Author: Alex Dieudonné
Campus: Queens College
Major(s): Psychology
Minor(s):
Professors: Lisa Brundage, Logan McBride
Macaulay Springboard 2026
Abstract
Society often fails to consider children’s thoughts or take them seriously in political spaces. For Black children in particular, whereas they directly participated in political activist movements, their voices aren’t centered in the retellings of these histories. Focusing on 1960s Harlem, I use Black children’s lived experiences as they appear in archival newspapers, yearbooks, and school rhymes to argue that they represented a counterculture that defined the movement for education reform during the Civil Rights era. By centering their voices, we can learn how they both understood and countered negative perceptions, racial violence, and criminalization faced in schools, to imagine a world that allows them to discover themselves and take control of their narrative. This research extends on midcentury scholarship on children as political agents, Black children in the political space, and the practice of locating youth voices as a methodological tool for researching children in history. It also encourages readers to think about the ways that they perceived schooling as children and how it informed both their political thought and their perceptions of children as activists today.
Public Scholarship Components
Reflections
This topic has changed so much from September. I was initially interested in looking at play culture, children’s political behavior, and how adults discriminate against them across a broad scope. I just can’t believe it turned into what it is now, and I really can’t come up with the words for how that feels. Some of the biggest obstacles I faced coming into Spingboard were trusting the research process and realizing where I needed to be specific when articulating my ideas.
Being in a room with so many brilliant minds and topics, while intimidating, really helped me learn about what research looks like. It involves extensive thought, editing, collaboration, circling back, and many other things. The recovering perfectionist in me had to accept that I would never be able to produce a final piece the first, second, or third time. I really put it into perspective when I realized it took four entire months to finalize just the research question. It took a long time, but it came to completion at the end of the day. This whole thing is a process, one that drove me insane many times, but a rewarding process.
This was an incredibly difficult year for me to complete the most extensive research project of my academic journey. I’m so proud and grateful that it’s over and that the hard work paid off. I’m proud that I was able to meaningfully contribute to not only my own research but others’ as well. A big part of my project stemmed from my experiences as a Black boy in a NYC school, and how I was constantly disregarded and dismissed by educators when trying to share my ideas. For the youth that I researched for this project, it’s clear that, despite being dismissed by most adults, they created their own spaces to be in conversation with each other. Doing this project in collaboration with the Springboard team really helped me understand the importance of both choosing and creating a space that values your intellect.
Acknowledgements and Notes
Thank you to my grandmother, who passed away back in October, and is my main motivation for this project. Thank you to my mom, another motivator and big contributor to my final research topic, as I listened to you share your own experiences growing up in Harlem. Thank you to Lisa and Logan for all the feedback, encouragement, and genuine interest in my topic. The contributions you made to my work are invaluable to me as a student. Thank you to my Springboard buddies and my friends, who sat with me through all the drafts, whining, and panicking. You guys pushed me intellectually, thinking in ways I never could have alone, and helped me understand the value of doing research in collaboration. I truly am grateful for this experience and the student it’s made me become.
Fields of Study
Cultural Studies, Education
Generative AI Disclosure
This project is proudly human-made
