For-profit Colleges Haul in Government Aid

For-profit Colleges Haul in Government Aid: Students aren't the only ones benefiting from the billions of new dollars Washington is spending on college aid for the poor.

An Associated Press analysis shows surging proportions of both low-income students and the recently boosted government money that follows them are ending up at for-profit schools, from local career colleges to giant publicly traded chains such as the University of Phoenix, Kaplan and Devry.

Last year, the five institutions that received the most federal Pell Grant dollars were all for-profit colleges, collecting over $1 billion among them. That was two and a half times what those schools hauled in just two years prior, the AP found, analyzing Department of Education data on disbursements from the Pell program, Washington's main form of college aid to the poor.

Va. Military Institute Faces Sexism Accusations

Va. Military Institute Faces Sexism Accusations: LEXINGTON Va.- Virginia Military Institute is defending itself against a lengthy investigation into accusations that the school's policies are sexist and hostile toward female cadets, a dozen years after women won the right to enroll.

The U.S. Department of Education's Office for Civil Rights has an ongoing investigation of a sex discrimination complaint at the small, state-supported school that so far has taken nearly a year and a half, three times longer than usual.

Defenders say VMI has worked hard to recruit women and make them comfortable since the U.S. Supreme Court ordered co-education in 1997, but women remain a small minority. Of the 1,500 cadets on the Shenandoah Valley campus this fall, 126 are women.

Temple U. Establishes Center to Study, Promote Diversity-Related Issues

Temple U. Establishes Center to Study, Promote Diversity-Related Issues: The discussion about race and the Philadelphia public school system had already lasted 20 minutes and Temple University students couldn't stop talking. A forum on the country's changing demographics hosted by the Philadelphia-based university's new diversity research center left the students with more to say.

'We didn't finish!' freshman communications major Nyidera Edwards said as the three-hour event concluded.

The session, attended by approximately 40 students, was one of the first events of Temple's Academic Center on Research in Diversity, or ACCORD, which launched this year.

Pa. city torn by racial strife elects black mayor - washingtonpost.com

Pa. city torn by racial strife elects black mayor - washingtonpost.com: YORK, Pa. -- A little girl who trembled in her house as a National Guard tank rumbled past during York's chaotic 1969 race riots has grown up to become the first black mayor of the central Pennsylvania city.

Kim Bracey, 45, an energetic veteran of the struggling manufacturing city's improvement efforts will take office in January, to the delight of many African-Americans who thought they would never see a black mayor.
ad_icon

'President Obama was one thing, but here in York where few people vote ... I really didn't think I would live to see this take place,' Bracey said in a recent interview at her transition office.

Racial harmony or becoming York's first black mayor was not part of Bracey's platform. In fact, she hadn't even thought about it until a reporter brought it up after she won the 'White Rose' city's four-way Democratic primary in May.

Job Crunch Even Harder On People With Disabilities : NPR

Job Crunch Even Harder On People With Disabilities : NPR: As large numbers of Americans deal with losing jobs, the unemployment rates are even higher among certain groups, including men, minorities — and also people with disabilities.

Lenny Kepil knows. He was laid off from his job this spring as a software test engineer. He'd been the last hired, but his whole department took a hit. 'It makes you nervous when you're laid off a long period of time. And right now, it's been seven months so far,' he says. 'So I have to get ready for the reality that things are stacking up against me.'

Kepil, who lives in Naperville, Illinois, has an impressive resume with more than 26 years as a software engineer. He's also deaf.

Unemployment Rates Almost Double

In October, when the national unemployment rate hit 10.2 percent, the numbers were much grimmer for working-age people with disabilities. "It's quite dramatic," says economist Andrew Houtenville, of the Institute on Disability at the University of New Hampshire. "You're talking about an unemployment rate for people with disabilities of around 17-and-a-half percent."

No Longer a Civil Rights Footnote - Claudette Colvin - NYTimes.com

No Longer a Civil Rights Footnote - Claudette Colvin - NYTimes.com: On that supercharged day in 1955, when Rosa Parks refused to give up her bus seat to a white passenger in Montgomery, Ala., she rode her way into history books, credited with helping to ignite the civil rights movement.

But there was another woman, named Claudette Colvin, who refused to be treated like a substandard citizen on one of those Montgomery buses — and she did it nine months before Mrs. Parks. The Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. made his political debut fighting her arrest. Moreover, she was the star witness in the legal case that eventually forced bus desegregation.

Yet instead of being celebrated, Ms. Colvin has lived unheralded in the Bronx for decades, initially cast off by black leaders who feared she was not the right face for their battle, according to a new book that has plucked her from obscurity.

Last week Phillip Hoose won the National Book Award for Young People’s Literature for “Claudette Colvin: Twice Toward Justice,” published by Farrar, Straus & Giroux. The honor sent the little-selling title shooting up 500 spots on Amazon.com’s sales list and immediately thrust Ms. Colvin, 70, back into the cultural conversation.

National Faculty Group Convened at Atlanta HBCUs Urged to Help Determine U.S. Education Priorities

National Faculty Group Convened at Atlanta HBCUs Urged to Help Determine U.S. Education Priorities: ATLANTA - The voice of higher education's core - professors and administrators - must play a pivotal part of determining what education needs to look like in the future, said a high-ranking U.S. Education Department official last weekend.

'We need your voice desperately,' Dr. Martha Kanter, under secretary for the U.S. Department of Education, told a group of educators gathered at Atlanta's Morehouse College on Nov. 20 for a panel discussion during the Faculty Resource Network national symposium, 'Challenge as Opportunity: The Academy in the Best and Worst of Times.'

'We've had the last eight years of not hearing the full voice of the faculty,' she said. 'The role you play is critical to the future of our American public. ... We are asking professors, college presidents, others, what the federal government can do to have the greatest impact on student achievement and bringing American higher education to a far greater level of impact in this country than ever before. ... We really are putting out a call to the country to redefine the role of federal government in education because we really have not clarified that role.'

Despite Pact, Few Blacks at Coast Guard School

Despite Pact, Few Blacks at Coast Guard School: WASHINGTON- Eight years after the U.S. Coast Guard and the NAACP signed a voluntary agreement to work together to boost the number of African-Americans at its 1,000-cadet service academy, the annual enrollment and graduation figures for Blacks remain in single digits.

Seven Blacks graduated from the academy based in New London, Conn., in the spring of 2001, the year the agreement was signed.

The same number graduated from the Class of 2006, the first class for which blacks were recruited under the agreement.

Subsequently, there were seven black graduates in 2007, five in 2008 and four in 2009.

That makes 23 graduates in four years under the agreement, including the academy's first Black female valedictorian. In the four previous years the number was 33.

Leading lawmakers have grown increasingly upset with results even as they repeatedly are told the Guard is working hard to improve diversity in a service where only 311 of its 6,787 commissioned officers are Black, with only one Black admiral.

Va. Military Institute Faces Sexism Accusations

Va. Military Institute Faces Sexism Accusations: Virginia Military Institute is defending itself against a lengthy investigation into accusations that the school's policies are sexist and hostile toward female cadets, a dozen years after women won the right to enroll.

The U.S. Department of Education's Office for Civil Rights has an ongoing investigation of a sex discrimination complaint at the small, state-supported school that so far has taken nearly a year and a half, three times longer than usual.

Defenders say VMI has worked hard to recruit women and make them comfortable since the U.S. Supreme Court ordered co-education in 1997, but women remain a small minority. Of the 1,500 cadets on the Shenandoah Valley campus this fall, 126 are women.

'The language and terminology that is used and considered acceptable by VMI in the barracks reflects a climate and culture that is derogatory and discriminatory toward the women that are required as cadets to live in the barracks,' according to the Education Department's June 2008 complaint.

Despite pact, few blacks at Coast Guard school - washingtonpost.com

Despite pact, few blacks at Coast Guard school - washingtonpost.com: WASHINGTON -- Eight years after the U.S. Coast Guard and the NAACP signed a voluntary agreement to work together to boost the number of African-Americans at its 1,000-cadet service academy, the annual enrollment and graduation figures for blacks remain in single digits.

Seven blacks graduated from the academy based in New London, Conn., in the spring of 2001, the year the agreement was signed.

The same number graduated from the Class of 2006, the first class for which blacks were recruited under the agreement.

Subsequently, there were seven black graduates in 2007, five in 2008 and four in 2009.

That makes 23 graduates in four years under the agreement, including the academy's first black female valedictorian. In the four previous years the number was 33.

Leading lawmakers have grown increasingly upset with results even as they repeatedly are told the Guard is working hard to improve diversity in a service where only 311 of its 6,787 commissioned officers are black, with only one black admiral.

HBCUs Get On Board With Direct Lending

HBCUs Get On Board With Direct Lending: As Congress moves closer to wrapping up deliberation on the Obama administration's proposal to convert the U.S. higher education student loan system of public and private lending into one fully run by the federal government, historically Black colleges and universities (HBCUs) aren't expected to be among the institutions opposing the reform, HBCU leaders say.

The move last month by the U.S. Education Department to advise higher education officials at 3,000 institutions to prepare their schools for full participation in the department's direct lending program by the 2010-11 academic year ruffled Republican lawmakers and private student loan lending advocates.

Sen. Lamar Alexander, R-Tenn., characterized the department's Oct. 26 letter recommending schools become 'Direct Loan-ready' by the 2010-11 academic year as 'premature.' Sen. Mike Johanns, R-Neb., wrote to Education Secretary Arne Duncan that he was 'disappointed in (Duncan's) actions to encourage this conversion when legislation has not yet become law.'

Obama to honor young inventors at science fair - washingtonpost.com

Obama to honor young inventors at science fair - washingtonpost.com: WASHINGTON -- Hey kids, grab those beakers and Petri dishes, the White House is going to hold a science fair.

President Barack Obama said Monday he would convene a national science fair next year to honor young inventors with the same gusto that college and professional athletes celebrate their victories at the White House.

'You know, if you win the NCAA championship, you come to the White House,' said Obama, a sports fan as much as a science nerd. 'Well, if you're a young person and you produce the best experiment or design, the best hardware or software, you ought to be recognized for that achievement, too. Scientists and engineers ought to stand side by side with athletes and entertainers as role models.'

He said they would show young students how "cool science can be." He noted $260 million in companies' donations to take science into more classrooms with television programs and celebrity science personalities.

The president made his remarks as he decried what he described as students' lagging performance.

"Now, the hard truth is that for decades we've been losing ground," Obama said. "One assessment shows American 15-year-olds now rank 21st in science and 25th in math when compared to their peers around their world."

Blacks hit hard by economy's punch - washingtonpost.com

Blacks hit hard by economy's punch - washingtonpost.com: ...Joblessness for 16-to-24-year-old black men has reached Great Depression proportions -- 34.5 percent in October, more than three times the rate for the general U.S. population. And last Friday, the Bureau of Labor Statistics reported that unemployment in the District, home to many young black men, rose to 11.9 percent from 11.4 percent, even as it stayed relatively stable in Virginia and Maryland.

Hate crimes against blacks, religious groups rise - USATODAY.com

Hate crimes against blacks, religious groups rise - USATODAY.com: The number of crimes against black people and members of religious groups increased in 2008, making up a growing share of incidents motivated by bias, the FBI reported Monday.

The number of crimes against black people and members of religious groups increased in 2008, making up a growing share of incidents motivated by bias, the FBI reported Monday.

Those categories accounted for 56% of the 7,783 hate crimes reported in 2008. Overall, hate crimes increased 2% from 2007.

The election of the first black president and hot-button issues such as abortion and gay marriage contributed to the spikes, anti-bias groups say.

Making My Mark, Year One

When I taught at Penn State and Temple universities, my classrooms were mostly White save for a handful of Black and Brown faces.

The toughest thing for me to come to grips with was the fact that I was a person of color teaching students who had rarely interacted with minority educators. Those dynamics were apparent early on at Penn State, when students thought they could get away with being casual. On one occasion, one of my students sauntered into class 20 minutes late and said, "Sup dawg" before taking his seat.

As I became more comfortable at Penn State, where many of my White students admittedly had little interaction with minority groups, I realized my legitimacy as an educator was based on my experience as a journalist. As a result, I would use stories from my time as a reporter - from covering pro football, political races and murders - as a way of making the classroom material more tangible. Some of my students, including those who might have felt uneasy about learning from an Indian-American, stayed in touch with me long after they completed my class.

At Lincoln, there is an interesting racial dynamic that I never took into consideration. The majority of the professors in my department are White and over the age of 50. When I joined this fall along with two of my African-American colleagues, we were the first non-White educators some of these students had for classes.

Some Lawmakers Send Few Minorities to U.S. Academies

Some Lawmakers Send Few Minorities to U.S. Academies: ANNAPOLIS, Md.- As U.S. military academies try to recruit more minorities, they aren't getting much help from members of Congress from big-city districts with large numbers of Blacks, Hispanics and Asians.

From New York to Chicago to Los Angeles, lawmakers from heavily minority areas rank at or near the bottom in the number of students they have nominated for appointment to West Point, the U.S. Naval Academy or the U.S. Air Force Academy, according to an Associated Press review of records from the past five years.

High school students applying to the academies must be nominated by a member of Congress or another high-ranking federal official. Congressional nominations account for about 75 percent of all students at the academies.

Academy records obtained by the AP through the Freedom of Information Act show that lawmakers in roughly half of the 435 House districts nominated more than 100 students each during the five-year period.

Native American Scholar Links Language and Tribal Identity

Native American Scholar Links Language and Tribal Identity: Dr. Anton Treuer's passion for the Ojibwe language goes beyond the purview of academic study. As an assistant professor of Ojibwe language in the Languages and Ethnic Studies Department at Bemidji State University in Minnesota, Treuer's personal and professional life revolves around the study and preservation of the language and culture.

Surprisingly, Treuer is not an Ojibwe native speaker. He learned the language as an adult when he returned to his homeland in and around the Leech Lake Ojibwe Reservation in Minnesota. He believes maintaining the language is tied to the survival of Ojibwe tribal identity.

'Language is a fundamental attribute of tribal sovereignty,' he says. Without language, Treuer believes all tribal peoples lose an essential cornerstone to their identities.

Pa. university students upset about fitness class - washingtonpost.com

Pa. university students upset about fitness class - washingtonpost.com: PHILADELPHIA -- A Pennsylvania university's requirement that overweight undergraduates take a fitness course to receive their degrees has raised the hackles of students and the eyebrows of health and legal experts.

Officials at historically black Lincoln University said Friday that the school is simply concerned about high rates of obesity and diabetes, especially in the African-American community.

"We know we're in the midst of an obesity epidemic," said James L. DeBoy, chairman of Lincoln's department of health, physical education and recreation. "We have an obligation to address this head on, knowing full well there's going to be some fallout."

The fallout began this week on Lincoln's campus about 45 miles southwest of Philadelphia, where seniors - the first class affected by the mandate - began realizing their last chance to take the class would be this spring.

Tiana Lawson, a 21-year-old senior, wrote in this week's edition of The Lincolnian, the student newspaper, that she "didn't come to Lincoln to be told that my weight is not in an acceptable range. I came here to get an education."

In an interview Friday, Lawson said she has no problem with getting healthy or losing weight. But she does have a problem with larger students being singled out.

"If Lincoln truly is concerned about everyone being healthy, then everyone should have to take this gym class, not just people who happen to be bigger," she said.

Study Abroad? College Students Drop, Rethink Plans

Study Abroad? College Students Drop, Rethink Plans: PROVIDENCE, R.I. - Economic reality and money problems may be cooling the enthusiasm of U.S. college students to study abroad, just two years after students' interest in foreign study was at an all-time high.

Four times as many students went abroad in the 2007-2008 academic year as 20 years ago, according to a survey of 985 schools released this week by the Institute of International Education, a nonprofit advocacy group.

But nearly 60 percent of the schools and study-abroad groups surveyed in early September by The Forum on Education Abroad report decreased enrollment from a year ago, since the global economic crisis.

Brown University in Providence, which typically sends one-third of its junior class abroad, saw a 10 percent drop in such enrollment this fall compared with fall 2008, said Kendall Brostuen, director of the Office of International Programs and an associate dean.

'My sense is over the last year, there's probably been some very important dinner-table discussions about how to best go about using the resources that a family has,' Brostuen said.

At Macalester College in St. Paul, Minn., which typically sends more than 60 percent of its students abroad, study abroad enrollment this fall dropped 25 percent from the same time last year, said spokeswoman Amy Phenix.

AU Professor’s Cross-country Study Reveals American Hospitality Toward Muslims

AU Professor’s Cross-country Study Reveals American Hospitality Toward Muslims: Just weeks after Dr. Ahmed Akbar came to American University in August 2001, his life changed.

“I’m teaching one of my first classes when the plane slams into the Pentagon,” he said. From that moment on, he was on a mission.

“Because my subject is Islam, because I am a Muslim, it makes my task even more urgent,” he said. “I’m trying to create bridges of understanding, trying to create bridges of dialogue, on campus and off campus.”

The relevance of his topic is undeniable considering the unwanted and undeserved attention cast on Islam because of other tragic events — the D.C. sniper shootings in 2002, committed by John Allen Muhammad who was executed Nov. 10, and the Nov. 5 Fort Hood shootings, allegedly committed by Maj. Nidal Hasan. Both men self-identify as Muslims.

“The gap between mainstream Americans and Muslims … is growing wider,” he said.

Black Males Hit Extra Hard By Unemployment : NPR

Black Males Hit Extra Hard By Unemployment : NPR : The country's spiraling unemployment rate is taking a particular toll on men as the recession continues to roil male-dominated industries, such as manufacturing and construction.

This 'he-cession,' as it's sometimes called, has hit African-American men especially hard, increasing their unemployment rate to more than 17 percent last month.

One of those unemployed black men searching for work is Randolph Smith. When Smith, 53, is working, he manages logistics, inventory and supplies for large companies. He's been trying to find that type of work since he was laid off a year ago — but so far, he's had no success.

Playing racquetball has been a lifesaver for Smith. He meets friends at a local health club about three or four times a week.

'Just to be able to come somewhere that's affordable for me, not far from home, to be around some good friends where there's camaraderie. To exercise and get the stress off my life.'

A black teen longs for the wild blue yonder - washingtonpost.com

A black teen longs for the wild blue yonder - washingtonpost.com: Colin Banks can talk to you about World War I and World War II planes until you're not interested anymore. He likes to TiVo aerial dogfights on the History Channel. The 17-year-old can't drive the distance from Maryland to Richmond by himself, but he's flown it.

As a young black man with a passion for flying, Colin is an anomaly. The teen, a senior at South County Secondary School in Fairfax County, has his sights on the U.S. Air Force Academy in Colorado Springs and dreams of becoming a fighter pilot.

At a time when blacks have reached dazzling heights -- U.S. president, chief executives of giant companies, even the nation's top astronaut is a black man -- you won't find many in the cockpit of a fighter jet. The cost of aviation lessons, the required educational training and the lack of role models all contribute to the scarcity.

Black Coaches Group Seeks Increased College President Input on Football Hires

Black Coaches Group Seeks Increased College President Input on Football Hires: INDIANAPOLIS - The head of the Black Coaches and Administrators group called Wednesday for more involvement by college presidents in hiring football coaches, a move he said would lead to more minority coaches on the sidelines.

Floyd Keith, executive director of the group, believes it's the best option to make changes quickly.

After releasing the group's latest hiring report card Wednesday, Keith said he was willing to listen to any ideas, including a possible lawsuit, to improve numbers that show nine of 120 Football Bowl Subdivision schools have minority head coaches.

'Today, I believe the one group that can change this situation outside of state and or federal legislation is college presidents,' he said. 'Presidents can create and demand the proper environment and process for equitable searches. In the equation of the collegiate hiring process, a college president is the one individual who can demand justice in the search process.'

School Grades Reflect a Persistent Disparity - NYTimes.com

School Grades Reflect a Persistent Disparity - NYTimes.com: Over the last three years, high schools that received the lowest marks from the city have been the ones with the highest percentages of poor, black and Hispanic students, despite an evaluation system that was meant to equalize differences among student bodies, according to an analysis by The New York Times of school grades released this week.

Blacks and Hispanics make up on average 77 percent of the student population in the 139 schools that received A’s this past year, compared with more than 90 percent of the schools that received C’s or worse. While the vast majority of A schools have a high minority enrollment, 14 of the 15 largest high-performing schools in the city have drastically lower black and Hispanic enrollment.

As a result, black and Hispanic students over all are more likely to attend a school that scored lower under the city’s grading system: 34 percent of black and Hispanic students attend a high school that received a C or worse, compared with 15 percent of whites and Asians.

The analysis found a similar grade distribution in 2007 and 2008.

Indiana Professors Propose African Boarding School

Indiana Professors Propose African Boarding School: INDIANAPOLIS — Some Indiana University professors have proposed a novel way to give struggling inner-city students a fresh start: send them to boarding school in Africa. The project is still in its planning phase, and its backers admit it faces legal and financial hurdles. But the professors want to establish a school in the West African nation of Ghana where Indiana teachers would instruct some of the state's poorest children.

'The core idea is to pull kids out of an environment where they cannot thrive and put them in one where they can,' said law professor Kevin Brown, who leads the group behind the idea.

Backers would have to raise $4 million in donations to build the school, but the $10,000 or so the state pays urban districts for a student's education each year would cover the classes, room, board and travel, said Brown, who teaches at the university’s Bloomington campus.

Virginia analyzing lack of minorities in gifted programs - washingtonpost.com

Virginia analyzing lack of minorities in gifted programs - washingtonpost.com: Gov. Timothy M. Kaine announced Tuesday that the Virginia Education Department has launched a study of minority students' low participation in gifted education programs statewide.

African Americans represent 26 percent of the state's 1.2 million students but 12 percent of those in gifted education programs. Hispanics are 9 percent of the state's schoolchildren, but 5 percent of gifted students.

'Virginia is proud of both the high standards of our educational system and the wealth of diversity in our communities. . . . It's critical we assess any disproportionate barriers . . . so we can ensure students of all backgrounds have the opportunity to participate,' Kaine said in a release.

NAACP officials have urged Kaine in recent months to address racial and ethnic disparities in new regulations for gifted education that he is expected to sign in the next few weeks. Some said a study does not go far enough to address their concerns.

"When policymakers don't want to do something, they study something," said Arthur Almore, education chairman for the Chesterfield County branch of the NAACP. "I'm disappointed because the governor has the power to act here and bring about substantive change."

College Students Find Support in Campus 'Posses'

College Students Find Support in Campus 'Posses': Posse founder Deborah Bial started the organization in 1989 after a once-promising inner-city student told her, 'I never would have dropped out of college if I had my posse with me.'

Since then, Posse has sent more than 2,600 students to its partner campuses, including Vanderbilt University, Colby College and the University of California at Berkeley.

The program targets students in disadvantaged urban districts who have strong leadership skills but may lack the guidance to wade into what can be an intimidating college admissions process. Posse is not need- or minority-based, though many students fit both categories.

The demand for such help is dramatic, Bial said. Posse, which had been recruiting from six major cities, added Miami as its seventh this fall. The program received more than 12,000 nominations this year for 460 slots nationwide, Bial said.

Posse provides academic support and help with college applications, but admission decisions are made by individual schools, which offer full merit scholarships. A University of Missouri study presented last week links merit aid to increased freshman year grade-point averages, particularly for minority and low-income students.

Fairfax schools debate language instruction and its costs - washingtonpost.com

Fairfax schools debate language instruction and its costs - washingtonpost.com: The Fairfax County School Board took a sharp detour from America's aversion to learning foreign languages when it adopted an ambitious goal in 2006 that language instruction should start early and graduates should be able to speak two languages.

In an increasingly interconnected world, school leaders reasoned, English is insufficient to succeed at international business or diplomacy. Fairfax County, a cosmopolitan suburb near a seat of world power, where 40 percent of students hear or speak another language at home, seemed a natural place to make foreign language instruction a top priority.

Lean budget years have tested that resolve. In tough times, parents and board members are debating whether foreign language instruction, particularly in early years, is fundamental or a frill.

"It's a lovely thing to have. I would support it greatly if we had the money," said Fairfax parent Emily Slough, referring to an elementary language program that could be cut next year. "But we are down to bare bones."

Some parents support the school system's language goals but criticize the elementary programs. Others are skeptical of the foreign language emphasis, noting that English is spoken worldwide.

Report: More Americans going hungry - washingtonpost.com

Report: More Americans going hungry - washingtonpost.com: The number of Americans who lack dependable access to adequate food shot up last year to 49 million, the largest number since the government has been keeping track, according to a federal report released Monday that shows particularly steep increases in food scarcity among families with children.

In 2008, the report found, nearly 17 million children -- more than one in five across the United States -- were living in households in which food at times ran short, up from slightly more than 12 million youngsters the year before. And the number of children who sometimes were outright hungry rose from nearly 700,000 to almost 1.1 million.

Among people of all ages, nearly 15 percent last year did not consistently have adequate food, compared with about 11 percent in 2007, the greatest deterioration in access to food during a single year in the history of the report.

Taken together, the findings provide the latest glimpse into the toll that the weak economy has taken on the well-being of the nation's residents. The findings are from a snapshot of food in America that the U.S. Agriculture Department has issued every year since 1995, based on Census Bureau surveys. It documents both Americans who are scrounging for adequate food -- people living with some amount of "food insecurity" in the lexicon of experts -- and those whose food shortages are so severe that they are hungry.

Mass. Immigrant Tuition Bill to Get New Push

Mass. Immigrant Tuition Bill to Get New Push: It seemed like a given that Mario Rodas would go to college.

The Guatemalan-born student certainly had the academic credentials, going from English as a second language classes to taking advanced placement exams for college credit his senior year at Chelsea High School.

But paying for it was another matter. As an undocumented immigrant in 2005, Rodas would have had to pay out-of-state tuition fees to go to a public college in Massachusetts, and he couldn’t afford that. If he had lived in Texas or Utah, states that allow undocumented students to pay in-state tuition rates, Rodas, now 22, might have graduated already.

“Every year we have more and more students in limbo here,” Rodas said. “And every year we have more and more students taking advantage (of in-state tuition) elsewhere. I don’t understand.”

Nearly three years after Massachusetts House lawmakers soundly rejected a bill that would have allowed undocumented immigrants to attend college at in-state tuition rates, lawmakers are preparing to revisit the issue.

Activists say 10 other states, some dominated by conservative lawmakers, have passed legislation with bipartisan support, and advocates see no reason why Massachusetts, a state controlled by Democrats, can’t do the same.

Study Abroad Participation Up, Except Among Minority Students

Study Abroad Participation Up, Except Among Minority Students: Despite targeted outreach and the availability of financial aid, minority-student study abroad participation declined for several groups, according to the new Open Doors report from the Institute of International Education. The report, however, showed an 8.5 percent overall increase in study abroad participation.

“It is very disheartening to see how slowly the minorities’ share of study abroad is increasing,” said IIE Chief Operating Officer Peggy Blumenthal.

The data, from school year 2007-08, shows African-American student participation increased from 3.8 to 4 percent, but participation by Asian-Americans and Latinos decreased by a tenth of a percent each, from 6.7 to 6.6 percent and from 6 to 5.9 percent, respectively. This reflects a 10-year period of slow, if not stagnant growth for all minorities, during which study abroad participants doubled from about 130,000 to more than 260,000.

“A lot of steps are starting to be taken” to increase minority participation, Blumenthal said, “but it still doesn’t seem to be moving the needle enough.”

The Known World of Edward P. Jones - washingtonpost.com

The Known World of Edward P. Jones - washingtonpost.com: Edward Paul Jones is sitting at a table in Guapo's restaurant in Tenleytown early on a midsummer evening, looking down into a glass of red wine. Nobody in the place recognizes him, although he's arguably the greatest fiction writer the nation's capital has ever produced.

His three books, two of them collections of short stories set in black Washington, have been hailed as masterpieces. He's won the Pulitzer Prize, the National Book Critic's Circle award, the PEN/Hemingway Award, a MacArthur 'genius grant,' the Lannan Literary Award, the International IMPAC Dublin Literary Award, and a bunch of (by comparison) trifling stuff. He's won nearly $1 million in literary awards alone, never mind earning hundreds of thousands of dollars in royalties.

And yet he hasn't written a word of fiction in four years. There is not a draft in a drawer, not a scrap of paper with notes for a story or a novel. He's knocked off some nonfiction introductions to classic works and edited a couple of anthologies, but nothing of the sort that made him a name.

A look at Anacostia Community Museum exhibit 'The African Presence in Mexico' - washingtonpost.com

A look at Anacostia Community Museum exhibit 'The African Presence in Mexico' - washingtonpost.com: Telling stories that have largely been ignored: Such has the mission always been for the Anacostia Community Museum. Behind its doors, typically, are hidden treasures unearthed, tales hardly told, customs all but forgotten.

The raison d'etre of the small museum, part of the sprawling Smithsonian Institution family, remains the same, but as the Afro-Mexican faces just behind the lapis doors to the main gallery attest these days, its newest show is also a strong indication that the institution is evolving.

Witness its current exhibition, 'The African Presence in Mexico: From Yanga to the Present.' It is a collaboration of six organizations, including art from the collection of the National Museum of Mexican Art in Chicago, financial assistance from the Smithsonian Latino Center and program support from the Mexican Cultural Institute, both in Washington. The exhibition does have its roots firmly in Anacostia's long tradition of exploring racial identity -- through the prisms of everything from black churches to holidays and baseball teams.

Pa. swim club accused of bias to file bankruptcy - washingtonpost.com

Pa. swim club accused of bias to file bankruptcy - washingtonpost.com: PHILADELPHIA -- A suburban swim club accused of discrimination last summer after revoking the memberships of mostly black and Hispanic children plans to declare bankruptcy, a newspaper reported Saturday.

Valley Swim Club president John Duesler sent an e-mail to club 'friends and families' Friday saying the board of directors had voted to file for Chapter 7 bankruptcy this week, The Philadelphia Daily News reported.

Duesler wrote in the e-mail that many would blame the bankruptcy on legal proceedings and negative media exposure, the newspaper said. But, he said, 'the truth is that the club has struggled to stay out of the red for at least the last decade' and owes more than $100,000 in operational expenses and legal fees, the newspaper reported.

Middle school tests Va. Muslim girl's decision to wear head scarf - washingtonpost.com

Middle school tests Va. Muslim girl's decision to wear head scarf - washingtonpost.com: ... Eight years later -- even as the Muslim population in the United States has soared to as many as 7 million -- it still can take real courage for a girl to put on a head scarf and venture into a public middle or high school.

"Young boys go to school, and nobody knows they are Muslim, but young girls, with a scarf on their head, it shows clearly that she made a decision to stand out as a Muslim," says Mohamed Magid, the imam at ADAMS. "They suddenly become ambassadors of Islam."


Smar didn't embrace that role until her mother took her and her younger siblings to Egypt this past summer to visit family. Smar noticed immediately that all the women and girls there wore hijab. People stared at Smar's shoulder-length dark hair.


"It felt awkward," she says. "I felt so left out."

She decided to try wearing a head scarf. Her aunt, who lives in Cairo, showed her different styles: double layers of color that frame the face, tight cloth that gathers at the neck or blooms into a floret behind one ear. Smar returned to Virginia in early September with a rainbow assortment of scarves and a changed attitude.

She had grown used to wearing what she calls "my badge of faith." It was new and exciting, and it made her feel, she says, "modest and confident at the same time."

Racial rethinking as Obama visits - washingtonpost.com

Racial rethinking as Obama visits - washingtonpost.com: As a mixed-race girl growing up in this most cosmopolitan of mainland Chinese cities, 20-year-old Lou Jing said she never experienced much discrimination -- curiosity and questions, but never hostility.

So nothing prepared Lou, whose father is a black American, for the furor that erupted in late August when she beat out thousands of other young women on 'Go! Oriental Angel,' a televised talent show. Angry Internet posters called her a 'black chimpanzee' and worse. One called for all blacks in China to be deported.

As the country gets ready to welcome the first African American U.S. president, whose first official visit here starts Sunday, the Chinese are confronting their attitudes toward race, including some deeply held prejudices about black people. Many appeared stunned that Americans had elected a black man, and President Obama's visit has underscored Chinese ambivalence about the growing numbers of blacks living here.

MSIs To Get New Help in Going ‘Green’

MSIs To Get New Help in Going ‘Green’: A new grant to the United Negro College Fund should help a cross-section of minority-serving institutions - including Hispanic-serving universities and tribal colleges - promote environmentally friendly building practices in the years ahead.

The $1.8 million grant from The Kresge Foundation will go to UNCF for the Building Green at Minority-Serving Institutions Initiative. The chief goals are to build knowledge and capacity so these under-resourced colleges and universities can build faculty expertise and develop more sustainable, energy-efficient facilities.

The goal is for MSIs to build 'better, smarter, more intelligent' buildings, said William F.L. Moses, program director at the foundation. While environmentally friendly, such buildings also can reduce long-term operating costs by up to 50 percent through less use of electricity and water.

'Minority-serving institutions want and need to become as green as possible as fast as possible,' said Michael Lomax, UNCF president and chief executive officer.

The Unfinished Business of HBCUs

The Unfinished Business of HBCUs: Public historically Black colleges and universities have served the under-represented well in the years since Adams v. Richardson, but states can no longer continue to underfund HBCUs if these schools are to become 'comparable and competitive' with traditionally White institutions, a panel of former and current HBCU leaders concluded Thursday at a conference at Morgan State University.

'The magnitude of disparity between public HBCUs and historically White institutions remains particularly great,' said Lezli Baskerville, president and chief executive officer of the National Association for Equal Opportunity in Higher Education, the facilitator of the Presidential Round Table panel entitled 'The Unfinished Business of Parity in the Adams States: The Promise and the Perils.'

The problem is, 'public higher education is disengaging from educating the growing populations in their states,' she said, referring to African American, Latino and Asian American populations.

In the nearly 40 years since the Adams case, which required federal education officials to monitor the desegregation of public colleges in states with separate higher education systems for Blacks and Whites, little has been done to make HBCUs truly competitive. Inequitable public funding, program duplication at nearby schools, and a reluctance to fully integrate the student bodies are among the problems holding back HBCUs, the panel said.

Minorities use the Web to adjust the color on TV - washingtonpost.com

Minorities use the Web to adjust the color on TV - washingtonpost.com: ... Web television has been around since the '90s, but in the past year edgy new shows by, for and about minorities are proliferating on the Internet. Many of the new series take the form of webisodes -- episodes that usually last about five minutes, aimed at the short-attention spans of the all-mighty Millennium Generation.

"You can look at this as revolutionary," says Jonathan Moore, founder and CEO of Rowdy Orbit, which was launched in February. "It is giving people a voice and a platform to express themselves without judgment or red tape holding you down. Now they can go from idea to production to distribution."

For years, minority writers, producers and actors have complained about the lack of diversity on television. Last year, the NAACP Hollywood bureau criticized a "virtual whiteout" in broadcast television. "At a time when the country is excited about the election of the first African American president in U.S. history, it is unthinkable that minorities would be so grossly underrepresented on broadcast television," NAACP President Benjamin Todd Jealous said in a statement.

Robert Thompson, a white professor of popular culture at Syracuse University, says the lack of diversity in programming is counterintuitive, given the breakthrough success of programs such as "Roots" and "The Cosby Show." "The general politics of people who run television may have at some point been close to admitting diversity and people of color, but the fact remains when the NAACP did its report, the results were shocking," says Thompson.

New Study Examines Gender-based Pay Gaps in Academia

New Study Examines Gender-based Pay Gaps in Academia: A paper in the new issue of Psychology of Women Quarterly examines gender-based pay gaps among U.S. faculty using two methodologies. The multiple regression and resampling simulation approaches are different, yet they lead to the same conclusion - a gender-based pay gap exists.

The paper's three authors are faculty at the University of Tennessee-Knoxville. The study focuses on quantitative data gathered from the university's 14 colleges. Dr. Cheryl B. Travis, who is associated with the psychology and women's studies departments, says Tennessee has conducted salary studies for many years. This paper includes a new statistical methodology conceptualized by co-author Dr. Louis J. Gross of the Departments of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, and Mathematics.

'We wanted to do a salary study using his new methodology, resampling, and have a comparable standard multiple regression study to see would they find similar outcomes,' Travis says.

Schools Shun Kindle, Saying Blind Can't Use It

Schools Shun Kindle, Saying Blind Can't Use It: SAN FRANCISCO--Amazon's Kindle can read books aloud, but if you're blind it can be difficult to turn that function on without help. Now two universities say they will shun the device until Amazon changes the setup.

The National Federation of the Blind announced Wednesday that the University of Wisconsin-Madison and Syracuse University in New York state won't consider big rollouts of the electronic reading device unless Amazon makes it more accessible to visually impaired students.

Both schools have some Kindles that they bought for students to try this fall, but now they say they won't look into buying more unless Amazon makes changes to the device.

CSU Chancellor Expects Minority Enrollment to Remain Steady Amid Budget Cuts

CSU Chancellor Expects Minority Enrollment to Remain Steady Amid Budget Cuts: Despite massive cuts and closed enrollments at the California State University system, the percentage of minority students is not expected to drop, Chancellor Charles B. Reed said Tuesday in a press briefing.

“We are going to try not to do that,” Dr. Reed said to Diverse. He notes that some 54 percent of the system’s 450,000 students are “people of color” and that no changes in that level are expected. “We are holding workshops and are holding meetings to make sure of this,” he said.

Even so, the nation’s largest university system is undergoing unprecedented stress as it tries to cope with California’s budget crisis. A $564 million budget reduction is forcing to school to raise fees, furlough staff and close enrollments.

Chantilly Pyramid Minority Student Achievement Committee Celebrates 25th Anniversary

Chantilly Pyramid Minority Student Achievement Committee Celebrates 25th Anniversary: The Chantilly Pyramid Student Achievement Committee celebrated its 25th anniversary Sunday in Fairfax, Va. Since its founding by late Chantilly High School (Chantilly, Va.) Parent-Teacher Association member Shirley O. Nelson in 1984, the Committee - an organization of parents working in partnership with Fairfax County Public Schools and the community to help minority students improve their academic aspirations - has evolved from an ad hoc church committee to a 501 tax-exempt nonprofit with an all-volunteer 15-member executive board and approximately 100 members annually.

Mixed Race Americans And A 'Blended Nation' : NPR

Mixed Race Americans And A 'Blended Nation' : NPR: The 2000 U.S. census was the first to give Americans the option to check more than one box for race. Nearly 7 million people declared themselves to be multiracial, a number that's expected to shoot up in the 2010 count. As more of the nation's population identifies itself as of mixed race, the authors of a new book say Americans' ideas of racial identity are in for a challenge.

Comedian urges Hispanic students to stay in school - washingtonpost.com

Comedian urges Hispanic students to stay in school - washingtonpost.com: Los Angeles comedian Ernie G has a message for first-generation college-bound students in Washington.

'No matter how much education you get and how much success you achieve, if you grew up in the barrio, if you grew up in the 'hood, you will always have a little ghetto in you.'

The message is not meant to discourage. It's meant to show that college and ghetto can coexist.

The self-described Mexican American, Puerto Rican, Russian, French, Catholic Jew (G stands for Gritzewsky) is the spokesman for the Washington-based Hispanic College Fund. He's also a comedian who is moving from the nightclub circuit to the high school circuit so he can encourage the country's fastest-growing group of high school students to stay in school and go to college.

One in five Hispanic teens drops out of high school, according to U.S. Education Department statistics. That's about twice the rate for black students and more than three times the rate among white students. Only 12 percent of Hispanics ages 25 to 29 have a bachelor's degree or higher, compared with 31 percent of the general population, according to an analysis by the Pew Hispanic Center.

Tribal Leaders: ‘We Need to be Respected’

Tribal Leaders: ‘We Need to be Respected’: WASHINGTON - Before the largest gathering of tribal leaders in U.S. history Thursday, President Barack Obama pledged $50 million in funding for tribal colleges and vowed his administration would work to address problems facing Native Americans, from health disparities to economic development.

At the Tribal Nations Conference, held at the Department of the Interior, the president also signed a memorandum calling on every cabinet agency to give him a detailed plan to improve the relationship between the government and tribal communities.

'You will not be forgotten as long as I'm in this White House,' Obama said to a sustained ovation.

Tribal leaders and Native American scholars had expressed optimism about the outcome of Obama's tribal conference, but some remain skeptical that the administration can bring about substantive changes.

Racism without racists - Short Stack

Racism without racists - Short Stack: Racism without racists

Rich Benjamin spent two years traveling through white America and discovered a country filled with kind and endearing white individuals. In his book 'Searching for Whitopia: An Improbable Journey to the Heart of White America,' published by Hyperion in October, Benjamin reveals that he also found something else: a legacy of racial segregation and division resulting from habits, policies, and institutions that don't explicitly discriminate. In the following contribution, Benjamin, a senior fellow at Demos, a nonpartisan think tank, describes the nature of structural racism.

First Chinese-American Congresswoman in US sworn in CCTV-International

First Chinese-American Congresswoman in US sworn in CCTV-International: Judy Chu, Congresswoman, Democrat-California, said, 'Thank you. I'm so honored to be here. This is an overwhelming moment and I'm very humbled and honored to be here serving Congressional District 32, and to be here at a time of great change.'

Asked about the influence of her Chinese background, Chu said it benefits her greatly.

Judy Chu, Congresswoman, Democrat-California, said,'I think that many Chinese-Americans have suffered hardships in coming to America.'

Chu said her major task now is to help push forward the medical reform plans in Congress.

Before Chu, only two male Chinese-Americans have served in the US Congress. The House praised Chu for her 24 years' dedication to public service and commitment to the essential issues of the American nation, such as its economic strength, education of children and the health of all Americans.

Television - Same Street, Different World - ‘Sesame’ Turns 40 - NYTimes.com

Television - Same Street, Different World - ‘Sesame’ Turns 40 - NYTimes.com: IT is almost too perfect that the first African-American president of the United States was elected in time for the 40th anniversary of “Sesame Street.” The world is finally beginning to look the way that PBS show always made it out to be.

So it is to the credit of this daunting cultural landmark — a program that has taught generations of children to count, countless parents how to teach and is seen in 125 countries around the world — that Tuesday’s anniversary is not a frenzy of preening self-celebration. Episode No. 4187 is as child-centric and respectful of routine as any other.

The special guest — the first lady, Michelle Obama — doesn’t make her appearance alongside Big Bird until midway into a show crammed with the usual preschool didactics. The letter of the day comes first — H as in help and hug and healthy.

The only real difference is that on this day, viewers have to count to 40

Sports of The Times - Sluggish Pace of Integration in Baseball Still Echoes - NYTimes.com

Sports of The Times - Sluggish Pace of Integration in Baseball Still Echoes - NYTimes.com: ... Bernard Diggs is a 61-year-old Philadelphian who is a die-hard Eagles fan. But he has no bond with the Phillies, a coolness that stems from the history of the 1950s and not just the whimsy of a boy who liked one team’s colors over another.

For Diggs, the problem has always been the Phillies’ failure to integrate until almost every other major league club had already done so. In 2009, two of the Phillies’ stars — Ryan Howard and Jimmy Rollins — are African-Americans, which puts Philadelphia ahead of many other teams. Still, their presence has not swayed Diggs.

“They seem like the kind of folks I would like to meet,” Diggs said of the two players. “I really do like them as individuals in terms of their contribution to the Phillies and how they carry themselves.”

So how would he explain to them why he has not pulled for their team during the World Series — or ever, for that matter?

“I’d give them a history lesson,” Diggs said.

Reporter’s Query

Reporter’s Query: Does it seem like, during hard economic times, diversity initiatives are the first to go? A good number of students and faculty from colleges and universities around the country have started to cry foul because many of budget cuts have come in diversity-themed offices and among their staff. Diverse is documenting these cuts but we need your help. Have you heard about diversity/equity cutting or downsizing at your institution? Have these programs/offices/departments been disproportionately affected by the cost-cutting efforts? Share your story or tip with Arelis Hernandez at ahernandez@diverseeducation.com.

Confinement Too Costly For Middle-class Black Women

Confinement Too Costly For Middle-class Black Women: When Dr. Lisa B. Thompson names modern women who fit the iconic 'Black lady' mold - Coretta Scott King, Anita Hill, Condoleezza Rice and Michelle Obama - you know exactly whom she is trying to liberate. Chances are your mother played this role. You probably do, too, if you are a Black woman involved in higher education.

It is time for middle-class Black women to break the mold, Thompson argues in her book, 'Beyond the Black Lady, Sexuality and the New African American Middle Class' (New Black Studies Series), University of Illinois Press. Being this 'lady' is not all it is cracked up to be. The role is far too confining, and it comes at the high cost of denying any claim to what she calls 'sexual agency.' Such women do so in a valiant effort to 'uplift the race' by countering intractable stereotypes of Black women as 'promiscuous, seductive and sexually irresponsible,' she writes.

To pull it off, they 'have to be so morally upright they are almost inhuman,' she tells Diverse.

NFL player from Sierra Leone gives $2 million to U-Md. - washingtonpost.com

NFL player from Sierra Leone gives $2 million to U-Md. - washingtonpost.com: At 9, Madieu Williams immigrated to Prince George's County from Sierra Leone, one of the poorest nations on Earth. The move gave his family a sense of perspective. His mother told him over and over that if he ever found himself in a position to make a difference, he should do it.

At 28, Williams finds himself in a relatively prosperous position: He plays free safety for the Minnesota Vikings. And Wednesday, he made a difference.

In a morning news conference, the University of Maryland announced the creation of the Madieu Williams Center for Global Health Initiatives. The former U-Md. star is providing a $2 million endowment. It is the largest gift to the flagship school from an African American alumnus and the largest sum donated by someone so young.

Staten Island Elects Its First Black Council Member - City Room Blog - NYTimes.com

Staten Island Elects Its First Black Council Member - City Room Blog - NYTimes.com: Staten Island has long been unique in this racially diverse city: a borough where whites constitute the vast majority. But over the last few decades and particularly in recent years, people of other races have been increasingly calling the island home.

From 1990 to 2000, the percentage of residents who identified themselves as black increased to 8.9 percent from 7.4 percent, according to census data [pdf], and in the most recent survey from 2008, the figure increased to 10.1 percent.

Now, for the first time, Staten Island will have a black City Council member. Deborah L. Rose, a Democrat who also ran with the backing of the Working Families Party, easily won the race on Tuesday with 57.3 percent of the vote, with the rest split by candidates on the Republican and Conservative lines.

A lifelong Staten Island resident who was a longtime member of Community Board 1 and runs a program at the College of Staten Island that discourages local students from dropping out of high school, Ms. Rose was making her third bid for City Council.

Obama To Host Nation-To-Nation Conference

Obama To Host Nation-To-Nation Conference: President Barack Obama on Thursday will host the White House Tribal Nations Conference, meeting with representatives from the 564 federally recognized tribes.

'I look forward to hearing directly from the leaders in Indian Country about what my administration can do to not only meet their needs but help improve their lives and the lives of their peoples. This conference will serve as part of the ongoing and important consultation process that I value, and further strengthen the Nation-to-Nation relationship,' Obama said last month in announcing the conference.

“From what I understand, 90 percent of our tribal leaders are going. We’re looking forward to this historical event,” said Darrell Flyingman, governor of the Cheyenne and Arapaho Tribes, according to Native American Times.

The meeting is long overdue, Muscogee Creek Nation Principal Chief A.D. Ellis, told the publication.

U.S. May Not be Lagging Behind Internationally, Report Says

U.S. May Not be Lagging Behind Internationally, Report Says: The headlines are emblazoned with the gloomy tales of America’s academic decline as drop-out rates skyrocket and adult educational attainment sags behind international competitors, but one educational statistician, in a newly released report, said it's nothing more than propaganda.

“They quote this stuff because people like to be told how bad they are. We get hung up on how bad we are doing,” said Dr. Cliff Adelman, senior associate at the Institute for Higher Education Policy and a former researcher at the U.S. Department of Education. “I’m not out to tell you how good you are, but to provide an honest picture as opposed to a purposely dishonest picture.”

For the past couple of years, international education agencies have monitored the degree-completion numbers as nations like Canada, Korea and Japan caught up with the United States. In all those countries, the proportion of the population earning bachelor’s degrees or their equivalent increased while the U.S. seemed to drop in the rankings.

Justice of the Peace who refused to marry interracial couple resigns -

Justice of the Peace who refused to marry interracial couple resigns -: The Louisiana Justice of the peace who refused to issue a marriage license to an interracial couple has resigned, WDSU reports.

Louisiana Secretary of State's Office spokesman Jacques Berry said Justice of the Peace Keith Bardwelll's resignation is effective Tuesday, WDSU says.

Republican Gov Bobby Jindal and Democratic Sen. Mary Landrieu had both called for Bardwell to step down.

The Associated Press reports that Bardwell offered only a one sentence statement to Louisiana Secretary of State Jay Dardenne and no explanation of his decision: "I do hereby resign the office of Justice of the Peace for the Eighth Ward of Tangipahoa Parish, Louisiana, effective November 3, 2009."

The controversy in Hammond, La., erupted after Bardwell refused to issue a marriage license to a white woman and a black man. They were later married by another official.

Bardwell denied that he was a racist and said his concern is with the impact that an interracial marriage has on children. He says he has married white couples and black couples, but refers interracial couples to another JP.

Schools improve certification for school lunches - washingtonpost.com

Schools improve certification for school lunches - washingtonpost.com: WASHINGTON -- Schools are doing a better job of identifying students who are eligible for free or reduced-price school lunches, but some states are much better than others, the Agriculture Department says in a report to Congress.

In 2008-2009, 78 percent of schools identified eligible students by using government records of which households already receive aid like food stamps. Use of the so-called direct certification method, the most efficient way to enroll school children in subsidized lunch programs, was up 11 percentage points from the previous year, according to the report, which is being delivered to Congress on Tuesday. A copy was obtained by The Associated Press.

40 years after riots, Pa. city elects black mayor - washingtonpost.com

40 years after riots, Pa. city elects black mayor - washingtonpost.com: YORK, Pa. -- The central Pennsylvania city of York has elected its first black mayor, 40 years after violent race riots led to the death of a white police officer and a black woman.

Democrat Kim Bracey beat Republican Wendell Banks in Tuesday's general election. Democratic voters in York outnumber Republicans by nearly 2 to 1.

Bracey is the city's former director of community development.

York was the site of weeks of race rioting in 1969. The killings of a white police officer and black woman went unsolved for decades.

Bracey says she embraces the significance of her election. She calls it a historic accomplishment and says she's pleased voters trust her to lead the city.

Diary of a Mad Black Professor: A Critical Race Therapy Moment

Diary of a Mad Black Professor: A Critical Race Therapy Moment: ...Critical Race Therapy

So how does one go about negotiating this madness? Madness intervention. For me, it has been through years of a critical form of interventional therapy — critical race therapy — coupled with large doses of creative extremism to reduce the possibility of the onset of an early relapse or, worse yet, living the simple life of a pathetic assimilationist.

CRT is the sort of therapy that one uses to combat racial battle fatigue, microaggressions, nihilism, paradigmatic shift lag, white supremacy, racial commodification and a host of other race-related illnesses. I think folks stumble upon the cure by accident, but are unfamiliar with the name for the therapy. After all, you cannot find a critical race therapist in the phone book and there are no formal CRT support groups — at least that I know of. Nevertheless, I can point out instances when I have seen critical race therapy working at its best.

New Hampshire Scholar-Lawmaker Wants Monument to Slaves

New Hampshire Scholar-Lawmaker Wants Monument to Slaves: CONCORD, N.H.- In 1779, Prince Whipple and a small group of other New Hampshire slaves petitioned the state Legislature to free them.

Whipple eventually was freed by his owner, not the Legislature, which ignored the petition and did not ban slavery in New Hampshire until 1857. By then, census records showed no slaves remained in the state.

Now 230 years later, state Rep. Dr. David Watters wants New Hampshire to create a monument to acknowledge and commemorate New Hampshire's slaves.

'There's no public place we can acknowledge and recognize this history,' said Watters, D-Dover.

Watters' bill would establish a commission to research the names and numbers of people enslaved in New Hampshire from 1645 to 1840, the year the last record of a slave was noted by a census-taker at B.G. Searle's farm in Hollis.

Best & Brightest: From Homelessness to Inaugural Fellow

Best & Brightest: From Homelessness to Inaugural Fellow: Several weeks after she applied for inaugural 2009 James H. Ammons fellowship, Joane Theodule drove four hours this past spring for an unannounced visit to Florida A&M's campus to ensure she was chosen.

'I didn't know she was coming! Something about that just impressed the heck out of me,' said Dr. Chanta Haywood, the dean of graduate studies and research at Florida A&M who approved Theodule's fellowship.

'Anybody who drives that far without an appointment, (then) I better see them. I have never seen anybody so focused.'

Forced to live on her own as a teenager, at first in her car and later in an apartment she financed from part-time jobs, Theodule had to be focused.

'That's when I was determined to finish high school and pursue higher education because no one in my family went to college,' she said. 'Nothing was going to stop me.'

'Texas in Queens': Junior wranglers find refuge with black cowboys - CNN.com

'Texas in Queens': Junior wranglers find refuge with black cowboys - CNN.com: NEW YORK (CNN) -- Boney D and Rabbit come from rough parts of Brooklyn, places that could be unfavorably compared to the Wild West.

You wouldn't expect that they'd escape their environments at a rugged 25-acre ranch in nearby Queens, riding horses and hanging out with cowboys.

'I've seen a guy get shot dead, point [blank] range, right in front of me -- dropped him, boom,' D'vonte 'Boney D' Jemmott, 15, said of the neighborhood where he grew up. 'I've seen dudes get beat up, chased home, all sorts of things. I've seen all sorts of different drugs being ran around.

'If I wasn't down here,' he said, 'I'd probably be involved with things like that -- robbing people, probably hurting people -- because I've seen a lot of that stuff done around my way.'

Jemmott's mother has been taking him to Cedar Lane Stables since he was a toddler. The Federation of Black Cowboys, founded in 1994, has called Cedar Lane home since 1998.

NAACP President Benjamin Jealous reaches out to a changing membership - washingtonpost.com

NAACP President Benjamin Jealous reaches out to a changing membership - washingtonpost.com: WARREN, MAINE -- Benjamin Todd Jealous pulls in front of the prison compound, passes through the only unlocked door in the building and surrenders his BlackBerry and driver's license to guards. He is ushered quickly through a metal detector, then past a heavy green door that clangs shut.

A guard hands him a big beeper to clip to his tailored gray suit. 'Push the red button if you feel threatened,' he is told. The beepers are given only to the prison's most important visitors, and Jealous -- the national president of the NAACP -- qualifies.
ad_icon

He is led down a concrete path into a courtyard surrounded by a four-story-high chain-link fence topped with glinting barbed wire. He then passes through another heavy door that locks with a click and finally into a large room where 92 inmates are waiting.

Minority Lawmakers: No Census Citizenship Question

Minority Lawmakers: No Census Citizenship Question: WASHINGTON — A coalition of Black, Latino and Asian lawmakers has expressed opposition to a proposal that would require next year's census forms to ask about the status of a person's citizenship.

The House lawmakers criticized a proposal by Sens. David Vitter, R-La., and Bob Bennett, R-Utah, as a political ploy designed to discourage immigrants from participating in the high-stakes count, which begins April 1.

They also echoed warnings from the Census Bureau that making a last-minute change to the census would add burdensome costs to print new forms and prevent the head count from being completed on time, as legally required.

Obama Community College Proposal May Not Be Enough

Obama Community College Proposal May Not Be Enough: INDIANAPOLIS - Arthur Call commutes three hours roundtrip to his anatomy class at community college because similar courses on campuses closer to his Indianapolis home are packed this semester.

'Classes around the state were just full,' says Call, a full-time student who takes the rest of his classes in Indianapolis. 'Thank God it's only Tuesdays. I just have to drive there once a week.'

President Barack Obama wants to invest some $12 billion in community colleges with the aim of seeing an additional 5 million students graduate by 2020. This goal comes while many schools are already bursting at the seams with droves of displaced workers hit by the recession competing with traditional students seeking an education bargain.

'All community colleges are not prepared to take on those potentially large numbers of students,' said Dr. Debra Bragg, a professor and director of the Forum on the Future of Public Education at the University of Illinois.

Racial Achievement Gap Still Plagues Schools : NPR

Racial Achievement Gap Still Plagues Schools : NPR: American schools have struggled for decades to close what's called the 'minority achievement gap' — the lower average test scores, grades and college attendance rates among black and Latino students.

Typically, schools place children who are falling behind in remedial classes, to help them catch up. But some schools are finding that grouping students by ability, also known as tracking or leveling, causes more problems than it solves.

Integrated And Segregated
Columbia High School in Maplewood, N.J., is a well-funded school that is roughly 60 percent black and 40 percent white. The kids mix easily and are friendly with one another. But when the bell
rings, students go their separate ways.

Teacher Noel Cooperberg's repeat algebra class last year consisted of all minority kids who had flunked the previous year. There were only about a dozen students because the school keeps lower-level classes small to try to boost success. But a group of girls sitting in the middle never so much as picked up a pencil, and they often disrupted the class. It was a different scene from Cooperberg's honors-level pre-calculus class, which had three times as many students — most of them white.

These two classes are pretty typical for the school. Lower-level classes — called levels two and three — are overwhelmingly black, while higher-level four and five are mostly white. Students are assigned to these levels by a combination of grades, test scores and teacher recommendations.