the new averagebro blog

Since I’ve been entrusted by God to rear a young black man (AverageToddler is 21 months going on 21 years right about now), much of my time is spent pondering ways to ensure he doesn’t end up on the bad end of some random statistic. One such statistic would be the awful academic performance of black boys, who seem to universally trail every other demographic category in nearly all standardized tests. The achievement gap between blacks and whites is most often cited as a troubling issue in public education. Perhaps less analyzed is the perceived longstanding gap between males and females in general.

A recently released study seems to rebut this theory, but if you’re reading with your third eye, I’m sure you wouldn’t miss the underlying inference.

A new study to be released today on gender equity in education concludes that a “boys crisis” in U.S. schools is a myth and that both sexes have stayed the same or improved on standardized tests in the past decade.

The report by the nonprofit American Association of University Women, which promotes education and equity for women, reviewed nearly 40 years of data on achievement from fourth grade to college and for the first time analyzed gender differences within economic and ethnic categories.

The most important conclusion of “Where the Girls Are: The Facts About Gender Equity in Education” is that academic success is more closely associated with family income than with gender, its authors said.

Can’t really knock that assertion. Most studies seem to indicate that the socioeconomic status of the child’s parents is indeed a large factor in whether a kid does well in school. There are notable exceptions to this rule (ie: Paris Hilton, who never finished high school), but overall it’s on point.

But here’s where the whole study goes off the track and veers head first into the tackiest variety of racial politricks.

Math results from the NAEP show that white male students have an advantage over white female students, though there is less difference between Hispanic girls and boys.

From 1978 to 2004, among students age 13 and 17, white males scored higher on average than white females on 10 of 18 tests. For Hispanic students, 13- and 17-year-old males outscored females on three of the 18 tests. There was no gap among African American girls and boys

“A lot of people think it is the boys that need the help,” co-author Christianne Corbett said. “The point of the report is to highlight the fact that that is not exclusively true. There is no crisis with boys. If there is a crisis, it is with African American and Hispanic students and low-income students, girls and boys.”

Whoa! There is no crisis with boys, as long as they’re white of course. Otherwise, who gives a sh*t?

I’m not sure if this study’s co-author meant the above statement to be interpreted the way I’m taking it, but damn, what else could you possible read outta this?

I’m pretty darned sure there’s indeed a crisis among young black boys (and girls for that matter) in public education. Here in Maryland, the state created a blue ribbon panel to study just exactly why black boys lag behind other groups in virtually all standardized tests. The three year study indicated that a lack of black male teachers in high poverty areas, culturally ignorant white female instructors, and the systematic tracking of black boys into special education programs were chief among several culprits. This investigative report was issued by the State of Maryland, but most of what’s in there is pretty universal.

So, what did the state do with the findings of this expensive three year study? Why, they released them the week of Christmas, of course, when schools were out and the media was clearly focused elsewhere. The valuable information fell on deaf ears. Few, if any of the suggested solutions outlined there have been discussed since.

It’s almost as if the state issued the report merely to say “we issued a report”.

If there’s any small upside of this study, it’s that it lead funding for the tutor/mentor program that I spent the past academic year as a part of. The program wasn’t without it’s flaws, nor was I, but I think that at the end, between his parents, the program, and me, AverageMentee grew considerably. His grades improved, he passed all his standardized tests, and his reading comprehension grew by leaps and bounds. The obvious issue is, each and every kid can’t have this sort of attention and these level of resources dedicated to them over a prolonged period of time. So, while he might have succeeded, his classmates who weren’t a part of the program likely didn’t. The cumulative effect on the school’s No Child Left Behind status is probably going to be negligible at best.

I don’t pretend to have the answers to all this stuff, I’m still just trying to figure out how to stop my son from putting his hand in the toilet. But in the meantime, I know that having more hands on deck sure wouldn’t hurt. Our program is getting funding for next year, but without more volunteer mentors, you can’t really help more kids. Recruiting black males willing and able to take an hour off work once a week to go tutor during school hours isn’t as simple as it sounds.

I’ll throw in the obligatory Take The AverageBro Challenge plug in here, but honestly, all this stuff is pretty discouraging, and borderline depressing if you dwell on it too long. So, I’ll just run the question by you guys.

Question: Other than increased parental participation, what is the miracle cure for the crisis in urban education?

No Crisis For Boys In Schools, Study Says [WashPost]

Task Force on the Education of Maryland’s African-American Males Study [UMd Dept of Education]

Since I’ve been entrusted by God to rear a young black man (AverageToddler is 21 months going on 21 years right about now), much of my time is spent pondering ways to ensure he doesn’t end up on the bad end of some random statistic. One such statistic would be the awful academic performance of black boys, who seem to universally trail every other demographic category in nearly all standardized tests. The achievement gap between blacks and whites is most often cited as a troubling issue in public education. Perhaps less analyzed is the perceived longstanding gap between males and females in general.

A recently released study seems to rebut this theory, but if you’re reading with your third eye, I’m sure you wouldn’t miss the underlying inference.

A new study to be released today on gender equity in education concludes that a “boys crisis” in U.S. schools is a myth and that both sexes have stayed the same or improved on standardized tests in the past decade.

The report by the nonprofit American Association of University Women, which promotes education and equity for women, reviewed nearly 40 years of data on achievement from fourth grade to college and for the first time analyzed gender differences within economic and ethnic categories.

The most important conclusion of “Where the Girls Are: The Facts About Gender Equity in Education” is that academic success is more closely associated with family income than with gender, its authors said.

Can’t really knock that assertion. Most studies seem to indicate that the socioeconomic status of the child’s parents is indeed a large factor in whether a kid does well in school. There are notable exceptions to this rule (ie: Paris Hilton, who never finished high school), but overall it’s on point.

But here’s where the whole study goes off the track and veers head first into the tackiest variety of racial politricks.

Math results from the NAEP show that white male students have an advantage over white female students, though there is less difference between Hispanic girls and boys.

From 1978 to 2004, among students age 13 and 17, white males scored higher on average than white females on 10 of 18 tests. For Hispanic students, 13- and 17-year-old males outscored females on three of the 18 tests. There was no gap among African American girls and boys

“A lot of people think it is the boys that need the help,” co-author Christianne Corbett said. “The point of the report is to highlight the fact that that is not exclusively true. There is no crisis with boys. If there is a crisis, it is with African American and Hispanic students and low-income students, girls and boys.”

Whoa! There is no crisis with boys, as long as they’re white of course. Otherwise, who gives a sh*t?

I’m not sure if this study’s co-author meant the above statement to be interpreted the way I’m taking it, but damn, what else could you possible read outta this?

I’m pretty darned sure there’s indeed a crisis among young black boys (and girls for that matter) in public education. Here in Maryland, the state created a blue ribbon panel to study just exactly why black boys lag behind other groups in virtually all standardized tests. The three year study indicated that a lack of black male teachers in high poverty areas, culturally ignorant white female instructors, and the systematic tracking of black boys into special education programs were chief among several culprits. This investigative report was issued by the State of Maryland, but most of what’s in there is pretty universal.

So, what did the state do with the findings of this expensive three year study? Why, they released them the week of Christmas, of course, when schools were out and the media was clearly focused elsewhere. The valuable information fell on deaf ears. Few, if any of the suggested solutions outlined there have been discussed since.

It’s almost as if the state issued the report merely to say “we issued a report”.

If there’s any small upside of this study, it’s that it lead funding for the tutor/mentor program that I spent the past academic year as a part of. The program wasn’t without it’s flaws, nor was I, but I think that at the end, between his parents, the program, and me, AverageMentee grew considerably. His grades improved, he passed all his standardized tests, and his reading comprehension grew by leaps and bounds. The obvious issue is, each and every kid can’t have this sort of attention and these level of resources dedicated to them over a prolonged period of time. So, while he might have succeeded, his classmates who weren’t a part of the program likely didn’t. The cumulative effect on the school’s No Child Left Behind status is probably going to be negligible at best.

I don’t pretend to have the answers to all this stuff, I’m still just trying to figure out how to stop my son from putting his hand in the toilet. But in the meantime, I know that having more hands on deck sure wouldn’t hurt. Our program is getting funding for next year, but without more volunteer mentors, you can’t really help more kids. Recruiting black males willing and able to take an hour off work once a week to go tutor during school hours isn’t as simple as it sounds.

I’ll throw in the obligatory Take The AverageBro Challenge plug in here, but honestly, all this stuff is pretty discouraging, and borderline depressing if you dwell on it too long. So, I’ll just run the question by you guys.

Question: Other than increased parental participation, what is the miracle cure for the crisis in urban education?

No Crisis For Boys In Schools, Study Says [WashPost]

Task Force on the Education of Maryland’s African-American Males Study [UMd Dept of Education]

I’m a proud HBCU graduate. My southern Negro College engineering school prepared me well for the real world, but perhaps more so, was my first real experience of being in an environment almost entirely run by black folks. This of course had it’s pluses and minuses. The facilities were downright meager compared to your typical “white college”. As a freshman, my floor of 100+ young men shared three pay phones. The climate controls were an either/or proposition of blasting heat or Arctic level cold. The bathrooms featured prison-style open showers and toilets that worked when they preferred, which is to say, not very often. The dorms were built using the same floorplan as our state penitentiary. The cafeteria food was one step above the stuff I occasionally dole out when I do community outreach at our local homeless shelter. And yeah, there was saltpeter in there, or so the urban legend went.

The odd thing about this is that for someone like myself who never had to “rough it” growing up, these somewhat less than ideal accommodations were bizarre motivating factors to bust my butt in class. I can’t speak for other HBCUs, but this lack of pampering, especially when contrasted with the Ritz-Carlton level accoutrements at our rival crosstown public “white college” oddly encouraged spirit and pride in my school. And in some equally odd fashion, it fostered an “us against the world” mentality that caused people to stick together and pull each other up. Besides, the level of instruction and education were world-class. Being surrounded by other brilliant black folks from all around the world broadened my horizons. And since the school is world-renowned for graduating more black engineers than any other any four year college, employers were practically knocking themselves over to cherrypick the best of the best. I graduated with honors, and walked away with my choice of 9 equally enticing offers. Best of all, since I was an in-state resident, my tuition was barely even $800/semester. Can you can “zero student loans”? I can.

Seriously, what’s not to like?

The big selling point on HBCUs in the early 90’s was that our schools generally had superior retention and graduation rates, and were universally hailed as being more supportive environments for black students. There were the cultural intangibles as well (read: girls and Two to Sixes), but that’s neither here nor there. When I walked across that stage on graduation day, you couldn’t tell me there was any better educational option for a black student than a quality (key word: quality. they ain’t all built alike) HBCU.

Over time, I’ve changed my tune a bit. Much of this has to do with post-grad exposure to other black folks who went to “white colleges”, and the realization that their overall experiences weren’t all that different from mine. And an equal amount comes from the realization that after your first real “job” post-graduation, nobody really cares or even asks where you went to college anymore. So, while in the past I might have been pretty dogged in my insistence that my son follow my lead and become a 3rd generation alumnus of my Negro College HBCU, I now realize they’re hardly one-size-fits all propositions. Some black folks who might have grown up in more progressive areas may not need the cultural experience. And kids nowadays aren’t willing to “rough it”. Even though most HBCUs have dramatically improved their facilities, they’re still decades behind your typical “white college”.

So, my final pro-HBCU argument would be the graduation and retention rates, which used to speak to some level of support that the typical student wouldn’t get at a majority institution. But after reading this little tidbit in the Sunday Post, I’m wondering if even that point has merit anymore.

More black students graduate from the University of Virginia within six years than from any other public university in the country, and here’s why: institutional commitment, an admissions process that selects strong students, generous financial aid and a network of peer advisers.

Nationally, there’s a gap of nearly 20 points between the percentage of black and white students who graduate; just 44 percent of black students finish within six years, according to four-year averages calculated by the Journal of Blacks in Higher Education, which has found U-Va. to be the leader “by far” among public schools for the past 14 years.

The University of Maryland has in recent years improved its six-year graduation rate, to 71 percent for black students who started in 2000. That’s part of a systemwide initiative to improve all of Maryland’s public universities’ six-year graduation rate for black students, which is as low as 20 percent at Coppin State.

The most recent figure from U-Va., for black students who began college in 2001, is just shy of 90 percent. That rate is lower than those at the top schools in the country (Harvard University has steadily been in the mid-90s) but better than most of the schools U-Va. considers peers, such as the University of California at Berkeley, the University of North Carolina, Cornell University and Vanderbilt University.

The reasons some black students drop out include cost, poor academic preparation from weak high schools, the racial climate and a lack of support because there hasn’t been a family tradition of college, according to Bruce Slater, the journal’s managing editor.

Truth be told, most of these schools have higher graduation rates because they generally are far more selective about which black students they admit. The mission of the typical HBCU isn’t the same as a UVa. HBCUs generally have lower standards of admission, in the name of giving nearly everyone a fair shake at a college education. But even that doesn’t explain the paltry graduation rates of some schools like Coppin State, Bowie State, and Virginia Union.

Seriously, I don’t want anyone to think I’m dumpin’ on my alma mater. I’m not. I give money. I use my management position to help get more alumni in the door at my company. It’s an even better school academically now than when I was there. The facilities are vastly improved. It is still dollar-for-dollar one of the best bargains in higher education. Sure, all the sports teams absolutely suck, but hey, you can’t have it all. If I had to do it all over again, I wouldn’t choose any other school. But after all these years, I guess I have to ask the dreaded question.

Question: Are Historically Black Colleges and Universities still relevant? Are you alarmed by the graduation rates of some HBCUs? Did you go to an HBCU? If so why? If not, why?

At U-Va., a Dean Making a Difference [WashPost]

Historically black colleges and universities Info [Wikipedia]