It should shock no one to be told that a terribly high percentageof black American youngsters are getting lousy excuses for aneducation. Any look at the verbal and math skills, the ability toread and write, the rates of dropouts and pregnancies, makes it clearthat black youngsters represent a grave challenge to this nation'seducation leaders.
What I do find shocking are some of the silly "panaceas" beingproposed: schools set up almost exclusively for black males;"parental choice" for families to use government vouchers to sendtheir children away from their bad public school, and cries to makecurriculums at predominantly black schools "Afrocentric."
Some blacks in Milwaukee, New York and a few other cities seem tohave decided that young black men are "different" - that they can'tlearn or achieve properly in the presence of whites or black females.
I say that unless these schools become the equivalent ofmilitary academies, they are not going to turn out ambitious blackmen whose single-minded passions are to invent things, buildskyscrapers or write great novels. Isolation will cure nothing.
The newest "let's have pride" fad is to put Africa at thecenter of studies programs in predominantly black public schools andcolleges.
Lord knows I favor a heavy emphasis on black heritage in theseinstitutions. I want every school system to expose children toAfrican history. But I do not want to see "Afrocentrism" blind blackyoungsters to the fact that math, medicine, reading and writing arenot delivered to us by any continent or clan. Learning aboutTimbuktu must never replace taking the tough calculus, physics andEnglish courses.
Our children must know that the only life-lifting pride comesfrom one's own achievements, not from any vicarious flirtation withhistory.
This business of vouchers and "parental choice" is a powerfulsnare and delusion for many black parents. They know that theirneighborhood school is third rate, and may even see the teachersthere sending their children to private schools. Ordinary parentswant the same for their children.
The terrible truth is that no more than a relative handful ofblack youngsters will get vouchered into a private school, or a"magnet" or first-class public school. The rest will be left tomediocrity and worse in voucher-weakened public school systems.
What our kids need is a legally required equalization ofexpenditures on public school children, rich and poor alike. Theyneed a great infusion of federal money to lift the level ofexpenditures per child as between, say, Mississippi and Michigan.They need intense pressures on black teachers to care and sacrificemore, on black parents to become involved, and church leaders ofevery race to "get religion" about disadvantaged children'seducational needs.
If black kids get these things we can dismiss the misguided,destructive "solutions" of resegregation, Africanization andvoucherism. We can just teach children of every race and backgroundto excel.
Carl T. Rowan is a nationally syndicated columnist of theChicago Sun-Times.
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