Member Highlight: Mr. Chidi Duru

In October Crossland High School's Mr. Chidi Duru won the Fulbright Teachers for Global Classrooms Program award from the U.S. Department of State and the Fulbright Foreign Scholarship Board.

“The Fulbright program will potentially help my students to gain a better appreciation of other cultures and acquire the global competencies and crucial critical thinking skills needed to thrive in the 21st Century,” Duru said. “I tell my students to hold their heads high because they are as good as any students anywhere. I am eager to demonstrate this to them as they interact with students from across the United States and around the world.”

An 18-year PGCPS educator and National Board Certified Teacher, Duru is a mentor to new NBCT candidates, a member of his school leadership team, professional development facilitator for PGCPS, and presenter at national conferences.

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Education History in Prince George's County

In 1913, philanthropist Julius Rosenwald instituted a program, conceived by Booker T. Washington, to construct rural schools for blacks throughout the American south. When the program ended in 1932, it had helped fund 28 schools in Prince George’s County.

Similar to the Freedman’s Bureau the Rosenwald program required that communities petition for a school and supply seed money. The buildings were sometimes even built on the site of earlier Freedmen’s Bureau Schools.

The Lincoln School, Camp Springs School, Lakeland Elementary School, T.B. School, Community High School, Ridgeley School, Highland Park School, Clinton School, The Meadows School were all first built in this period as Rosenwald schools.



There were also schools build in Westwood, Laurel, Capitol Heights, Chapel Hill, Fletchertown, Duckettsville, Dupont Heights, Glenarden, Upper Marlboro, Muirkirk, Oxon Hill, Forestville, Collington, Brandywine, Mitchellville, and Holly Grove.

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