Just a few months after the Baltimore riots, the University of Maryland law school is offering a course examining the death of Freddie Gray and the Baltimore "disturbances."
"Freddie Gray’s Baltimore: Past, Present and Moving Forward" is an eight-week course offered by the University of Maryland Francis King Carey School of Law. The course claims Gray’s death and the Baltimore riots "have highlighted and/or uncovered serious on-going social and financial dislocations within the City":
"The idea for this course emanates from the recent disturbances in Baltimore arising from Freddie Gray’s arrest and his resulting death."
The course will focus on the "recent unrest itself and then examine the causes of, and possible solutions to, those dislocations."
The course syllabus obtained by the Baltimore Sun alleges the course will emphasize housing segregation, racial profiling by police, the "school to prison pipeline," public health issues, and the "cycles of violence."
Throughout the course, students will be required to participate in volunteer opportunities to "work on the issues addressed in the course." Students also have to write a paper recommending a solution to a social problem "identified in the class."
In a statement on the course, law school dean Donald B. Tobin said, "We see this course as an opportunity for our students to grapple with important issues in their backyard."
"We want not only to educate our students but to inspire them to act on what they’ve learned and work with our neighbors in West Baltimore to strengthen our community and city," Tobin continued.
The statement notes that in 2014, the school launched a discussion series in cooperation with the School of Social Work about the Ferguson "demonstrations."