On this Martin Luther King Day, these pertinent articles from past blogs are cited:
1. A Lesson on Urban Identity, by Matthew Amaral - “Can you be Ghetto and successful?” I tell them they can’t talk about drug-dealers, rappers, athletes, or other entertainers--we’re talking about real careers. . . . This is something that will really come into focus on a college campus when a majority of the students are NOT like them."
2. Achievement gap slow to close, by Diana Lambert - "In 2009 there was a gap of 27% points between fourth-grade white students and African American students, and a gap of 22% points between white and Latino students in math. There also was a 28% gap between white and African American fourth-graders in reading."
3. Minorities are now the majority at UT-Austin, by Jon Marcus and Reeve Hamilton - Hechinger Report "Whites are in the minority this year for the first time in the history of the flagship Texas school, which was segregated until the 1950s. Fifty-two percent of the Class of 2014 is nonwhite. Black and Hispanic students represent about 5 percent and 23 percent, respectively. Asians account for 17 percent of freshmen. The demographic shift at U.T. is a bellwether of what is about to happen—and, with little notice, already has, at other universities in Texas, California, Florida, Georgia, Illinois and New York—in a country where new Census figures confirm that nonwhites are by far the fastest-growing proportion of traditional-age university students."
4. Proficiency of Black Students is Found to Be Far Lower Than Expected, by Trip Gabriel -http://www.nytimes.com/2010/11/09/education/09gap.html?_r=2&hpw “What this clearly shows is that black males who are not eligible for free and reduced-price lunch are doing no better than white males who are poor,” said Michael Casserly, executive director of the council. The report shows that black boys on average fall behind from their earliest years. Black mothers have a higher infant mortality rate and black children are twice as likely as whites to live in a home where no parent has a job. In high school, African-American boys drop out at nearly twice the rate of white boys, and their SAT scores are on average 104 points lower. In college, black men represented just 5 percent of students in 2008."
5. Black Male Achievement in a 'State of Crisis,' Study Says, by Dakarai Aarons - http://t.co/1wmZtp2 via @educationweek"
"As a study this summer by the Schott Foundation for Public Education pointed out, fewer than half of black males graduate from high school on time. "At almost every juncture, the odds are stacked against these young men in ways that result in too much unfulfilled potential and too many fractured lives," writes Michael Casserly, the council's executive director. The council's report suggests that the underperformance of black male youths is nothing short of a national emergency, and it calls for the convening of a White House conference."The previous efforts to ring the alarm bell have too often fallen on deaf ears, and we thought that a White House conference would help both raise the visibility of the issues and aide in attempting to martial the public will to tackle it," Casserly said in an interview."
6. This Raging Fire, by Bob Herbert, The New York Times, November 15, 2010 - http://nyti.ms/9Jjsc2 "The first and most important step would be a major effort to begin knitting the black family back together. There is no way to overstate the myriad risks faced by children whose parents have effectively abandoned them. It’s the family that protects the child against ignorance and physical harm, that offers emotional security and the foundation for a strong sense of self, that enables a child to believe — truly — that wonderful things are possible. All of that is missing in the lives of too many black children."
7. Financial Aid: A Broken Bridge to College Access? by Bridget Terry Long and Erin Riley - http://www.hepg.org/document/19/ "Although there are many barriers to college access and success for low-income and minority students, most can be grouped into three major categories. The first set of major barriers relates to cost. . . . A second major set of barriers to college enrollment and persistence is academic preparation. . . . The third major impediment to higher education for many students, particularly those from low-income families, is the complexity of the college admissions process and financial aid systems, as well as a lack of accurate information about higher education costs. College attendance is the culmination of a series of steps and benchmarks, and this current landscape is too complex and difficult for many families to decipher and navigate."
8. Failure to educate, by Junia Yearwood - http://b.globe.com/dz8Hmo "I knew that most of my students who walked across the stage, amidst the cheers, whistles, camera flashes, and shout-outs from parents, family, and friends, were not functionally literate. They were unable to perform the minimum skills necessary to negotiate society: reading the local newspapers, filling out a job application, or following basic written instructions; even fewer had achieved empowering literacy enabling them to closely read, analyze, synthesize, and evaluate text. However, they were all college bound — the ultimate goal of our school’s vision statement — clutching knapsacks stuffed with our symbols of academic success: multiple college acceptances, a high school diploma; an official transcript indicating they had passed the MCAS test and had met all graduation requirements; several glowing letters of recommendation from teachers and guidance counselors; and one compelling personal statement, their college essay."
9. Unready and Unsuccessful, by Joanne Jacobs - http://www.huffingtonpost.com/joanne-jacobs/unready-and-unsuccessful_b_775668.html "Seventy percent of California's degree-seeking community college students failed to earn a credential or degree -- or to transfer to four-year universities -- within six years, concludes a new study. Most students drop out quickly, reports the Institute for Higher Education Leadership & Policy and the Campaign for College Opportunity. Between 2003 and 2009, only 40 percent of students earned at least 30 college credits, which is considered "the minimum needed to provide an economic boost in jobs that require some college experience," reports the LA Times. Blacks and Latinos did worse: Only 26% of black students and 22% of Latino students had completed a degree or certificate or transferred after six years, compared to 37% of whites and 35% of Asian Pacific Islanders. Students fail because they're not prepared for college-level reading, writing and math. Many are juggling jobs and family responsibilities too, of course, but college readiness is the make-or-break issue."
10. A Call for Change - http://graphics8.nytimes.com/packages/pdf/opinion/A-Call-For-Change.pdf "The Social and Educational Factors Contributing to the Outcomes of Black Males in Urban Schools”
