Reclaiming Our Way promoting the well-being of African American children & families

Jim Crow in the Classroom: New Report Finds Segregation Lives on in U.S. Schools

In a legal climate that sanctions (encourages you could argue) the disenfranchisement of African American voters, while simultaneously (re-)creating a three-tiered racially and economically segregated schooling system, many African American children and families are still managing to create meaningful opportunity out of limited resources - consistent with the generations of our families in front of us.

As we continue to press on, and do our best for our children and families, we have to simultaneously look outside of our own neighborhoods and communities so that we can see the larger pattern. This, I would argue, will help us to better understand what's really happening in our own neighborhoods and communities.

Another article discussed on Democracy Now yesterday, The Resegregation of America’s Schools, tells some of this larger story. I've always argued that we need to be more attentive to what's happening around us, otherwise we'll continue to be on the receiving end of policies and schemes to undermine our children, our families and our community.

From the interview and discussion...

Well, I think it’s very obvious, if you just look strictly at the facts, that we still have a racialized K-12 system and that black and brown students tend to be in schools where they’re receiving an inferior education. They have a less rigorous curriculum. They’re less likely to get access to classes that will help them in college, such as advanced placement physics, higher-level math. And they are most likely to be taught by inexperienced teachers. So, when you have this system where black and brown students are receiving a very different education than white students, and then once you get to the college level you say race no longer matters, and despite your disadvantage in a public educational system, that now we are all—everyone should compete at the same level, I think, in some sense, it’s just—there’s just a big disconnect between what’s happening on these two levels of education.

Approximately 20 minutes...