Despite earning superior grades, Tracey Meares was shared the title of 'Top Student' with a White student at her 1984 graduation.
SPRINGFIELD, Ill. -- A 55-year-old woman has been honored 38 years after her Illinois high school failed to make her its first Black valedictorian.
Despite earning superior grades, Meares was shared the title of"Top Student" with a White student at her 1984 graduation. In the years before her graduation, the top student was named"valedictorian" and the second student"salutatorian," film director Maria Ansley told CNN. "The resonance that the film has had with so many people is also incredibly powerful," Meares said."The ways structural racism and race discrimination can work are not the kinds of ways that people understand, right? It's not always really obvious. But it's still deep."Making the documentary has expanded her understanding of racism, and she hopes it does the same for her audience, said Ansley.
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