Graduation “gap” widens in Maryland - College, Inc. - The Washington Post

Graduation “gap” widens in Maryland - College, Inc. - The Washington Post: A progress report from the Education Trust, a Washington nonprofit committed to narrowing achievement gaps, shows that graduation rates for low-income and minority students have gone down in Maryland over the past five years, while the completion rate for all students has gone up.

It’s not the sort of momentum Maryland needs to narrow the gap; ideally, the completion rate for all students would rise, and the rate for poor and minority students would rise even faster.

Between 2005 and 2010, the EdTrust report states, the graduation rate for all students in the University System of Maryland rose one point to 63 percent. In the same years, the completion rate for low-income students dipped three points to 48 percent. The rate for underrepresented minorities slipped three points to 43 percent.

Dennis Mahon’s Prosecutors Request 63 Years In Prison | TPMMuckraker

Dennis Mahon’s Prosecutors Request 63 Years In Prison | TPMMuckraker: If federal prosecutors get their way next week, an aging white supremacist who bragged about being a serial bomber and who was convicted earlier this year of sending explosives to a city office in Arizona will never see the outside world again.

A jury in Phoenix found Dennis Mahon guilty in February on three charges related to the 2004 bombing in Scottsdale that injured three city employees, including the director of the Office of Diversity and Dialogue.

Now, with Mahon’s sentencing scheduled for Tuesday in U.S. District Court in Arizona, prosecutors are asking Judge David Campbell to send the 61-year-old bomber to prison for the next 63 years, which would effectively mean he would die behind bars.

Militias, Hate Groups Grow in Response to Minority Population Boom - ABC News

Militias, Hate Groups Grow in Response to Minority Population Boom - ABC News: The number of radical hate groups and militias has exploded in recent years in reaction to the changing makeup of America, and new census figures showing the majority of babies born in 2011 were non-white could fuel those simmering tensions, experts who track hate groups warned.

"White supremacist groups have been having a meltdown since the census bureau predicted that non-Hispanic whites would lose the majority by 2050," said Mark Potok, spokesman for the Southern Poverty Law Center, which monitors hate groups. "The demographic change in this country is the single most important driver in the growth of hate groups and extremist groups over the last few years."

The data released this week revealed a tipping point in the country's demographic shift. For the first time in the country's history, more minority children were born than white children, setting the stage for an eventual non-white majority in America's population.

Christian Head, Black UCLA Medical School Doctor, Files Lawsuit After Alleged Gorilla Depiction

Christian Head, Black UCLA Medical School Doctor, Files Lawsuit After Alleged Gorilla Depiction: A faculty professor who filed a racial discrimination suit against UCLA, saying that the school ignored racial slights against him over his career, has taken to YouTube to air his grievances.

In a six-minute YouTube video, Dr. Christian Head, an otolaryntologist at the UCLA's medical school, says he was the subject of repeated criticism during an annual event in which residents performed mocking roasts of their professors.

"In the final slide was a photo…of a gorilla, on all fours, with my head Photoshopped onto the gorilla with a smile on my face," Head says in the video. "And a Caucasian man, completely naked, sodomizing me from behind, and my boss' head Photoshopped onto the person smiling."

Head later complained to his superiors at the hospital, but says he was told "if you want tenure, [and] make a big stink about this, they're going to crush you."

NYPD announces stop-and-frisk training changes after lawsuit ruling | 7online.com

NYPD announces stop-and-frisk training changes after lawsuit ruling | 7online.com: NEW YORK -- Police Commissioner Raymond Kelly on Thursday announced changes to officer training and supervision amid a growing public outcry and a federal lawsuit claiming the stop, question and frisk policy at the nation's largest department amounts to racial profiling.

Kelly sent a letter to City Council Speaker Christine Quinn detailing the changes. Quinn, a likely candidate for mayor, has been a vocal critic of the policy. Last year, more than 630,000 people were stopped, mostly black and Hispanic men. About half are frisked, and only about 10 percent are arrested.

Kelly said in the letter that the steps were meant to increase public confidence in the tactic and that the New York Police Department has reiterated its policy that prohibits racial profiling.

Colliding into Class Issues on Campus

Colliding into Class Issues on Campus: Jourdan Shepard, a student at Morehouse College in Atlanta, created a lively blogosphere debate with his online post decrying the expectation that students will aspire to elitism and classism at the historically Black all male college. “Every August, a new freshman class walks through the gates of the school and into the campus gymnasium only to have their older brothers try to transform them into Black elites,” Shepard wrote late last year as the Morehouse correspondent for NewsOne.com, an online aggregator of news targeted at Black Americans. “Yes, Morehouse does tell their freshmen what is expected, but the bravado has seemed to overshadow the greater good. This is a problem.”

What drew Shepard’s ire is the sense of elitism and entitlement among a certain group of students on strutting across his campus green. According to a growing body of scholarly literature, class stratification on college campuses may well be an immutable barrier that increasingly divides affluent students from their less well-off classmates, threatening the long-cherished ideal that a college education serves as the great equalizer of society.

Colorado Springs 2nd Grader Dressed As Martin Luther King, Jr. In Black Face Paint, Gets In Trouble

Colorado Springs 2nd Grader Dressed As Martin Luther King, Jr. In Black Face Paint, Gets In Trouble: A Colorado Springs second-grader at Meridian Ranch Elementary school found himself in hot water Wednesday when he was pulled out of class for dressing like Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. while also wearing black face paint.

KRDO first reported that Sean King dressed up as MLK, Jr. for a school project. The boy's mother told KRDO that it was "wax museum day" for the second grade class and that each child was assigned a historical figure to dress up as.

King showed up for school on Wednesday doing a Martin Luther King impersonation, wearing a black suit, tie, mustache and black face paint -- his parents were with him, as were all the students' parents, to watch the day's presentation. But before things could get started, the school's principal told the second-grader that he needed to wash his face, according to KWGN, leaving Sean confused.

ATF Bureau Honors First African-American Officer Killed In Line Of Duty | WAMU 88.5 - American University Radio

ATF Bureau Honors First African-American Officer Killed In Line Of Duty | WAMU 88.5 - American University Radio: Federal law enforcement officials with the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, and Firearms (ATF) yesterday honored the first African-American federal agent killed in the line of duty after Reconstruction.

William Henderson Foote was a deputy collector with the U.S. Treasury in Mississippi in 1883. A forerunner of today's ATF special agents, Foote enforced liquor laws and arrested moonshiners who were more inclined to kill his kind, so-called 'revenuers,' than be taken into custody.

It was an already harsh job made nearly impossible because of who Foote was," said Todd Jones, acting ATF director.

"Being the deputy collector to collect taxes in Yazoo City, Miss. was a tough gig," said Jones during a ceremony in Washington, D.C. May 14. "But being African-American in post-Reconstruction south who has a gun and a badge with federal arrest authority? An incredible story of courage."

Report Highlights Institutions That Educate Latinos in Health Care Fields

Report Highlights Institutions That Educate Latinos in Health Care Fields: A select group of colleges and universities were hailed in a new report Wednesday for being the top producers of Latino graduates in the health care field.

Leaders from government, higher education and the private sector said the matter concerns more than just building a diverse workforce, but rather making sure that patients from diverse backgrounds – in this case, Latinos -- get the best health care possible.

“We believe that better communication with health care professionals allows the community to get better information to be able to make better decisions, and that leads to better results,” said Russell Bennett, vice president of Latino Health Solutions with United Healthcare.

“When populations are of a different culture or speak a different language, we feel that we must help provide that communication in the right language and right cultural context,” Bennett said.

Missouri Guardsman Investigated For Alleged Racist Ties Linked To Terrorism Probe | TPMMuckraker

Missouri Guardsman Investigated For Alleged Racist Ties Linked To Terrorism Probe | TPMMuckraker: For the second time this year, officials with the Missouri National Guard are investigating whether a white supremacist has been serving in their midst.

In March, officials accused a Missouri guardsman of participating in neo-Nazi activities while also serving in the military’s honor guard, which routinely helped pay last respects at funerals for veterans who fought in WWII. The sergeant was fired from the honor guard after former coworkers said he kept a picture of Adolf Hitler in his living room and tried to recruit them to the white supremacist movement.

Now, the military is investigating whether another guardsman, an Iraq War veteran, might have traveled to Florida to train a group of white supremacists who were accused earlier this month of planning to start a race war and arrested as part of a domestic terrorism probe.

Texas Led Nation In Workplace Discrimination Complaints In 2011, EEOC Report Says

Texas Led Nation In Workplace Discrimination Complaints In 2011, EEOC Report Says: The U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission received more complaints of workplace discrimination from workers in Texas than from any other state last year, with 10 percent of all complaints filed there, according to a report made public by the agency on Monday.

During the 2011 fiscal year, nearly 10,000 of the record 99,947 federal charges of workplace discrimination received by the EEOC were filed in Texas, according to the report. The most common complaints within the state were "retaliatory charges," or those alleging that the employer fired, demoted or otherwise retaliated against an employee because he or she fought against discrimination in some way, such as going to the EEOC.

The second and third most common complaints were claims of race and gender bias, respectively, followed by national origin bias claims and religious discrimination claims.

Census: Minority babies are now majority in United States - The Washington Post

Census: Minority babies are now majority in United States - The Washington Post: For the first time in U.S. history, most of the nation’s babies are members of minority groups, according to new census figures that signal the dawn of an era in which whites no longer will be in the majority.

Population estimates show that 50.4 percent of children younger than 1 last year were Hispanic, black, Asian American or in other minority groups. That’s almost a full percentage point higher than the 49.5 percent of minority babies counted when the decennial census was taken in April 2010. Census Bureau demographers said the tipping point came three months later, in July.

Chuck Brown dies: The ‘Godfather of Go-Go’ was 75 - The Washington Post

Chuck Brown dies: The ‘Godfather of Go-Go’ was 75 - The Washington Post: Chuck Brown, the gravelly voiced bandleader who capitalized on funk’s percussive pulse to create go-go, the genre of music that has soundtracked life in black Washington for more than three decades, died May 16 at Johns Hopkins Hospital in Baltimore. He was 75.

The death, from complications from sepsis, was confirmed by his manager, Tom Goldfogle. Mr. Brown had been hospitalized for pneumonia.

Known as the “Godfather of Go-Go,” the performer, singer, guitarist and songwriter developed his commanding brand of funk in the mid-1970s to compete with the dominance of disco.

Like a DJ blending records, Mr. Brown used nonstop percussion to stitch songs together and keep the crowd on the dance floor, resulting in marathon performances that went deep into the night. Mr. Brown said the style got its name because “the music just goes and goes.”

Why education inequality persists — and how to fix it - The Answer Sheet - The Washington Post

Why education inequality persists — and how to fix it - The Answer Sheet - The Washington Post: ...The report finds that a black or Hispanic student is nearly four times more likely to be enrolled in one of the city’s poorest performing high schools than an Asian or white, non-Hispanic student. According to review of 2009-10 data, none of the city’s strongest schools are located in the poorest neighborhoods of Harlem, the South Bronx, and central Brooklyn. Schools with the highest scores are found in northeastern Queens, the and the Upper East Side. As a result of New York City policies, black, Latino and low-income students have very limited access to those schools.

Districts with higher poverty rates have fewer highly educated, experienced teachers and less stable teaching staffs. Students from low-income New York City families of all ethnic groups have little chance of being tested for gifted-and-talented program eligibility. Few black and Hispanic students are selected for the city’s top exam schools, such as Stuyvesant and the Bronx High School of Science.

Carlos Fuentes, Mexican Novelist, Dies at 83 - NYTimes.com

Carlos Fuentes, Mexican Novelist, Dies at 83 - NYTimes.com: Carlos Fuentes, Mexico’s elegant public intellectual and grand man of letters, whose panoramic novels captured the complicated essence of his country’s history for readers around the world, died on Tuesday in Mexico City. He was 83.

His death was confirmed by Julio Ortega, his biographer and a professor of Hispanic studies at Brown University, where Mr. Fuentes taught for several years. No cause was given. 

Mr. Fuentes was one of the most admired writers in the Spanish-speaking world, a catalyst, along with Gabriel García Márquez, Mario Vargas Llosa and Julio Cortazar, of the explosion of Latin American literature in the 1960s and ’70s known as “El Boom.” He wrote plays, short stories, political nonfiction and more than a dozen novels, many of them chronicles of tangled love, that were acclaimed throughout Latin America.

Forum Highlights Efforts to Boost Academic Achievement among Minority Males

Forum Highlights Efforts to Boost Academic Achievement among Minority Males: When it comes to making a difference in educational outcomes for young men of color, it’s better to be in the trenches than at the podium.

That was the heart of the message that Eagle Academy Foundation president and CEO David Banks delivered recently at the National Press Club.

“We got a lot of people writing books. We got a lot of people speaking out from policy,” Banks said at the College Board event titled “Young Men of Color: Charting a Way for Educational Success.”

“We don’t have a lot of people on the front lines,” Banks said. Banks was invited to share his experience as one of several co-founders of Eagle Academy for Young Men in New York City—the first in a network of all-boys public schools in New York and one of several schools throughout the nation seen as exemplary for making a difference in getting more minority males into higher education.

Commentary: Young, Black and Attending College in Small Town, USA

Commentary: Young, Black and Attending College in Small Town, USA: I had always dreamed about leaving Richmond, Ky., the small town in which I was raised. I dreamed of pulling myself out of the sinking sand of poverty, drug addictions and an overall absence of people who looked like me. It seemed like the faster I moved, the harder it became to find a sturdy foundation and a face like mine to pull me out.

I am the face of Small Town, USA. I ran out of there kicking and screaming to the University of Louisville for my undergraduate degree, just to find myself right back after graduation in the city I had run away from. As I now find myself working in higher education in a rural setting not too different from the one I knew as a youngster, I look at the African-American student population and those students in similar settings around the U.S. and realize that there is a desperate need for support and community for these Black collegiate students.

Northwestern U. Scholars Mobilized in Countering Blog Attack on Black Studies

Northwestern U. Scholars Mobilized in Countering Blog Attack on Black Studies: In five hastily conceived paragraphs, a White conservative blogger threw cold water on the warmly received dissertations presented by three African-American Ph.D. candidates at an academic conference last month.

Naomi Schaefer Riley, an affiliate scholar of the Institute for American Values, a New York-based conservative think tank, ripped into the scholarly research of the Northwestern University doctoral students after reading summaries of their work in story by a Chronicle of Higher Education reporter. Calling the dissertations “a collection of left-wing victimization claptrap,” Riley, then a contributor to the Chronicle’s “Brainstorm” blog, cited them as evidence that the entire Black studies discipline should be eliminated.

The three students’ research was presented at “A Beautiful Struggle: Transformative Black Studies in Shifting Political Landscapes — A Summit of Doctoral Programs,” put on by Northwestern University’s Department of African American Studies in mid-April.

University of Michigan Hosts ‘Title IX at 40’ Conference

University of Michigan Hosts ‘Title IX at 40’ Conference: Among a broad range of topics covered at the three-day conference, one of the most pressing is the need to increase interest in and improve access to sports for girls and women of color.

A conference marking the 40th anniversary of Title IX, the landmark legislation that prohibits gender-based discrimination at educational institutions that receive federal funds, proved a time for enthusiasm about how much progress has been made while also noting the huge barriers to equality that still exist. The presenters and attendees explored topics ranging from injuries to policy to research.

Injustices of Stop and Frisk - NYTimes.com

Injustices of Stop and Frisk - NYTimes.com: The pressure is increasing on the New York City Police Department to reform its stop-and-frisk program under which New Yorkers, nearly all innocent of any crime, were stopped by the police close to 700,000 times last year.

The department said recently that it was instructing precinct commanders to review the legality of all stop-and-frisk reports, according to a report by WNYC. But such reviews — which should have been done all along — will be meaningless unless independent investigators actually interview officers to determine the proportion of stops based on reasonable suspicion, as required by law, and the percentage based on improper racial profiling, in which blacks and Hispanics are singled out. 

The statistics are getting worse by the year. Last week, the New York Civil Liberties Union released a report — based on the department’s data — showing the number of street stops had grown to 685,724 in 2011 from about 97,000 in 2002, the year Mayor Michael Bloomberg took office. On Friday, the Police Department released data showing that the stops have occurred at an even higher pace for the first three months of this year.

Louis H. Pollak Obituary: View Louis Pollak's Obituary by The Daily Record

Louis H. Pollak Obituary: View Louis Pollak's Obituary by The Daily Record: PHILADELPHIA (AP) - Louis H. Pollak, a federal judge who helped work on the pivotal school-desegregation case Brown v. Board of Education, and later served as dean of two Ivy League law schools, has died. He was 89.

Pollak, a U.S. district judge, died Tuesday at his home in Philadelphia's West Mount Airy neighborhood, Michael Kunz, clerk of federal district court, said Thursday.

"He was brilliant in issues of jurisprudence. However, that was tempered with a humility that is not often seen in persons of his standing in the legal profession," Kunz said, noting that Pollak's legal career extended across more than six decades, including a 1948-1949 stint as a law clerk to Supreme Court Justice Wiley B. Rutledge.

From 1950 to 1955, Pollak and William T. Coleman worked with Thurgood Marshall and the NAACP Legal Defense Fund in writing briefs about school desegregation cases that culminated in the 1954 ruling that said state laws requiring separate public schools for black and white students were unconstitutional.

Finding a Match and a Mission, to Help Blacks Battle Cancers - NYTimes.com

Finding a Match and a Mission, to Help Blacks Battle Cancers - NYTimes.com: A month after his 2009 graduation from Yale Law School, Seun Adebiyi learned he had not one but two lethal blood cancers and began an odyssey to find a bone-marrow donor. Mr. Adebiyi, 28, who came to this country from Nigeria as a child, made appeals through Yale, on radio stations, in a YouTube video and even on a trip to Nigeria to ask law students to volunteer.

But finally, his doctor called, saying that a Nigerian woman in this country had donated her baby’s umbilical cord blood to a “cord-blood bank” and that the stem cells in it were a close enough match. After his own marrow — the source of his cancers — was wiped out, those cells were infused into him at Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center. He has been in remission since. 

Now he is trying to repay that debt, with an effort that experts say may save the lives of both Nigerians and black Americans. In February, he helped start Nigeria’s national bone-marrow registry, the first in Africa outside South Africa. He is now raising money to start a cord-blood bank there.

Segregation in New York City’s Public Schools - Graphic - NYTimes.com

Segregation in New York City’s Public Schools - Graphic - NYTimes.com: The landmark decision that outlawed segregation, Brown v. Board of Education, was handed down 58 years ago this week. In its wake, school systems undertook desegregation efforts that peaked in the 1980s. Since then, schools across the country have been going through a process of de facto resegregation. In New York, efforts over the years to reduce the segregation of schools have had little effect.

At Explore Charter School, a Portrait of Segregated Education - NYTimes.com

At Explore Charter School, a Portrait of Segregated Education - NYTimes.com: IN seventh-grade English class, sun leaked in through the windows. Horns bleated outside. The assignment was for the arrayed students to identify a turning point in their lives. Was it positive or negative? They hunched over and wrote fervidly.

Floriande Augustin, a first-year teacher at the school, invited students to share their choices. Hands waved for attention. One girl said it was when she got a cat, though she was unsure why. Another selected a car crash. A third brought up the time when her cousin got shot and “it was positive because he felt his life was crazy and he went to college so he couldn’t get shot anymore.”

The lesson detoured into Martin Luther King Jr. and his turning points. Ms. Augustin listed things like how his father took him shopping for shoes and they were made to wait in the back. How a bus driver told him to relinquish his seat to a white passenger and stand in the rear. How he wasn’t allowed to play with his white friends once he started school, because he went to a black school and his white friends went to a white school.

Obituary: Photographer Willie Middlebrook documented African American life - latimes.com

Obituary: Photographer Willie Middlebrook documented African American life - latimes.com: Willie Robert Middlebrook, a photographer who sought to enlarge public perceptions of the African American community through painterly depictions of its people and places, died Saturday at Brotman Medical Center in Culver City. He was 54.

The cause was complications of a stroke suffered last month, said his daughter, Jessica Middlebrook.

Middlebrook's death came just a week after the unveiling at the new Expo/Crenshaw Metro station of one of his largest public installations, a series of 24 mosaic panels based on his photographs. He was known for what he called photographic paintings, well-composed photos that he made more evocative by brushing the negatives with developing fluid, a method later replaced by digital enhancement.

Swim lessons help minority children break cycle - CNN.com

Swim lessons help minority children break cycle - CNN.com: ...Josh was not alone in the black community. According to USA Swimming, 70% of African-American children cannot swim, compared with nearly 60% for Hispanic children and 42% for white children. According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, African-American children between the ages of 5 and 14 are three times more likely to drown than white children in the same age range.

As Butts tried to make sense of her son's tragedy, she realized she had passed her own inexperience to her son. Her father had witnessed a drowning when he was young and instilled in her a fear of water.

A Pioneering Army Sergeant Fights to Keep Her Job - NYTimes.com

A Pioneering Army Sergeant Fights to Keep Her Job - NYTimes.com: COLUMBIA, S.C. — When Command Sgt. Maj. Teresa L. King was named the first female commandant of the Army’s elite drill sergeant school in 2009, proponents of gender equality in the military hailed the news as a watershed.

But it did not take long for the grumbling to start. Students who flunked out of the school complained that she set unfair standards. Some of her own instructors said she rigidly enforced old-fashioned rules. Traditionalists across the service asked: how could a woman with no experience in combat manage the Army’s only school for training the trainers who prepare recruits for war? 

She says she tried to ignore the criticism, but her superiors did not. Last November, they suspended Sergeant Major King, forbidding contact with students or staff and opening an investigation into what they called the “toxic” environment at the school. As that review dragged on, she says she felt like a criminal: isolated, publicly humiliated and so despondent that friends worried that she might hurt herself.

National science test shows only slight improvement - The Washington Post

National science test shows only slight improvement - The Washington Post: National tests measuring science knowledge among eighth-graders show slight improvement compared with those of two years earlier,but one-third of all students still lack a basic understanding of the physical, life and earth sciences, according to a federal study made public Thursday.

The tests showed that black and Hispanic students had made slightly more progress than white students, making a tiny dent in the persistent achievement gaps between the racial groups.

Commentary: Black Studies - The Never-Ending (Beautiful) Struggle

Commentary: Black Studies - The Never-Ending (Beautiful) Struggle: Much has been written about a former (recently fired) Chronicle of Higher Education (CHE) blogger’s racist, dismissive, and uninformed rant against the discipline of Black Studies—particularly a group of Northwestern University graduate students—but very little scrutiny has been afforded the article that inspired the toxic torrent in the first place.

That would be “Black Studies: ‘Swaggering into the Future’: A New Generation of Ph.D.'s Advances the Discipline,” written by Chronicle reporter Stacey Patton.

As one who earned the Ph.D. in African American Studies at Temple University, over a decade ago, I have some thoughts on the direction of the discipline beloved by so many ... and reviled—and misunderstood—by far too many others.

Stop and Frisk Practices | New York Civil Liberties Union (NYCLU) - American Civil Liberties Union of New York State

Stop and Frisk Practices | New York Civil Liberties Union (NYCLU) - American Civil Liberties Union of New York State: he NYPD’s stop-and-frisk practices raise serious concerns over racial profiling, illegal stops and privacy rights. The Department’s own reports on its stop-and-frisk activity confirm what many people in communities of color across the city have long known: The police are stopping hundreds of thousands of law abiding New Yorkers every year, and the vast majority are black and Latino.

An analysis by the NYCLU revealed that more than 4 million innocent New Yorkers were subjected to police stops and street interrogations from 2004 through 2011, and that black and Latino communities continue to be the overwhelming target of these tactics. Nearly nine out of 10 stopped-and-frisked New Yorkers have been completely innocent, according to the NYPD’s own reports.

'Freeman': A Liberated Slave In Search Of Family | WAMU 88.5 - American University Radio

'Freeman': A Liberated Slave In Search Of Family | WAMU 88.5 - American University Radio: ...In Freeman, Pitts explores the turbulent and violent time after the official end of war and assassination of President Lincoln. He draws from historical classifieds to emphasize the steadfast efforts of freed slaves looking to reconnect with their loved ones. Pitts tells NPR's Audie Cornish that most people weren't aware of what was going on at the time.

"To me, it's such a fascinating and little known fact that all of these African-Americans newly freed slaves went to such lengths to reconstitute their marriages and reconstitute their families," he says.

"Nobody really talks about this, but you've got — 20 years after the war — people placing ads and walking across counties and states. And I just liked the idea of using real ads to emphasize that this was a real story. These were real people who were looking for their loved ones."

Arizona - Sheriff to Face Civil Rights Suit Over Claims That Include Profiling - NYTimes.com

Arizona - Sheriff to Face Civil Rights Suit Over Claims That Include Profiling - NYTimes.com: The federal authorities said Wednesday that they planned to sue Sheriff Joe Arpaio of Maricopa County and his office over claims of civil rights violations, including the racial profiling of Latinos. The Justice Department has been seeking an agreement requiring the sheriff’s office to train officers in how to make constitutional traffic stops, collect data on people arrested in traffic stops and reach out to Latinos to assure them that the department is there also to protect them. Sheriff Arpaio has denied the claims of racial profiling and has said that allowing a court monitor would mean that every policy decision would have to be cleared through an observer and would nullify his authority. Justice officials told a lawyer for the sheriff on April 3 that his refusal of a court-appointed monitor was a deal-breaker that would end settlement negotiations and result in a federal lawsuit. A “notice of intent to file civil action” came Wednesday from Thomas Perez, an assistant attorney general, in a letter to a lawyer for the sheriff.

Census Analysis Shows Shifts in New York City's Makeup - NYTimes.com

Census Analysis Shows Shifts in New York City's Makeup - NYTimes.com: Reversing a trend that had held for decades, more Dominicans left New York City than arrived since 2000, a new census analysis found. And a surge of Mexican immigrants nearly bumped them ahead of South Americans into third place among Hispanic groups.

Mexicans are also poised to overtake Puerto Ricans and Dominicans among mothers giving birth in the city. Birthrates among Mexican immigrants in North Corona, Queens, are nearly as high as among Orthodox Jews in central Brooklyn, who have one of the highest birthrates of any group in the city. During the last decade, Hispanic residents of North Corona had the highest natural population increase — births over deaths — in the city.

Immigrant Mothers To Be Deported Beg ICE To Let Them Stay In US With Their Children (VIDEO, PHOTOS)

Immigrant Mothers To Be Deported Beg ICE To Let Them Stay In US With Their Children (VIDEO, PHOTOS): There may not be anything more painful than a mother having to say goodbye to her child.

And yet that is the predicament that many mothers, including Carmen and Maria, are facing. After both women pleaded with immigration officials to be allowed to stay with their children, Maria was granted an extension but Carmen was ordered out of the country, CBS reports in the video above.

Carmen, who has lived in the US for 22 years, now has a monitoring brace on her ankle until her flight back to Peru in three weeks.

She and her 14-year-old son, Brian, made tearful pleas to Immigration and Custom Enforcement (ICE) to allow her to stay. “I feel depressed, nervous, sometimes scared… I don’t want to lose her, I want to be next to her, step by step," Brian said.

Coming to the Defense of Black Students

Coming to the Defense of Black Students: When school systems recognize that many of their Black students are falling behind, they frequently bring in consultants to help right the situation. Often that person is Dr. Jawanza Kunjufu.

Kunjufu should be a very familiar name to educators and African-American parents. He is the founder and president of African American Images, a Chicago-based publishing company that also sponsors dozens of workshops for educators and parents.

He also is the author of more than 30 books, including Countering the Conspiracy to Destroy Black Boys (2004), 200 Educational Strategies to Teach Children of Color (2009), Raising Black Boys (2007) and Restoring the Village, Values, and Commitment: Solutions for the Black Family, all published by African American Images. Kunjufu holds a bachelor’s degree in economics from Illinois State University and a Ph.D. in business administration from Union Graduate School in Cincinnati, Ohio.

Baltimore prosecutors' office sued - baltimoresun.com

Baltimore prosecutors' office sued - baltimoresun.com: A 61-year-old white woman, who says she was wrongfully fired from the Baltimore prosecutors’ office after 25 years on the job, has filed an employment discrimination lawsuit alleging age, race and gender discrimination in the 2010 termination.

Antoinette E. Swiec, of Baltimore, is seeking $400,000 in compensation from the Baltimore state’s attorney’s office on each of two counts, claiming she was fired because the predominantly young, African American division she worked for wanted her out.

The lawsuit was filed in U.S. District Court Monday, and was to be served on Baltimore State’s Attorney Gregg Bernstein, though the firing occurred under his predecessor, Patricia C. Jessamy. Bernstein took office in 2011.

New York Fire Department Gains Minority and Female Applicants - NYTimes.com

New York Fire Department Gains Minority and Female Applicants - NYTimes.com: For the past two years, Fire Department recruiters have complied aggressively with a court-mandated effort to diversify the department by increasing the number of minority applicants.

Their efforts seem to have paid off. Of the 42,161 applicants who took the firefighter exam this spring, 19,260 were nonwhite and 1,952 were women — both all-time highs for groups traditionally underrepresented in the department, the fire commissioner, Salvatore J. Cassano, said on Tuesday. 

Of the roughly 10,000 firefighters in New York, 6 percent are Hispanic, 3 percent are black, and 1 percent are Asian, fire officials said. There are 28 female firefighters. The number of minority and female applicants who took the spring test was roughly double the number who took it in 2007, the last time the test was given.

“This is a huge step forward,” said Michele J. Maglione, assistant commissioner for recruitment. “We just opened the door to thousands of New Yorkers.

Summit: Future U.S. Innovation Tied to Reshaping K-12 Education, Reforming Immigration Policies

Summit: Future U.S. Innovation Tied to Reshaping K-12 Education, Reforming Immigration Policies: ARLINGTON, Va. – To foster more innovation in the future, business needs to help reshape K-12 education to grow better thinkers, and the United States should reform its immigration policy to attract and keep talent from various parts of the world.

Those were two of the main points that business leaders made Tuesday during the inaugural “Innovation Summit” hosted by The Atlantic Magazine.

“Now, universities are training many people around the globe and (the United States) is forcing them to go home,” said Boeing CEO James McNerney. “Great for them, other countries and the global economy. But it cuts off that flow that has led to populating our companies and institutions with great people.

Learning the New Economic Reality

Learning the New Economic Reality: The dean’s message on the website of Howard University’s School of Business imparts a clear message: “As we continue in our quest to maintain academic excellence, we must adjust to the changing economic environment. The recent downturn in the global economy continues to [have an] impact on opportunities for our students and many of our alumni,” Dr. Barron Harvey wrote, adding that the business school is taking “aggressive steps” to stay competitive, including increasing its focus on international programs and entrepreneurship.

Harvey’s candid assessment illustrates a proactive stance that many historically Black business schools have taken during this period of economic uncertainty.

Naomi Schaefer Riley, Chronicle Of Higher Education Blogger, Fired For Calling Black Studies 'Claptrap'

Naomi Schaefer Riley, Chronicle Of Higher Education Blogger, Fired For Calling Black Studies 'Claptrap': The Chronicle of Higher Education dismissed one of its bloggers after outcry over a blog post she wrote questioning the legitimacy of black studies as an academic discipline.

Naomi Schaefer Riley, a lecturer and author who wrote for the Chronicle's blog, Brainstorm, was let go after readers pushed back on an essay she published last week titled "The Most Persuasive Case For Eliminating Black Studies? Just Read the Dissertations." Riley's essay responded to a sidebar of a story in the Chronicle which profiled several up-and-coming black studies scholars in the process of writing dissertations. Riley looked at the titles of the dissertations -- on subjects like the role of race in housing policy and the history of black midwifery in the United States -- and called them "left-wing victimization claptrap."

National Cathedral to dedicate stone carving of civil rights leader Rosa Parks - The Washington Post

National Cathedral to dedicate stone carving of civil rights leader Rosa Parks - The Washington Post: Civil rights matriarch Rosa Parks will be honored in Washington this week as the National Cathedral dedicates a stone carving in her likeness.

The dedication ceremony will be held at 5:30 p.m. Thursday and will include live performances of prayer songs by the cathedral’s men’s and boys’ choirs.

The carving commemorates Parks’s refusal in 1955 to give up her bus seat to a white man, sparking the modern civil rights movement. It will be displayed in the cathedral’s Human Rights Porch, an area that celebrates “those who struggle to bring equality and social justice to all people,” according to the church Web site.

Thursday’s dedication ceremony comes nearly seven years after Parks’s death in 2005, at the age of 92.
In the days and weeks that followed, the nation was reminded of her marked, albeit quiet, contribution to the civil rights movement.

American Art Museum gives a peek at vast collection of African American art - The Washington Post

American Art Museum gives a peek at vast collection of African American art - The Washington Post: In 1966, IBM donated Sargent Johnson’s sculpture “Mask” to the Smithsonian American Art Museum, then called the National Collection of Fine Arts, marking the museum’s first receipt of a gift of African American artwork.

Today, the institution says it has the largest collection of African American art in the world, some 2,000 works by 200 artists, and a portion of those holdings are on view in “African American Art: Harlem Renaissance, Civil Rights Era and Beyond,” Johnson’s “Mask” marks the beginning of this 100-work exhibition. The copper bust of a girl’s head from the early 1930s, rendered in the style of African sculpture, also speaks to the history of Harlem. It was crafted when conversations about the foundations of black art were being held in New York and being circulated by figures such as Howard University professor Alain Locke, who influenced Johnson by calling for a reclamation of African heritage.
 
That is a powerful legacy, but it is only a moment in the cacophony of history stitched together for the exhibition — a wide mix of voices from artists who emerged from different cities and traditions. The exhibition does not seem to build a grand narrative, but to indulge the museum’s desire to bring these works out of storage, even if the result is disjointed and without a clear message. What the exhibition produces instead is a look at the heart of this museum, through its history of acquisitions.

For children of Filipino teachers, bitter end, uncertain beginnings - baltimoresun.com

For children of Filipino teachers, bitter end, uncertain beginnings - baltimoresun.com: As the school year draws to a close, one group of Baltimore students isn't making plans for summer. They deflect discussions about courseloads for next year, and shy away from questions about which colleges they hope to attend. They don't talk about "the future."

For hundreds of Filipino children who made the journey to Baltimore when the city school system sent recruiters across the world to recruit their parents for teaching positions in 2006, this year marks bitter ends and uncertain beginnings.

The children attended some of the best schools in the city, many graduating at the top of their classes and securing scholarships to attend college. But now they face the possibility that the school system no longer has a place for them or their parents.

Study: Up to 90% of Asian Schoolchildren Are Nearsighted | Healthland | TIME.com

Study: Up to 90% of Asian Schoolchildren Are Nearsighted | Healthland | TIME.com: Scientists say an epidemic of myopia, or nearsightedness, is sweeping through Asian children, and is likely due to students’ spending too much time indoors studying and not enough time outside in the sunlight.

It has long been thought that nearsightedness is mostly a hereditary problem, but researchers led by Ian Morgan of Australian National University say the data suggest that environment has a lot more to do with it.

Reporting in the journal Lancet, the authors note that up to 90% of young adults in major East Asian countries, including China, Taiwan, Japan, Singapore and South Korea, are nearsighted. The overall rate of myopia in the U.K., by contrast, is about 20% to 30%.

Black Panthers: Activists for Healthy Communities

Black Panthers: Activists for Healthy Communities: Dr. Alondra Nelson, an associate professor of sociology at Columbia University, didn’t set out to find stethoscopes and the white coats of medicine among stories of gun-toting Black Panther Party members or their iconic black leather jackets and berets, but she did.

The historical research and extensive interviews conducted with members of the Black Panther Party that eventually led to Nelson’s October 2011 book, Body and Soul: The Black Panther Party and the Fight Against Medical Discrimination, began, somewhat, as a scholarly detour and personal curiosity. Nelson, whose expertise includes gender, science, and socio-historical studies of medicine, had already set out to understand and write about the barriers that African-American communities confronted in mobilizing around the HIV/AIDS epidemic when she began noticing references to the Panther’s little-known health activism.

Recess Helps African American, Latino Students Perform In Class, Study Says

Recess Helps African American, Latino Students Perform In Class, Study Says: While the benefits of physical activity among children has given rise to little, if any, debate, the benefits of midday playtime has. On one end of the spectrum some say that recess poses safety hazards and cuts into much needed instructional time; on the other end of the spectrum, proponents say recess may actually help children perform better in the classroom.

A new study from the latter camp shows that time away from the classroom might be especially beneficial for Black and Latino students.

According to researchers from Mathematica Policy Research and the John W. Gardner Center for Youth and Their Communities at Stanford University, teachers reported less bullying, better recess behavior and more readiness for classes among students who engaged in recess.

To evaluate the benefits of break time, the study focused in on a program called Playworks, a nonprofit which uses recess to address social and emotional development issues large Black and Latino student populations. Researchers collected onsite observations and feedback from 1,982 fourth and fifth grade students, 247 teachers, and 25 principals, as well as the 14 Playworks coaches who participated in the study.

Cornell students using ‘Trayvon’ as a racial slur | The Raw Story

Cornell students using ‘Trayvon’ as a racial slur | The Raw Story: The Sigma Pi fraternity at Cornell University threw objects and made a reference to the late Trayvon Martin at black students Sunday morning, according to the school’s Cornell Daily Sun.

Sophomore student Beverly Fonkwo was walking home with her friend when a group from the fraternity group’s house began to throw items at them. When Fonkwo and her friend asked them to stop twice, Fonkwo said the group continued to toss the objects and responded by saying, “Come up here, Trayvon” and other racial comments.

“I feel like it was targeted and racially motivated, we felt very threatened,” Fonkwo told the Daily Sun. “Meanwhile, the assailants were just laughing at the whole situation until we called the police and then they ran inside.”

Positive Bias? Black, Latino Students Get Less Critical Feedback From Teachers, Study Suggests

Positive Bias? Black, Latino Students Get Less Critical Feedback From Teachers, Study Suggests: Black and Latino students may be getting less critical, but helpful, feedback from teachers than their white counterparts, a new educational study indicates.

"The social implications of these results are important; many minority students might not be getting input from instructors that stimulates intellectual growth and fosters achievement," study researcher Kent Harber, a Rutgers-Newark psychology professor, said in a press release.

This positive bias in feedback to minority students may be contributing to the achievement gap between white and minority students, a stubborn national problem, Harber said.

The study "tested" 113 white middle-school and high-school teachers in two public school districts, one middle class and white, and the other working class and racially mixed. Both are located in the New York/New Jersey/Connecticut tri-state area.

Why Black Women Are Fat - NYTimes.com

Why Black Women Are Fat - NYTimes.com: FOUR out of five black women are seriously overweight. One out of four middle-aged black women has diabetes. With $174 billion a year spent on diabetes-related illness in America and obesity quickly overtaking smoking as a cause of cancer deaths, it is past time to try something new.

What we need is a body-culture revolution in black America. Why? Because too many experts who are involved in the discussion of obesity don’t understand something crucial about black women and fat: many black women are fat because we want to be. 

The black poet Lucille Clifton’s 1987 poem “Homage to My Hips” begins with the boast, “These hips are big hips.” She establishes big black hips as something a woman would want to have and a man would desire. She wasn’t the first or the only one to reflect this community knowledge. Twenty years before, in 1967, Joe Tex, a black Texan, dominated the radio airwaves across black America with a song he wrote and recorded, “Skinny Legs and All.” One of his lines haunts me to this day: “some man, somewhere who’ll take you baby, skinny legs and all.” For me, it still seems almost an impossibility.

New Book Explores History of Black Studies

New Book Explores History of Black Studies: In her new book The Black Revolution on Campus (University of California Press) Dr. Martha Biondi, an associate professor of African-American studies and history at Northwestern University, chronicles the turbulent 1960s student movement that resulted in the formation of Black Studies programs on college campuses across the nation.

“We don’t understand or appreciate the student founders of the field,” says Biondi, who recently presented the inaugural lecture for the “Reflections on African American Studies” series at Princeton University’s Center for African American Studies. The title of her talk was “The Counter Revolution on Campus: Why Black Studies is so Controversial.”

Popular Powwow Celebrates Native American Presence at Stanford University

Popular Powwow Celebrates Native American Presence at Stanford University: When Maija Cruz’s mother arrives at Stanford University this week, it will mark not only her first campus visit but also enjoying a long-shared tradition connecting them to their American Indian roots.

The annual, student-run Stanford Powwow, which takes place Friday through Sunday, draws more than 300 dancers in full regalia from around the country and Canada and celebrates the respective cultures of the 300-plus Indian students on campus. For the latter, the occasion is as significant as Homecoming or Parents Weekend for the rest of the student body, and many of their families travel from afar for the festivities.

“My mom hasn’t seen the campus since the day she dropped me off for freshman year,” says Cruz, a junior from Milwaukee, Wis., and Powwow co-chair. “Among my Native friends here, it’s very common for their parents to come out for Powwow and graduation.”

In Connecticut, East Haven Is Unlikely Site of Latino Expo - NYTimes.com

In Connecticut, East Haven Is Unlikely Site of Latino Expo - NYTimes.com: EAST HAVEN, Conn. — Visitors to the high school here this weekend were treated to a carnival of Latino exuberance before they finally stumbled upon the outliers. They walked through a shiny corridor where D.J.’s blasted Ricky Martin and reggaeton music, past a boisterous chef shimmying and shaking his hips as he cooked, and past a gaggle of teenage girls posing in their quincea era dresses.

Only then, around a cafeteria corner and comfortably out of view from the piña colada station, would visitors at this year’s Latino Expo be greeted by the unexpected: two uniformed men sitting beneath a blue banner emblazoned with “East Haven Police” in large yellow letters. Nearby, the town’s mayor, Joseph Maturo Jr., bounced among vendors, a blue plastic lei dangling from his neck. 

Under typical circumstances, in a typical town, a mayor could glad-hand visitors and his police department could set up a recruiting booth at a local event without raising eyebrows or suspicions.

UN expert calls for U.S. return of native lands | The Raw Story

UN expert calls for U.S. return of native lands | The Raw Story: The UN special rapporteur on the rights of indigenous peoples has called on the United States to mitigate the “sense of loss” among the Native American community by restoring some tribal lands.

James Anaya, made the comments after a 12-day tour of the United States, during which he met with tribal leaders in the capital as well as in the states of Arizona, Alaska, Oklahoma, Oregon, South Dakota and Washington.

“The sense of loss, alienation and indignity is pervasive throughout Indian country,” Anaya said in a statement released Friday.

Marian Wright Edelman: Poison in America

Marian Wright Edelman: Poison in America: The growth in hate groups and the use of their divisive and negative language in the mainstream political and media arena is cause for national alarm. Already this year several horrendous hate crimes, possible hate crimes, and crimes committed by people with ties to hate groups have received national attention.

In the first week of May a sixteen-month-old girl was shot and killed along with her mother, grandmother, and her mother’s boyfriend allegedly by Arizona white supremacist, border vigilante and longtime neo-Nazi J.T. Ready. The murders were the apparent result of domestic violence but were tragically little surprise from a man the Southern Poverty Law Center’s Mark Potok called “a violent thug who typifies the very worst element in the American nativist movement.” In Tulsa, Oklahoma, hate crime charges were filed in April against two white men who went on a Good Friday shooting spree in a black neighborhood randomly targeting and killing three black victims and injuring two more.

Muslim woman wins $5 million verdict from AT&T for discrimination - chicagotribune.com

Muslim woman wins $5 million verdict from AT&T for discrimination - chicagotribune.com: KANSAS CITY, Missouri (Reuters) - A Kansas City woman who converted from Christianity to Islam has been awarded $5 million in punitive damages by a jury who found the telecommunications giant AT&T created a "hostile work environment" after her conversion, according to a judge's order issued Friday.

Susann Bashir, a 41-year-old married mother, sued AT&T unit Southwestern Bell for what she said was a pattern of offensive and discriminatory conduct by her supervisors that began when she converted to Islam in 2005, six years after she started working for the company as a network technician.

Voter registration down among Hispanics, blacks - The Washington Post

Voter registration down among Hispanics, blacks - The Washington Post: The number of black and Hispanic registered voters has fallen sharply since 2008, posing a serious challenge to the Obama campaign in an election that could turn on the participation of minority voters.

Voter rolls typically shrink in non-presidential election years and registrations fell among whites as well, but this is the first time in nearly four decades that the number of registered Hispanics has dropped significantly.

That figure fell 5 percent across the country, to about 11 million, according to the Census Bureau. But in some politically important swing states, the decline among Hispanics, who are considered critical in the 2012 presidential contest, is much higher: just over 28 percent in New Mexico, for example, and about 10 percent in Florida.

For both Hispanics and blacks, the large decrease is attributed to the ailing economy, which forced many Americans to move in search of work or because of other financial upheaval.

Justice Department: Ala. law hurting Hispanic students – USATODAY.com

Justice Department: Ala. law hurting Hispanic students – USATODAY.com: MONTGOMERY, Ala. – Alabama's controversial immigration law has had lasting consequences on the education of Hispanic students and others learning English, according to a Justice Department letter to the state.

The letter, dated May 1, was released Thursday — hours after six protesters had a sit-down demonstration against the law near the Alabama Senate Chamber.

"During the weeks after Section 28 (of the law) went into effect, absences by Hispanic students receiving ELL (English language learner) services rose significantly, with the result that hundreds of students failed to receive the educational services to which they are legally entitled," says the letter, dated May 1 and written by Assistant U.S. Attorney General Thomas Perez to state school Superintendent Tommy Bice.

The letter focuses on the section of the law, known as House Bill 56, that requires school districts to collect information on immigration status from students at the time of enrollment. The law does not ban undocumented aliens from attending school, a right upheld by the Supreme Court in 1982's Plyler v. Doe.

9-Month-Olds Show Racial Bias When Looking at Faces - Yahoo! News

9-Month-Olds Show Racial Bias When Looking at Faces - Yahoo! News: Adults have more difficulty recognizing faces that belong to people of another race, and this deficit appears to start early.

New research indicates that by the time they are 9 months old, babies are better able to recognize faces and emotional expressions of people who belong to the group they interact with most, than they are those of people who belong to another race.

Babies don't start out this way; younger infants appear equally able to tell people apart, regardless of race.

"These results suggest that biases in face recognition and perception begin in preverbal infants, well before concepts about race are formed. It is important for us to understand the nature of these biases in order to reduce or eliminate [the biases]," said study researcher Lisa Scott, a psychologist at the University of Massachusetts, Amherst, in a statement.

Phil Mushnick, NY Post Writer: Brooklyn Nets Should Be Called 'New York N-----s' Because Of Jay-Z Ownership

Phil Mushnick, NY Post Writer: Brooklyn Nets Should Be Called 'New York N-----s' Because Of Jay-Z Ownership: A New York sportswriter is in hot water after writing that the Brooklyn Nets should change their name to the "New York N------s" because they are co-owned by Jay-Z.

Phil Mushnick, who writes for the New York Post, has apparently been a long-time critic of the rapper's role in the franchise. In a Friday column, he trashed Jay-Z's choices for the team's new uniforms:

As long as the Nets are allowing Jay-Z to call their marketing shots -- what a shock that he chose black and white as the new team colors to stress, as the Nets explained, their new "urban" home -- why not have him apply the full Jay-Z treatment?

Why the Brooklyn Nets when they can be the New York N------s? The cheerleaders could be the Brooklyn B----hes or Hoes. Team logo? A 9 mm with hollow-tip shell casings strewn beneath. Wanna be Jay-Z hip? Then go all the way!

Women hold one quarter of jobs in science and related fields - May. 4, 2012

Women hold one quarter of jobs in science and related fields - May. 4, 2012: NEW YORK (CNNMoney) -- High school senior Mimi Yen spends a lot of time thinking about worm sex.

At Yen's lab at New York University, where she studies worms under a microscope after school, she can point out which ones are hermaphrodites.

Yen's career plans are set: She is pursuing a career in the sciences -- a field still dominated by men.
Overall, women make up nearly half the U.S. workforce. But they hold less than a quarter of the jobs in science, technology, engineering and math.
And those jobs pay well, too: The average annual income of a college-educated worker in the sciences is $74,000, compared to $59,000 for college grads in other fields, according to federal data. (Related: 25 top-paying jobs)

4 Years Later, Race Is Still Issue for Some Voters - NYTimes.com

4 Years Later, Race Is Still Issue for Some Voters - NYTimes.com: STEUBENVILLE, Ohio — This is the land of die-hard Democrats — mill workers, coal miners and union members. They have voted party line for generations, forming a reliable constituency for just about any Democrat who decides to run for office.

But when it comes to President Obama, a small part of this constituency balks.

“Certain precincts in this county are not going to vote for Obama,” said John Corrigan, clerk of courts for Jefferson County, who was drinking coffee in a furniture shop downtown one morning last week with a small group of friends, retired judges and civil servants. “I don’t want to say it, but we all know why.” 

A retired state employee, Jason Foreman, interjected, “I’ll say it: it’s because he’s black.” 

For nearly three and a half years, a black family has occupied the White House, and much of the time what has been most remarkable about that fact is how unremarkable it has become to the country. While Mr. Obama will always be known to the history books as the country’s first black president, his mixed-race heritage has only rarely surfaced in visible and explicit ways amid the tumult of a deep recession, two wars and shifting political currents.

Racial Bias Among Doctors Linked To Dissatisfaction With Care, Report Says

Racial Bias Among Doctors Linked To Dissatisfaction With Care, Report Says: The average time most doctors spend with their patients during each visit is just 20 minutes, according to 2009 estimates by the National Center for Health Statistics. And a survey last year by health care consultant group Press Ganey determined that before patients even get in to see a doctor, they've waited an average of 23 minutes.

But while health care professionals have offered advice on how to minimize waits and how to make the most of your one-on-one time with a doctor, few have ever addressed a hurdle that many black patients may face -- racial bias.

In a study published in a March issue of the American Journal of Public Health, researchers found that two-thirds of doctors harbored "unconscious" racial biases toward patients. When those biases were present, researchers found that doctors tended to dominate conversations with African-American patients, pay less attention to their personal and psychosocial needs and make patients feel less involved in making decisions about their health.

Pennsylvania Voter ID Law: Viviette Applewhite, ACLU, NAACP File Lawsuit

Pennsylvania Voter ID Law: Viviette Applewhite, ACLU, NAACP File Lawsuit: Civil rights advocates have been fighting this year against controversial voter ID laws in a number of states across the country. On Tuesday, 93-year-old Viviette Applewhite became the lead plaintiff in a lawsuit filed by the ACLU and NAACP challenging the voter ID law in Pennsylvania.

Under the new law, which Gov. Tom Corbett (R) signed in March, Pennsylvania will issue free photo ID cards to voters who can produce birth certificates or other proof of identify.

But Applewhite, who marched in Macon, Ga., with Martin Luther King during the height of the civil rights movement and first voted in 1960, casting her ballot for John F. Kennedy, according to The Philadelphia Inquirer, doesn't have a drivers license. She never learned to drive, and she lost her other IDs when her purse was stolen years ago. She has asked the state for a copy of her birth certificate, but the state can't seem to find it. As a result, she can't get a photo ID that will allow her to vote in the November election.

Colorful Visions At African-American Art Exhibit : NPR

Colorful Visions At African-American Art Exhibit : NPR: The African-American experience is reflected, right now, on the walls of the Smithsonian American Art Museum in Washington, D.C. Exuberant dancing in Chicago. Laundry on a line in the nation's capital. A girl smiling out from her father's warm jacket — all captured in photographs, paintings and sculptures from the 1920s through the 1990s.

The show is called "African-American Art: Harlem Renaissance, Civil Rights Era and Beyond." And there is a question: Does it segregate — or at the very least compartmentalize — African-American artists? Yes, says exhibition consultant Renee Ater, an art historian at the University of Maryland. But, she says, it also shows African-Americans involved in visual conversations that have absorbed artists of all races.

"They're concerted with color, they're concerned with line, they're concerned with form, and that's one of the things that you see in the show," Ater says. "And the other thing about this exhibition is that you see African-American faces looking out at you."

Georgetown Business School Takes on Added Rigor, Boosts Focus on Globalization

Georgetown Business School Takes on Added Rigor, Boosts Focus on Globalization: Dean of the McDonough School of Business at Georgetown University since August, Dr. David Thomas is a rarity — he is an African-American and he leads a top business school. He has taught at Harvard Business School and, before that, the Wharton School of Business at the University of Pennsylvania. He has co-written two books, Breaking Through: The Making of Minority Executives in Corporate America and Leading For Equity: The Pursuit of Excellence in Montgomery County.

Tufts University Moving to Expand Black Studies Program

Tufts University Moving to Expand Black Studies Program: Since 1980, Tufts has offered a minor called Africa in the New World, but for reasons lost to time, the private university north of Boston did not join other schools in the 1960s and 1970s in creating a major in what was usually called Black studies. A faculty-student committee’s recommendation in 1972 to do so went unimplemented.

African-American students began petitioning the Tufts administration anew in 2009 for an Africana studies major, later holding campus rallies. Momentum toward a resolution to the student protests built with the arrival the next year of a new dean of arts and sciences, Dr. Joanne Berger-Sweeney, an African-American who compiled a strong record on diversity at Wellesley College.

“Student advocacy played a role,” Berger-Sweeney says, “but I would also say that I came to Tufts feeling issues related to diversity and diversification of faculty are just very important to the future and relevancy of the academy.”

Mind the Gap: Why are good schools failing black students?

Mind the Gap: Why are good schools failing black students?: Well-funded suburban schools are doing a good job educating white students. Yet black and hispanic students, even kids from middle-class families, are falling behind. This one-hour radio documentary looks at the causes of the minority achievement gap through the stories of students, teachers and parents at a diverse public high school in New Jersey.

Column: Teach black and Hispanic students differently – USATODAY.com

Column: Teach black and Hispanic students differently – USATODAY.com: In late March, a panel of 10 education experts gathered in Washington to nominate four most-improved urban school districts for a national education prize. What should have been a routine review of student data, however, suddenly took a new direction.

First one member on the review panel for the annual Broad Prize for Urban Education then another noticed the same thing: Plenty of large urban school districts nationwide were making solid progress with Hispanic students closing achievement gaps with white students. But African-American students continued to lag.

In theory, the experts should not have been seeing what they were seeing. The federal data tracking Hispanic and black students show that they are making roughly the same progress (not much) in closing learning gaps. That left the review panel members puzzled. Was this an illusion?

It appears the Broad Prize panel was seeing something very real that suggests Hispanic and black student should be taught differently.

Discrimination at airport security? There's an app for that - USATODAY.com

Discrimination at airport security? There's an app for that - USATODAY.com: AP
Civil-rights groups led by The Sikh Coalition unveiled an application for mobile devices Monday that allows airline passengers to report suspected discrimination at airport checkpoints.

Sikhs have complained for years that they are targeted by Transportation Security Administration because of their turbans, which they wear for their religion. Yet they created the application for anyone interested in filing a formal report alleging discrimination, including Muslims, Latinos and blacks.

"The TSA says they don't profile," says Amardeep Singh, director of programs for the Sikh Coalition. "I hope this app will help us get closer to the truth on that question by giving the public the tools to file complaints and document their experience."

Developing a Partnership with Parents - MCPS Staff Bulletin article

Developing a Partnership with Parents - MCPS Staff Bulletin article: Cathrine Shinn, assistant principal at Rachel Carson Elementary School, talks about the effort to reach out to Spanish-speaking parents in the community.

While all other communities are within walking distance of Rachel Carson Elementary School, the Governor’s Square apartment community in Gaithersburg is nearly five miles away.

Many students living in this community are second-language learners and impacted by poverty. With geographic, language and economic barriers, the community seemed isolated.

Parents were often unaware of events and meetings taking place at the school, which meant they were unable to actively engage in school meetings and events. In March 2009, parent volunteer Alex Stavitsky-Zeineddin became an active and integral part of an initiative to reach out to parents in this community. Stavitsky-Zeineddin spoke fluent Spanish and offered valuable insight about cultural and educational patterns that were different for the families we wished to reach.

New Internet Tools Helps Measure Community College Student Success

New Internet Tools Helps Measure Community College Student Success: Washington, D.C. – In an effort to provide a more nuanced snapshot of completion rates at community colleges, the College Board on Monday launched a new Internet tool described as a “quick and easy” way get a handle on various measures of student outcomes.

While the usefulness and user-friendliness of the new website is a matter of perspective (it only provides already-published data that must be downloaded in spreadsheet form) College Board collaborators described it as a welcome attempt to shine light on the role that community colleges are being expected to play in providing workforce training for students from diverse walks of life.

...The website features the ability to break information down by state, race and ethnicity or gender, but it does not include institution-specific data, thus, it is not possible to figure out the percentage of students at a given community college who landed jobs in their field of study.

Newly Re-established White House Initiative Office to Seek Ideas on Native American Education

Newly Re-established White House Initiative Office to Seek Ideas on Native American Education: Officials representing the White House Initiative on American Indian and Alaska Native Education are hosting a series of forums around the country in the coming weeks seeking ideas on how to improve educational outcomes for indigenous populations.

In hopes of gaining participation and input from tribal nations, the upcoming meetings dovetail with efforts to create a memorandum of understanding that will frame a partnership aimed at expanding educational opportunities and improving academic achievement. The Department of Education and Department of Interior, which oversee the initiative, already have held roundtables with tribal leaders, Indian educators and other federal officials.

The initiative seeks to close the achievement gap between Indian and non-Indian students, reduce the high dropout rates among Alaska natives and Indians, and help preserve and revitalize Native languages, histories and cultures.