The annual event is a competition in which students test their knowledge of local Black history.
Oke helped her team pull ahead of Lamphier High School and Springfield Southeast High School by remembering that retired Southern Illinois University professor Victoria Nichols Johnson co-founded the international Academy of Breastfeeding Medicine. She remembered Dr. Johnson partially because she wants to go into healthcare herself.
“The most exciting part of this is the level of enthusiasm and the number of students who happen to be Black students or otherwise African American students who partake in this voluntarily,” said moderator Robert Blackwell. He is a retired social worker and former head of racial equity practice at the Illinois Department of Children and Family Services.
The bowl took a personal turn for Blackwell on Sunday. His daughter was one of the history makers featured in the competition.
Tracey L. Meares had the grades to be valedictorian in 1984.
“[She] was a high school student here at Springfield and was denied the title of valedictorian through in-house political reasons and racial reasons,” Blackwell said.
The school decided to declare two “top students” instead and shared the honor between Meares and the white student with the next best grades.
Meares went on to become the first African American woman to receive tenure at Yale Law School. Springfield District 186 honored her as a belated valedictorian in 2022.
“It sends a message to these young people that life ain’t always fair, but it shouldn’t stop you from doing what you’ve been called to do,” Blackwell added.
Oke said it is important for other school districts to follow Springfield’s leadership. She recommended other schools start with smaller events like Black History Month presentations to drum up enthusiasm and volunteers for the bowl.
“We have a long way to go before we get to that perfect representation and equality, but when it comes to little steps like education, modeling after schools that have been taking those steps will be better for our schools and school districts across the country as a whole.”