Civil Rights Pioneer Visits Eastvalley

Students at Eastvalley Elementary School received a riveting message on Monday from a figure in one of the seminal events of the Civil Rights movement.

They also may have been surprised when Terrence Roberts, of the famed Little Rock Nine, stayed on them about not using "like" and "um" to start sentences.

And when he concluded his talk by urging them to read a book a week of their choosing, in addition to assigned reading from teachers.

But for Roberts, 71, demanding precision in speech and diligence in learning are staples of what he asks of young people in the many appearances he makes telling his personal story.

They're part of what he calls taking "executive responsibility" for one's own life.

Fourth- and fifth-graders sat in the Eastvalley media center Monday morning as Roberts recalled the fear he felt in helping integrate Central High School in Little Rock in 1957, and being attacked by hostile white students.

"We met a wall of resistance," said Roberts, who with his eight fellow black students was able to enter through the school doors with protection from U.S. Army troops from the 101st Airborne Division and National Guard troops ordered by President Dwight D. Eisenhower.

"But we took a vow of non-violence. We chose not to fight. These [white] kids at Central didn't believe in non-violence. They thought they were going to hurt us by calling us names."

But despite the epithets and physical attacks, Roberts said he never wavered in his pledge not to strike back. In dismissing the hurtful words, he said he maintained his dignity and self-esteem, and urged the Eastvalley students to consider doing the same.

"Unless they called out, 'Hey Terry,' they weren't talking to me," Roberts said. "That wasn't a message for me. So I ignored it. I took executive control and I kept on walking."

When Arkansas Gov. Orval Faubus shut down all Little Rock public schools for the 1958-59 year to defy desegregation, Roberts moved in with relatives in California and completed his high school education. He owns a management consulting firm and and is a clinical psychologist in Pasadena.

Among the Eastvalley students in attendance were his grandsons, PJ Goodloe, a fourth grader, and first-grader Austin Goodloe. Their mother is Becki Goodloe, Roberts' daughter. She and her husband Paul have lived in the East Cobb area for 15 years. 

Becki Goodloe said a previous attempt to have her father speak at Eastvalley was called off due to weather. Monday's visit was arranged with Eastvalley teacher Sarah Covington, whose students have have been studying a unit called "Courage" in which they examine exemplary individuals throughout American history.

Students found the wait a worthy one, as they showered Roberts with questions, including: Why did he step forward to integrate Central High in the first place?

"I could not continue in my own skin to live that way," he said of the segregated  South in which he grew up, even though he admitted that after the school was integrated, "every second of every day, I wanted to bolt out of there.

"But it wasn't over. I had work to do."

When he returns to Little Rock these days, he said, "they roll out the red carpet. I never have to buy lunch."

His experiences, retold to many since they first unfolded 55 years ago, continue to strengthen his message of not looking at others through the singular prism of race.

"I don't see the world in black and white," Roberts said. "I see the world and we're all in it. I am friends with the world. That's how I see it."