WASHINGTON—Historically Black colleges and universities must meet the challenges of educating Black students in an age in which Black males are, in the words of one speaker, “literally disappearing before our very eyes,” according to a panel of Black educators and policy analysts Wednesday at a public forum here.
“We can’t be tricked by the idea of vouchers. We can’t be tricked by the idea of ‘No Child Left Behind,” said Charles Ogletree, a Harvard University law professor, referring to the Bush administration’s education plan. “We can’t be tricked by the idea of not needing the role of the HBCUs in teaching the best and the brightest.”
He made his remarks at the 30th annual conference of the National Association for Equal Opportunity in Higher Education, the organization representing the nation's 118 historically Black colleges and universities. The conference, which ended last Saturday, had as its theme “Developing An Agenda On Blacks In Higher Education.”
Ogletree called educating Black youth—particularly Black males—“the biggest challenge of the 21st century” because of the low graduation rates of Black men in high school and college.
He said that America faces a dilemma: “The disappearing Black male…. They are literally disappearing before our very eyes,” Ogletree claimed.
Other panelists included: Louisiana State Sen. Charles Jones (D); Rev. Carolyn D. Hunt, executive director of the Louisiana Center Against Poverty; Save Our Sons & Girl Power!; Bobby William Austin, an administrator at the University of the District of Columbia who chairs a planning committee on the status of Black men, and Carlton P. Jordan Jr., senior associate of the Education Trust.
Jordan citied a litany of local and national statistics, both good and bad, on how Black males perform in high school. He said solutions to the problem of Black male retention in high school must include getting qualified teachers in Black classrooms and creating “a sense of alignment” with other institutions, including HBCUs.
Jones called for HBCUs to lead the charge against abolishing mandatory minimum sentences for nonviolent crimes—laws that put young Black men disproportionally in prison. “I’m concerned that the prison system is the closest thing to slavery that we have (today),” he argued.
Hunt called on the professional Black men in the audience to mentor young Black males. “Each one of them is looking for another man to tell that they can make it,” she said.
Austin said that Black families need to reclaim themselves and their religious traditions to rescue their young men. “They (Black males at risk) are merely the residue of a society gone mad in the modern world,” he declared.
The panel’s moderator, Kofi Lomotey, president of Fort Valley State University, said HBCUs are already in states where they can be used effectively to help Black males rescue themselves. Seven of the 13 states with the lowest African-American male high school graduation rates—Florida, Georgia, Illinois, North Carolina, New York, Ohio and South Carolina—have HBCUs, explained Lomotey.
Highlights of last week’s conference included addresses by U.S. Sen. Barack Obama (D-Ill.), U.S. Secretary of Education Margaret Spellings and National Urban League CEO Marc Morial. HBCU student leaders attending the conference participated in a “Student Congressional Forum on Higher Educational Act Reauthorization” on Capitol Hill last Thursday.
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Sound Clips:
www.hbcuconnect.com/nafeo
Posted By: Will Moss
Wednesday, April 27th 2005 at 4:36AM
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