Republic file photo Paulette Roberts has been named The Republic’s Woman of the Year and will be honored in ceremonies in June at The Commons.
Twenty years after Paulette Roberts stepped out of a long-time, paid role as a classroom teacher, the 75-year-old Columbus resident remains a passionate educator.
That explains why she stood speaking in front of a group of 10 students and eight volunteer tutors on a recent Saturday morning in the basement of the local Second Baptist Church. Since 2004, she has spent three-and-a-half hours every Saturday from September through May leading her volunteer, academic tutoring effort known as the Columbus Enrichment Achievement Program.
Ask her why she launched it, and she will look at you as stunned as if you’ve just queried why she’s not standing on the sun. She is nothing if not straightforward.
“I knew that (struggling) students needed the extra help,” she said, relaxing in the church fellowship hall.
Let the record show that Roberts has filled nearly every imaginable need she has seen in recent years — and now has earned The Republic’s annual Woman of the Year honors for her wide-ranging volunteerism and advocacy that includes:
- Presenting dramatic, costumed historical presentations on Black history leaders ranging from Harriet Tubman to Sojourner Truth to Maya Angelou.
- For organizing many of the Kwanzaa celebrations in the past several years here.
- For curating Black History Month displays as far back as the 1990s in The Commons.
- For leading Black History Tours in the downtown for Landmark Columbus.
- For identifying top Black historic sites for Landmark’s coming historical markers.
- For leading local Black history panel discussions in recent years with people such as Brenda Pitts.
- And for being a key figure in local Juneteenth celebrations, including making available many books to younger students and more (at her own expense) on American Black history figures.
She will be honored at 5:30 p.m. June 26 at The Commons, 300 Washington St., at an invitation-only event that will feature previous Women of the Year honorees and friends and family. She will receive the newspaper’s handcrafted Woman of the Year necklace and $2,000 that she will award to a charity of her choice.
She laughed when asked for her reaction to the award. She backspaced a few years to a question her now-late husband Dennis asked her one day after reading of several other female community leaders’ honors: “How come you’re not getting these awards?”
No one need ask any longer.
Beloved Community Award
In 2023, the socially conscious local African American Pastors Alliance selected her for the Beloved Community Award, established to honor those working for equality for all in the vein of the Rev. Martin Luther King, who envisioned such a beloved community.
King day award presenter Whittney Gaines, a local educator like Roberts, said from the podium that she has always admired Roberts.
“She’s a whole vibe,” Gaines said. “She deserves all the accolades. She is an example of what it actually looks like to do this (community) work.”
Others have noticed also.
Glenda Winders, who handles publicity for the Columbus/Bartholomew County Area Branch of the NAACP, acknowledged that she is impressed by Roberts and her broad interests in what hardly seems like retirement.
“She supplements American history as it was meant to be told — firmly but gently supplementing the ‘white’ history we already know,” Winders said. “She is a gift to this city.”
She makes little time for such superlatives. And maybe the only boasting she does is emblazoned on her bright blue T-shirt she wore. It declared “Columbus Enrichment Achievement Program works!”
Roberts, a staunch Christian and longtime Second Baptist deaconess who sees her faith as one of action, mentioned that she feels as if God nudges her to be involved in an assortment of issues. Little surprise, then, that her favorite Scripture is Luke 12:48: “To whom much is given, much will be required.”
Roberts came up through a segregated elementary school in Hazard, in the heart of southeastern Kentucky coal country. Her family genealogy is marked by teachers, several of whom attended eastern Kentucky’s Berea College, still well-known for its teacher training.
Her father marched with King at an event in March 1964 at the state capital of Frankfort, Kentucky.
“I am doing this for you,” Roberts’ father told her and her siblings.
Black history, American history
She began teaching locally in 1970 as only the second Black teacher with Bartholomew Consolidated School Corp. She was among those who fought over the years to include more elements of Black history in the local curriculum.
She also was among those locally who fought to make Martin Luther King Jr. Day, a federal holiday, also a local school holiday. She was among the first local minority leaders to begin repeatedly reminding others of this mantra: “Black history is American history.”
Roberts said she finds her joy in doing good for others where she can.
“You got to be upbeat and wanting to participate,” she said. “I think having a servant attitude is all there is. You know — helping other people. And when I help other people, it helps me.
“It makes me feel better. It makes me feel good to know that I’ve done something that means this other person is therefore going to be able to contribute something of what they’re about.”
At least part of her seemingly inexorable energy comes from her one-hour, three-mile People Trail walks every other day. Yet, she believes that she is slowing a bit, and is considering turning over her enrichment program to “the right person.”
She remains a serious reader, currently finishing ex-First Lady Michelle Obama’s book “The Light We Carry,” which seems appropriate for a woman well aware of lighting the way for others.
“Sometimes,” Roberts said, “I have to read parts of that book over and over again to make sure I’m getting the message.”
Many people locally may find that surprising — especially since she seems to have long carried a light for the sake of others.
About Paulette Roberts
Age: 75
In Columbus since: 1970
Family: Husband Dennis died in 2020. Son, Dennis Roberts II of Columbus. Five grandchildren.
Teaching career: Began at what was then Southside Junior High School; finished at Central Middle School in 2004.
Community involvement and leadership: Founder of the Columbus Enrichment Achievement Program tutoring students; Black History Month through the years; the Columbus/Bartholomew County Area Branch of the NAACP; keynote speaker of the 2015 Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. Day Community Breakfast; the local Kwanzaa celebrations; Junetennth celebrations; leading local panel discussions on local Black history; and more.
