Antioch’s Seattle Campus Chooses First American Indian Woman College Head

Antioch’s Seattle Campus Chooses First American Indian Woman College Head: "Dr. Cassandra Manuelito-Kerkvliet of the Navajo, or Dine, tribe appears to be the first American Indian woman to be appointed president of a mainstream university outside of the tribal college system. She was named this month to lead Antioch University Seattle from a pool of more than 40 candidates. She formally begins her presidency July 15.

Neither the American Indian Higher Education Consortium (AIHEC) nor the Council on the Advancement and Support of Education has a record of any Native woman being named president of a non-tribal college until now, but cannot confirm the information with 100 percent accuracy. The lack of such data could be said to underscore the dearth of native women in leadership positions among non-tribal colleges. Rather fittingly, Manuelito-Kerkvliet’s doctoral thesis examines the challenges faced by Native women pursuing leadership positions in higher education and the lack of mentoring available to them."

Study: Minorities Fare Worse in Traffic Stops

WASHINGTON (AP) -- Black, Hispanic and white drivers are equally likely to be pulled over by police, but blacks and Hispanics are much more likely to be searched and arrested, a federal study found.

Police were much more likely to threaten or use force against blacks and Hispanics than against whites in any encounter, whether at a traffic stop or elsewhere, according to the Justice Department.

The study, released Sunday by the department's Bureau of Justice Statistics, covered police contacts with the public during 2005 and was based on interviews by the Census Bureau with nearly 64,000 people age 16 or over. (Read the full reportexternal link)

"The numbers are very consistent" with those found in a similar study of police-public contacts in 2002, bureau statistician Matthew R. Durose, the report's co-author, said in an interview. "There's some stability in the findings over these three years."

Traffic stops have become a politically volatile issue. Minority groups have complained that many stops and searches are based on race rather than on legitimate suspicions. Blacks in particular have complained of being pulled over for simply "driving while black."

"The available data is sketchy but deeply concerning," said Hilary Shelton, director of the NAACP's Washington bureau. The civil rights organization has done its own surveys of traffic stops, and he said the racial disparities grow larger, the deeper the studies delve.

Affirmative Action Admits Tend To Be More Successful Than Legacy Admits, Says Study

Affirmative Action Admits Tend To Be More Successful Than Legacy Admits, Says Study
Researchers at Princeton University have found that students who received legacy admissions are more likely to face academic challenges than Blacks who were admitted under affirmative action admissions programs.

Despite their findings, the programs remain a target of critics, as anti-affirmative action groups look to duplicate the success of Michigan’s voter-approved ban on race-based preferences in college admissions. Arizona, Colorado, Missouri and Oklahoma are the next battlegrounds.

In a study published in the February 2007 journal Social Problems, Princeton sociologists Douglas S. Massey and Margarita Mooney used data from the National Longitudinal Survey of Freshmen to compile a sample of nearly 4,000 students at 28 colleges and universities. They found that 77 percent of the Black students surveyed were the beneficiaries of affirmative action. By comparison, 48 percent of all legacies benefited from admissions preferences.

Minorities hit hard by rising costs of subprime loans - USATODAY.com

Minorities hit hard by rising costs of subprime loans - USATODAY.com
Across the nation, black and Hispanic borrowers helped fuel a multiyear housing boom, accounting for 49% of the increase in homeowners from 1995 to 2005, says Harvard's Joint Center for Housing Studies. But Hispanics and African-Americans were far more likely to leverage the American dream with subprime loans — higher-cost products for buyers with impaired credit — that are now going bad at an alarming rate.

About 46% of Hispanics and 55% of blacks who took out purchase mortgages in 2005 got higher-cost loans, compared with about 17% of whites and Asians, according to Federal Reserve data. The South Side of Chicago, with a large concentration of minority borrowers, has a high concentration of subprime loans and the state's highest foreclosure rate. In Boston, where defaults are rising — especially in minority areas — 73% of high-income black buyers (those making $92,000 to $152,000) and 70% of high-income Hispanics had subprime loans in 2005, compared with 17% of whites.

Pay gap persists: Women still make less, study says

NEW YORK — Women make only 80% of the salaries their male peers do one year after college; after 10 years in the workforce, the gap between men's and women's pay widens, according to a study released Monday.

The study, by the American Association of University Women Educational Foundation, found that 10 years after college, women earn only 69% of what men earn.

Even after controlling for hours, occupation, parenthood, and other factors known to affect earnings, the study found that one-quarter of the pay gap remains unexplained. The group said part of the gap is "likely due to sex discrimination."

"Over time, the unexplained portion of the pay gap grows," the group said in a news release.

Catherine Hill, the organization's director of research, said: "Part of the wage difference is a result of people's choices, another part is employer's assumptions of what people's choices will be. ... Employers assume that young women are going to leave the workforce when they have children, and, therefore, don't promote them."

The organization found that women's scholastic performance was not reflected in their compensation. Women have slightly higher grade point averages than men in every major, including science and math. But women who attend highly selective colleges earn the same as men who attend minimally selective colleges, according to the study.

"The pay gap is not going to disappear just through educational achievements," Hill said.

First integrated prom for rural Georgia high school

ASHBURN, Georgia (AP) -- For the first time, the faces of students at the Turner County High School prom were both white and black.

Each year, in spite of integration, the school's white students had raised money for their own unofficial prom and black students did the same to throw their own separate party, an annual ritual that divided the southern Georgia peanut-farming county anew each spring.

That all changed Saturday as horse-drawn carriages and stretch limousines carried young couples around the downtown streets to a single prom.

"I couldn't be more proud of these young people," said Ray Jordan, the county's school superintendent. "The changes needed to come from the student body."

At the start of the school year, Turner County's four senior class officers had told principal Chad Stone they wanted an official prom and they wanted everyone invited.

Stone spent $5,000 of his discretionary fund to put together the county's first school-sponsored prom. Another $5,000 came from supporters after news stories about the plan spread across the nation.

"Tonight, it's a fresh start," said James Hall, the black senior class president who led the charge for the integrated prom.

Just the Stats: Socioeconomic Gaps Persist For Students

College freshmen today are more affluent than at any point over the past 35 years, but they say they not very concerned about race relations and are not as prepared for college as they’d like to be, according to a recent report from the University of California, Los Angeles titled “American Freshmen: Forty-Year Trends, 1966-2006.”

Researchers analyzed four decades of data from the Cooperative Institutional Research Program’s Freshman Survey, first launched in 1966. The analysis looked at access and affordability, preparation for college and values, breaking down each category by race/ethnicity and gender.

In 2005, the median annual family income of entering freshmen was $74,000 —60 percent more than the national average family income of $46,236. The gap has widened considerably since 1971, when the median income of families of college freshmen was 46 percent more than the average U.S. family — $13,200 compared to $9,028.

The report also found that among entering college students, just over one-third rated the objective of helping to promote racial understanding as “essential” or “very important.” That represents a decline from a high of 46.4 percent in 1992, when the Rodney King beating trial sparked riots in Los Angeles.

The study also found that students continue to be unprepared for college-level math and science, even though more high school students are college preparatory courses in those subjects.

In 1971, more than half of all American Indians, Blacks and Hispanics said they needed remedial work in mathematics during their college years. Between 1971 and 1979, students’ expectations of needing remedial work in college declined. That trend has since reversed. The overall percentage of college freshmen indicating a need to take remedial math increased from 21.5 percent in 1979 to 24.1 percent in 2005. The percent of freshmen indicating a need to take remedial science rose from 9.7 percent to 10.9 during that same period.

Rights activist June Johnson dies at 59 - Race & Ethnicity - MSNBC.com

Rights activist June Johnson dies at 59 - Race & Ethnicity - MSNBC.com: JACKSON, Miss. - Civil rights activist June E. Johnson, who as a teenager was beaten by white officials in a 1963 confrontation that led to federal charges, has died. She was 59.

Johnson died Friday of kidney failure at Providence Hospital in Washington, said her son, Hakim Malik Johnson.

Born in the Mississippi Delta city of Greenwood, Johnson became involved in the Student Non-Violent Coordinating Committee when her parents hosted members of the group in their home.

In June 1963, on the way back from a voter registration workshop in South Carolina, Johnson was arrested at a Winona, Miss., bus station along with Fannie Lou Hamer, one of the founders of the Mississippi Freedom Democratic Party, and others.

The sheriff asked the 15-year-old girl whether she was a member of the NAACP. When Johnson answered yes, she was beaten in the face, then punched in the stomach.

"I raised my head and the white man hit me in the back of the head with a club wrapped in black leather," Johnson said in her statement, quoted in John Dittmer's 1994 book "Local People: The Struggle for Civil Rights in Mississippi."

"Blood was streaming down the back of my head and my dress was all bloody," she said.

Hamer and three others also were beaten. The Kennedy administration's Justice Department brought federal civil rights charges against five men, including the sheriff and police chief, but they were cleared later in the year by an all-white jury.

Washington, D.C., congressional delegate Eleanor Holmes Norton, who worked with SNCC at the time, said Johnson "sparkled with uncommon courage."

Community College Presidents And Congressional Black Caucus Join Forces To Reverse Decline In Black Male Enrollment

Community College Presidents And Congressional Black Caucus Join Forces To Reverse Decline In Black Male Enrollment
Alarmed by the declining number of Black males seeking higher education, the Presidents’ Round Table, a group of Black community college presidents, has mobilized to tackle that crisis.

To that end, members of the Round Table participated in sessions with titles like “The Vanishing Male: Minority Males in Higher Education,” and “Ensuring Success for African American Males at Community Colleges” at the 2007 American Association of Community Colleges convention, which is being held in Tampa, Fla., through Tuesday.

The Round Table also met with members of the Congressional Black Caucus in February in an effort to form a national action plan to effect a turnaround in the Black male crisis. Dr. Charles A. Taylor, the Round Table’s convener and president of Thomas Nelson Community College in Hampton, Va., says one of his principle policy priorities is getting the Round Table engaged on that issue nationally. The Round Table consists of CEO members of the National Council on Black American Affairs, an AACC council.

NPR : A Test of Courage: Jackie Robinson's Rookie Year

NPR : A Test of Courage: Jackie Robinson's Rookie Year: When Jackie Robinson stepped onto the diamond at Ebbets Field on April 15, 1947, it was the beginning of a year that would test not only his personal courage, but the mettle of a nation.

While much of Robinson's life has become folklore, the inside story of his pivotal first year on the Brooklyn Dodgers is less well known.

Before he'd even swung a bat in Brooklyn, the media was comparing Robinson to Frederick Douglass, George Washington Carver and Joe Louis. By integrating baseball, Robinson had the weight of a nation on his shoulders, and he knew it.

In his new book, Opening Day: Jackie Robinson's First Season, author Jonathan Eig delves into the personal and professional battles that Robinson fought during his rookie season. Eig tells Liane Hansen about the man who would lead the Dodgers in their dramatic race for the 1947 pennant.

African-American News- To Close Gaps, Schools Focus on Black Boys - AOL Black Voices

African-American News- To Close Gaps, Schools Focus on Black Boys - AOL Black Voices: OSSINING, N.Y. -- In an effort to ensure racial diversity, the school system here in northern Westchester County is set up in an unusual way, its six school buildings divided not by neighborhood but by grade level. So all of the second and third graders in the Ossining Union Free School District attend the Brookside School.

But some minority students, the black boys at Brookside, are set apart, in a way, by a special mentoring program that pairs them with black teachers for one-on-one guidance outside class, extra homework help, and cultural activities during the school day. 'All the black boys used to end up in the office, so we had to do something,' said Lorraine Richardson, a second-grade teacher and mentor. 'We wanted to teach them to help each other' instead of fight each other. While many school districts have long worked to close the achievement gap between minority and white students, Ossining's programs aimed to get black male students to college are a new frontier.

Gary Howard at Busboys and Poets

Busboys and Poets Books
2021 14TH STREET NW
202-387-POET
Questioning...challenging...re-thinking...the world behind the headlines.
Operated by Teaching for Change

Thursday, April 19, 2007 6:30 – 8:00pm
Gary Howard will give a presentation based on his best-selling book, We Can't Teach What We Don't Know: White Teachers, Multiracial Schools, 2nd Edition. “Borrowing from the words of Malcolm X, ‘We can't teach what we don't know, and we can't lead where we can't go,’ Gary Howard's book acts on both points. He explains why teachers mustn't ‘fake it,’ but must acquire the knowledge, skills, and disposition to successfully teach all students. A great book for teacher-candidates and experienced teachers.” —Carl A. Grant, Hoefs-Bascom Professor, University of Wisconsin–Madison

Gary Howard outlines what good teachers know, what they do, and how they embrace culturally responsive teaching. The second edition includes a new introduction and a new chapter that speak directly to current issues such as closing the achievement gap, and to recent legislation such as No Child Left Behind. With our nation’s student population becoming ever more diverse, and teachers remaining largely White, this book is now more important than ever. A must-read in universities and school systems throughout the country, We Can’t Teach What We Don’t Know continues to facilitate and deepen the discussion of race and social justice in education.

The book is on sale at the Busboys and Poets Bookstore, operated by Teaching for Change, and Gary Howard will sign copies following the presentation.

A $3 donation is requested at the door. Reservation required, RSVP: admin@teachingforchange.org.

To Close Gaps, Schools Focus on Black Boys - New York Times

To Close Gaps, Schools Focus on Black Boys - New York Times: In an effort to ensure racial diversity, the school system here in northern Westchester County is set up in an unusual way, its six school buildings divided not by neighborhood but by grade level. So all of the second and third graders in the Ossining Union Free School District attend the Brookside School.

But some minority students, the black boys at Brookside, are set apart, in a way, by a special mentoring program that pairs them with black teachers for one-on-one guidance outside class, extra homework help, and cultural activities during the school day. “All the black boys used to end up in the office, so we had to do something,” said Lorraine Richardson, a second-grade teacher and mentor. “We wanted to teach them to help each other” instead of fight each other.

While many school districts have long worked to close the achievement gap between minority and white students, Ossining’s programs aimed to get black male students to college are a new frontier.

Ossining school officials said they were not singling out black boys, but after a district analysis of high school students’ grade-point averages revealed that black boys were performing far worse than any other group, they decided to act. In contrast, these officials said, the performance of black girls compared favorably with other students and did not warrant the same concern.

Minority Scholarships Fall Victim To Fear Of Anti-affirmative Action Lawsuit

Minority Scholarships Fall Victim To Fear Of Anti-affirmative Action Lawsuit
Starting this fall, a scholarship created to boost Black student enrollment at Northeastern University will be open to White students, one of several policy changes the university has taken to avoid becoming the target of an anti-affirmative action lawsuit.

The Ujima Scholars program will also fund far fewer student this fall than it has in past years, although officials say the change is intended to more fully cover college costs. The changes have Black students on the campus ill at ease.

“We thought it was a mistake at first, whether Caucasians can receive the Ujima scholarship, but we were told it wasn’t,” says Lula Petty-Edwards, the associate dean and director of the African American Institute, which has housed the Ujima Scholar’s program since 1972. Ujima is Swahili for collective work and responsibility.

“If Northeastern is already predominately a White university, why should the Ujima programs be used for White students, is the question [Black students] are asking,” she says.

The Boston institution is not alone. Numerous schools nationwide have chosen to open their once racially targeted scholarships to White students in an effort to avoid equal protection lawsuits.

First-generation Students Need Continued Support for College, Says Report

First-generation Students Need Continued Support for College, Says Report
First-generation students say navigating the admissions process and receiving continuing support after getting in are some of the key elements in raising their aspirations, according to a new study by the Pell Institute for the Study of Opportunity in Higher Education.

“Straight from the Source: What Works for First-Generation College Students” is based on interviews with Hispanic and Black students enrolled in TRIO’s Talent Search and Upward Bound programs in six Texas cities — Dallas, Edinburg, El Paso, Houston, Kingsville and San Antonio. The students were either from low-income backgrounds, were first-generation students or both.

According to Dr. Colleen O’Brien, director of the Pell Institute and a co-author of the report, it is not enough to raise first-generation students’ hopes and dreams.

“To make the successful leap to college, disadvantaged students need intensive help with the admissions and financial aid processes and a real comfort level with both campus life and college academic support resources. And once they are in college, the challenges to stay enrolled are just as significant,” O’Brien says.

At present, there are 6.5 million first-generation undergraduate students. The report also shows the wide range of issues first-generation students come across in their quest to finish college, such as understanding why college matters and involving family members in the transition. The study recommends prior exposure to college life and knowledge about financial aid programs, and, once enrolled, access to college-based support services.

Report: Investing in American Indian Students Improves Their Health, Income

Report: Investing in American Indian Students Improves Their Health, Income: Higher education can drive economic and social development for all American Indian communities, according to a recent study released by The Institute for Higher Education Policy.
The report, “The Path of Many Journeys: The Benefits of Higher Education for Native People and Communities,” in collaboration with the American Indian Higher Education Consortium and the American Indian College Fund, shows how higher education can benefit tribal communities.
According to the study, almost 28 percent of American Indians age 25 and over had not graduated from high school in 2004. By comparison, 15 percent of the general American population in 2004 had not earned a high school diploma by age 25. American Indians have also faced challenges at traditional higher education institutions, largely caused by the rampant poverty in Native communities. Most students at tribal colleges and universities come from families that make just under $14,000 per year. The poverty limit for a family of four in 2005 was $19,971, according to the U.S. Census Bureau. American Indian students were most likely to receive federal aid (around 50 percent), and were more likely to receive grants (59 percent) than loans (32 percent).

Goal No. 1: Good Science. Goal No. 1: Diversity. - New York Times

Goal No. 1: Good Science. Goal No. 1: Diversity. - New York Times: BALTIMORE — There’s something striking about the laboratory of Michael F. Summers at the University of Maryland, Baltimore County. It’s not the giant nuclear magnetic resonance machine that he uses to visualize molecules; it’s the faces of the people who work there.

Fifteen of the 32 researchers in Dr. Summers’s biochemistry lab, including a postdoctoral student and 3 Ph.D. candidates, are black. In the halls of American science, such representation is rare.

Dr. Summers, 49, works on two tracks: trying to cure AIDS and trying to create more diversity at the research bench. When he is not in the lab, he takes to the road with the university president, Freeman A. Hrabowski III, pushing universities to set up programs for minority students who are inclined toward science. At U.M.B.C., the Meyerhoff Scholarship Program has provided an intense scientific education to about 800 undergraduates so far.

Indiana University Joins 9 Black Colleges For Science Initiative

Indiana University Joins 9 Black Colleges For Science Initiative: Indiana University is joining with nine historically Black colleges and universities to boost the number of minorities seeking careers in science, starting with a summer program for promising students who will work at IU’s research laboratories.

IU President Adam Herbert, who announced The STEM Initiative during a Thursday news conference at IUPUI, said a $2 million endowment to fund a graduate student fellowship program is already in place to help get the effort off the ground.

He said the STEM program -- its name derives from science, technology, engineering and math -- aims to bring students from the mostly southern Black colleges to Indiana for educational opportunities. IU students and faculty will also be able to study or teach at the nine schools.

“This innovative undertaking unites several thousand students and faculty members across the nation around a common objective -- increasing the number of underrepresented minority graduate students, scholars and professionals in the STEM disciplines,” he said.

School Size and Location Important for Hispanic Achievement

School Size and Location Important for Hispanic Achievement: Public high schools in the seven states accounting for the majority of U.S. Hispanic students (79%) are more likely to have characteristics that negatively affect the learning process and academic achievement, according to a report from the Pew Hispanic Center, 'The High Schools Hispanics Attend: Size and Other Key Characteristics.' The message directed to educators and educational policymakers being that they 'have vastly more influence over the characteristics of their schools than the characteristics of their students,' such as parents' education or socioeconomic status.

Schools in these high Hispanic enrollment states -- California, Texas, Florida, New York, Arizona, Illinois, and New Jersey -- tend to be larger, to have higher student-to-teacher ratios, to be located in central cities, and to have higher percentages of low-income students (see chart, 'Top Seven States by Hispanic High School Enrollment'). All of these characteristics are correlated with reduced educational achievement.

Child fatal injury rate down, but race gap up | U.S. | Reuters

Child fatal injury rate down, but race gap up | U.S. | Reuters: CHICAGO (Reuters) - Young children may be less likely to suffer fatal injuries than they were two decades ago but young blacks and American Indians are twice as likely as whites of dying in accidents, a U.S. study said on Monday.

A steady improvement in the rate of unintentional fatal injuries among children up to age 4 among all racial groups -- a roughly 80 percent drop since the 1980s -- was credited to more extensive use of safety measures such as car seats, smoke detectors and childproof caps on medicines and household products, the study said.

However, there was a 'troubling trend showing increases in recent poisoning deaths in Hispanic and black children,' lead study author Joyce Pressley wrote in Pediatrics, the journal of the American Academy of Pediatrics.