Pulling Together for Equal Education

(NOTE: This article appeared in the Commercial Appeal on May 6, 2007)

In a New York town best known for hosting the Sing Sing state prison, school leaders have made it their mission to eradicate the achievement gap that separates white and black students. Since 2005, the school district in Ossining, New York, a small suburban district with approximately 4,000 students, has initiated a variety of programs specifically targeting black males, a group whose grades and test scores consistently lagged behind those of other students.

The Ossining programs read like a dream list of ways to raise the achievement of at-risk students. The voluntary programs begin in kindergarten and continue through high school graduation. High school students may receive one-on-one guidance from black mentor teachers, while elementary school students' progress can be tracked by a team of teachers. Parents of students as young as sixth grade are able to attend college planning workshops that explain the practical obstacles college can present to families while at the same time putting college on a student's radar at an early age. These multipronged efforts seek to deliver academic support, shift the norm of what is achievable for black male students and build a community environment that helps push students to succeed.

Although in a district vastly different from the Memphis City Schools, the Ossining programs are exactly the type of comprehensive efforts that would complement the Memphis City Schools' mission of "Every Child. Every Day. College Bound." That campaign seeks to elevate the expectations and outcomes of all Memphis City Schools students, 85 percent of whom are black, and Supt. Carol Johnson is committed to ensuring that "College Bound" is more than just a slogan.

In Ossining, although it is too early to see any impact on test scores, school officials report that behavioral incidents are down and enrollment in college-level courses is up for black students. With such trends, it seems that those who champion equal educational opportunities would hail Ossining's efforts as a welcomed attempt to tackle the black-white achievement gap. Although some have offered such praise, other would-be allies are highly critical of the district's singling out black male students for special attention.

"I think this is a form of racial profiling in the public school system," Michael Meyers, executive director of the New York Civil Rights Coalition, a group that plans to file a formal complaint regarding Ossining with the state education department, said in a New York Times article last month. Kati Haycock, president of Education Trust, a group that advocates for disadvantaged children, told the Times, "You do have to worry whether you're creating a stereotype that is as damaging as the one you're trying to replace."

The goal of these civil rights advocates is presumably the same as the goal professed by the Ossining school district: to educate all black males to the highest of high standards. Yet these critics would halt extra attention being provided on a voluntary basis for fear of creating new stereotypes, or as Meyers put it in the Times article, "making (students) feel inferior or different simply because of their race and gender." Although there is a fundamental difference between assigning students to inferior schools based on their race and offering extra attention to students in a racial group that lags statistically in educational outcomes, there is validity to the critics' concern. In a perfect world, black students would not need any more attention to reach the same outcomes as other students. In fact, even in our own imperfect world, many black students excel without such attention. However, the reality -- especially in our own community -- is that many black students, particularly black males, are not achieving equal educational outcomes. For these students, the system is not working and it is incumbent on those who desire to solve this problem to offer creative solutions that work.

There are already enough challenges to elevating the educational opportunities of at-risk students, regardless of race. It is discouraging when those who seem to share the goal of eradicating the racial achievement gap construct additional roadblocks in the way of that goal. Students will be better served when racial politics, such as those surfacing in Ossining, do not derail programs that effectively tackle what some have dubbed the civil rights issue of our generation.