By Tabitha Redder/managing editor

The Walsh Library will host a two-day event to celebrate the piece of legislation that helped give equality to the country. 

America’s Long Struggle for Equality: TCC NW Commemorates the 50th Anniversary of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 starts Sept. 17 with a faculty roundtable 12:30-2:30 p.m. in the Michael Saenz Conference Center (WACB 1123). In a series of short lectures, four government and history professors will speak on various civil rights topics and allow time afterward for questions from attendees. 

“It gives the professors a chance to show students some of the specialized knowledge that they have in these areas that they don’t often get a chance to go into in a regular class time,” assistant director of library services James Baxter said. 

Government assistant professor Bryan Calvin will speak about school integration and the rise of private schools. 

“One way that people reacted to [desegregation] was by pulling their kids out of public schools because private schools could enroll whoever they wanted or not accept whoever they wanted, so they were able to maintain this level of segregation,” Calvin said. “If you go back and look at a lot of the founding dates of private schools, they’re in the 1950s, 1960s. Now, private schools are open to basically everybody. Private schools want diversity, but many of them did not start out that way.” 

Government assistant professor Paul Benson will cover the integration of college athletics in the South, government professor Julie Lantrip will discuss the international effect of the American civil rights movement and history associate professor Brian Cervantez will review the civil rights era in Fort Worth.

The celebration features the first African-American on Texas’ highest criminal court, Judge Louis Sturns, speaking in Texas Before and After the Civil Rights Era of 1964: An Afternoon with Tarrant County Judge Louis Sturns 4-5:30 p.m. Sept. 18 in the Walsh Library. 

“He was very enthusiastic about coming to talk with us,” Baxter said about Sturns. “I think he will have a good message for students because he’s an older gentleman, and he remembers what life was like in Texas before the Civil Rights Act, so he’ll have some very good firsthand knowledge to share.”