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 Teaching at Tuskegee
Self-sufficiency was essential at Tuskegee. Students raised their own food, cobbled their own shoes, and even fired their own bricks to build their own classrooms.
When he first arrived, Carver himself was shocked to find a rickety shack of a classroom devoid of lab equipment. A microscope, his going-away present from Iowa State, was his only real lab equipment.
But Carver’s resourcefulness—made necessary by years of lean living—came in handy. He took his students to the junkyard where they scavenged materials to make equipment.
 Carver’s Classroom
To Carver, discovery was more important than memorizing facts and figures. He encouraged students to think about and explore nature for themselves. He used real samples of plants and minerals in his teaching and encouraged his students to search out their own specimens.
Carver was a demanding teacher, but he could be playful and affectionate too. He “adopted” many students just as others had adopted him. He corresponded with them for years after they left Tuskegee, helped them find work, and occasionally gave them financial assistance.
Continue to Carver’s Mighty Vision. >>
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