educating black children
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LeBron James’ I Promise School Receives a $1 Million Boost from Dick’s Sporting Goods
The good news keeps coming for LeBron James’ groundbreaking I Promise School in his native Akron, Ohio. Following April reports that the school was already yielding incredible results in its first year, the NBA star surprised I Promise students by announcing that they’d be receiving a brand new gym, thanks to a $1 million grant…
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Black Mississippi High School Grad Charges Her Salutatorian Honor Was Given to Less Qualified White Student to Appease Racist Townspeople
Apparently, in at least one Mississippi town, black folks can’t even come in second place without raising racist ire. According to a federal lawsuit, recent high school graduate Olecia James charges she was denied her rightful place as salutatorian of her Mississippi high school’s graduating class in a move the district made so as not…
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NY School Holds Mock Slave Auction Selling Black Students to White Kids
After an apparent celebration kicking off the return to 11 White History Months in a row, administrators at an exclusive private school in New York are scrambling to explain reports that a teacher held a series of mock slave auctions in which white students bid on their black classmates. According to WPIX, Rebecca Antinozzi, a…
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2 Former Louisiana Cops Indicted for Slamming 14-Year-Old on Ground, Into Desk
And people wonder why we don’t want more police officers in schools. Surveillance footage from October reveals two then-officers slamming a 14-year-old boy onto the ground and into a desk after he tried to walk away from administrators and out of a school office. In the video, former Officer Anthony Dupre handles the student like…
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Dear, Teacher: How Does It Feel to Be an Oppressor?
The New York Daily News reported Feb. 1—the start of Black History Month—that a teacher in a majority-minority school in the Bronx, N.Y., instructed three black children in her seventh-grade class to lie on the floor during a lesson on slavery. Then she stepped on the students’ backs, allegedly to show them “how it feels…
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Somebody Lied: Education Alone Can’t Dismantle White Supremacy
Editor’s note: Once a month, the National Interest column will tackle broader questions about what the country should do to increase educational opportunities for black youths. Americans like to think that if individuals are educated in great schools, they can pull themselves up by their proverbial bootstraps and bring their families with them. From childhood,…
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Black People Support Vouchers, Black Leaders Don’t. Who’s Right?
At times, black people, like any group battered and oppressed by the state, may celebrate any perception of forward motion. Folks scour social media pages to see who has what appointment, what political power is being amassed and what black person has been newly elected. Although I strongly believe in the need for more representation…
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The National Interest: All Money Ain’t Good Money: The Role of White Foundations in Social Justice Movements
Editor’s note: Once a month, the National Interest column will tackle broader questions about what the country should do to increase educational opportunities for black youths. There are wealthy white philanthropists in every city saying that they want to change urban education, but few are able to save their own organizations from whiteness. That’s because…
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'Crazy Baldheads' Seek to Eliminate Dreads
Is there a causal connection between hairstyles worn by black boys and their future success, and should we strongly encourage these boys to avoid wearing dreadlocks and braids? That’s what Steve Perry, Steve Harvey and the U.S. Army seem to be arguing. Recently, they teamed up to disseminate pearls for success to an audience of…