Posted on 04/28/2003 1:32:16 AM PDT by Cincinatus' Wife
The great disappointment of my ongoing crusade to foment a revolution in black education has been the lack of a response, and even hostility, from black leaders in this community. Naturally, I expected everyone to drop what they were doing and hop onto my education movement bandwagon.
To be sure, black readers in general have responded positively and in droves to the call for a black education movement along the lines of our historic civil rights movement. They have said they agree that this movement must demand rigorous academic standards and a high level of parental responsibility and community involvement to ensure black children's success.
In a comment typical of many I've received, a reader wrote, "We as black people must begin to create a culture of valuing education ... if we are to ever pull our children out of the river of underachievement in which they find themselves. I believe that this can be done, but it will require a new and different determination on the part of the black community, and every black parent in particular, before it will be achieved."
Another reader wrote, "I am just frustrated at our community's complacency towards education and the willingness of so many parents to allow their children to waste their young years on activities that do not help them become competitive in academia. ... I'm making the effort to convert as many [people] as I can. I think I successfully turned my husband around. He was wiling to buy his children-to-be their first car but would not fund their college education. Now THAT had to change."
But I've heard little from Houston's black leadership.
Of course, many people are doing interesting and important work to promote high standards in black education.
Helen M. Berger runs Houston Preparatory Academy's U-Prep model in which academically promising students from poor northeast neighborhoods are provided four weeks of intensive instruction in reading, writing and math. Afterward, a select few students who meet the high admission and academic standards of some of Houston's best private schools enter those schools with scholarships and the social and academic support of U-Prep to ensure their success.
Sylvia Brooks, president & CEO of the Houston Area Urban League, after reading my columns calling for new black leadership to head a black education movement, called to point out all the work the local Urban League is doing in that field. In fact, the promotion of equal access to education is one of the main goals of the Urban League's advocacy mission, and I applaud that.
Kevin Hoffman, the president of the Houston school board, posed a couple of questions when I complained to him about black leadership on education. "Do you go off and have a public tantrum, or do you work inside the system in which you were elected?," he asked. "Do you want to represent as an insider getting things done or as an outsider making a fuss on the front page?"
Without patting himself on the back too hard, Hoffman noted the significant number of new schools that will be built in black neighborhoods and of old ones that will be renovated under the district's new bond issue. Point well-taken.
My thinking has been that a natural place for the new black education movement to grow could be black churches. I have imagined church leaders organizing tutoring sessions for young members, recognizing and rewarding good grades and bringing in experts to teach test-taking skills and to help parents support their children's educational endeavors.
So, not long ago, I spoke with Rev. Michael Williams, pastor of Joy Tabernacle church. In writing a column afterward, I focused on those issues which he and I held in common, such as parents' major role in early education.
Williams chastised me later for not playing up his other points, such as that "serious and significant inequities" in funding and facilities exist in white and black communities, and that "American institutional life is designed to support white supremacy and public education is no different."
I had chosen to ignore some of his more outrageous statements, such as that "college is overrated for black people" and that many good jobs exist for people without college degrees.
Even if that were true, why would Williams, who also happens to be a trustee of the Houston Community College board, preach that to young people?
People who believe, as Williams apparently does, that black people are powerless to achieve excellence in their lives because they are oppressed victims ought to take a note from all the people who are out there working hard to show black children how bright the future can be. That's real leadership.
Georgsson, an editorial writer, is a member of the Chronicle Editorial Board andrea.georgsson@chron.com
I will bet a month's salary that if we let blacks have neighborhood schools as part of their choice plan, parents will become true stakeholders and will participate in their children's lives at school. Everyone, black and white, will benefit.
When race is at issue, we fear the inevitable. And we fear the truth: Left to our own devices, we will segregate ourselves along racial and ethnic lines. Whites will associate with whites. Blacks will associate with blacks. After 2007, voluntary integration will teach us this harsh lesson.***
But no matter how many chances are given to pass, a single test should not determine a student's future, said Adora Obi Nweze, president of the Florida NAACP. "There is more to education than writing an answer," she said. "You have students that can do so many other things, and all should be used to determine if they should be promoted."***
The problem is that he carries a secret that, if exposed, will subject him to almost-certain ridicule: He loves and reads the poetry of Gwendolyn Brooks, he writes excellent verse and he wants to study English and become a poet of the non-hip-hop kind. I was told of his plight because mine was similar when I was his age, which I had shared with his mother and her classmates. Like I was at 17, this young man is a victim of one of black culture's self-imposed stereotypes: dark-skinned black males are dumb.***
Distressed that their teen-aged children's grades were lagging behind those of their white counterparts, despite having similar socioeconomic advantages in the racially mixed school district, the black parents organized their own investigation. They invited anthropology Prof. John U. Ogbu, a well-known figure in the field of student achievement for the past 30 years, all the way from the University of California at Berkeley to examine the district's 5,000 students and figure out why the black-white performance gap persists.
Six years later, Ogbu has published his findings in a book, Black American Students in an Affluent Suburb: A Study of Academic Disengagement (Lawrence Erlbaum Associates publishers). Not all of the parents are pleased with his conclusions. That's because he found part of the problem to be the parents. ***
The fact is that African-American children like mine who are from stable family backgrounds and attend competitive schools are doing well. Any legislative attempt to address the problem of offering African-American students more opportunity must also take into account equipping them to take advantage of those opportunities. We need to move past the political rhetoric and address the real needs of these students.
I am tired of the liberal assumption that the only way to help African-American students is to lower the bar. I am equally weary of my black colleagues who cry "racism" every time the bar is not lowered for them. Ultimately, with our state placing 50th in SAT scores for the nation, we need better SAT preparation for all college-bound students. This doesn't mean only special test-taking courses, but rigorous programs that will teach the vocabulary and math skills that the SAT assesses. Instea
That's part of the prescription for ending educational mediocrity discussed in Abigail and Stephen Thernstrom's new book, "No Excuses: Closing the Racial Gap in Learning" (Simon & Schuster, 2003).
It's no secret that, as the Thernstroms point out, the education achieved by white students is nothing to write home about. In civics, math, reading, writing and geography, nearly a quarter of all students leave high school with academic skills that are "Below Basic." In science, 47 percent leave high school with skills Below Basic, and in American history it's 57 percent. Below Basic is the category the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP) uses for students unable to display even partial mastery of knowledge and skills fundamental for proficient work at their grade level.
As dismal as these figures are, for black students it is magnitudes worse. According to NAEP findings, only in writing are less than 40 percent of black high school students Below Basic. In math, it's 70 percent, and science 75 percent. Blacks completing high school perform a little worse than white eighth-graders in both reading and U.S. history, and a lot worse in math and geography.
The Thernstroms report, "In math and geography, indeed, they know no more than whites in the seventh grade." From these facts, the Thernstroms conclude, "The employer hiring the typical black high school graduate (or the college that admits the average black student) is, in effect choosing a youngster who has made it only through the eighth grade."***
The Loaded Weapon sneaker is among the latest shoes to hit the Converse conveyor belt. And the new game Ghettopoly, a take on the classic board game Monopoly, features "playas" who vie for stolen property and crack.
All three speak to a growing fascination with hip-hop and its portrayal of urban black America. The products have also ignited protests and boycotts nationwide, highlighting a division in the African-American community over what's an appropriate representation of the black experience.
It is part of a larger cultural war among blacks, fought largely along class and generational lines.
"The traditional civil rights model included a kind of politics of respectability, putting the best face of the African-American community forward," says Imani Perry, a law professor at Rutgers University. "There is an absolute refusal in the hip-hop community to adhere to those ideals of respectability, in terms of what the public face of black people should be."
That tension may only heighten as hip-hop goes global and the appetite for edgy products grows. Nelly announced the release of Pimp Juice, named after his hit single, at the MTV music video awards late this summer. Days later, the Rev. Paul Scott, founder of the Messianic Afrikan Nation, launched a local campaign to keep it off shelves in Durham, N.C. He calls the word "pimp" derogatory and demeaning.
"We don't want our young people walking around with Pimp Juice in their lunchboxes, thinking that it's cool," says Mr. Scott, who has joined forces with black leaders nationwide to petition for Nelly to change the name. "Four hundred years ago, black women were being sold into slavery ... and now someone wants to come out with a drink selling women." ***
Shirley and other Harlemites are right to encourage their children to love learning for its own sake. This new generation will reject the self-destructive mantra that being smart is acting white.
For good reason, Asian children have been labeled the "model minority." If this label is a stereotype, Shirley says she wishes it on all black children. For black children to become another model minority, black parents must change their views on learning and formal education.
"You can't be selfish," Shirley said. "Blacks have got to start sacrificing for the children. I'm not a saint or anything, but I put my babies first. I don't make much money. Their dad helps out some, about $150 a month. I spend every penny I can on the boys' classes. I don't even think about it."
While in Shirley's two-bedroom apartment on St. Nicholas Avenue, I noticed the boys' many awards for excellence in math, writing and science. Books are everywhere. The boys share a tiny bedroom, and each has a laptop that Shirley bought through a discount program her church sponsored.
"A lot of people, even some of our kinfolks, told me I was pushing my kids too hard," she said. "I told them to get lost. When people don't understand what you're doing, you have to shut them out and do what you know is right. My kids don't complain. They love making good grades. They really want to study hard." ***
THE FRUIT OF FAILURE
I am of a generation that has largely failed that role, that turned ''judgment'' into a four-letter word. The fruit of that failure lies before us: an era of a historical young people who traffic in stereotypes that would not be out of place in a Ku Klux Klan meeting.
And I'm supposed to be angry at David Chang? I'm not. He's just a good capitalist, just regurgitating what he has been taught in hopes of turning a buck. My anger is not for the student, but for his teachers. And not just my anger, but my sorrow, too.
I'm not losing sleep worrying about what David Chang thinks of black people. I'm more concerned with what black people think of themselves.***
I'd be offended by the fact that the HOPE scholarship controversy has become another forum for repeating the ancient wisdom that black students simply don't perform well on standardized tests.
I'd be embarrassed by black lawmakers who threaten to go to court to protect my right to receive HOPE, even though my scores don't measure up to those of most white students.
I think I'd want to prove them wrong. I think I'd give up TV and take as many advanced placement classes and spend as many hours with a math tutor as necessary to raise my SATs. That's what I'd do.
Will black children around the state respond that way? Or will they merely sink back into a fatalism that will guarantee the outcome -- poor test scores -- that has been forecast for them? ***
According to Education World, "Seven states use the National Evaluation System's tests, 27 use the National Teachers Exam, 43 ask new teachers to pass basic skills tests, and 32 require teachers to demonstrate proficiency in the subjects they teach. Teachers have not done well on those tests. Failure rates are between 20 and 30 percent on the basic skills and proficiency tests and 50 to 55 percent on the National Teachers Exam." Keep in mind that to pass the teacher certification test you need only eighth-, ninth- and, at best, 10th-grade skills. For example, a multiple choice math question asks: "Amy drinks one-and-a-half cups of milk three times a day. At this rate, how many cups will she drink in one week?"
America's public education rot goes beyond incompetent teachers. According to the Sept. 2 New York Post, in the school year 2002-03, "1,495 Department of Education employees and other school workers were arrested - 228 more than the previous year - an 18 percent increase." Those arrested included teachers (371), custodians (243), paraprofessionals (181) and school aides (106). Among the charges were assault (313), drugs (435), robbery (180), weapons (88), sex abuse (36) and falsifying documents (74). How representative New York's school system is of other big city school systems is hard to say.
Where is educational rot the worst? If you said at predominantly black inner-city schools, go to the head of the class. Inner-city schools are home to the least-qualified teachers. For example, in a dozen Chicago schools, 40 percent of the teaching staff flunked one or more tests. One teacher flunked 24 out of 25 tries, including all 12 of the tests in the subject she taught. Nevertheless, she is still teaching. None of this is to say there aren't a few competent and dedicated inner-city teachers battling tremendous odds.
Here's my question: Do parents, particularly black parents, know or even care about what's being done to their children in the name of education? Do they know that the A or B on their children's report card is worthless?
Don't say the solution lies in more money unless you're prepared to show me great results with expenditures of $15,000 per student in Massachusetts and $13,000 in Washington, D.C., and skyrocketing education budgets elsewhere. ***
My fraternal and maternal grandparents were quiet, determined subversives. I loved listening to them talk about the "days before welfare." I remember how these unflappable people put their families before everything else; how children dared not insult an elder inside or outside the home; how doing well in school was taken for granted; how "cutting up" in public and "shaming the family" were not tolerated.
Calling me old-fashioned and an Uncle Tom does not change this simple truth: If African-Americans are to succeed and enjoy the benefits of this rich culture, mature adults must persuade our children to strive to be admired for all the right reasons.***
I have no idea. My church does run a small school and we are racially mixed.
How about home schooling? Do blacks do that in comparable numbers to whites?
No, but I think the reason for that has to do with more black parents being single parents then anything else. Unless you have a two-parent household it is almost impossible to home school.
Lee, known for directing films that include "Malcolm X" and the documentary "4 Little Girls," spoke to an audience of more than 400 students for about 90 minutes.
"I've always felt you can feel the progress of African Americans by listening to their music," Lee said. "Some of this 'gangsta rap' stuff, it's not doing anybody any good. This stuff is really dangerous."
He said some black adults equate education, good grammar and good grades with "being white," but when he was growing up, those things were seen as positive goals.
"You were not ridiculed if you spoke correct English," he said. Lee urged the audience to make their voices heard by not purchasing or viewing media that portrays blacks in a negative way.
"We buy all this stuff, not even thinking about what's behind it ... Think about the power that we have," he said. "We can't just sit back and think it doesn't affect us. We have to do something about it. We have to be more choosy about the types of stuff we support."
Lee also urged students to follow their dreams after graduation, "or you'll be sitting around, fat, divorced and miserable because you took some job, or you took some path that you didn't really want to do."
The speech was sponsored by the Brown Lecture Board, a student group that brings speakers to campus. [End]
Critics' arguments against raising standards and holding educators accountable don't stand up. Among them:
o There's no money to support reform . The federal funding of poor schools has grown 33% during the past two years.
o The reform goals are unrealistic . The law demands that by 2014, all children must score as "proficient" learners on state tests. Most educators agree that the ambitious goal probably won't be met. But it is worth striving for. Extending the deadline now would slow down the pace of school reform.
o The law relies on one-size-fits-all testing . In fact, the tests that critics revile identify the children whom teachers are failing to reach. In Gainesville, Fla., for example, Abraham Lincoln Middle School received an "A" under the state's grading system. But federally required tests revealed a wide racial learning gap. While 90% of Lincoln's white students were proficient in math and reading, only 22% of the black students were proficient in reading and 15% in math.***
When it becomes a minstrel show.
At least that's the reaction some had recently after reading a Dec. 2 column in the Naples Daily News satirizing the speech patterns of rap fans in an effort to describe a hip-hop concert that failed when the promised headliner didn't show.
Writer Brent Batten decided to tell the story using hip-hop slang and providing what he called an "English translation" as "a public service."
A sample:
"See, da brotha had some phat new school playaz lined up. Cris was in da house but 5-0 came down hard, wit Macs an' dogs sniffin fo' bud so da peeps all bailed."
His "translation": "The promoter had assembled an impressive lineup of popular hip-hop artists, featuring headline act Ludacris, but a heavy police presence, complete with guns and drug-sniffing dogs, deterred many would-be attendees."
According to a column written by Daily News editor Phil Lewis, the article didn't get much reaction in Naples, where rap shows draw a crowd of mostly white teens. But once the story circulated on the Internet - including on Jim Romenesko's Media News, a journalism Web site presented by the Poynter Institute for Media Studies, which owns the St. Petersburg Times - readers from across the country responded, including me.
Eventually, the National Association of Black Journalists wrote a letter to Lewis calling the column "patently offensive, intellectually condescending and journalistically unfocused." (Full disclosure: As a longtime association member, I provided feedback on the issue to the group's leadership before it drafted the letter.) ***
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