Are Black boys victims of the American promise ?
Perhaps, which is why I’m advocating for middle and high schools to show American Promise this month.
American Promise opens our eyes to the struggles of Black Boys
The documentary highlights their struggles and successes.
It challenges us to see the importance of removing the stereotypes of Black males.
The stereotypical and demeaning undertone that American citizens who live in what’s identified as lower or middle class communities still exists in education.
Black boys should not have to be isolated in resource classrooms to get a quality education.
This type of ideology creates a racially divided society that says to some American citizens, “You have a very slim chance of finding success!”
American Promise highlights the following areas as to reasons why Black children experience challenges in school.
- Absence of parents or lack of parental engagement
- Lack of diversity in school faculty and staff
- Improving Early Childhood Education
Increasing the engagement of stakeholders! Schools are building the work of family engagement which involved the family and community in helping continue education at home.
This also impacts parenting skills and improved ways to rear Black children.
Being intentional about recruiting and retaining a diverse staff (gender, race, culture, talents). Schools should hire someone who speak Spanish/other languages because there are ELL students or Black teachers because there are Black students.
We should have a diverse staff that represents a wide range of talents and cultures.
Building improved partnerships between schools, early learning centers and parents.
I believe if schools were more proactive with partnering with early learning centers, more families would be prepared for grade school.
Jason has worked in education for over 15 years as a teacher, blogger and community advocate. He speaks and writes primarily about the need to improve education for Black boys, particularly increasing the number of Black male educators in schools. In addition to blogging here at EdLanta, Jason is also a featured writer at Education Post.