Oral Lee Brown was honored on "Oral Lee Brown Day" for her impact on over 160 students, whom she promised to support through higher education. Nearly 40 years ago, she pledged to fulfill the college dreams of her students at Brookfield Elementary School. Brown, whose background included picking cotton in Mississippi, founded the Oral Lee Brown Foundation to provide not only financial support but also mentoring and tutoring, demonstrating her deep commitment to enabling low-income students to pursue higher education successfully.
"Today is Oral Lee Brown Day in California," Tony Thurmond, the California State Superintendent of Public Instruction said as he handed Brown a Proclamation. "Thank you for your service and congratulations, this is for you!"
"...she said if you stick to it and graduate, I will pay for you to go to any college you want to go to and she stuck to it," Cory Edwards, a former student said.
"We can either work with them and take care of them now or we can take care of them the rest of our life and the rest of their lives," Brown said.
"I had lived in Batesville, Mississippi, picking cotton for $2 a day and I survived off of that, and so when God blessed me to leave there, there's nothing that he won't ask me to do that I won’t do."
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