8_jacksonian_student life
NAACP M
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JSU president proves new era in ississippi
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hen Tim Fizer was elected into Jackson State’s NAACP chapter, he invited his best friend – a white rural Rankin County, Miss., native whose grandparents refuse to allow blacks into their home – to witness the meeting. “I told him he could sit in the back,” says the 21-yearold biology major, who grew up steps from JSU’s campus. “He was very, very nervous.” Three years later, the campus civil rights group elected Fizer’s friend as its president, making him the first white leader of an NAACP chapter at a Historically Black College or University. “I’m a true sign of progression in Mississippi,” says Michael Teasley, a senior political science major. “My parents understood that just as devastating as segregation and racism have been to black people, in their own way, they’ve been stifling to white people as well.” Teasley’s path to Jackson State has not been smooth. Family troubles and his mother’s poor health caused him to drop out of school at age 15. He later got involved in selling drugs and had brushes with the law on and off through adulthood. Despite his days as a “juvenile delinquent,” Teasley grew up fast when his girlfriend got pregnant. The birth of his son prompted him to get his GED, find legitimate work and get married (the couple has since divorced). The young father worked for UPS and later built a career as a real estate specialist in the telecommunications industry. By the time he reached his 30s, Teasley left the corporate world to pursue his first love: music. A songwriter and guitar player, he applied to JSU hoping to study music. Though he was not accepted into the music program, Teasley still enrolled at JSU. Teasley got involved in Jackson State’s NAACP chapter when then-presidential canditate Barack Obama campaigned on campus. He joined the NAACP’s voter-registration drive to help get Obama elected. “It wasn’t about black or white,” Teasley says. “It was about change.” Teasley and JSU’s NAACP chapter registered 1,700 voters, including a 98-year-old man Teasley met selling balloons outside a Tigers football game. “He had never voted because he couldn’t read or write,” Teasley says. The man called him later in tears of joy because he helped elect the nation’s first black president. Despite Teasley’s passion for civil rights, some students are
skeptical of having a white NAACP president. “It’s the same as when you go to a black history museum and the tour guides there are white,” says Monica Atkins, 21, an English/journalism major. “It doesn’t seem like he would be able to relate to the things the NAACP fights for.” However, whites have had prominent roles in the NAACP since its founding in 1909. In fact, the idea for the organization came from a group of white liberals who issued a call for a meeting about racial justice. Of the nearly 60 people who answered, only seven were African American. The group’s first president was white. “I understand the whole thing with me being the president and me being Caucasian, but I would like to get this out there first and foremost,” Teasley says, “as Dr. (Martin Luther) King said, don’t judge me by the color of my skin but by the content of my character. I see my state suffering. We rank very high in high school dropout rates, heart attacks, teen pregnancies, teen STDs and teen incarceration. That’s why I’m looking for change.” State NAACP leaders have been very supportive of Teasley. “Michael has been very dedicated to the wok of the NAACP,” says Derrick Johnson, president of the Mississippi State Conference NAACP. “He’s always first to show and last to leave, never seeking attention, always making sure the basics get done. We definitely appreciate having him on board.” As Jackson State’s NAACP chapter president, Teasley says his main goal is to lead a campaign to change Mississippi’s state flag, which incorporates the Battle Flag of the Confederacy. “It’s no longer a symbol of heritage,” says Teasley, whose right arm is tattooed with a poem his mother wrote about him before she died. “It’s a symbol of hate. And people use that symbol all over the world to promote hate.” As for his goals on campus, Teasley has a long list. “I want an agenda that gets students involved politically,” he says, such as extending dorm visitation hours and holding sensitivity training for security guards. “These are issues that are real to us as a student body.” Fizer, who is vice president of JSU’s NAACP chapter, says Teasley’s leadership proves the organization has moved beyond black and white. “We’re supposed to view ourselves as human beings, not as our color,” he says. “We’re for civil rights for all people.” “