Black Males Doing Worse Than Expected In US Schools

Proficiency of Black Young Men Is Bleak & Getting Bleaker!

By TRIP GABRIEL

Only 12 percent of black fourth-grade boys are proficient in reading, compared with 38 percent of white boys, and only 12 percent of black eighth-grade boys are proficient in math, compared with 44 percent of white boys.

Poverty alone does not seem to explain the differences: poor white boys do just as well as African-American boys who do not live in poverty, measured by whether they qualify for subsidized school lunches.

The data was distilled from highly respected national math and reading tests, known as the National Assessment for Educational Progress, which are given to students in fourth and eighth grades, most recently in 2009. The report, “A Call for Change,” is to be released Tuesday by the Council of the Great City Schools, an advocacy group for urban public schools.

Although the outlines of the problem and many specifics have been previously reported, the group hopes that including so much of what it calls “jaw-dropping data” in one place will spark a new sense of national urgency.

“What this clearly shows is that black males who are not eligible for free and reduced-price lunch are doing no better than white males who are poor,” said Michael Casserly, executive director of the council.

The report shows that black boys on average fall behind from their earliest years. Black mothers have a higher infant mortality rate and black children are twice as likely as whites to live in a home where no parent has a job. In high school, African-American boys drop out at nearly twice the rate of white boys, and their SAT scores are on average 104 points lower. In college, black men represented just 5 percent of students in 2008.

The analysis of results on the national tests found that math scores in 2009 for black boys were not much different than those for black girls in Grades 4 and 8, but black boys lagged behind Hispanics of both sexes, and they fell behind white boys by at least 30 points, a gap sometimes interpreted as three academic grades.

The search for explanations has recently looked at causes besides poverty, and this report may further spur those efforts.

“There’s accumulating evidence that there are racial differences in what kids experience before the first day of kindergarten,” said Ronald Ferguson, director of the Achievement Gap Initiative at Harvard. “They have to do with a lot of sociological and historical forces. In order to address those, we have to be able to have conversations that people are unwilling to have.”

Those include “conversations about early childhood parenting practices,” Dr. Ferguson said. “The activities that parents conduct with their 2-, 3- and 4-year-olds. How much we talk to them, the ways we talk to them, the ways we enforce discipline, the ways we encourage them to think and develop a sense of autonomy.”

The report urges convening a White House conference, encouraging Congress to appropriate more money for schools and establishing networks of black mentors.

What it does not discuss are policy responses identified with a robust school reform movement that emphasizes closing failing schools, offering charter schools as alternatives and raising the quality of teachers.

The report did not go down this road because “there’s not a lot of research to indicate that many of those strategies produce better results,” Mr. Casserly said.

Other have a different response. The key to narrowing the achievement gap, said Dr. Ferguson, is “really good teaching.”

One large urban school district that has made progress is Baltimore’s, where the dropout rate for African-American boys declined to 4.9 percent during the last academic year, down from 11.9 percent three years earlier. Graduation rates for black boys were also up: 57 percent in 2009-10, compared with 51 percent three years earlier.

Andres A. Alonso, the chief executive of the Baltimore City Public Schools, said the improvement had little to do with changes at the margins, like lengthening the school day or adding mentors. Rather, Mr. Alonso cited aggressively closing failing schools, knocking on the doors of dropouts’ homes to lure them back and creating real-time alerts — “almost like an electrical charge” — when a student misses several days of school.

“Hispanic kids and African-American kids this year had a lower dropout rate than white kids,” Mr. Alonso said.

Source - NY Times

Waiting For Superman: Black Folks Must Choose Education, Or Die!

Black Sorority Members of Sigma Gamma Rho Charged With Beating 7 Rutgers Pledges

It has long been a tradition within Black collegiate life. A young pledge is told the beatings would "humble" her, that each flesh-rending strike with a wooden paddle would build love and trust between sorority sisters. It wasn’t hazing, the young African American coed said they told her. The women of Sigma Gamma Rho at Rutgers University didn’t condone hazing.

For seven nights the beatings went on, she said. In all, she was struck 201 times. On the eighth day — unable to sit, her buttocks covered with blood clots and welts — she went to the hospital. Then she reported it to the university.

Today, Rutgers police said they had arrested six members of the sorority on charges of aggravated hazing, alleging they repeatedly beat at least three pledges between Jan. 18 and Jan. 25. A university official, vice president of student affairs Greg Blimling, and the pledge who spoke to The Star-Ledger put the number of victims at seven.

The university immediately suspended the Rutgers chapter of Sigma Gamma Rho, as did the sorority’s national organization, headquartered in North Carolina.

"The local chapter was doing this on its own, not with the sanction of either the university or the national organization," Blimling said, noting Rutgers has a clear anti-hazing policy that includes workshops for all fraternities and sororities.

He said the university moved aggressively against Sigma Gamma Rho, which has operated for "many years" on the New Brunswick campus but does not have a dedicated sorority house, after learning another hazing session had been scheduled for Tuesday night. The first arrests took place before it could happen.

Charged Tuesday were Vanessa Adegbite, 21, of Jersey City; Joana Bernard, 21, of West Orange; Kesha Cheron, 20, of Newark; and Llana Warner, 20 of the Bronx. Each was charged with aggravated hazing, a felony that carries up to 18 months in prison. All four were later released from the Middlesex County jail on $1,500 bail.

Today, police arrested Shawna Ebanks, 21, of East Orange, and Marie Charles, also 21, of West Orange, on the same charges.

Charles and Cheron are public health majors. Ebanks is a political science major.

Authorities said the beatings took place at Rockoff Hall, a student apartment building on George Street, and at private homes in Newark and West Orange. In addition to the paddling, police said, the pledges were in some cases denied food.

The pledge who spoke to The Star-Ledger did so on condition of anonymity, saying she feared retaliation. Her cousin, Khalilh Anthony, accompanied her to Robert Wood Johnson University Hospital, along with the pledge’s mother, saying she was appalled when she saw the injuries caused by the repeated beatings.

"I wanted to beat them back," said Anthony, who has a different last name. "Maybe if they got hit, they wouldn’t hit others. They’d know what it felt like."

The pledge said she was eager to join Sigma Gamma Rho, an African-American sorority founded in 1922, because of its history of community service. On Jan. 18, eight pledges gathered in an apartment in Rockoff Hall, she said.

"They told us there was no hazing, that they didn’t believe in it," she said.

Then the paddles came out. The pledges, clad in sweat pants, were instructed to wrap blue and gold tape around the wooden paddles, each a foot long and 6 inches wide, she said.

She was struck 19 times that night, she said. Four sorority members delivered the blows, the pledge said, while two others supervised. She said the group was told the beatings would "humble" them and would get them to rely upon one another.

"At the end, we were supposed to be helping each other," she said.

One pledge stopped attending after a few nights, she said. Another began to bleed freely at one point. The pain, she said, grew worse by the day. By Monday, unable even to lie down without pain, she called her cousin and mother and went to the hospital.

Colleges across the country have cracked down on hazing, but incidents continue to crop up. In 2008, a Sigma Gamma Rho chapter at the University of Texas in Austin was sanctioned. A year earlier, A Rider University freshman died after drinking nearly two-third of a bottle of vodka during an initiation ritual at the Phi Kappa Tau fraternity.

By Sue Epstein and Tom Haydon/The Star-Ledger

Staff writers Mark Mueller, Karen Keller and James Queally contributed to this report.

Source

13-Year-Old Stephen Stafford II Wows Morehouse Students Who Want To Be Like Him When They Grow Up

You Can Always Tell A Morehouse Man -- But You Can't Tell Him Much

As a 13-year-old, Lithonia resident Stephen Stafford II can usually be found sitting in front of the television playing video games or playing his drum set.

But Stafford is no typical 13-year old – he’s a college student. The triple-major child prodigy is becoming a sensation at Morehouse College.

“I’ve never taught a student as young as Stephen, and it’s been amazing,” said computer science professor Sonya Dennis. “He’s motivating other students to do better and makes them want to step up their game.”

“When I saw how much knowledge Stephen has at such a young age, I wondered what I had been doing with my life,” laughed third-year student, Eric Crawford. A psychology major and computer science minor, Crawford wanted to step up his game so much that he got Stephen to tutor him. “Even though I’m older, Stephen is like a mentor and my elder in computer science,” said Crawford.

“Eric’s a really fun person to be around, and we have a good time together,” said Stafford.

Crawford added, “Stephen has a lot of patience with me. I got a 95 in the class because of Stephen.”

The Story Continues...

Change We Can Believe In??? Black High School In Chicago has 115 Out Of 800 Female Students Pregnant

Of the total female student population at Paul Robeson High School in Chicago, Ill., 1 in 7 are expectant mothers. Robeson Principal Gerald Morrow blames the staggering number of pregnancies on the girls home life and absentee men who are not being the loving fathers they need to.

"It can be a lot of things that are happening in the home or not happening in the home, if you will," Morrow said, according to the network, noting that "absentee fathers" are another factor in the school's high number of teen pregnancies.

The birth rate for teens ages 15 to 19 increased 5 percent from 2005 to 2007, according to a March 18 report from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention's National Center for Health Statistics.

Could the reasons be lack of access to sexual health education and pregnancy prevention and a lack of access to reproductive health resources. Possibly. What .about the effort to get public assistance? Absolutely.

Or could it be the highly sexualized rap videos on BET or the degrading lyrics in Hip Hop songs catering to these same kids.

Is it a culture that glorifies violence, sex and crimes against women. The same women who have grown up fatherless watching videos portray black women as sexual objects for the pleasure of rappers and their thug entourages.

Is it how rapper Lil Wayne freely plants his seed in any chickenhead willing to open her legs to him. (So far the tally of baby mamas knocked up by the rapper this year alone stands at 4. Wayne already has a 9-year-old with reality tv personality Antonia Carter)

In fact, there was a recent incident where black girls shot up his tour bus because he refused to have sex with them.

The school's students are largely from poor communities of color where teenage pregnancies can be high. At least Robeson is a school in which young women are not being thrown out or transferred to other schools. Principal Morrow notes, "We're looking at how we can get them to the next phase, how can we still get them thinking about graduation?"

Is the answer as simple as providing educational classes and centers to normalize and encourage the use of birth control methods and distribute condoms? While a teen health center is being built across the street, some are advocating for more funding for the creation and maintenance of centers such as these so that teenage pregnancy rates go down.

If only if it were that easy. having 115 pregnant students is an epidemic that is only accelerating the complete economic and social disenfranchisement of Blacks in the US!

California Budget Crisis Means No College For Many, Those Hardest Hit Will Likely Be Black & Latino Students

NO SCHOOL, NO PEACE?

In a move to cut enrollment because of California's budget deficit, the 23-campus Cal State University system announced it will not allow students to start at the university next spring.

Cal State usually admits about 35,000 freshmen, undergraduate transfers and graduate students in the spring, officials said.

Since most students of color tend to matriculate through the Cal State system as opposed to campuses such as Berkley, UCLA, and UC Santa Barbara, this will prove to be devastating for many pursuing their educational dreams.

Making it even tougher for potential mid-year starters, the seven Cal State campuses on the quarter system or with a winter term stopped taking applications last week for first-time winter enrollment. So, any slow-moving potential applicant for the 2009-10 school year is now out of luck, except in those cases where Cal States maintain spring transfer agreements with community colleges, said spokeswoman Claudia Keith.

"We are looking at any way we can to reduce enrollment," Keith said. She said administrators hope to cut Cal State’s overall enrollment of 450,000 students by 40,000 over the next two years as a way to cope with a shortfall in state funding.

While some exceptions will be made in unique circumstances, many are not keeping their hopes up that the situation will ultimately work in their favor -- particularly with the state issuing IOU's as this devastating news was being disseminated.

Cal State system chancellor Charles B. Reed said this week he would seek an additional student fee hike of 15% to 20% for this fall on top of a 10% increase already approved. The Cal State Board of Trustees is scheduled to vote later this month on the extra fee hike and other austerity measures such as a two-day-a-month furlough plan for university employees.

Source

Trustee Angela Reddock Wants LA Community College Students Trained in Hybrid, Plug-In Vehicle Service

Los Angeles Candidates in The 2009 Election

L.A. Community College Board Trustee Angela J. Reddock has initiated what she believes will lead to the eventual launch of a new state-of-the-art, high tech automotive job training facility for the servicing, maintenance and repair of hybrid and plug-in electric cars and trucks, and hydrogen fuel cell vehicles.

For minority students and those seeking job opportunities in today's economy, this is the type of leadership that more elected officials should be demonstrating.

Ms. Reddock said, “Fuel efficient, low emission hybrid and plug-in electric vehicles are the top choice for many motorists. The job market for skilled technicians to service hybrids and plug-in vehicles is expected to grow tremendously as domestic and foreign automakers – at the urging of the federal government – make a major shift to manufacturing green vehicles. L.A.’s community colleges are an ideal place to train hybrid and plug-in electric auto service technicians.”

“Today’s green vehicle service and repair is high tech. Our college students need to keep pace with the latest in automotive service of hybrid and plug-in electric cars and trucks. That means building and equipping a facility that can train hundreds of green auto service technicians each year. GM, Ford, Chrysler, Toyota, and Honda are ideal partners for our community colleges as the world’s automakers restructure their vehicle lines to produce and sell more green cars in California and across the country,” Ms. Reddock said.

Black Colleges Struggle For Relevancy As Opportunities, Money Change The Game

Historically black colleges and universities, like many other schools, are struggling with both fewer resources and a growing demand from students for financial aid.

But the institutions known as HBCUs have another problem that some leaders contend is theirs alone: Many African-American students are finding their needs met elsewhere.

In 1977, 35 percent of all bachelor’s degrees awarded to black students were from historically black colleges. By 2002, the share was down to 22 percent, according to the National Center for Education Statistics, even though the number of African-American students earning bachelor’s degrees from historically black colleges actually grew.

In the days of segregation, African-American students had limited options. Now, with a wide range of choices, only 13 percent of African-American college students are enrolled in HBCUs.

Kristin Mason, a junior English major at Atlanta’s Spelman College, is one. Mason, who is from Colorado, chose Spelman, she said, because of the “sense of belonging” she felt surrounded by smart black women.

Morehouse College senior Shaun Harris, a business major from Illinois, said he was “looking for brotherhood” at the Atlanta men’s school whose alumni include the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr.

But Mark Gamble of Columbus said he “embraced the diversity” at Georgia State University, where about 60 percent of the students are white, 26 percent African-American, and the rest are other ethnicities or identify themselves as multiracial.

“I like being around whites, blacks, Asians and all the other minorities,” said Gamble, a sophomore film major.

Georgia State freshman Mercedes Callaway of Atlanta said she chose the state research university over Spelman, a private women’s HBCU, because of money. A friend at Spelman is “getting a good education,” said Callaway, who is on the HOPE scholarship. “But she’s in debt to pay for school.”

HBCUs are losing students to a range of institutions, said William “Sonny” Walker, who graduated from a historically black college in Arkansas and has served on the boards of three others, including, currently, Atlanta’s Morris Brown College.

“Many of the students who came from middle- and upper-income families, whose parents could afford to pay tuition, are going to Harvard, are going to Georgia, are going to Georgia Tech, are going to Vanderbilt,” Walker said.

Many historically black schools have lower endowments than other colleges, making less money available for scholarships, school officials say. But those institutions play an important role, said Leonard L. Haynes, executive director of the White House Initiative on Historically Black Colleges and Universities.

At historically black institutions, he said, students of color can “get an education, get nurturing, get to mature and get to be good citizens after they graduate” in an environment that celebrates their cultures. “If they didn’t exist today, they would have to be created,” Haynes said.



The current economic climate —- which is hitting universities across the country, public and private —- is making it harder to pay the bills, exacerbating problems both for families of students and for the schools themselves, officials of local colleges say.

Clark Atlanta University, Morehouse and Spelman all revealed this month that they are cutting back on expenses.

Clark Atlanta President Carlton E. Brown said 70 faculty members and 30 other staffers were being laid off because of an “enrollment emergency” after years of declining numbers. At least 200 students recently dropped out or transferred to state colleges because they could no longer afford Clark Atlanta, Brown said.

Morehouse officials confirmed that they had not renewed the contracts of about 25 adjunct professors, about a third of the school’s part-time instructors.

And Spelman officials announced that they are eliminating 35 positions, 23 of them staffed, phasing out the college’s department of education and discontinuing some programs.

Spelman, whose donors include Bill Cosby and Oprah Winfrey, is in high demand among black women, said its president, Beverly Tatum.

“Students want to go to Spelman,” she said. “The issue is whether they can afford to go to Spelman.”

Morris Brown has struggled for years. It faces a Feb. 17 deadline to pay the remaining $214,000 of past-due water bills to the city of Atlanta. The college lost its accreditation from the Southern Association of Colleges and Schools in 2002, largely because of financial instability.

The Morris Brown board and its president, Stanley Pritchett, say they are looking at specialty programs and projects that might save the school, which, he said, would probably not be able to continue as a traditional liberal arts college.

Despite their troubles, historically black colleges and universities have fierce defenders.

“We need to find a way to preserve these institutions,” said state Sen. Emanuel Jones (D-Decatur), chairman of the Georgia Legislative Black Caucus. “Our universities have struggled to survive just as we as a people have struggled to survive.”

Historically black colleges “speak to the legacy of our forefathers,” he said.

Jones, whose degrees are from the University of Pennsylvania and Columbia University, packed his oldest child off to college this fall.

He’s a freshman at Johns Hopkins University.

ATLANTA’S HBCUs

Clark Atlanta University Research university Enrollment: 3,900 Founded: 1988, merging Clark College and Atlanta University

Morehouse College Traditional men’s college Enrollment: 2,800 Founded: 1887 as Augusta Institute

Morris Brown College Liberal arts college Enrollment: About 200 Founded: 1881

Spelman College Traditional women’s college Enrollment: 2,200 Founded: 1881

By Gayle White, The Atlanta Journal-Constitution

Black Institiution Morris Brown College On Life Support

2009 may night be the best year for Morris Brown College. Morris Brown has lost its accreditation. And without accreditation, it cannot receive federal or state financial aid – nor can any of its students. Which pretty much explains why Morris Brown now doesn’t enroll enough students to fill a high school, much less an entire college. It also explains their debt of 32 million. And all their trouble started with two people people trying to help ...


In 2006, its former president, Dolores Cross, and its former financial aid director, Parvesh Singh, were convicted of bilking the federal government out of millions for students who didn’t exist.

Now the school, whose budget is 80 percent-enrollment driven, was struggling before Cross and Singh pulled their stunt sometime between 1998 and 2002. A judge even said that they used most of the embezzled money to bolster the school’s ailing finances. But what they did pretty much choked off any crucial lifeline that the college might have grasped for.

And anytime a school or, for that matter, any institution is in trouble because of a scandal involving theft, that makes it tough to persuade any deep-pocketed donor to step up – at least not without a major change in management.

Now the water has been shut off. A major campus building is facing foreclosure, and hundreds of thousands of dollars in liens have been filed against it. Altogether, Morris Brown faces $32 million in debt. And twilight is closing in.

Of course, there’s at least one bright spot. According to the Atlanta Journal-Constitution, Morris Brown’s alumni and supporters rallied to raise $70,000. Much of that money came from alumni living in the metro Atlanta area.

They may ultimately raise enough to get the water turned back on. But while that may buy the troubled school some time, once that time is up, they may not have much of a prayer. Thsnks Tonyaa Weathersbee, BlackAmericaWeb.com for this info.

Did Race Play Into LAUSD Supt. David Brewer's Payoff???

From the moment a faction controlled by Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa seized control of the Los Angeles Unified School District board, the conventional wisdom has been that LAUSD Supt. David Brewer’s days as the district’s chief executive were numbered.

This being L.A., the issue was, from the beginning, viewed through a racial prism, because the school board’s leader, a Latina, led the charge to remove Brewer, who is African-American. Race even played a role in bringing this drama to its climax: LAUSD Board President Monica Garcia first attempted to engineer his ouster last week; however, apparently afraid of how things would look, pulled back the effort when the board’s only Black member, Marguerite LaMotte, would not return from a previously scheduled trip to take part in a show trial — one in which everyone involved knew a verdict had already been rendered.

The only thing left was the posturing. So the blur of activity that resulted in Tuesday’s board decision to buy out Brewer’s contract, to the tune of an estimated $500,000, was really just the coda to a distracting melodrama that has finally played itself out.

Most reasonable parties understand that Brewer’s ouster was less about race, and more about who will ultimately control the LAUSD — officially or not. Like Garcia, Brewer’s expected temporary replacement, Deputy Superintendent Ramon Cortines, is a close ally of Villaraigosa — whose legislative bid to take control of the city’s schools was deemed unconstitutional by a state appeals court last year.

By taking out Brewer, who was selected by a former school board majority hostile to Villaraigosa’s dream of expanding his political portfolio, the mayor moves a step closer to pulling all the strings on an ineffective board that is far too eager to abdicate its core responsibilities. All to appease an ambitious mayor who has not yet proven himself capable of improving student achievement.



Especially in times like this, when the state of urban education is in serious crisis, school superintendents in big cities across the United States tend to come and go.

But even with all racial considerations aside, it seems particularly unfair to place the de facto blame for LAUSD’s failing schools on Brewer’s head by orchestrating his departure halfway into a four-year contract. In terms of test scores, the single factor that is currently — and perhaps unfortunately — in vogue as to measuring student achievement, Brewer has shown marked improvement during his brief tenure. He also won plaudits for placing an emphasis on Black student achievement — a high-profile effort that gave rise to suspicions that race did indeed play a part in his unpopularity with the school board.

This is why the racial suspicions persist, which Brewer has done little to dispel. And the community is reacting: On the day this editorial is published, a group of the city’s African-American leaders will hold a press conference responding to Brewer’s exit.

During it, they plan to demand substantial representation on a selection committee that will help choose a new permanent superintendent, and the formation of a task force to address the specific needs of Black students. According to an announcement aboutThursday’s event at Dorsey High School, this would also include “a strategic plan for African-American students with a focus on Black males who make up approximately 274 gangs in 17 cities and five unincorporated areas in Los Angeles County.”

Fine, the school board didn’t want to give the former Navy admiral more time to build on his successes. As long as they understand that it is going to take one hell of a soldier to guide LAUSD through a political morass that has grown thornier due to the hasty — and costly — actions of this week.

Ahmad Ali Lewis Is More Than A Black, Washed-Up, Hip Hop Artist: He's Going For His Phd at Stanford

The Rapper Become The Scholar

Ahmad Ali Lewis made a deal with his mother back when he was a student at Palisades High School: He would go to college unless he got a recording contract for his upbeat rap music.

It was a big if. But Lewis, 17, an honors student and top football player, skipped the college entrance exams and signed with Giant Records. "I said, 'S.A.T. -- whatever. I want to R.A.P.,' " he recalls.

Ahmad Ali LewisHis 1994 album, immodestly called "Ahmad," included a hit single, "Back in the Day," a nostalgic riff on his South Los Angeles childhood. In it, he rapped:

I miss those days, and so I pout like a grown jerk

Wishin all I had to do now, was finish homework.

It's true you don't realize

really what you got

til it's gone

And I'm not gonna sing

another sad song, but

Sometimes I do sit and

reminisce then

Think about the years I was raised, back in the days.

Looking back, Lewis said he does not regret his teenage decision, even though his early success was followed by struggles in a music industry he criticized as promoting violence in the African American community. Now 32 and the father of a 4-year-old son, he is still recording songs, but he also is finishing homework.

Ahmad the first-name-only rapper has become Ahmad Ali Lewis the Stanford-bound scholar.

Lewis enrolled two years ago at Long Beach City College and graduated in May as valedictorian, with a 4.0 grade point average. He was accepted as a transfer student by several universities for this fall and chose Stanford.

CHECK HIM OUT ON VIDEO

"When I stepped on campus, something in my gut said, 'Dude, this is where you belong,' " said Lewis, who plans to pursue bachelor's degrees in sociology and African American studies. He said he is "going to be Dr. Ahmad Ali Lewis, the first rapper with a PhD." He quickly conceded, "Maybe someone else has done it, I don't know." No matter, he said, since he expects to get a doctorate in social work and become a professor.

"I love teaching," said Lewis, who recently tutored at an elementary school. "Rapping and teaching are not that far apart. You're rapping, you're talking. You're a professor, you're talking."
Compact but broad-shouldered at 5 feet 7 and 155 pounds, Lewis still has the build of the running back he was in high school. His head is shaven and he has two tattoos: on his left shoulder, a map of Africa containing a woman's face, and on his right forearm, "4th Avenue Jones," the name of the soul-rock-rap band he cofounded with his former wife, singer Tena Jones. When he talks, he waves his hands in the open-fingered style of rap performance.

He speaks of his Christian faith and academic ambitions with enthusiasm, humor and what he jokingly concedes is the "egomania" of a well-loved child. His mother, Paulette Holt, inspired him by starting college when she was a divorced mother of three and also "brainwashed me," he said.
"I always thought I was better than average, that I was handsome, smart and talented. It was a trick," he said. "Being black in America, from the ghetto, you need that extra little bit of confidence. So that's kind of my mission, to give other kids that kind of confidence."

The odds were against him at Stanford, which accepted just 20 of this year's 1,200 transfer applicants. But Lewis was admitted and offered a financial aid package that will cover his tuition and room and board, which total more than $47,000 this school year. He'll also receive funds for books and living costs each year through a highly competitive grant program that the Virginia-based Jack Kent Cooke Foundation offers to community college students transferring to four-year schools.

Ahmad Ali Lewis"Ahmad was really a standout in all the areas," said Vance Lancaster, a Cooke Foundation spokesman. "He is truly a scholar and a humanitarian who just happens to be a chart-topping rapper."

Lewis grew up mainly near 76th and Hoover streets, on a block with a crack house and gangs. His mother arranged for him to be bused out of the neighborhood to honors classes, and eventually to take the hourlong ride to Palisades High.He was both a football jock and a bookworm, with a singing voice that won him attention in church. His Muslim father, John, was a musician as well but Lewis didn't see him much after his parents divorced. When young Ahmad became consumed with rap, his mother panicked.

"I feared him getting involved in drugs, feared him getting involved in a lot of stuff that could have been devastating to him," said Holt, who earned a masters' degree in social work from USC in 2002 and is a therapist for Childrens Hospital Los Angeles.

"I told him, 'if you are going to rap, at least don't use bad language and don't talk down about women.' And he said, 'Mom, that's not me anyway, I don't do that.' So I was able to hear his music. It wasn't church music but it certainly was a positive message."

The few curse words in his songs were mild compared with the obscenity-filled lyrics of other rappers. A 1994 Times review called his first album "mostly upbeat, always insightful and sometimes very funny." One of the album's cuts offered a cautionary tale about a wannabe gangbanger who tries to impress his crew by planning to rob and shoot a shop owner:

"But I didn't do it quick enough, or he thought

of it first

Cause he blasted to the chest, and now I'm restin yellin, "Nurse!"

And holdin on to life, or at least tryin to hold on

In a jailward wearin cuffs

Cause I had to be rough

Cause you gotta be tough"

Lewis admits he wasn't an angel. He smoked pot, drank and partied during his concert tours. He earned enough to buy a car and a house in Long Beach.

But he was also denouncing "gangsta" rap's influence on black children. "We're destroying ourselves, teaching our kids low self-esteem," he said in an interview with The Times when he was 18. And he tangled with music executives who wanted a tougher edge to his unreleased second album and rejected its religious overtones, he said.

The subsequent 4th Avenue Jones group had some success, opening shows for big names such as Sheryl Crow and the Black Eyed Peas. The group then had contract troubles and Lewis became disillusioned with life on the road.

"I got to the point: 'What's this all about? Am I really having a significant impact on people's lives, just showing up in a city for an hour and doing a show and then leaving?" Lewis recalls. "I thought stardom and fame would bring me a kind of a joy. When I attained that, it was empty."

The big money was gone and the house had to be sold. After nine years of marriage, Lewis and Jones divorced, sharing custody of their son, Yeshuwa. The personal crisis led Lewis to community college.

Byron Clift Breland, Long Beach City College's dean of student affairs, interviewed Lewis during valedictorian selection and learned how he had joined a trip to help orphans in Zimbabwe, but had no idea about his music career. Later, Breland's wife realized that Lewis was the author of "Back in the Day," a song she liked so much that she had it included on their wedding video.

"I was shocked and excited," Breland said of learning Lewis' identity. "To see Ahmad break down a lot of stereotypes of folks who go into the music industry in general, let alone hip-hop or rap, and then return to higher education and go to Stanford is a remarkable story."

Next month, Lewis will start spending weekdays at Stanford and weekends in Los Angeles with his son. Music, however, is not out of Lewis' life.

Ahmad Ali LewisHe is writing lyrics for a new album he hopes to sell to a music label. He lives with his mother and stepfather in Carson and composes at a Salvation Army recreation center in Compton where he draws inspiration from its diverse patrons.

In a small office overlooking the noisy gym, Lewis reviews the lines he has written in an old-fashioned notebook. Swaying in his chair, he sings into a laptop over prerecorded musical tracks from collaborators. The autobiographical album, titled "The Death of Me," is meant to be celebratory, he said. In one number, "Smile," he raps:

"Back to college on the low like a panther

Finished as valedict' then went to Stanford

And I ain't paying for it

But I'm gon' pay it forward

Who gets the glory?

You know I gotta say

the Lord."

SOURCE

Wendy Williams Goes Oprah, Oprah Goes Barack and Another Black Paper Goes Digital

Wendy Williams To Go Nationwide in '09
Kwame Kilpatrick Wins Latest Round/Loses Attorney

At Least 30 Feared Dead in Haiti from Fay
Countdown is on for Obama's VP Announcement
Oprah to Join Obama for Democratic Party Crowning
HIV/AIDS in Deep South a Silent Enemy for Blacks

My Mom's L.A. High School Now Has 58% Dropout Rate

Forbes: Hip-Hop's Cash Kings 2008

San Francisco Black Paper Dumps Print Goes All Online
The Costs of Marital Rape in Southern Africa
Racial Slur Defaces African American Church in VA

Zimbabwe Inflation Hits 11,200,000 Percent

Mayor of London Backs Slavery Memorial

New Book Examines Race and Entrepreneurial Success

L.A. School Superintendent David Brewer Talks About Blacks and Education With Angel City Classic Panel

WTF??? Black Students Given "Ghetto Names" In High School Yearbook Prank

Jordan Smith Ain't Laughing

A yearbook staff student intentionally replaced the names of nine African Americans, including Smith, with "Tay Tay Shaniqua," "Crisphy Nanos" and "Laquan White" - next to their Black Student Union club photo.

What kind of crap is this?

The school's yearbook, The Chronicle, will clearly not be the same for these kids who are just trying to do the right thing by going to school and getting involved. As a parent, I'm really pissed about how Charter Oak High School in Covina, CA has handled the incident.

"Someone was just trying to be funny but it's not funny," said Jordan, 18, a BSU member. "It's upsetting. It's a mistake that should not of been overlooked."

School Board President Joseph M. Probst has said that "appropriate actions will be taken." Probst said he did not know the gender or race of the student who changed the names, but he did know the student will be a senior next year.

"We are discussing the intent and impact of the student's actions. The first step was to remedy the issue." The students whose names were changed were given stickers with the correct names to be placed over the error in their books.

"What else can you do?" asked Probst. "It would be nice to snap a magic finger, but I think it was incredibly well done."

SMH!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

How about agreeing to meet with the families in person to apologize? What about committing to having a school assembly in the Fall to discuss the issue of race and how important it is to show respect to individuals who may not look like you? What about implementing a policy that final approval before printing must be signed-off by a school official? What about expelling the student unless he or she apologizes on camera and it gets uploaded on YouTube???

That's what I'm talking about!

Instead, BSU student Evanne Jackson, a junior, said she was given a handful of stickers and told to pass them out to her friends on the last day of school.

"How humiliating," said Evanne's mother, Toi. "The school is responsible, and they ask the victim to pass out the stickers."

But BSU students like Paisley Moore, said the corrective sticker is not enough.

"I kind of laughed at it," said Moore. "Show that you are sincerely apologetic. I don't think they realize what happened here."

School officials are not aware of any previous similar incidents.

Past editions of the yearbook have received awards from the University of Columbia Scholastic Press with gold and silver medals in 2006 and 2007, respectively, according to school staff.

Of the 2,000 students who attend Charter Oak High School about 45 percent are Latino; 30 percent white and 4.5 percent black, according to school officials.

"We have a wonderful diversity on our campus which makes a richer educational experience," said Harwick.

But Moore said she is not surprised something like this happened.

"People of color, Latinos and African Americans, are viewed at the school as a joke," she said.

The affected picture appears in the back of the book and shares a page with other group photos including Class Councils, North American Unity and Asian Unity.

"This has hit us pretty hard," said Principal Kathleen Wiard. "We take great pride in producing a great yearbook with positive, good memories."

The BSU students' families, however, aren't so sure this yearbook is something they'll want to remember.

"A yearbook is very significant and something you always hold on to," said Toi. "When she shows it to her kids she will have to explain why she has the name Crisphy."

Source

For Those Who Even Get To College, Graduation Is Tough For African American And Latino Students

Acceptance into San Jose State University turned Joel Bridgeman and Anwar Estelle into instant neighborhood heroes. Few from the bleak Richmond streets make it to college. It meant never having to sweep the parking lot of Burger King again.

But the reality of college hit hard. Upon arrival, they needed remedial courses. Financial aid fell through. Their families couldn't help. And hardly anyone on campus looked like them.

"It's demoralizing when you get here and you're starting off behind," Bridgeman said. "You think: Maybe I'm not as smart as I thought."

Much of the debate over the achievement gap has focused on helping African-American and Latino students graduate from high school and get into college. But the sobering reality is that the gap persists even there.

Bridgeman and Estelle prevailed and will celebrate at Saturday's graduation.

According to the Washington D.C.-based non-profit the Education Trust, nationally, the graduation rate is 53 percent; in contrast, the graduation rate of what schools call "underrepresented minorities" - blacks, Latinos and American Indians - is 45 percent. The gap has narrowed slightly in recent years - in 2002, only 42 percent of such students graduated.

A university is designed to be a meritocracy, admitting the best and brightest. In fact, it reinforces many of the advantages of birth - with success based on strong preparation, financial support and educated parents who hold high standards and expect disciplined effort.

For Bridgeman and Estelle, both 24, their poor preparation made them question whether they belonged. "You come out of high school thinking you're one of the smart kids and a good student - and then you realize that your high school sucked," Bridgeman said. "You're wondering: Can I really make it through college?"

Adding to the stress, most must also work. Estelle, a business administration major, woke at 5:40 a.m. for his on-campus administrative job, ate lunch, then worked at a Verizon cell phone store until 10 p.m. He once fell asleep during a statistics exam.

Not everyone makes it, he noted, because it requires a strong work ethic. "Some people are lazy," he said. "If your story ain't that bad, you got no excuse."

Studies have found that there's not enough financial aid for low-income students. When it's available, many students find the deadlines and paperwork too daunting. Part-time work - needed to pay rent and food - disqualifies some from tuition grants. Others are scared to take on large loans.

After a while, quitting seemed like the most logical thing to do.

"What we've learned is that it is crucial, especially during the first year, to connect on campus. It makes you feel part of a larger community," said Jeff Towey, a mentor at the Making Waves Education Program in Richmond.

For Bridgeman and Estelle, once classes were over, "We'd sit around and smoke cigars - same spot, every day - and talk about college stuff." If Estelle hadn't read a book for class, Bridgeman summarized it for him.

When Bridgeman's financial aid fell through, he slept on Estelle's sofa and cut hair in dormitories for $7 a person - and kept going to class. They both came close to dropping out. Sophomore year, Estelle walked into San Jose State's administrative offices to get permission and was rebuffed. "I guess she thought if I was stupid enough to ask, she'd just say, 'No,' " he recalled, laughing.

Bridgeman thought about it, too. But he reconsidered when his mentor, African-American studies Professor Stephen Millner, asked: "If you don't make it, what message does it give to all the other kids in your neighborhood?"

Membership in the black fraternity Iota Phi Theta during their junior year provided role models - and fun.

Frat brothers bonded during percussive dance "step shows," traveling to other schools for competitions. But on the way home, they studied. The startling 90 percent graduation rate of the small fraternity is triple the 30 percent rate of the school's overall African-American population.

Without the fraternity, Estelle said, "I definitely wouldn't have stayed. I'd be long gone."

From there, doors opened to new opportunities. Bridgeman, a political science major, landed an internship at the U.S. House of Representatives.

Together, Estelle and Bridgeman sponsored a fraternity-based "shadow day" for 25 black high school boys to accompany them on campus.

And last fall, the friends gathered new freshmen in a room, fed them pizza and offered advice."We say: 'Don't be a statistic,' " Bridgeman said. "If we did it, they can." Full story

No April Fools Here: 1 Million Students A Year Drop Out Of High School

Here's yet another reason for Mayor Kwame Kilpatrick to step down. A new report by the nonprofit America's Promise Alliance found that only about half the students in 17 of the nation's 50 largest cities actually get a diploma.

In Detroit, only a 25% of public school students graduate.

Some of the nation's largest cities, including Indianapolis and Cleveland, are getting failing grades when it comes to high school graduation rates.

Former Secretary of State Colin Powell is the founding chairman of the alliance launched in 1997.He called it a "catastrophe" and is supporting summits in every state to help get students better prepared to attend college and perform in the work force.

New York City has one of the nation's sorriest graduation rates, with less than half of city high-schoolers earning a diploma on time.

"It's an enormous waste of talent and time and resources," said Cary Goodman, whose Directions for Our Youth organization held a summit on the city's dropout crisis in February. "Unfortunately, New York has never made the dropout crisis the centerpiece of its work in education."

"This is an economic crisis as well as a moral crisis," said America's Promise Alliance President Marguerite Kondracke.

Dying A Slow Death, Put Fisk University Out Of Its Misery... NOW!

If We're Not Going To Support These Black Schools,

What's The Point?

Reporting operating losses that totaled more than $7 million in 2005 and 2006, Fisk University has still not been able to turn any of the valuable art donated by painter Georgia O'Keeffe into cash after two years. Already dealing with donor fatigue, the historically black college in Tennessee is on its last leg.


Although a legal fight over the latest $30 million proposal to share the 101-piece art collection with an Arkansas museum is scheduled for trial in February, African American leaders acknowledge that it could be years before any money changes hands.

So the Nashville school that was founded in 1866 to educate former slaves has had to look elsewhere to keep its doors open -- a difficult task in a community that has been asked to come to the school's financial rescue several times before.

"There is a fatigue factor there," said Tennessee Gov. Phil Bredesen, a Democrat and a former Nashville mayor. "There's a lot of people who give money traditionally for valuable projects who have given money to Fisk in the past, who don't think they've necessarily fixed the underlying problems. "They are really in the mode of 'I'm kind of through with that.' "

Fisk President Hazel O'Leary this month set a goal of raising $6.2 million by June 30, an effort that got a big boost this month when the New York-based Andrew W. Mellon Foundation announced it would give the school grants worth as much as $3 million. The Mellon Foundation, which awards grants to historically black colleges and universities among several other endeavors, said Fisk will receive $1 million up front.

A separate fundraising effort by black churches in Nashville has netted about $25,000 so far.
Fisk's board of trustees in December 2005 voted to try to sell off two signature pieces of the art collection to help keep the school afloat. Those efforts became bogged down in court battles over whether the sale of paintings violated the terms of O'Keeffe's bequest, and a Fisk lawyer told the judge that the school was likely to run out of cash before the end of the year.

The Mellon grant has halted that cash-flow crisis, but some feel that the school waited too long to focus on fundraising efforts because of a preoccupation with selling the art that was donated in 1949. "Why opt for the strategy of selling your art rather than developing a capital campaign?" asked Lucius Outlaw Jr., a Vanderbilt professor and Fisk alumnus. "The normal way of managing an institution is to have developed and implemented a plan for substantial fundraising to build an endowment." Davis Carr, a former member of the school's board, said donors are frightened off by Fisk's decades of financial problems.

The bad news keeps coming>>>

Oprah Distraught Over Abuse At Her Girl's School: It's Not Her Fault, But That Won't Stop The Haters For Blaming Her!

With Tears Wailing In Her Eye, Winfrey Asks For Forgiveness For Alleged Abuse At Her South Africa Girls' School.

"I've disappointed you. I'm so sorry. I'm so sorry," Oprah told parents at an emergency meeting in a packed marquee tent on the school premises. The TV talk-show queen has visited at least twice in the past few weeks, after allegations that one of the matrons fondled a girl and that other pupils had been physically abused.

Oprah gave the girls her personal telephone number, her e-mail address and her postal address so that they could contact her at any time, day or night. Apart from the matron apparently involved, Oprah sent the principal, a Dr Mzimane, and at least one other matron on leave two weeks ago. Only the principal was on paid leave. A parent told Rapport on Saturday evening that the abuse had visibly upset Oprah. She had felt guilty because she had trusted the principal and the matron. Oprah has laid a charge, "I trusted her (Dr Mzimane). When I appointed her, I thought she was passionate about the children of Africa. "But, I've been disappointed," Oprah said in tears last Saturday.The father of one of the pupils had responded by telling Oprah: "It's not your fault. We don't blame you."

"You trusted them. You have more passion for the school and its existence than anyone else in this country, including us parents." Oprah gave parents the assurance she would do everything possible to ensure that those who had been guilty of abuse would be dealt with. Rapport newspaper has disclosed that the queen of chat personally laid a charge with the police against the matron concerned. Oprah's "daughters" have accused Dr Mzimane of failing to take action, although the girls had often complained of being grabbed by the neck, beaten and thrown against a wall, and being sworn at.

Source

Stop Dogging Oprah For Gaining Weight: Our Hero Has Been Having A Health Crisis

Take Care Of Yourself Girlfriend, We Want You Around A Looong Time!

NEW YORK (AP)- Oprah Winfrey is going public about the thyroid condition that slowed down her metabolism and caused her to gain 20 pounds.

Winfrey, 53, was feeling incredibly sluggish by the time her talk show wrapped up its season in May. She eventually discovered the problem: an out-of-balance thyroid."My body was turning on me," she says in the October issue of O, the Oprah magazine. "First hyperthyroidism, which sped up my metabolism and left me unable to sleep for days. (Most people lose weight. I didn't.)"

Dorm Matron at Oprah's South Africa School is Suspended

"Then hypothyroidism, which slowed down my metabolism and made me want to sleep all the time. (Most people gain weight. I did! Twenty pounds!)"Hyperthyroidism can also cause a fast heartbeat, among other symptoms; hypothyroidism, the opposite condition, can result in fatigue and weakness.

Winfrey, exhausted and stressed, took a month-long break in Hawaii to regain her health.
Winfrey also discussed her thyroid condition on Tuesday's "Oprah" show, saying she "wanted so many other women who are going through the same thing to check on yourself and recognize that ... it's an issue we all share in common."She devoted the show to women's health issues and featured Dr. Christiane Northrup, author of "The Wisdom of Menopause."

Biracial High School Musical Star Corbin Bleu Takes His Act To Paris, Space, And Beyond!

Actor, dancer, model, singer Corbin Bleu, the irrepressibly “cool” star of High School Musical, is set to make an unprecedented visit to Walt Disney Studios Park on Monday. The half-Jamaican, half Italian Disney Channel superstar, is planning a whole day planned to meet his fans publicise the premiere of High School Musical 2 in France.

Instead, guests at the park will be able to see Bleu stroll the park, star in the parade and even appear in 2007’s final performance of High School Musical On Tour.

And in an effort to makes science cool, Corbin, 18, teamed up with Nortnhrop Grumman this past week to help fight back against the war on science.

Trying to sell kids on the idea that math and science is crazy-sexy-fun, Corbin volunteered for duty as a "Zeronaut" bravely enduring conditions that made his lovely locks float widely in three dimensions- all in the name of science.

Says Bleu, "The point of me being there was pretty much to have someone in the entertainment field show them what incredible things math and science can do."

This young guy, who just turned down going to Stanford University, seems like he's got a plan and it's working for him. All we know is this kid is a great example (right now) for how to work hard, get paid, and not be out at the clubs getting buck wild!