YOUNGSTOWN Girl's skit brings history to life

Maraiya Hakeem will perform her skit at a national competition.
By JoANNE VIVIANO
VINDICATOR EDUCATION WRITER
YOUNGSTOWN -- This time, Maraiya Hakeem has a metal lunch box.
After all, that's the kind Ruby Bridges carried to school. The brown bag just wasn't realistic enough.
Maraiya, a Volney Rogers Junior High School seventh-grader, has taken on the role of the young Bridges for a History Day competition.
Her performance -- and her brown bag -- won her local and state awards. Now, she's ready to tote her plaid lunch box to a national competition in Washington, D.C.
Maraiya wrote her own script and memorized the lines to transform herself into Bridges, the first-grader who was the first black pupil to attend the segregated white William Frantz Elementary School in New Orleans.
About the performance
Maraiya starts her 10-minute skit as the adult Bridges receiving an award. She then removes her coat, and the young girl emerges, telling of her life in 1960 New Orleans.
"I wanted people to know about her," Maraiya said. "I really admire her for going to school like that. If it was me, I would not have been able to do that. It took a lot of courage."
There are serious parts and humorous parts and some that blend the two together.
The girl open the lunch box and pours milk into a paste jar to hide it from her teachers. She doesn't want to drink it because she remembers the woman who yelled at her on the first day of school -- and threatened to poison her.
Maraiya has learned that Ruby and four other girls were chosen to desegregate the school district, but Bridges was the only one to go to William Frantz school.
Her experience
Maraiya said the mayor and police did not like the idea of desegregation, and President Dwight D. Eisenhower ordered federal troops to escort Bridges into school her first day.
People yelled and screamed and held up black dolls lying in caskets.
Most teachers rejected Ruby, but one, Miss Henry, taught her in a room all their own. She saw children in other classes and wondered, "Why can't I play with them?" Maraiya said.
By the end of the year, some children came into Ruby's room, Maraiya said. But one boy wouldn't play Duck, Duck, Goose, telling her: "I can't play with you. My mother told me not to" because she was black.
Until then, Ruby hadn't understood.
But things improve and by the next school year, she gets to play with other children and join their classrooms.
Maraiya wrote her History Day piece after teacher Donna Hageman, a gifted intervention specialist at the school, encouraged pupils to enter the local contest.
"I was just awed by it," Hageman said. "She uses the actual words of Ruby Bridges in some cases. It's just dynamic.
" ... I thought it was perfect because of the fact that she's taking advantage of the opportunity to get an equal education, and Ruby Bridges broke down that barrier," Hageman added. " ... She fits right into Ruby Bridges."
Support
Maraiya said her success in part is due to her supportive mother, Angie Hakeem, and stepfather, Nathan Elliott, who don't allow her to say "can't." Her mother and 9-year-old brother, Trelan Barron, are going to the competition with her.
The Youngstown Downtown Kiwanis Club and the Roth, Blair, Roberts, Strasfeld & amp; Lodge law firm have helped sponsor Maraiya's trip.
Maraiya first learned about Ruby Bridges from a Disney Channel movie. To write the script, she researched Bridges on the Internet, gleaning details from a PBS Web site, and read a biography about the woman.
The honor roll pupil and track team member who is reading "The Iliad" in her spare time said she's ready for next week's competition at the University of Maryland. She'll wear a white ruffled blouse, plaid skirt and brown shoes with buckles.
She's confident, not nervous, and said she just wants to represent Ruby Bridges well.
"I like what I'm doing. I don't think of it as a competition," she said. "I just want to get the message across."