The Trouble With Black Boys E-Book

Pedro A. Noguera

• Herausgeber: John Wiley & Sons
• Kategorie: Bildung
• Sprache: Englisch

Seitenzahl: 530

Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2009

Beschreibung

For many years to come, race will continue to be a source of controversy and conflict in American society. For many of us it will continue to shape where we live, pray, go to school, and socialize. We cannot simply wish away the existence of race or racism, but we can take steps to lessen the ways in which the categories trap and confine us. Educators, who should be committed to helping young people realize their intellectual potential as they make their way toward adulthood, have a responsibility to help them find ways to expand identities related to race so that they can experience the fullest possibility of all that they may become. In this brutally honest—yet ultimately hopeful— book Pedro Noguera examines the many facets of race in schools and society and reveals what it will take to improve outcomes for all students. From achievement gaps to immigration, Noguera offers a rich and compelling picture of a complex issue that affects all of us.

Leseprobe

Table of Contents

Title Page

Copyright Page

Dedication

The Author

Introduction

Trouble Begins at School

The Trouble with Black Boys

The Miner’s Canary: The Need for Equity in an Inequitable Society

Part I - The Student Experience

Chapter 1 - Joaquin’s Dilemma Understanding the Link Between Racial Identity ...

The Emerging Awareness of Race

Theories of the Identity-Achievement Connection

Race in the School Context

What Can Educators Do?

Chapter 2 - The Trouble with Black Boys The Impact of Social and Cultural ...

The Nature of the “Risk”

Structural Versus Cultural Explanations

Identity and Academic Performance

Learning from Students and the Schools That Serve Them Well

Conclusion: The Need for Further Research

Chapter 3 - And What Will Become of Children Like Miguel Fernández?/Y Qué ...

Chapter 4 - How Listening to Students Can Help Schools to Improve

Findings: Learning from Student Experiences

How Listening to Students Can Be Incorporated into School Decision Making

Part II - The Search for Equity

Chapter 5 - Latino Youth Immigration, Education, and the Future

Push and Pull Factors and Their Impact on Latino Families

Race, Assimilation, and Social Mobility

Latino Immigrant Students and Prospects for the Future

Chapter 6 - Preventing and Producing Violence A Critical Analysis of Responses ...

Waging the Fight Against Violence

The School as an Agent of Control

Discipline as an Exercise of Power

The Disciplining Event

Race, Class, and the Politics of Discipline

The Role of Teachers

Humanizing the Environment: Alternative Approaches to Violence Prevention in Schools

Chapter 7 - Schools, Prisons, and Social Implications of Punishment Rethinking ...

Social Control and the Social Contract of Schooling

Discipline and the Social Purposes of Education

Does Sorting Out the Bad Apples Work?

Disorder and Disengagement in High Schools

Breaking the Connection Between Prisons and Schools

Chapter 8 - Racial Politics and the Elusive Quest for Excellence and Equity in Education

The Minority Student Achievement Network

The Role and Significance of Race in the Achievement Gap

Good Intentions Are Not Enough: The Failure of Integration at Berkeley High School

Two Schools in One: Sorting Students at BHS

Conclusion: Making Steps Toward Educational Equity by Overcoming the ...

Part III - The Schools We Need

Chapter 9 - Reclaiming the Promise of Public Education

High Performance

High Standards

Systems for Success

Generating the Will

Chapter 10 - Standards for What? Accountability for Whom? Rethinking ...

NCLB and the Promise of American Education

Taking the Easy Way Out

Doing the Right Thing: Addressing the Needs of the Toughest Schools

Conclusion

Chapter 11 - Racial Isolation, Poverty, and the Limits of Local Control as a ...

Race, Class, and School Accountability

Poverty, Racial Isolation, and Oakland’s Failing Schools

Responding to the Nonacademic Needs of Students and the “Captured Market” Problem

The Role of Social Capital in Improving the Quality of Public Schools

Social Capital and Institutional Responsiveness

A Dream Deferred: Racial Politics and the Unfulfilled Promise of Black Power in Oakland

Changing Schools from the Outside In: The Potential Role of Social Capital and ...

Developing Civic Capacity

Conclusion

Chapter 12 - Transforming Urban Schools Through Investments in Social Capital

Who Counts, Who Doesn’t: Social Capital and the Uneven Relationship Between ...

Problematizing Failure: The Role of Urban Schools in the Reproduction of Social Inequality

Empowering a Captured Population

Transforming Urban Schools by Increasing Community Control

Lessons from Existing Models of Parental Empowerment

Notes and References

Epilogue

Index

Discussion Questions

ALSO BY PEDRO NOGUERA

Praise

Copyright © 2008 by John Wiley & Sons, Inc. All rights reserved.

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Credits are on page 333.

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Noguera, Pedro.

p. cm.

Includes bibliographical references and indexes.

eISBN : 978-0-470-54512-6

1. Educational equalization—United States. 2. Academic achievement—Social aspects—United States. 3. Minorities—Education—United States. I. Title.

LC213.2.N64 2008

371.829073—dc22 2007049671

HB Printing

PB Printing

This book is dedicated to the memory of Patricia Rocio Vattuone,my wife of twenty-five years, who passed away on April 7, 2006.In addition to being the mother of our four children—Joaquin,Amaya, Antonio, and Naima—she was my confidante, mycounselor, my comrade in struggle, and my best friend. She wasknown by others as a tireless fighter for peace and justice, an artistand a musician, a gardener and a building contractor, a student,a mother, and a daughter. Born in Lima, Peru, and raised by asingle parent in the projects of San Francisco, Patricia went on tograduate with honors from the University of California at Berkeleyand to earn a master’s degree in public policy at the KennedySchool of Government at Harvard University. For all childrenand parents who are struggling to use education as a means toovercome obstacles and to make the world more just and humane,Patricia is an example from whom we can learn and be inspired.

The Author

Pedro A. Noguera is a professor in the Steinhardt School of Education at New York University, the executive director of the Metropolitan Center for Urban Education, and the codirector of the Institute for the Study of Globalization and Education in Metropolitan Settings (IGEMS).

An urban sociologist, Noguera has focused his scholarship and research on the ways in which schools are influenced by social and economic conditions in the urban environment. He has served as an advisor to and engaged in collaborative research with several large urban school districts throughout the United States. He has also done research on issues related to education and economic and social development in the Caribbean, Latin America, and countries in other areas.

From 2000 to 2003, Noguera served as the Judith K. Dimon Professor of Communities and Schools at the Harvard Graduate School of Education. From 1990 to 2000, he was a professor in social and cultural studies at the Graduate School of Education and the director of the Institute for the Study of Social Change at the University of California, Berkeley.

He has published over 150 research articles, monographs, and research reports on topics such as urban school reform, conditions that promote student achievement, youth violence, the potential impact of school choice and vouchers on urban public schools, and race and ethnic relations in American society. His work has appeared in major research journals, and much of it is available online at inmotionmagazine.com. He is the author of The Imperatives of Power: Political Change and the Social Basis of Regime Support in Grenada (1997) and City Schools and the American Dream (2003), winner of the ForeWord Magazine Gold Award, and he is the coeditor of Beyond Resistance: Youth Activism and Community Change (with Shawn Ginwright and Julio Camarota, 2006). His most recent book is Unfinished Business: Closing the Achievement Gap in Our Nation’s Schools (with Jean Yonemura Wing, 2006).

Noguera has served as a member of the U.S. Public Health Service Centers for Disease Control Taskforce on Youth Violence, the chair of the Committee on Ethics in Research and Human Rights for the American Educational Research Association, and a member of numerous advisory boards to local and national education and youth organizations. He was a K-12 classroom teacher for several years and continues to teach part-time in high schools. From 1986 to 1988, he served as the executive assistant to the mayor of Berkeley, California, and from 1990 to 1994, he was an elected member and the president of the Berkeley School Board. From 2005 to 2006, he served as the president of the Caribbean Studies Association and was a member of the Commission on the Whole Child (Association of Supervision and Curriculum Development).

In 1995 he received an award from the Wellness Foundation for his research on youth violence, in 1997 he was the recipient of the University of California’s Distinguished Teaching Award, in 2001 he received an honorary doctorate from the University of San Francisco and the Centennial Medal from Philadelphia University for his work in the field of education, and in 2005 he received the Eugene Carothers Award and the Whitney Young Award from the National Urban League, both for leadership in the field of education. Noguera is the father of four children and resides in New York City.

Introduction

Black males in American society are in trouble. With respect to health, education, employment, income, and overall well-being, all of the most reliable data consistently indicate that Black males constitute a segment of the population that is distinguished by hardships, disadvantages, and vulnerability (Littles, Bowers, and Gilmer, 2007).

Although they comprise a relatively small portion of the American population (less than 6 percent), Black males occupy a large space within the American psyche and imagination. Throughout much of American history, Black males have served as the ultimate “other.” In literature and film, they have been depicted as villains, con men, and feebleminded buffoons. Indeed, the image of the Black man has sometimes been used to symbolize the very embodiment of violence (Apel, 2004). Most often, Black men have been regarded as individuals who should be feared because of their uncontrolled and unrefined masculinity. And their very presence, particularly when they are encountered in groups, has been regarded as a menace to innocents (particularly white women) and a potential danger to the social order. They are a threat that must be policed, controlled, and contained (Baker, 1998).

Today the popular images of Black males are less extreme but no less distorted. Black males are omnipresent in the media, but in a departure from the past, they are as often idolized as heroes because of their accomplishments in sports and popular music as they are scorned for their misdeeds, both real and imagined. These newer images of Black males may appear to be more positive than the ones from the past, but they have not supplanted the more traditional negative characterizations; rather, the two cohabit the same social and psychological space. For every story devoted to the feats of a Black sports hero, there are others where Black men are decried as irresponsible fathers, drug dealers, and sexual predators. As cultural theorist Homi Bhabha (1994) has written in reference to other subordinate groups, societies frequently conjure up phobias and fetishes toward marginalized groups and individuals. In the United States, the stereotypes and images associated with Black males have the effect of magnifying the attention and scrutiny directed toward them in ways that result in their being both vilified and valorized and that make living an ordinary life a tremendous challenge.

It is ironic that the lead character of Ralph Ellison’s Invisible Man is a Black man, one who is so marginal and irrelevant that he is literally unseen. Today Black males are anything but invisible or unseen. In fact, they are so prominently positioned as celebrities and criminals that hardly a day passes when one is not the subject of news in the media. Be it the latest golf tournament victory of Tiger Woods, an act of violence perpetrated by a criminal, or the latest song by Jay-Z, Kanye West, or 50 Cent, the visibility of Black males far exceeds their actual numbers in American society. For Black males, adulation and scorn are often two sides of the same coin, and as we have seen in the cases of O. J. Simpson, Michael Vick, and Michael Jackson, even those who seem to be loved and adored can easily and quickly fall from grace and find themselves hated and despised.

The dichotomous nature of the lens through which Black males are perceived poses a tremendous problem for ordinary men and boys. The vast majority of Black men are not star athletes or glamorous entertainers; neither are they hoodlums or gangsters. Yet the images and stereotypes of Black males that permeate American society compel all Black men and boys to contend with characterizations and images that are propagated in the media and with the perceptions that lurk within imaginations. Black males who are everyday fathers, sons, factory workers, college students, professionals, and craftsmen often find that they must prove their trustworthiness and convince others that they are not individuals who should be feared. Unlike men and women from other racial and ethnic groups, Black males are rarely seen as individuals in possession of a full range of attributes and flaws, strengths and weaknesses. The stereotypes that shape the American images of Black males are so stark and extreme that even the most ordinary and unexceptional Black males find they are forced to contend with the fantasies and fears that others hold toward them.

It is important to point out that in certain contexts—predominantly White schools and colleges, for example—Black males occasionally encounter stereotypes that might be construed as positive. Among some classmates and instructors, there may be an assumption that Black males are inherently gifted athletes, good dancers, and naturally “cool.” In settings where Black males are regarded as novelties rather than threats, they may experience attention that may not be totally negative, especially if they are star athletes. Yet a closer examination of the assumptions operative in such contexts reveals how often they negate attributes such as honesty, integrity, and intellectual ability and serve to limit and constrain the development of a well-rounded personality. Moreover, as my colleague Ron Mincy, a six-foot-four professor of economics at Columbia University, pointed out, having others assume you can play basketball is not a compliment when you are being considered for a job as a professor or being reviewed for tenure.

Still, no matter how annoying assumptions about one’s athletic ability might be, the negative stereotypes associated with Black males are a far more onerous burden. How many Black men have been stopped for no justifiable reason by police officers because they are said to fit the description of a suspect or because their mere presence in a public setting evokes fear and suspicion? According to a recently released study by the Rand Corporation, a statistical analysis of police stops in New York City carried out between 2004 and 2006 found that Black men were stopped, frisked, and detained by police at a rate that is 50 percent greater than their representation in the residential census (Ridgeway, 2007). The stress and humiliation of such experiences undoubtedly take a toll on psychological well-being and serve as a reminder to Black men that they will never be judged as individuals.

For Black men, police harassment is by no means limited to New York City. How many Black men have seen strangers cross the street as they walk toward them? How common is it for Black men to be subjected to additional scrutiny by a security guard, to be asked to produce extra proof that they have the funds in their account to cover a check, or been asked to produce additional identification to make a credit card purchase? My friend and colleague Antwi Akom, a professor at San Francisco State University, was beaten and arrested by campus police when he entered his office at night (with his key) to retrieve a book while his two young daughters waited for him in their car. Major offenses like this one, as well as minor indignities, or what psychologist Chester Pierce (1995) referred to as micro-aggressions, are so common and pervasive that for many parents, preparing their Black sons for the likelihood of an interrogation by the police has become an increasingly regular part of socialization to manhood.

Lani Guinier, the acclaimed Harvard Law School professor, points out that even she, an upper-middle-class intellectual, cannot shield her son from the threats that Black males experience. As a result, she feels compelled to prepare him for the trials and tribulations he may face living in American society. In describing her quandary over how to educate her son about race and racism in the United States, she writes “that a failure to acknowledge difference is a failure to prepare him for a world in which his differences may matter—a world in which when he walks down the street, white cops may stop him or other Black males may resent him, in both cases because of a potentially deadly combination of racism and machismo” (Guinier and Torres, 2002, p. 3). Like many other parents, Guinier laments the need to burden her son with an awareness that he may be subjected to harassment and hostility, not because of something he has done but simply because of the reactions that his race and gender evoke. She resents the need to prepare him because she understands that by engaging in this form of socialization, she is in effect “reinforcing hierarchy, not resisting it” (p. 3).

Sadly, part of what Guinier and other parents must prepare their Black sons for is the prospect, and even the probability, that the group he is most likely to experience conflict and hostility with is not the police or the Ku Klux Klan but other Black males. For reasons that can never be fully explained, Black males kill and harm one another at a rate that far exceeds any other segment of the American population (Bell and Jenkins, 1990; Earls, 1994). The alarming homicide rates among young Black males is one of the major factors that has led to Black males being the only segment of the U.S. population with a declining life expectancy (Earls, 1994). Gangs, drug dealing, and the availability of guns are certainly contributing factors, but there is more going on related to the phenomenon of violence among and between Black males that defies easy explanation.

I once found myself in the middle of a heated argument that nearly erupted into violence between Black men over nothing more than a basketball game. At the time, I was a professor at Harvard University, living in Cambridge, Massachusetts, and as was my custom, I went to play basketball at a court where men my age (roughly between thirty and forty-five) played ball on Saturday mornings. Most of the men playing were employed, some like me as professionals, and most were husbands and fathers with children. This was a typical pickup game of street ball—an informal form of recreation with no uniforms or referees. Teams are chosen just before the start of the game, and nothing is at stake: no one is getting paid, it really does not matter who wins or loses, and there are no spectators present to impress other than the men waiting to play next. One morning during a game that was becoming particularly intense, two players who had been engaged in friendly banter over who was the better player began arguing over how closely and aggressively they were guarding each other. Finally one player took a hard fall to the ground after a flagrant foul by the other player, and the two men began posturing as if they were about to fight. After cursing, yelling, and exchanging threats with each other for several minutes, a few other men joined the fray, some attempting to make peace so that we could get on with the game, while others egged on the two as though they hoped a fight between the two men might actually erupt. As the threats and arguing escalated, one man announced that he was going to his car to get his gun, at which point several of the other men and I left the court with great haste.

On my drive home, I asked myself why grown men with so much to lose—families, jobs, reputations—would threaten to kill each other over a basketball game. Although no one was actually killed that morning, the fact that threats of death were exchanged over something so trivial suggested something profound was going on. As I thought about it, I realized that the incident made no sense by considering only what was happening on the court, so I thought about the lives of these Black men beyond the court: the pressures they experience in their jobs, the scrutiny they endure in many contexts and situations, the burden so many bear to prove their competence and worthiness, and the mask of aggression that many Black men feel compelled to don as a method of warding off threats on the streets. I then understood that this fight over basketball was emblematic of a much larger phenomenon. Several researchers have found that the pressures that Black men and boys experience exact a toll on their (our)1 psychological and emotional well-being. How they respond to these pressures is undoubtedly a factor that contributes to the high rate of interpersonal violence between and among Black males. It is also the reason that it is so important that the challenges confronting Black males not be framed in ways that characterize them as helpless victims.

Trouble Begins at School

Sadly, the pressures, stereotypes, and patterns of failure that Black males experience often begin in school. I say sadly because we might hope, and even expect, that school would be a place where Black males are nurtured and supported, where they receive encouragement to excel and guidance on how to achieve their goals and dreams. Yet for many Black males, the opposite is true. Throughout the United States, Black males are more likely than any other group in American society to be punished (typically through some form of exclusion), labeled, and categorized for special education (often without an apparent disability), and to experience academic failure (Schott Foundation, 2004). The existence of such patterns does not mean that Black male students are innocent victims of unfair treatment, but it does raise the possibility that in schools throughout the United States, the failure of Black males is so pervasive that it appears to be the norm and so does not raise alarms.

School discipline patterns are just one of several troubling indicators commonly associated with Black males. When the full picture of educational performance among Black males is analyzed, the results are even more disturbing. On every indicator associated with progress and achievement—enrollment in honors courses, Advanced Placement, and gifted programs—Black males are vastly underrepresented, and in every category associated with failure and distress—discipline referrals, dropout rates, grade retention—Black males are overrepresented (Schott Foundation, 2004). In what is perhaps the most ominous and obvious sign of distress, for the past several years, there have been more Black males between the ages eighteen and twenty-four in prison than in college (Littles et al., 2007). Such patterns of failure and hardship are so pronounced and entrenched that they end up shaping adult outcomes and have broad and far-reaching implications for the status of Black men and Black people in American society.2

What is perhaps even more troubling than the numbers, which are themselves overwhelming and disturbing, is the weakness of the response to these problems. In many schools in the United States, educators have grown so accustomed to seeing Black male students drop out, fail, and get punished that their plight is barely regarded as a cause for alarm. In fact, it could be argued that the problems confronting Black males are so pervasive and commonplace that they have been normalized. Like other social problems that have been normalized—attitudes toward the homeless, or society’s tolerance for the large number of people who lack access to adequate health care—a sense of complacency characterizes how many Americans think about the failure of Black males. Because the educational problems afflicting Black males have been normalized, the barrage of dismal statistics barely registers a sense of outrage or concern, with the notable exception of many Black communities. Were the problems confronting Black males regarded as an “American” problem, meaning an issue like cancer or global warming that must be taken on by the entire society in order to be addressed, the plight of Black males would be a subject that policymakers and research centers would embrace in an effort to find ways to reduce and ameliorate the hardships.

Although there have been calls for urgent action of this kind, it is hard to argue that recognition of the need to address this pressing problem is widespread. This is why the mass incarceration of Black males (Black males comprise approximately 50 percent of the adult male prison) has elicited few calls for action to reverse these trends (Belk, 2006). Black males are ten times more likely to be incarcerated than any other segment of the U.S. population, but little public concern is expressed about the impact this problem has on Black families or Black men themselves. Although the majority of men behind bars are there for nonviolent crimes and although a substantial number of those we incarcerate are poor, uneducated, and mentally disabled, very little public concern has registered over the injustices of the criminal justice system. Today there are few serious calls for alternatives to incarceration even for the aged or the drug addicted, and surprisingly little focus on what might be done to educate and rehabilitate those who are warehoused in our nation’s prisons.

In public schools, the normalization of failure on the part of Black males is equally pervasive. This is undoubtedly because many educators have grown accustomed to the idea that a large percentage of the Black male students they serve will fail, get into trouble, and drop out of school. Such complacency is present not only in large urban school systems, where it could be argued that failure for many different kinds of students (boys and girls of various races) has long been accepted, but in more affluent suburban schools as well.

Not long ago I was leading a workshop on the achievement gap for principals in an affluent school district. I presented a set of strategies that I suggested could be used to address lagging achievement among certain groups of students. At the end of the presentation, I encouraged the principals to do more to address the blatant ways in which students were denied learning opportunities through what I described as structural indifference. During the discussion that followed, one of the principals posed what I felt was a fairly provocative question. He explained that he had recently been hired by the district and was still becoming familiar with his school. One of the things about the school that he did not understand was why he consistently observed a large group of Black males loitering in the hallways after the bell had rung. He had made efforts to encourage them to get to class on time, yet he felt they were deliberately taking their time and that teachers and administrators at the school seemed to ignore their lingering. Disturbed by their apparent intransigence and curious about where they might be going, he decided to follow them to their destination. After chatting casually about the importance of being in class on time, he was surprised to find that all of the young men in this group were descending to the basement of the school. When I asked why they were going to the basement, he explained that the special education classes were located there. With a note of sarcasm in his voice, he asked, “Do you think that maybe they’re embarrassed to be seen heading into the basement? Do you think it might be a good idea to take those classes out of the basement?”

In schools across the country, it is surprising that more educators are not calling for Black males and other students who are denied educational opportunities to be removed from basements, detention centers, and classrooms where they are not learning. They should object not merely to the ways in which some students are physically marginalized in educational settings, but to the ways in which they have been psychologically and socially isolated as well. A large body of research has shown that when students are labeled and sorted into groups on the basis of their academic ability or behavior (that is, as troublemakers or underachievers), the behaviors that were ostensibly targeted for treatment are often reinforced instead of being ameliorated (Oakes, 1985). This is because such practices almost always lead to lowered expectations on the part of the adults assigned to teach them. Even more insidious, those who are labeled often internalize the labels assigned to them. As a result, instead of providing a setting where problematic behaviors can be modified, the sorting practices many schools use reinforce the very behaviors they were intended to correct (Obidah, 1995).

How is it possible that schools would adopt practices designed to help students that end up having the opposite effect? Much of the answer to this question lies in the assumptions and expectations that many educators hold toward Black males and other students they have grown accustomed to seeing struggle and fail in school. What is needed to reverse these trends is more than a new program or policy. There must instead be a complete interrogation of the thinking that has allowed such practices to operate without challenge. The assumptions held toward Black males that allow them to be regarded largely as a problem, pathologize their needs, and deny them the opportunity to learn must be thoroughly discussed, debated, and challenged. It is important for educators to understand that the practices that result in the marginalization of Black boys in school mirror the attitudes and beliefs that rationalize the marginalization of Black men in society at large. In too many cases, educators do not question the assumptions they hold, and as a result, those who are charged with teaching, advising, and mentoring Black males too often inadvertently adopt attitudes and postures that are unsupportive and even hostile toward the boys they serve.

The Trouble with Black Boys

The trouble with Black boys is that too often they are assumed to be at risk because they are too aggressive, too loud, too violent, too dumb, too hard to control, too streetwise, and too focused on sports. Such assumptions and projections have the effect of fostering the very behaviors and attitudes we find problematic and objectionable. The trouble with Black boys is that most never have a chance to be thought of as potentially smart and talented or to demonstrate talents in science, music, or literature. The trouble with Black boys is that too often they are placed in schools where their needs for nurturing, support, and loving discipline are not met. Instead, they are labeled, shunned, and treated in ways that create and reinforce an inevitable cycle of failure.

I was reminded of just how unsupportive some educators can be toward Black male students when I was visiting an elementary school in the San Francisco Bay Area. After the assistant principal gave me a tour and proudly pointed out the new library and computer facilities, he shook his head with disgust as he noticed a little boy waiting for him outside his office. Seeing the boy, he turned to me and declared, “You know, there’s a prison cell in San Quentin waiting for that boy.” I responded with shock: “Really! How do you know?” He explained that the boy’s father and brother were in prison and then prophesied, “I can tell from the way that he behaves that he’s headed to prison too.” I then looked at him and asked, “Well, given what you know about this boy and his circumstances at home, what is the school doing to keep him out of prison?” The assistant principal reacted to my question with incredulity. He explained that the boy was frequently in trouble and that what he was about to do was to place the boy, only eight years old, on an extended and indefinite suspension. Due to his misbehavior in school, he was going to be sent home, where he would be under the supervision of his sick grandmother. His schoolwork was to be delivered to his house and collected at the end of each week until they felt he was ready to return to school. I asked the assistant principal if he thought this strategy would help this child, and he responded by saying he was more concerned about the “students who wanted to learn.” He elaborated, “A child like this needs more attention than we can provide. I can’t allow one kid to take up so much of my time that I end up ignoring the needs of others.” Though he didn’t admit it, that assistant principal was in effect washing his hands of this boy and allowing him to head on the path to prison, just as he had predicted.

What I find troubling about this incident is that the assistant principal never considered the possibility that the school or even the community might be able to do something to help this boy and thereby reduce the likelihood that he would one day end up in prison. Perhaps even more disturbing, the assistant principal was a Black man.

I do not make light of the difficulty in addressing the needs of troubled students. Children who come from homes without adequate supervision, guidance, and support pose a tremendous challenge to the educators charged with serving their academic needs. I also do not take the position that schools should be expected to solve these problems by themselves. Charged with the task of educating disadvantaged and neglected children, many educators find themselves overwhelmed by their needs, many of which have little to do with academic learning, but are much more related to their health, unmet social needs, and emotional well-being. In cities, towns, trailer parks, and housing projects across the United States, there are growing numbers of children in such circumstances (Children’s Defense Fund, 2006). If our society is to find ways to reduce the numbers who end up permanently unemployed, incarcerated, or prematurely dead, we must do more to address their needs, especially while they are young.

I fully acknowledge that Black males are not helpless victims in this situation. In fact, it is my contention that the only way we will begin to break the cycle of failure is if Black males are empowered and engaged in addressing these issues themselves. To not acknowledge that Black males have the capacity to make choices that will positively affect their lives—to study, work hard, not take drugs, or not abuse women, to support their children and raise their families in a responsible manner—is merely another way of inadvertently contributing to their marginalization and powerlessness. Certainly there are many factors that Black males do not control that have tremendous bearing on the quality of their lives: the quality of the school they attend, the kind of neighborhood they live in, whether there are jobs available or employers who will hire them, whether police officers will stop them without justification or judges will treat them fairly, or even if they will be born healthy and raised in loving, supportive families. Nonetheless, there are factors that they can and must exercise control over.

I made this point recently to a large group of incarcerated Black and Latino young men whom I was asked to address at New York City’s Rikers Island, the largest penal facility in the world. Prior to my visit, I spent a great deal of time thinking about what I could possibly say that might serve as a source of inspiration to them. I knew the statistics: two-thirds would end up back in prison in two years or less, and I knew that despite their age, many of them had already experienced so much failure and rejection that in all likelihood, they had already given up on the prospect of living productive lives. Still, the challenge of saying something that might inspire even a few to recognize that they had the power to make different choices on how they wanted to live intrigued me, and I embraced the task.

Upon entering the prison and gradually making my way through a vast series of security checkpoints, I entered a large room where several hundred young men were seated. With guards posted all around and sullen, expressionless looks on the faces of most of the young men, I opened my lecture with a statement that I hoped would provoke and shake them out of the utter resignation that seemed to engulf them. “There is a conspiracy to keep you in prison,” I charged, “and there are many people whose jobs and income depend on keeping you here.” Seeing some of them sit up in their seats and sensing that I now had their attention, I went on. “There are policymakers planning to build more prisons right now, and whole towns in upstate New York that rely upon their prisons for jobs and economic development. There are corporations that run prisons for profit, taking advantage of the low wages prisoners receive for the work they do. Even the guards in this room, while they may not be part of the conspiracy, understand that their jobs depend on you.” At that point, several of the guards looked at me with expressions of concern on their faces. I continued, “My question to you is this: Are you part of the conspiracy? These prisons can’t stay filled unless you mess up again, unless you make bad choices, and do stupid things that will allow you to be put back into a place like this after you are released. The statistics show that most of you will be back in prison in less than two years after you’ve been released. So I want to know: Are you part of the conspiracy to keep Black and Latino men in prison?”

My tactic worked. My charge that they might be part of a conspiracy to keep them in prison drew them out of their stupor and resignation and spurred a lively discussion and debate about personal responsibility.

I believe that we must engage Black men and boys in debates about personal responsibility, preferably before they enter prison. I agree with Bill Cosby and Alvin Poussaint, authors of the new book poignantly titled Come On People, that parents must take more responsibility in raising their children. However, I completely disagree with their approach. I see very little evidence that condemning parents for doing a poor job in raising their children will improve the situation. Unlike Cosby and Poussaint, I also believe that our society—its schools, churches, private businesses and corporations, and local government—must do more to address the ways in which Black boys and men are set up for failure. What would happen if instead of sending the eight-year-old boy home, the assistant principal had engaged him in a discussion about his behavior in the classroom and tried to get him to understand how he was affecting others? What would have happened if the assistant principal had initiated a conversation with his students about why their classroom was in the basement and, after agreeing to work with them to get it removed, challenged them to take their education seriously and encouraged them to enter the classroom on time regardless of where the room was located?

The Miner’s Canary: The Need for Equity in an Inequitable Society

Lani Guinier and Gerald Torres implore us to view those who are racially marginalized like the miner’s canary: vulnerable populations whose hardships alert us to the dangers confronting our society. They write:

Those who are racially marginalized are like the miner’s canary: their distress is the first sign of danger that threatens us all. It is easy enough to think that when we sacrifice this canary, the only harm done is to communities of color. Yet others ignore problems that converge around racial minorities at their own peril, for these problems are symptoms warning us that we are all at risk. . . . The miner’s canary metaphor helps us to understand why and how race continues to be salient. Racialized communities signal problems with the ways we have structured power and privilege. These pathologies are not located in the canary [pp. 11, 12].

Black boys are the miner’s canary in our nation’s schools, but they are not the only vulnerable group. In some schools, immigrant students, particularly those who are undocumented, are the most vulnerable. Their right to an education, while recognized by the courts,3 is under attack from militias, television pundits, politicians, and others who are waging a war against the undocumented. But even those they call “illegal immigrants” are vital to this nation’s economy because they come to this country to work in jobs that most Americans refuse to accept. Yet they are increasingly being hunted down like fugitives and relegated to lives at the margins and in the shadows of society. Today undocumented students who study hard and apply themselves must face the fact that for most, their diligence will more likely lead not to college but to the same low-wage, dirty jobs their parents hold.4

Poor Whites in trailer parks, rust belt towns, and rural areas across the country also find themselves among the vulnerable and disadvantaged. Too often those who champion civil rights ignore the fact that while race sometimes acts as a protective buffer against the hardships associated with poverty in the United States, it does not work this way all of the time. There are poor Whites in rural Maine, Arkansas, and West Virginia whose chances of going to college are no better than that of Blacks in the inner city. Unlike the visibility and attention frequently directed toward poor Blacks (a mixed blessing at best), poor Whites are almost invisible in America, and few policy initiatives are aimed at addressing their plight. For poor White students, the pursuit of equity in education could also serve as a means to counter the pernicious effects of poverty.

Despite its many flaws and shortcomings, public education remains the “one best system” (Tyack, 1974); it is the only system that turns no child away, regardless of race, status, language, or need. For this reason, public schools are perhaps the only institution that is positioned to play a role in addressing the effects of poverty and social marginalization and furthering the goal of equity. Christopher Jencks (1972) reminds us that equity is not the same as equal opportunity. When practiced in the context of education, equity is focused on outcomes and results and is rooted in the recognition that because children have different needs and come from different circumstances, we cannot treat them all the same.

This book articulates the need for equity in public education and calls attention to the many factors that undermine and thwart efforts to make it an attainable goal. Although I do not claim to have spelled out a complete agenda for pursuing equity in our nation’s public schools, I do hope that readers will identify strategies and approaches that they can apply to achieve similar goals. My hope is that after reading this book, you will feel a bit like I hoped those young men at Rikers might feel: more empowered to recognize that each of us can play a role in furthering equity through education and less inclined to accept the status quo.

Despite all of the ways in which recent educational reforms may have taken the soul out of education—overemphasizing testing and underemphasizing learning, treating teachers like technicians rather than creative professionals, humiliating schools that serve poor children rather than providing them with the support and resources that they need—the fact remains that through education, we have the potential and power to open minds, tap the imagination, cultivate skills, and inspire the innate ability in all human beings to dream and create. This is what makes education such a special endeavor, and this is why public schools remain our most valuable resource.

Black boys are merely one of several canaries in the mines of our schools. Our challenge as educators, parents, policymakers, and activists is to find ways not merely to save Black boys and others who are at risk but to create conditions so that saving is no longer necessary. How we respond to our schools and those who are not now well served there is more than merely a call to do good. What happens in our nation’s schools is truly a matter of self-preservation, for whether we can use education to transform lives and expand opportunities will ultimately determine what kind of society we live in.

Part I

The Student Experience

1

Joaquin’s DilemmaUnderstanding the Link Between Racial Identity and School-Related Behaviors

When I am asked to speak or write about the relationship between racial identity and academic performance, I often tell the story of my elder son, Joaquin. Joaquin did extremely well throughout most of his early schooling. He was an excellent athlete (participating in soccer, basketball, and wrestling), played piano and percussion, and did very well in his classes. My wife and I never heard any complaints about him. In fact, we heard nothing but praise about his behavior from teachers, who referred to him as “courteous,” “respectful,” and “a leader among his peers.” Then suddenly, in the tenth grade, Joaquin’s grades took a nosedive. He failed math and science, and for the first time he started getting into trouble at school. At home he was often angry and irritable for no particular reason.

My wife and I were left asking ourselves, “What’s going on with our son? What’s behind this sudden change in behavior?” Despite my disappointment and growing frustration, I tried not to allow his behavior to drive us apart. I started spending more time with him, and I started listening more intently to what he had to tell me about school and his friends. As I did, several things became very clear to me. One was that all of the friends he had grown up with in our neighborhood in South Berkeley (one of the poorest areas of the city) were dropping out of school. These were mostly Black, working-class kids who didn’t have a lot of support at home or at school and were experiencing academic failure. Even though Joaquin came from a middle-class home with two supportive parents, most of his reference group—that is, the students he was closest to and identified with—did not.

The other thing that was changing for Joaquin was his sense of how he had to present himself when he was out on the streets and in school. As he grew older, Joaquin felt the need to project the image of a tough and angry young Black man. He believed that in order to be respected, he had to carry himself in a manner that was intimidating and even menacing. To behave differently—too nice, gentle, kind, or sincere—meant that he would be vulnerable and preyed on. I learned that for Joaquin, part of his new persona also involved placing less value on academics and greater emphasis on being cool and hanging out with the right people.

By eleventh grade, Joaquin gradually started working out of these behaviors, and by twelfth grade, he seemed to snap out of his angry state. He became closer to his family, his grades improved, he rejoined the soccer team, he resumed playing piano, and he even started producing music. As I reflected on the two years of anger and self-destructiveness that he went through, I came to the conclusion that Joaquin was trying desperately to figure out what it meant to be a young Black man. As I reflect on that period, I realize that like many other Black male adolescents, Joaquin was trapped by stereotypes, and they were pulling him down. During this difficult period, it was very hard for me to help him through this process of identity formation. While he was in the midst of it, the only thing I could do was talk to him, listen to him, and try to let him know what it was like for me when I went through adolescence.

As a high school student, I had coped with the isolation that came from being one of the few students of color in my advanced classes by working extra hard to prove that I could do as well as or better than my White peers. However, outside the classroom, I also worked hard to prove to my less studious friends that I was cool or “down,” as we would say. For me this meant playing basketball, hanging out, fighting when necessary, and acting like “one of the guys.” I felt forced to adopt a split personality: I behaved one way in class, another way with my friends, and yet another way at home.

The Emerging Awareness of Race

Adolescence is typically a period when young people become more detached from their parents and attempt to establish an independent identity. For racial minorities, adolescence is also a period when young people begin to solidify their understanding of their racial identities. For many, understanding the significance of race means recognizing that membership within a racial category requires certain social and political commitments. Adolescence is often a difficult and painful period for many young people. And for young people struggling to figure out the meaning and significance of their racial identities, the experience can be even more difficult.

Awareness of race and the significance of racial difference often begins in early childhood. We know from psychological research that the development of racial identity is very context dependent, especially in the early years. Children who attend racially diverse schools or reside in racially diverse communities are much more likely to become aware of race at an earlier age than children in more homogeneous settings.1 In the latter context, race is often not a defining issue or a primary basis for identity formation. When children see their race as the norm, they are less likely to perceive characteristics associated with it (for example, physical appearance) as markers of inferiority.

In contrast, children who grow up in more integrated settings become aware of physical differences fairly early. Interacting with children from other racial and ethnic backgrounds in a society that has historically treated race as a means of distinguishing groups and individuals often forces young people to develop racial identities early. However, prior to adolescence, they do not usually understand the political and social significance associated with differences in appearance. For young children, being a person with different skin color may be no more significant than being thin or heavy, tall or short. Differences in skin color, hair texture, and facial features are simply seen as being among the many differences that all children have. In environments where racist and ethnocentric behavior is common, children may learn fairly early that racist speech is hurtful.2 They may know that calling someone a nigger is worse than calling that person stupid, but they may not necessarily understand the meaning of such words or know why their use inflicts hurt on others.

In 1999 I was conducting research with colleagues at an elementary school in East Oakland. We were interested in understanding how the practice of separating children on the basis of language differences affected their social relationships and perceptions of students from other groups. As is true in many other parts of California, East Oakland was experiencing a major demographic change as large numbers of Mexican and Central American immigrants were moving into communities that had previously been predominantly African American. As is often the case, schools in East Oakland serve as the place where children from these groups encounter one another, and at several of the high schools there had been a significant increase in interracial conflict.3

In the elementary school where we did our research, we found that most of the Black and Latino students had very little interaction with each other. Although they attended the same school, the students had been placed in separate classes, ostensibly for the purpose of serving their language needs. From our interviews with students, we learned that even very young children viewed peers from the other racial group with suspicion and animosity, although they could not explain why. Interestingly, when we asked the students why they thought they had been placed in separate classrooms, most thought it was to prevent them from fighting. We also found that the younger Mexican students (between ages five and eight) saw themselves as White, and the Black students also referred to the Mexican students as White. However, as the children entered early adolescence (age nine or ten), the Mexican youth began to realize that they were not considered White outside this setting, and they began to understand for the first time that being Mexican meant something very different from being White.

Depending on the context, it is not uncommon for minority children to express a desire to reject group membership based on skin color, especially during early adolescence. As they start to realize that in this society to be Black or Brown means to be seen as “less than”—whether it be less smart, less capable, or less attractive—they often express a desire to be associated with the dominant and more powerful group. This tendency was evident among some of the younger Mexican students in our study. However, as they grew older, the political reality of life in East Oakland served to reinforce their understanding that they were definitely not White. As one student told us, “White kids go to nice schools with swimming pools and grass, not a ghetto school like we go to.”

In adolescence, awareness of race and its implications for individual identity become even more salient. For many young men and women of color, racial identity development is affected by some of the same factors that influence individual identity development in general. According to Erikson and other theorists of child development, as children enter adolescence, they become extremely conscious of their peers and seek out acceptance from their reference group.4 As they become increasingly aware of themselves as social beings, their perception of self tends to be highly dependent on acceptance and affirmation by others. For some adolescents, identification with and attachment to peer groups sometimes takes on so much importance that it can override other attachments, to family, parents, and teachers.

For adolescents in racially integrated schools, racial and ethnic identity also frequently take on new significance with respect to friendship groups and dating. It is not uncommon in integrated settings for preadolescent children to interact and form friendships easily across racial boundaries—if their parents or other adults allow them to do so.5 However, as young people enter adolescence, such transgressions of racial boundaries can become more problematic. As they become increasingly aware of the significance associated with group differences, they generally become more concerned with how their peers will react to their participation in interracial relationships, and they may begin to self-segregate. As they get older, young people also become more aware of the politics associated with race. They become more cognizant of racial hierarchies and prejudice, even if they cannot articulate the political significance of race. They can feel its significance, but they often cannot explain what it all means.

Between 2000 and 2003, I worked closely with fifteen racially integrated school districts in the Minority Student Achievement Network (MSAN). At the racially integrated high schools in MSAN, students often become much more aware that racial group membership comes with certain political commitments and social expectations. In these schools, high-achieving students of color (like my son Joaquin) are sometimes unwilling to enroll in Advanced Placement courses or engage in activities that have traditionally been associated with White students because they fear becoming estranged from their friends. If they appear to engage in behavior that violates racial norms, they may be seen as rejecting membership in their racial group and run the risk of being regarded as a race traitor. For this reason, I have urged the districts in MSAN not to rely on the initiative of students to break down racial barriers but to put the onus on school leaders to take steps that will make this border crossing easier and more likely.6

Theories of the Identity-Achievement Connection

For educators, understanding the process through which young people come to see themselves as belonging to particular racial categories is important because it has tremendous bearing on the so-called achievement gap. Throughout the United States, schools are characterized by increasing racial segregation7 and widespread racial disparities in academic achievement.8 Blatant inequities in funding, quality, and organization are also characteristic of the American educational system. Despite overwhelming evidence of a strong correlation between race and academic performance, there is considerable confusion among researchers about how and why such a correlation exists.

The scholars whose work has had the greatest influence on these issues are John Ogbu and Signithia Fordham, both of whom have argued that Black students from all socioeconomic backgrounds develop “oppositional identities” that lead them to view schooling as a form of forced assimilation to White cultural values.9 Ogbu and Fordham argue that Black students and other “nonvoluntary minorities” (such as Chicanos, Puerto Ricans, Native Americans, and others whose groups have been dominated by White European culture) come to equate academic success with “acting White.” For these researchers, such perceptions lead to the devaluation of academic pursuits and the adoption of self-defeating behaviors that inhibit possibilities for academic success. In this framework, the few students who aspire to achieve academically must pay a heavy price for success. Black students who perform at high levels may be ostracized by their peers as traitors and “sellouts” and may be forced to choose between maintaining ties with their peers or achieving success in school.10 This would explain why middle-class minority students like my son Joaquin would underperform academically despite their social and economic advantages.

My own research challenges Ogbu and Fordham’s “acting-white” thesis. While carrying out research among high school students in northern California, I discovered that some high-achieving minority students are ostracized by their peers, but others (like me) learn how to succeed in both worlds by adopting multiple identities. Still others actively and deliberately challenge racial stereotypes and seek to redefine their racial identities by showing that it is possible to do well in school and be proud of who they are.