"Notes from the Field--originally performed as a one-person play--portrays a host of real-life figures who have witnessed, experienced, and fought the system that pushes students of color out of the classroom and into prisons. (As Smith put it in a recent interview: "Stuff that for middle-class kids or rich kids, it'd be considered mischief; for poor kids, it's really that road to prison.") We are introduced to these figures one by one: Sherrilyn Iffil, president of the NAACP; Rev. Jamal Harrison Bryant, who spoke at the funeral of Freddie Gray; Niya Kenny, a high school student who was arrested for defending a classmate against a teacher's overzealous discipline; Bree Newsome, the activist who made headlines when she removed the Confederate flag from the state house grounds of South Carolina; and many others. Taken together, these voices bear powerful witness to a great injustice of our time--and inspire us with their accounts of perseverance, resistance, and progress"--;Prologue: Sherrilyn Ifill -- The death of Freddie Gray -- Kevin Moore -- Allen Bullock -- Jamal-Harrison Bryant -- Councilman Michael Tubbs -- On the river -- Taos proctor -- Abby Abinanti -- Leticia de Santiago -- The Shakara story -- Amanda Ripley -- Niya Kenny -- Denise Dodson -- Trauma -- Sari Muhonen -- Dr. Victor Carrion, MD -- Steven Campos -- Stephanie Williams -- Bryan Stevenson -- Never give up -- James Baldwin -- Sherrilynn Ifill -- Bree Newsome -- Congressman John Lewis.
