Dr. Jerry Jones is seeking personal stories of segregation in the region to compile in a book.
EMORY, VA -- An Emory & Henry College professor who attended Southwest Virginia schools during the time of segregation is searching for personal stories as he writes a book about the experience.
Dr. Jerry L. Jones, an E&H professor of information management, has written several chapters of his book, tentatively titled Go and Come Again, which delves into four generations of African American education in the region, focusing particularly on the struggle with segregation.
In the book, Jones discusses his own experiences as a young man who grew up in Glade Spring and was bused to Bristol, Va., to attend a segregated school. He also discusses the factors that motivated him, the son of a single mother, to seek a college education and a graduate degree before working as a college educator.
"We don't seem to have a lot of documentation of the segregation experience in this region," Jones said. "This book is an attempt to fill that void by telling the stories of many African Americans who were educated in a segregated system that often offered them an inferior learning environment."
As Jones writes the book, he continues to search for other stories to help illuminate the educational experience for African Americans in the region. "I want to exemplify many of the different encounters that people had with segregation and education in this region."
Jones has taught at Emory & Henry since 2001. Before coming to Emory & Henry, he worked as a professor at J. Sargeant Reynolds Community College in Richmond, Va., and as a high school teacher in Baltimore, Md.
He received a doctorate degree in education from Virginia Tech. The author of a college textbook, Structured Programming Logic, Jones has completed additional study at East Tennessee State University, Virginia Commonwealth University, Morgan State University, University of Memphis, Purdue University, and Indiana University.
Call Jones to share a story at (276) 944-4121.
