UGA Desegregation

History can be made to seem farther away than it really is, particularly the history of racial discrimination against African Americans in the United States. Disheartening events such as the University of Georgia ruling against two African American students attending the school because of the color of their skin could seem like an archaic notion.

The reality is that such an event happened only 60 years ago. Stepping Stones, an augmented reality app takes the journeys of Charlayne Hunter Gault and Hamilton Holmes, the two first black students at UGA, and emphasizes the recency of this journey through showing students that they are stepping exactly where these two students stepped not long ago. The app shows students that they are in fact traveling through significant areas throughout their day, areas that were integral to the journeys of these two leaders.

In order to prevent the horrors of the past from repeating we must acknowledge the past in every respect including how recent it really was. It is integral that the past not be ignored or erased in order to promote change, and digital is forever.