By:
Dr. Mike Robinson
What
is the future of education for African Americans relative to the academic
achievement of African American children?
If you or anyone working as a civil rights advocate, community organizer
or civic leader knows, please share it with the rest of us. Because from where
most of the African American community sits the vision and pathway is not
really clear.
The
ongoing failure of school systems to educate an increasingly high percentage of
African American young men is frightening. In some urban school districts the
dropout rate is as high as 70%. What become of those who leave the thousands of
school systems? Where do they go? What do they do? Those are just a few of the many questions
that confront the African American community.
Is
it time for a massive nationwide protest for our rights for a quality
education. Should we march and rally on our State capitals demanding justice in
education? Maybe we need to galvanize on Twitter and Facebook and any other
forms of social media to get the word out; that we want quality education for
our communities and we want it now!
It
is likely that an approach using those methods above will generate some public
responses from civic leaders and community advocates. There is even a
likelihood that some forms of legislation requiring access, increase funding
may come out of the outcry for educational justice. However, herein lies the issue, “been there,
done that and have the T-shirt.” So at the end of the day, we eventually find
ourselves right back where we started. A community with high dropout rates
among African American young men; African American female students graduating
at a lower rate than white and Asian females; fewer African Americans entering
college; a disproportionate number of African American students entering
college unprepared and needing remedial educational courses; the steady decline
in the number of African American men matriculating through institutions of
higher education. I could go on and on, but we get the picture and in many
cases, we have lived or we are living it.
With an unemployment rate hovering near 15% (probably higher) our only
solid hope to turn this tide for future African American generations is to emphasis
the need for an educational system that is filled with academic rigor,
demanding and competitive classes and state of the art equipment which ensures
our children can compete nationally and internationally.
It
is time for a National Educational Agenda for the African American community?
This would be agenda should outline the expectations of the academic
achievement for African American students from a nationwide perspective. What
would such an agenda look like? Well let me offer the first few components:
- Increase in the number of African American male teachers in the classroom
- A national meeting between all HBCUs, the United States Department of Education and the 50 Secretaries of Education representing each state in the Union create MOUs to hire over 100,000 male teachers by 2025
- Every African American church should adopt at least one school in their community to provide educational support not religious doctrine
- Entrepreneurial based curriculum should be included in the academic courses starting as early as 4th grade
- Extend the learning day
- Increase multicultural training for teachers and staff as a means to reduce the disproportionate number of African American students suspended or placed in special education
- Parental involvement that is supported by schools, churches and employers
These
are just a few of the components that should make up the National Educational
Agenda for African Americans. We have to
demand more academic rigors and once we have it, demand performance from our
children and their friends. Respect and celebrate the academic achiever, make
them the rule, not the exception.
