Strider Academy
{{Use mdy dates|date=January 2025}}
{{Infobox school
| name = Strider Academy
| motto = Attitude Determines Altitude
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| address = 3698 MS Highway 32 Central
| city = Charleston
| state = Mississippi
| zipcode = 38921
| country = United States
| coordinates = {{Coord|33|58|13|N|90|14|02|W|region:US-MS|display=inline,title}}
| pushpin_map = Mississippi
| type = Private school
| religious_affiliation =
| established = {{Start date|1971}}
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| grades = PK-12
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| enrollment_as_of = 2016
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| website = {{URL|strideracademy.wordpress.com}}
}}
Strider Academy was a PK-12 school in Tallahatchie County, Mississippi, United States, which operated from 1971 until 2018. The school was established in 1971 as a segregation academy to allow white parents to avoid sending their children to racially integrated public schools. The school was sited on Mississippi Highway 32, about {{convert|10|mi|km}} west of Charleston and about {{convert|8|mi|km}} north of Tippo. The school ceased operations at the end of the 2017–18 school year.
History
{{see also|Education segregation in Mississippi Delta}}
Strider Academy was founded in 1971 as a segregation academy{{Cite book| url=https://books.google.com/books?id=Q_hk5Nh_z-8C&pg=PA40|title=James Meredith: Warrior and the America that Created Him| last=McGee| first=Meredith Coleman| date=2013-03-21|publisher=ABC-CLIO|isbn=9780313397400| language=en| page=40}} and was an accredited member of the Mississippi Association of Independent Schools.
The school was said to be named after Clarence Strider, the Tallahatchie County Sheriff who obstructed the investigation of the 1955 lynching of Emmett Till in a successful attempt to acquit the murderers.{{Cite web |title=Emmett Till Q&A {{!}} American Experience {{!}} PBS |url=https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/americanexperience/features/emmett-q-public/ |access-date=2022-07-04 |website=PBS.org |publisher=PBS|language=en}}
The school campus suffered two fires in two weeks in August 1977. The main building and the field house were both destroyed. The FBI was involved in the investigation.{{Cite news|title=Officials comb scene at school fire for clues| last=Faulkner| first=Ken|date=28 August 1977| work=Clarksdale Press Register|page=1|url=https://www.newspapers.com/image/315749509/}}
In 1989, Greenwood public schools trustee Jeff Milman of Tippo resigned after the NAACP protested his decision to enroll his children in Strider Academy instead of racially integrated public schools. Milman stated that his children wanted to attend Strider and that it was closer to his residence.{{cite news| date = October 19, 1989| pages =1, 10 |work = The Sun-Sentinel| location = Charleston|title = School board seeks a replacement| url = https://www.newspapers.com/image/268404901/}} - [https://www.newspapers.com/clip/78845903/for-strider-academy/ See clipping of first] and [https://www.newspapers.com/clip/79253887/for-strider-academy/ of second pages] from Newspapers.com
In 1993, the school did not receive an increase in admissions from Greenwood parents; at the time white parents were concerned about a plan to put all students in the same middle school in Greenwood.{{cite news| date=April 20, 1993| first= Al| last= Fava| page =2|newspaper = Greenwood Commonwealth | title = Winona Academy a possible route of escape for students| url = https://www.newspapers.com/image/237806803/ | via = Newspapers.com}} - [https://www.newspapers.com/clip/78845462/for-strider-academy/ See clipping] By that year the school was air conditioned.{{cite news|title=Schools preparing for start of classes|newspaper=The Charleston Sun-Sentinel|date=1993-08-05|place=Charleston, Mississippi|volume=70|issue=31|page=A1}} - [https://www.newspapers.com/clip/78845197/for-east-and-west-tallahatchie-school-di/ Clipping] from Newspapers.com.
In 1999, it started an elementary school level daycare program.{{Cite news|title=Local schools to resume classes|newspaper=Charleston Sun-Sentinel|date=1999-07-22|page=2}} - [https://www.newspapers.com/clip/78811720/for-west-tallahatchie-school-district/ Clipping at] Newspapers.com.
As of 2016, the school's students were 96% white, but Tallahatchie County was 54% black.{{cite news| last1=McLaughlin| first1=Eliott|title=Could Mississippi integration ruling trigger 'white flight'?| url=http://www.cnn.com/2016/05/27/us/cleveland-mississippi-sidebar-segregation-academies/ |access-date=11 October 2016| agency=CNN|date=May 27, 2016}} Filings for the 2015–16 school year indicates that all seventy-two students at the school were white. In July 2018, the school announced it would not reopen for the following school year.{{cite news|url = https://www.tallahatchienews.ms/strider-academy-will-not-open-fall|title=STRIDER ACADEMY WILL NOT OPEN THIS FALL |last=McFerrin |first=Clay | date=July 10, 2018| newspaper=Sun-Sentinel}}
References
{{Reflist}}
{{Education in Tallahatchie County, Mississippi}}
Category:Private K–12 schools in Mississippi
Category:Schools in Tallahatchie County, Mississippi
Category:Segregation academies in Mississippi
Category:Educational institutions established in 1971
Category:1971 establishments in Mississippi