New College Partners with WEDU on PBS’ Freedom Riders Documentary

April 12, 2011 – New College of Florida has signed on as a community partner with public television station WEDU to sponsor the Tampa Bay area premiere of the new PBS documentary Freedom Riders. The premiere takes place on Wednesday evening, April 13, at The Historic Tampa Theater, 711 N. Franklin Street in Tampa, Fla. Doors open to the public at 7 pm.  Admission is free.

Freedom Riders is an award-winning documentary based on the book by Dr. Ray Arsenault. It is scheduled for national release on PBS’American Experience series beginning on Monday, May 16. Arsenault will be a special guest at the Tampa event on April 13.

The film tells the story of an integrated group of college students who in 1961 traveled by Greyhound bus to the Deep South to engage in the fight for Civil Rights by challenging segregation policies. Although engaged in peaceful protest, they often were met with violence and all were arrested at various times for violating Jim Crow laws. Their bravery, however, forced the federal government and the broader American public to come face-to-face with the need to address the civil-rights inequities that plagued the nation at the time.

For more information on New College’s community partnership with WEDU for the premiere of Freedom Riders, contact the New College Office of Public Affairs at (941) 487-4153 or email [email protected]. For more information on the new PBS documentary Freedom Riders, visit the PBS website at pbs.org/wgbh/americanexperience/freedomriders.