Ruth Batson

Ruth Marion Batson (née Watson; 1921–2003) was an American civil rights activist and outspoken advocate of equal education. She spoke out about the desegregation of Boston Public Schools. She served as Chairman of the Public Education Sub-Committee of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) in 1953. Later, she served as the executive director of the Metropolitan Council for Educational Opportunity (METCO).

Biography Ruth Marion Watson was born August 3, 1921, in Roxbury, Massachusetts, to Jamaican immigrants, Joel R. Watson and Cassandra D. Buchanan. She attended the Everett School in Dorchester, Massachusetts. Batson graduated from the Girls Latin School in 1939.

She attended the Nursery Training School of Boston, which was associated with Boston University. She later received a Master of Education degree from Boston University in 1976.

Career Inspired by her mother's interest in civil rights, Batson became the chairman of the Public Education Sub-Committee of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) in 1953. In April 1957, she became the chairwoman of the New England Regional Conference of the NAACP, where she worked as a civil rights lobbyist.

In the early 1960s, she challenged the Boston School Committee, charging that Boston Public Schools were largely segregated. Batson highlighted that schools with majority black student populations often had poor quality facilities when compared to the facilities at schools with majority white student enrollment. In 1993, she received an honorary degree from the University of Massachusetts Boston.

She was a member of the board of visitors of Boston University's School of Medicine; trustees, Boston City Hospital; member, Corporation of the Massachusetts General Hospital and former member of its board of trustees; and board member of Roxbury Community College Foundation.

Publications She was the author of The Black Educational Movement in Boston: A Sequence of Historical Events (1638–1975), a comprehensive chronology documenting the heroic efforts and contributions of African American parents to educational history in Boston. Northeastern University's School of Education has made the manuscript available online.

Philanthropy She was the founder in 1969 of the Ruth M. Batson Educational Foundation, which provided grants to African American college students for tuition and emergency needs. The Batson Foundation also awards grants to educational institutions and community organizations whose program objectives reflect the philosophy of the Batson Foundation.

More recently, Batson had directed the revitalized Museum of African American History in Beacon Hill, stepping down in 1990.

Her financial support for medical students at Boston University School of Medicine, the school, under the leadership of Dr. Aram Chobanian, established the Ruth Batson Scholarship in 1997. Since that time, the school has awarded more than US$500,000 in scholarships to 40 Boston University minority medical students, including four MD and PhD students. Each year, Batson visited the medical center to have lunch with the Batson Scholars, hear their life's stories and share her experiences, especially with the health care system in America.