The following oral history summaries of student activists who attended Pratt during the 1960s and early 1970s were conducted as part of an effort to address gaps in the historical record as it is represented by Pratt’s archives. After conducting historical research about activism and engaging with the Black Student Union, current students have helped the project fill in some of these silences through interviews with alumni. This work has also begun to expose some of the historical continuities that connect the circumstances faced by Black alumni who attended Pratt decades ago to those facing similar challenges in the present.
Please contact us if you know someone whose story should be shared.
Student Activism, 1960s-70s
Connie Harold
Class of 1975
Communications Design, Black Student Union Participant
Connie came to Pratt in 1971 from Detroit, with a dedicated scholarship connected to her specialized art and design public high school. In her oral history, Harold describes her trajectory as an artist and designer beginning with her engagement with youth art programs in Detroit from an early age.
Pat Cummings
Class of 1974
Illustrator, Black Student Union Participant
When she came to Pratt in 1968, she started in fashion and then dropped out because “the revolution started” and she “thought the world was going to change, adding “Kent State had happened, the war was going on and I thought we were really going to make a difference.
Larry Provette
Class of 1974
Architecture, Black Student Union Participant
Larry Provette came to Pratt from one of the oldest and best academic high schools of pre-engineering and architecture in the state of Kentucky. His aunt had attended Pratt in the 1930s and encouraged him to attend.
Ron Shiffman
Class of 1961, Architecture; Class of 1965, MS City and Regional Planning
Ron Shiffman attended Pratt as an architecture student and never left. He became an urban planner, has been teaching at Pratt since 1967, and in 1963 helped start PICCED, which would eventually become the current Pratt Center for Community Development.
Renelda Higgins Walker
Class of 1976, Communications Design
Renelda transferred to Pratt in 1969 where she studied photography, design, and illustration. She had her first child in 1970 and her second in 1972. She remembers the students who were involved in the Black Student Union and the Puerto Rican Student Union, “but my focus at this point was on my work, on my artwork, on school and my family.”
Summer Youth Programs
The following oral histories are just the beginning of our attempt to uncover the 30-year history of Pratt’s summer youth programs that grew out of the BSU demands in the early 1970s. We would especially like to conduct oral histories of the participants and are reaching out through this website, public exhibitions, and social media platforms.
In addition, although the Center for Brooklyn History and Pratt Institute host Ron Shiffman’s extensive archives, we are attempting to uncover the history of the Central Brooklyn Neighborhood College and Benjamin Banneker High School which the Pratt Center helped launch and support.
Ayan Gorsline
Youth participant, Pratt’s Summer Youth Skills and Development program 2001-2002.
Rudy Bryant
Pratt Center for Community and Environmental Development, 1967-2007.
Ron Shiffman
Pratt Center for Community and Environmental Development, 1964-2003.
Preserving Activism 