Marva Collins

Teacher

Birthday August 31, 1936

Birth Sign Virgo

Birthplace Monroeville, AL

DEATH DATE Jun 24, 2015 (78)

#131747 Most Popular

About

Chicago teacher who founded the Westside Preparatory School and enriched the lives of inner-city students. She employed classical educational ideas--notably, the Socratic method--while teaching inner-city kids.

Before Fame

She graduated from Clark College in Atlanta, Georgia.

Trivia

She established her low-cost preparatory school in an effort to provide a proper education for poverty-stricken, African-American children who had been labeled (often wrongly) as "learning disabled" by the public school system.

Family Life

Her daughter, Cynthia B. Collins, also became a teacher.

Associated With

She was portrayed by actress Cicely Tyson in the 1981 television movie The Marva Collins Story.