By Quintessa Williams 
Word in Black 

It’s no longer a surprising revelation that Black girls are disciplined at disproportionately high rates compared to their peers of other racial backgrounds. 

However, new data from two women’s advocacy organizations and the federal government has further shed light on this persistent trend. Black girls, who make up just 15 percent of public school students, are far more likely than White girls to be suspended for behavior issues — and face exclusionary expulsion and corporal punishment as early as preschool.

A 2024 report from the National Black Women’s Justice Institute found that Black K-12 girls represented more than three times their enrollment share in transfers and corporal punishment and more than double their share in expulsions. This data has been bolstered by a new report from the Government Accountability Office, which found that in the 2017-2018 school year, Black girls accounted for nearly half of all exclusionary discipline cases — including 45 percent of out-of-school suspensions, 37 percent of in-school suspensions, and 43 percent of expulsions.

This disparity also echoes the findings from the National Women’s Law Journal and Ed Trust, which reported that in the 2015-2016 school year, Black girls were five times more likely than their White peers to be suspended. In addition, the report also found that as early as preschool, Black girls made up 20 percent of the female enrollment but accounted for 53 percent of out-of-school suspensions.

Bayliss Fiddiman, senior director of educational equity at NWLC, tells Word In Black that the new findings illustrate the uphill battle Black girls face in school.

“These disparities have existed for years, but the GAO report is a stark reminder that little has changed,” she said. “The data reinforced what we already knew as a problem — Black girls are subject to harsher disciplinary actions for behaviors that are often perceived through the lens of bias, such as defiance or disruption.”

Adultification and colorism contribute to the disparity

The GAO identified that the disproportionate discipline of Black girls is due to a range of factors, including poverty levels, disabilities, and the presence of school resource officers. However, racial bias — particularly via adultification and colorism — plays the most significant role.

“Teachers and school staff often perceive Black girls as older and more mature than they are, which means they are seen as more ‘responsible’ for their actions and are punished more severely than their peers,” says Dr. Sydney McKinney, executive director of the National Black Women’s Justice Institute. “This bias manifests in labeling typical teenage behavior as ‘disrespect’ or ‘disruption,’ and Black girls often bear the brunt of these stereotypes.”

Fiddiman also elaborated on the colorism factor: “Black girls with darker skin are undoubtedly more likely to be punished than those with lighter skin,” she says. “It’s an unfortunate extension of the racial bias that permeates school discipline systems.”

Black girl discipline is a national public crisis

The discipline crisis among Black K-12 girls spans every state in the U.S. McKinney pointed to the long-standing trends in exclusionary discipline data from the 2024 NBWJI report. “Our data from 2011 to 2018 shows consistent overrepresentation of Black girls in nearly every category of discipline—whether it’s suspensions, expulsions, or referrals to law enforcement,” she says. “This consistency over time is perhaps the most alarming aspect. It’s clear that little progress has been made despite awareness of the issue.”

The over-punishment of Black girls in schools is not a recent phenomenon but part of a broader historical trend of excessive discipline rooted in racial and gender biases. That includes corporal punishment in the classroom. 

In Arkansas, for example, an 8-year-old Black girl was paddled for refusing to do her schoolwork. The administrator involved later acknowledged the harm caused by such punishment, especially when disproportionately applied to Black students​. 

A 2019 report by the Southern Poverty Law Center and the UCLA Center for Civil Rights Remedies later found that Black girls like the 8-year-old are paddled at three times the rate of White girls.

This article was originally published by Word in Black.

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By Rev. Dorothy S. Boulware

Every Black Christian worshiper has heard this phrase at one time or another: “Oh, you can do better than that.” It’s often said in reference to the vim and vigor of the phrases of praise offered by the congregation–or the lack thereof. 

“You can do better than that” is repeated, as if what’s being uttered is never good enough for the recognition of God’s blessings. As if more vigorous praise is a more acceptable offering with an added benefit for the “praiser.”

And maybe rightfully so. For many people of faith, praise is more than just a spiritual practice — it’s a tool for better health. From the familiar call to “do better than that” in expressing praise to the quiet strength of individual worship, faith and wellness have long been intertwined. 

”I’ve seen it close up, that people of faith health quicker and require less pain medicine, even if they have had a more extensive disease,” says Baltimore-based licensed practical nurse Tammy Saunders.  who’s been a nurse for years and is now a consultant. 

Referring to her work on a cancer unit, she said, “I’ve always been meticulous about getting meds to my patients on time and often, more often than not, more women than men, would not need the medicine at that time. They’d ask for help going to the bathroom or answering some other need, but it would be almost time for the next dose before they needed more meds.” 

Saunders added, “And I wasn’t even saved then to understand what was going on. I just easily recognized the difference.”

What Exactly Is Praise?

Not to be confused with worship, praise is a show of appreciation for what God has done. Worship is the acknowledgment of God’s essence, the “isness” of God. 

Churches often establish a sort of praise character — some loud, others not so loud. And within that collective praise is the added expression of all the arts, instruments, dance, singing, artistic expression and even reading of scriptures of praise. 

This generally describes the time of “praise and worship” in the average Black church, if there is such a thing as an average Black church.

In the late 1970s and early 1980s, many traditional Black churches began to exchange choirs for “praise and worship” teams who led the entire church in a section of congregational singing of repetitive choruses in lieu of hymns with three to five stanzas and the gospel hymns that had previously been the mainstay and staple of church music. As an addendum to the singing, congregants are encouraged to lift their voices with chants of phrases like “Praise the Lord,” “Hallelujah,” “God is good,” and “We bless you Lord,” — or whatever else flows out of the heart and soul.

And studies seem to highlight the correlation between the utterances of praise and the health of the praisers.

The Praise and Health Connection

A 2017 study, “Church Attendance, Allostatic Load and Mortality in Middle-Aged Adults” suggested that “people who attend services at a church, synagogue or mosque are less stressed and live longer.” 

The study used data from the National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey (NHANES) collected by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s National Center for Health Statistics. Researchers found that middle-aged (ages 40 to 65) adults—both men and women—who attend church or other houses of worship reduce their risk for mortality by 55 percent.

One of the researchers, Vanderbilt professor Marino Bruce — who is also a Baptist minister — wrote that they “found that being in a place where you can flex those spiritual muscles is actually beneficial for your health.” 

In “Neurophysiological Benefits of Worship,”  Michael Liedke, a nurse practitioner, suggested that worshiping God causes an increase in BPNF, a neurotransmitter that helps grow healthy brain cells. “Every morning, we wake up with 300 million more brain cells. When we worship, gamma waves are created in our brain that can actually help us feel the presence of God.”

Psalm 22:3 says God inhabits the praises of his people, and “we actually get a physical boost as these gamma waves fire in our brains while we worship,” he wrote.

According to Liedke, gamma waves do more than just make us feel better, they actually increase our intelligence, too. 

“Research has shown that as you worship, you increase in wisdom, and there’s an increase in your capacity to understand the goodness of God,” he wrote. “So your relationship with God deepens as you worship him. As you worship, your brain is comprehending wisdom from the living Word helping grow your capacity to understand that God absolutely adores you. Interestingly, just seven minutes of worship every day will change your brain.”

This article was originally published on WordinBlack.com.

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By Rev. Dorothy S. Boulware

Overview:

Since the 2020 election, far-right vigilantes have begun appearing at polling places, threatening poll workers and voters, usually in Black communities. Coupled with strict voter I.D. laws and criminal penalties for voter fraud, voting can be an uncomfortable experience.

For decades, voting for president every four years was as easy and safe as picking up a loaf of bread from the supermarket: show up to the polls, cast your ballot, and move on with the rest of your day. Then, the 2020 election happened. 

There were lies about election fraud and strict voter ID laws some say are racist. Vigilante “poll monitors,” some of them armed, menaced voters and poll workers, often in Black communities. Intimidating new rules were imposed that all but declare a blue vote in a red state may not be counted. 

It’s enough to make a faithful voter wish for divine intervention. Faiths United to Save Democracy, however, could be the next best thing. 

A nonpartisan, multi-racial, interfaith organization, FUSD is an organization designed to help and protect voters on Election Day. It dispatches trained, non-partisan volunteers —  poll chaplains — to help ensure free and unhindered access to the polls for members of vulnerable communities. 

Armed With the Law

Together with “peacekeepers” — lay volunteers trained with the chaplains —  they support voters, explain the rules or help them report irregularities, including electioneering, harassment and intimidation. The goal: help people navigate rules that could make it more difficult for Black people, young people, the elderly and differently abled to cast a ballot and have it count.

FUSD’s voter protection campaigns this year will take place in the South, including Alabama, Florida and Texas, along with Ohio and several key swing states: Arizona, Georgia, Michigan, North Carolina, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin. 

The organization was created in the wake of the 2020 election to “protect the sacred freedom to vote of vulnerable citizens” because of “wide acceptance of political violence and the increase in anti-voting laws,” Dr. Barbara Williams-Skinner, a clergywoman and activist, said in a letter to new team members.

Amen, says Bishop Reginald T. Jackson, pastor of the Second Episcopal District of the AME Church in Washington, D.C. 

“We’re going to watch and pray that there be no intimidation, no obstruction, and no challenges,” he says. “We just want to keep the peace. We are 100 percent non-partisan in nature.” 

With early voting already underway in more than a few states, Faith United to Save Democracy and partner organizations — including the NAACP, Latino Christian National Network, the National Council of Churches, Religious Action Center of Reform Judaism, and the Nation’s Mosque — have dispatched some of the peacekeepers and poll chaplains they’ve trained since summer. 

While some right-wing poll watchers show up with loaded guns, the FUSD teams are armed only with knowledge of election rules and laws, nonviolent intervention tactics, a voting-rights hotline, and, of course, prayer. The need for peacekeepers and poll chaplains is clear, according to an FUSD press release. 

Fighting Chaos with Witness

Since the 2020 election, “voters have faced increasing barriers to exercising their right to vote,” according to the FUSD statement. “Nearly 400 voter restriction measures in 49 states, from ID laws to limited access to mail voting, have been proposed or passed. These laws erect barriers that disproportionately limit people of color, the elderly, and the poor from being able to vote.”

At the same time, “increasingly violent rhetoric and events throughout the 2024 election,” including election fraud conspiracies and death threats to poll workers, “have given voters credible concern about violence or intimidation at the polls,” according to the statement.

To counter those developments, “trained poll chaplains and peacekeepers will be deployed to cities and polling sites in areas of greatest need in this critical time for the future of our democracy,” according to the FUSD statement.

Though trained together, peacekeepers will be inside polling places as helpers while poll chaplains will stand outside to assist voters as needed. The task is simple, says Dr. James Perkins, pastor emeritus of Detroit’s Greater Christ Baptist Church.

“Be on time, let your presence be known, and be helpful as needed,” he says. “And keep the number of the hotline handy, just in case it’s needed.”

“The involvement of poll chaplains and Peacekeepers is essential in actively safeguarding the vote in local communities,” says Rev. Moya Harris, director of racial justice at Sojourners, a faith-based social justice nonprofit and FUSD member. “This is integral to our call as people of faith — to combat chaos with love and witness.”

This article was originally published on WordinBlack.com.

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By Ethan Ashley

Education has always been a contentious issue, but as we approach the 2024 elections, it’s become ground zero for broader cultural and political clashes. Book bans targeting diverse and inclusive materials are on the rise, and restrictive gag orders are silencing classroom discussions on critical topics like race, gender and American history. 

With the conservative agenda of Project 2025 gaining traction, the threat to both democracy and public education has never been more urgent. In times like these, it’s easy to feel powerless—but, as citizens, we can’t afford to disengage. The fight for our country’s future begins at the local level, particularly with our school boards.

Though often overlooked, school boards are the backbone of our democratic process, influencing the education of nearly 90 percent of America’s children who attend public schools. Their decisions determine everything from which books make it into classrooms to the curriculum that teaches civics and voter education. They are the gatekeepers of academic freedom and have a crucial role in shaping young people’s understanding of democracy. School boards are responsible for dismantling the remnants of systemic racism in education and laying the foundation for future citizens who will either uphold or dismantle democratic values.

That’s why who sits on our school boards is so critical. Diverse representation on these boards ensures a variety of perspectives, particularly when it comes to identifying inequities and implementing inclusive policies. 

However, school boards in the U.S. were designed in a different era, for a different demographic. Historically led by white, male landowners, school boards have not evolved to reflect the diversity of the communities they now serve. Today, although public school students are more than 55 percent students of color, a 2022 survey by School Board Partners found that 64 percent of school board members are white, highlighting a significant gap in representation.

This May the nation celebrated the 70th anniversary of the U.S. Supreme Court decision in Brown v. Board of Education, the decision that outlawed segregation based on race in public schools. At the time of the ruling, roughly 90 percent of students were white. Since then, public school demographics in America have continued to morph into being more racially and ethnically diverse: less than half of students are white, meaning that about 55 percent of public school students identify as minority populations, with more than a quarter being Hispanic, and nearly 15 percent being Black. These numbers don’t even account for non-English native language speakers, students with disabilities, students identifying as part of the LGBTQ community, or students in varying socioeconomic backgrounds. 

Across the country this fall, people will go to the polls and cast votes that will have a major impact on the future of our country. With over 21,000 seats up for election this year, School Board Partners is among the groups working to ensure voters realize the importance of school board elections specifically.  

The reality is that the tensions we’re witnessing around education will continue to compound — but we have the collective power to choose a better future by electing a more diverse candidate pool who will advocate for policies and procedures that meet the needs of students, no matter their background. By nature and design, school boards were established by the people, for the people. It’s time to bring our school boards into the present and deliver on that founding promise. The future of democracy depends on it.

This op-ed was originally published by Word in Black.

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By Megan Sayles
AFRO Business Writer
msayles@afro.com

After two decades in the education system as a math teacher, principal and administrator, Atiyah Harmon noticed a problem: young Black girls in middle school were increasingly disinterested in mathematics. 

Their lack of interest wasn’t due to challenges in grasping the subject but because it wasn’t perceived as “cool.”  

“It wasn’t that they didn’t have the skills, it was just that it wasn’t cool to be a math person anymore,” said Harmon. “I was very frustrated about this because I saw the lack of growth in the field.” 

Harmon decided she wanted to stop this cycle. In 2020, she created Black Girls Love Math (BGLM), an organization based in Philadelphia that seeks to eradicate racial and gender inequality in mathematics. It partners with schools to provide curriculum, exposes girls to women in science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM) careers and holds competitions that challenge girls to solve social justice issues impacting their communities with math knowledge. 

According to a report from the American Association of University Women, many girls lose confidence in math by the time they reach the third grade. Teachers, who primarily are women, also tend to have math anxiety that they pass onto girls and grade girls harder than boys for the same work. 

“Educators are the major component of what can make or break a kid’s education,” said Harmon. “How educators feel about math and the way girls can succeed is something that you have to challenge at times.” 

Most recently, BGLM began providing culturally-responsive teacher development to ensure educators can affirm students’ identities and skills. 

Special education teacher Kezia Ellis enrolled her nine-year-old daughter, Chelsea, in the organization’s programming last January. She learned about the organization from a friend. After attending an open house, Chelsea asked Ellis if she would sign her up. 

“I just noticed from the pictures they showed us, there was a lot of smiling,” said Chelsea. “I could tell they had a lot of fun, and there was joy in their faces. I knew that this would be something I would enjoy.” 

Chelsea has never really enjoyed math, but she has always had a natural talent for it.

Recently, she took the New York state math test and earned a near perfect score. 

Chelsea praised her BGLM instructors, saying they are funny and kind. She said her friends in the program have become her “math sisters.” One of her favorite parts about BGLM has been reading the organization’s affirmational creed at the start and end of each session.

She offered a piece of advice to other girls who are interested in joining BGLM.

“Be yourself. Be the real you. You don’t have to act a different way in front of them,” said Chelsea. “When you’re around them, it’s like they’re family to you— but like a math family.” 

Ellis thinks BGLM has played a significant role in Chelsea’s confidence in math— something the educator believes is crucial. 

“A lot of our young people approach math with such anxiety because they’ve experienced a challenge with math and created the narrative that they’re not good at it. We need math in our everyday lives. It’s all around us,” said Ellis. “I’m all about breaking the stereotype that only men are good at math and other races are more proficient in math than Black people.” 

The post Black Girls Love Math: Challenging gender and racial stereotypes appeared first on AFRO American Newspapers.

A group of White evangelical pastors are urging their followers to vote for Vice President Kamala Harris — and Franklin Graham is not happy.

By Rev. Dorothy S. Boulware

In his prime, the Rev. Billy Graham, the legendary Baptist minister and televangelist, was known as the “Pastor to Presidents.” Over nearly seven decades, Graham was a regular presence in the Oval Office, giving spiritual counsel to every sitting president from Harry Truman to Donald Trump. 

Since entering politics in 2016, Trump himself has had the White evangelical Christian vote on lockdown. In the 2020 presidential election, for example, Trump’s tough brand of social conservatism led 70 percent of them to choose him over President Joe Biden.

Now, a group of White evangelical pastors want to break Trump’s political grip on the faithful. They are urging their followers to vote for Vice President Kamala Harris, using Graham’s and Trump’s own words to make their case.

And Graham’s son, Franklin Graham — a staunch Trump supporter and an influential figure in conservative politics— isn’t happy about it. 

The younger Graham, president and CEO of Samaritan’s Purse and the Billy Graham Evangelist Association, has demanded  Evangelicals for Harris (EFH) cease and desist their campaign, and vowed to sue if they don’t stop airing their ad. 

In an interview with Premier Christian News, Franklin Graham slammed EFH, and condemned Harris — the first woman of color to occupy the vice presidency, the first to win a major party’s nomination for the presidency, and who is running neck-and-neck with Trump— as “anti-Christ in her positions.” 

“They are trying to make it look like my father would have supported Vice President Harris,” Graham said. “My father was a strong conservative all of his life, theologically as well as politically. He would have never voted for or supported someone like Kamala Harris — someone who is almost anti-Christ in her positions. She has done nothing to support people of faith and what we believe and what we stand for.”

But EFH is standing its ground. 

“Our communications, our references to Billy Graham, and this larger discussion of our community’s values are absolutely critical to a healthy democracy,” according to a response to Graham’s threat. 

At issue is the decades-long claim conservatives have on evangelical voters. 

By definition, every Christian is an evangelical; the word simply signifies the belief in God as creator and Jesus Christ as savior and signals a commitment to the gospel he taught when he was on Earth. 

Controversy ensues when regular evangelical churchgoers unwaveringly support Trump — a boorish, twice-divorced convicted felon and purported sexual abuser with little familiarity of the Bible and no clear church affiliation. 

Just recently, a group of evangelicals issued a call to return to Christianity’s basic tenets of faith and away from the political draw to Trump.

What seems to most upset the younger Graham about EFH is its video ad comparing his father’s words to Trump’s crude self-assessment. 

For example, the ad begins with a video of Billy Graham preaching: “But you must realize that in the last days, the times will be full of danger, men will become utterly self-centered and greedy for money.”

Then, there’s a clip of Trump: ”My whole life I’ve been greedy, greedy, greedy. I’ve grabbed all the money I could get. I’m so greedy.”

The membership of EFH includes different races and varied faiths, and they claim credit for helping Biden reach the White House four years ago. Their platform cites the accomplishments of the current administration and Harris’ religious background; they argue she isn’t a newcomer to Christianity and has a platform aligned with Christian values.

“We keep surprising people,” Rev. Jim Ball, founder and chair, said in a statement. “We helped Joe Biden win in 2020 and we’re helping Kamala Harris today.

”Her policies are pro-family. As a former prosecutor and attorney general, she will defend our democracy, the rule of law and continue the drop in crime,” he said. “She’ll keep the government out of private family matters. She’s pro-environment and pro-climate action. And she will keep the economy growing and wages increasing, while continuing to bring prices down.”

This article was originally published by WordinBlack.com.

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By Dr. Frances ‘Toni’ Draper
Word In Black

The lyrics of an old Negro Spiritual poignantly declare, “Everybody talkin’ ’bout Heaven ain’t goin’ there.” Unfortunately, in 2024, despite all the discussion and debate about the presidential election, everybody talking about voting ain’t going there, either.  

It’s one thing to talk about the importance of this year’s presidential election, with Vice President Kamala Harris poised to become the first woman of color to hold the highest office in the land. It’s one thing to talk about the need to register and vote, but it’s another thing to actually register and then go to the polls on Nov. 5, Election Day. 

With all of the chaos, chatter, and confusion surrounding our democracy and our right as Black people to vote, it is more important than ever this election cycle that we not just talk about it but that we “be about it” — be about registering as many people as possible, be about helping people get to the polls, and be about understanding Project 2025, the right-wing blueprint that former President Donald Trump will almost certainly unroll if he wins the election.

We have to “be about” sending money not only to the Harris/Walz campaign but to down-ballot candidates running for the Senate and the House of Representatives whose policies and platforms align with your beliefs. That includes supporting Angela Alsobrooks, the Prince George’s County, Md., official who is running to become just the third Black woman elected to the U.S. Senate.

We must “be about” making a voting plan, and sticking to it — a plan that says, “If it rains, I vote; if it snows, I vote.” And if we don’t want to take a chance on something unforeseen happening on Nov. 5, we must “be about” requesting, filling out and submitting a mail-in ballot or voting early, if your state allows it. 

Most importantly, we must “be about” knowing our voter registration status today and making certain we are still eligible to vote.  

According to the Pew Research Center, “Black voters could play an important role in determining the outcome of key 2024 elections,” including the race between Harris and Trump. In Georgia, a closely-watched swing state, Black voters account for a third of all eligible voters in the state. 

The Black college student vote

Another group that plays a pivotal role in the voting landscape is the newly eligible young adult college student voter. 

A 2021 report from the Institute for Democracy and Higher Education said that “the voter turnout among college students jumped to a record high of 66 percent in the 2020 presidential election. And the student “yield” — the percentage at which students who are registered voters actually cast ballots — hit 80 percent. The report called it “an important milestone and signal that they are vested in their own futures and the health of democracy.”

Still, the report did not differentiate between Black and White students, so I decided to do a very informal, albeit extremely limited, poll of my own. I asked a few of our family’s college students who are first-time voters three questions: 

1. What excites you the most about voting in this upcoming presidential election?  

2. What scares you the most about voting in this upcoming election?

3. What’s your voting plan?   

Eva Lee, 19

Freshman, Georgia Southern University 

“I am excited to be a part of history and voting for the first Black woman in the election. I look forward to seeing how positive and hopeful Kamala Harris’ campaign is. I can’t wait to see new voters exercise their right to vote, especially Black teens. We all have a voice, and this is our chance to use it. 

Something that scares me is the hateful side of politics. I feel like it’s normalized to throw insults and spew misinformation and for our country, that is most bothersome. I hope the side that genuinely cares about us, the citizens, is chosen, where our rights will be respected and there’s less hate and more love for improving our livelihoods. I’m registering to vote here in Savannah!”  

Collin McLain, 18,

Freshman, Tuskegee University

“I’m most excited about finally having the chance to vote and to be able to assist towards making a change in this country. With such high stakes, the outcome of this election could significantly shape the future. 

What scares me the most about voting is feeling like my single vote is just one amongst millions and might not make much of a difference on its own. I plan to request and mail in an absentee ballot.”

Lyric Hamilton, 18

Freshman, Louisiana State University

“I am most excited for the experience to be able to vote: walking into the building, waiting in line, actually getting in the booth to vote. It’s a very surreal feeling knowing I can impact all of the U.S., from my singular vote on who helps run the government.  It is such an honor and a privilege to be a part of something that African Americans weren’t always allowed to have — especially at my age. 

What scares me the most is which candidate to choose. Each has their own flaws, and those flaws worry me sometimes. I’m not 100 percent settled on one person because neither of them lives Godly lives. I do know that whatever candidate seems closest to God is the one that I’ll be more than happy to support in this upcoming election. I hope whoever I choose doesn’t let us down, if they win, of course and strengthens America more than ever before. I plan to drive home on Election Day to vote, after my class ends at noon.” 

Blake Evans, 18

Freshman, Baylor University 

What excites me about voting in the upcoming election is voting with my family. As African Americans, it is an honor to be able to vote. Our ancestors fought for this right, and therefore, I will be going to the polls with my parents and my brother! 

I wouldn’t say I’m scared about voting in the upcoming election, but I am worried about my lack of preparation. They don’t talk much about the voting process in schools, nor do they talk about everything we’ll be voting on.  As I mentioned already, I will be going home on Election Day to vote with my family.” 

David Lee, Jr., 22

Senior, Georgia Institute of Technology

“I am excited to drive voter registration and education efforts on campus this election cycle. I am concerned about the level of misinformation that surrounds this election and worried about the long-term repercussions of this intentional falsification of reality within my community.  I go to school in my hometown, so I plan to vote in person on Nov. 5.”

Make a plan to “be about it”

Clearly, these young people have a plan to “be about it” as voters in their first presidential election. They are excited and anxious at the same time. But mostly they are full of optimism about going to the polls or mailing in their ballots.

Still, they also need to be prepared for those who don’t want them — or us — to exercise our right to vote: those who are spreading misinformation, interfering with a free and fair election, name-calling, lie-telling and plotting to overturn the election results. 

There are those who revel in what my cousin Laura Murphy calls “shenanigans.”

A seasoned civil rights and civil liberties lawyer, she reached out to her network for a toolkit of resources and election protection organizations, handy information for voters of any age:

1. Find out if you are registered, how to register and make an election-day plan by checking the Legal Defense Fund website.
2. Keep this number handy: 866-OUR-VOTE. Share it broadly. Use it If you encounter problems or interference at the polls. 
3. Join Win With Black Women to help in this election cycle

All our Word in Black publications have posted voter information on their sites; some even have links to other sites where you can check your voter registration. That includes:

• The Atlanta Voice, Voice Your Vote
• AFRO News, AFRO Votes
• The New York Amsterdam News, Election 2024
• The Seattle Medium, 2024 Elections Center
• The Washington Informer, Vote Your Future 

Let us all “be about it” during this and every election cycle. Check your voter registration status, make an Election Day plan and follow it. Encourage others to vote, utilize the suggested resources and prepare for a grand celebration in November!  

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By Keith Boykin
Word In Black

Here we go again. A handful of rappers, celebrities and instigators out here are discouraging Black people from voting or trying to convince us that our vote doesn’t matter because both candidates are the same. Don’t believe them. 

Every four years, a few vocal people — who rarely, if ever, use their voices to mobilize their followers to engage in specific political action — suddenly crawl out of the woodwork to spread misinformation about the next presidential election.

This year is no different. I thought about posting weekly rebuttals, but rather than spending the next two months debunking these voices over and over again, I want to ask two questions. 

First, what’s their strategy to achieve their goals? Assuming you agree with everything they want to do, how do they propose to get it passed through our divided Congress, signed by the President into law and upheld by a Republican-dominated Supreme Court that now considers any race-specific remedy to be illegal or unconstitutional? 

And second, if they had some genius strategy, where were they the last four years when Republican lawmakers and judges:

•Blocked the George Floyd Justice in Policing Act

•Blocked the John Lewis Voting Rights Act

• Ended affirmative action

• Halted Black farmers’ relief

• Restricted a venture capital fund for Black women

• Outlawed minority business grants

• Erased Black congressional districts

• Banned Black books

• Banned Black history classes

• Closed DEI offices 

• Refused to indict the officers who killed Breonna Taylor

• Ousted Black lawmakers in Tennessee 

• Arrested Black people for voting in Florida 

• Banned civil rights groups in Georgia from providing food and water to people standing in long voting lines

Many of us have been playing defense without a full bench the last three quarters, and we could have used some help from all the new celebrity players showing up in the fourth quarter who want to change the playbook.

As Malcolm X said, “Show me in the White community where a singer is a White leader.” Yes, celebrities have a valuable supporting role to play, but they don’t get to show up two months before an election, ignore the work of Black thought leaders and demand a meeting with a presidential candidate like they’re some official spokesman for Black America.

So, instead of spending the next eight weeks responding to every lie about Kamala Harris, I propose 10 constructive things we can do to help advance our political agenda well into the future. 

Ten things we can do

1-Get informed. Follow the news. Take a class. Become a critical thinker and more sophisticated consumer of information. I read dozens of news sources every day. You don’t have to read that many, but don’t rely on one source for all your news. Review multiple, credible sources. 

2-Verify the information you share. Learn to spot misinformation. And try not to forward fake news. Fact-checkers like Daniel Dale, Snopes.com, Factcheck.org and Politifact try to debunk misinformation, but sometimes they make mistakes or can’t keep up. That’s why you need to know your sources. Media outlets like Fox News, the New York Post, Newsmax, TownHall, the National Review and the Wall Street Journal editorial page have a distinct right-wing political bias that favors Trump and the Republicans. Also, rappers, athletes and celebrities have every right to share their opinions, but they’re not always the most reliable sources for information about government and politics.

3-Vote. Election Day is November 5, but some states require you to register weeks before then. Go to Vote.org today to find the voter registration deadline in your state. If you think you’re already registered, know that Republicans are trying to challenge and purge inactive voters. So check to make sure your name has not been removed from the rolls.

4-Attend local government meetings. Many of the decisions that affect us, including where liquor stores and pollution sites are built and which books are banned in schools, are made at local public meetings that very few people bother to attend. Go there and speak up.

5-Volunteer. Campaigns are always looking for people to make phone calls and knock on doors. Drop by the local campaign office, sign up to host an event, put up yard signs, or become a poll watcher. This is especially important if you live in one of the seven battleground states that will determine the election: Michigan, Wisconsin, Pennsylvania, Georgia, North Carolina, Arizona and Nevada.

6-Donate. If you’re not invested in the presidential election, find a candidate you do support and contribute to their campaign. This year, we have 435 House members, 34 Senators, 11 governors’ races, nine lieutenant governor seats, 10 attorneys general, seven secretaries of state and thousands of lower-level offices up for election in November. Unlike the presidential campaign, many of these candidates never get the attention and resources they need to win. Your money could make all the difference.

7-Don’t Reinvent the Wheel. Support organizations that are already doing the work. Groups like Color of Change and the NAACP are developing important policy goals and working to implement them. 

8-Lobby your elected officials. The president can make some critical unilateral decisions for the country, but most government decisions that affect your day-to-day life are made by Congress, your state legislature, your county commissioners, your city council, your zoning board and your school board. Do you know these officials? Visit their offices. Call them up. Write them letters. Let them know what issues you care about. The phone number for the U.S. Capitol switchboard is (202) 224-3121. 

9-Run for office. If you’re not satisfied with the people in government, show them how it’s done. Run for school board, town council, state representative or even Congress. Don’t expect somebody else to do it for you. We are the ones we’ve been waiting for.

10-Start a PAC. This is one of the most difficult tasks on the list, but it can be done. If none of the other steps work for you, you can start your own political action committee to fight for the causes you believe in. You can even create a legislative scorecard to give ratings to members of Congress based on the issues you care about. 

There are dozens of other constructive things you can do, so don’t be limited by this list. But remember this guiding principle. Cynicism is not a strategy, and apathy is not a solution.

This article was originally published by Word in Black.

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More than 15 million Christians are not registered to vote so organizations are working to energize and register the faithful.

By Rev. Dorothy S. Boulware
Word in Black

For many generations, Christians have been encouraged to participate in the political system in spite of the “Be in the world, but not of the world” scripture used by many to remain aloof. The Black church, especially, has been the center of prayer and protest, and of Jesus and justice.

The upcoming general election in this country — one tasked with “saving the soul of the country,” as President Joe Biden put it — demands the attention of everyone of good faith to make the country better in whatever way they see fit.

”Don’t complain, Vote” is among the many slogans on front lawns around the nation, along with those who profess the candidate of their choice. According to Voter Registration Sunday, a campaign to foster increased voter registrations, more than 15 million Christians are not registered to vote. 

So, organizations of varied faiths have aligned themselves to encourage participation by the myriad members of their combined groups.

From Sunday service to virtual organizing

For some, the message will be emphasized every Sunday through the Nov. 5 presidential election.

“I’m preaching about lessons from the Daughters of Zelephedad (Numbers 27) when women’s rights and human rights were on the line,” says Ambassador Suzan Johnson Cook regarding her Sept. 29 sermon at Mt. Calvary Baptist Church in Gastonia, North Carolina. She says democracy and women’s rights are on the line for history’s sake. 

“These women woke up, spoke up, got up, and acted upon their conditions. As a result, all the laws were changed to reflect rights for everyone,” she says.

”That’s what this Sunday is about, to do our one ‘Black job’ and go out and vote, to make a difference throughout the land.”

The website Vote Your Faith, which facilitates registration, offers information and a comprehensive tool kit that outlines how to sponsor a voter registration Sunday event at one’s house of worship.

In July, the coalition Faiths United to Save Democracy began training volunteers to “provide a calming and moral presence for vulnerable voters at in-person polling sites,” according to their website. They did so mainly because the last election, vehemently protested by the Republican candidate for president, was the scene of potential voters being denied access to the polls and of perfectly safe voting places being called unsafe, not to mention the voter identification laws enacted since that election. 

“Increasingly violent rhetoric and events throughout the 2024 election has given voters credible concern about violence or intimidation at the polls,” according to the FUSD site. Trained poll chaplains and peacekeepers will be deployed to the most vulnerable polling places. At this point, targeted states are Alabama, Arizona, Florida, Georgia, Michigan, North Carolina, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Texas, and Wisconsin during early voting and on Election Day, Nov. 5.

“God intends for all creation to thrive. The current state of politics emphasizes the importance of protecting the vote for all people, especially for people of faith. It is crucial to ensure safe access to the polls in all communities,” said Rev. Moya Harris, director of Racial Justice at Sojourners.

“The involvement of poll chaplains and peacekeepers is essential in actively safeguarding the vote in local communities. This is integral to our call as people of faith — to combat chaos with love and witness.”

This article was originally published by WordinBlack.com.

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By Rev. Dorothy S. Boulware 
Word in Black 

When I became curious about the work of the Holy Spirit in my life, it was Rev. Cecelia Williams Bryant, who started a class at Bethel AME Church in West Baltimore called Power for Living. When my interest in spiritual healing was piqued, it was Rev. C, as she is called, who started a Saturday morning class on healing. I wasn’t even a member of Bethel, but when the hand of God began to tug at my spirit with a call to ministry, there she was again, hosting a “Behold the Woman” conference in a downtown arena. 

It was as if she had been assigned to my case and I’m sure I’m not alone. I’m also sure I was not alone in wondering who would pray for us, who would gather us for prayer, when we learned she had eased out of time into eternity.

It was she who easily summoned the world together in prayer. It was she who prayed before kings and queens, bishops and potentates. 

I was deeply saddened to learn of her Sept. 26 death. 

“Rev. Dr. Cecilia Bryant was a commanding disciple who stood deep and strong in her faith and family, as she remained deeply dedicated to the cause of salvation,” Maryland Rep. Kweisi Mfume said in a statement sent to the AFRO. “As an advocate for community healing and mental health awareness, she committed her whole life to spreading the word of God as a liberating and annointing force to everyone she met. She will be dearly missed but never forgotten.”

A steadfast relationship with God

It was clear to everyone that Rev. C held a special place in the heart of God and could summon his attention to whatever situations we faced; and we could therefore expect relief because of her relationship with the Lord.

This relationship began years ago through the praying heart and hands of her mother, and flourished throughout her youth and even more in her relationship with Bishop John Richard Bryant to whom she was married for 55 years.

Together they changed the whole scene at Bethel AME Church. 

“The AME church was typically a quiet type of a service, very solemn,” Wanda Watts, director of the Wattsline who joined Bethel AME in 1977, told the AFRO, “and he changed that with choirs that sang contemporary music, and a different way of praising than AME had been accustomed to.”

She said he became everybody’s bishop. 

“If you’re Baptist, he’s still your bishop.”

The community began to come into Bethel AME church. They came in dashikis because that was the mode of the day. They came in jeans. They came in sandals. They came with wraps on their heads. They came happy and they came high– but they came to Bethel AME. And they were well served until the ministry demanded the couple be elevated to bishop and district superintendent.

A spiritual visionary

“Rev. C was an extraordinary spiritual leader and visionary whose impact spanned the globe. As a spiritual director, missionary and women’s empowerment leader, she embraced a calling to bring healing to the nations,” according to a statement from New Birth Missionary Baptist Church, where her son, Dr. Jamal-Harrison Bryant is pastor.

“Her leadership awakened the African and Diasporic Church to critical issues such as health, ecological wellness, development, culture and peace. She co-founded the AME Church in India with her husband and was the founder of the AME Church in the Ivory Coast.”

Bishop Walter S. Thomas, of New Psalmist Baptist Church in Baltimore, called her a spiritual lighthouse always pointing to safe haven and referred to the precious love with which she raised her children and stood beside her husband as they did their kingdom work. 

“There was such a vibrancy and zest for life that exudes from her and it was born out of her wonder for God,” he said, adding that “she’s missed already.” 

Rev. C preached on prayer, wrote books on prayer, summoned groups to prayer, called seasons of prayer, but most importantly she was a determined intercessor

Nurturing generations in ministry

Her children in ministry are almost innumerable.

 “I met her when I was 17-years-old, at Emerson College, while attending St. Paul AME Church in Cambridge, Massachusetts. I’d never seen a dynamo Black Christian team, with afros and dashikis and anointing, male and female,” says Former Ambassador Suzan Johnson Cook.

“About 40 of us became senior pastors out of that era, leading congregations throughout the nation and she and Bishop John have always been there for us and with use. For those entering ministry in the 1980s, there were no female role models except Rev. C.”

The faith community can hardly stand the thought of letting her go, even if it is into the arms of God. Many regards of sweet peace have been offered through all the social media platforms, with remembrances of that special touch.

“Last year she sent me prayers for a challenge our family was going through, texting regularly. And for the past few weeks we changed roles and this time I sent her prayers and covered her,” Johnson Cook says. 

“I don’t even have words to describe how I feel, only to say, I thank God for her; her ministry, her devotion, her marriage, her motherhood and her love.”

A homegoing service will be held in Baltimore at Bethel AME Church, 1300 Druid Hill Avenue, on Oct. 5. A wake will take place at 10 a.m., with the funeral service beginning  at 11 a.m.

This article was originally published by Word in Black.

The post Dr. Cecelia Williams Bryant: ‘She lived what she preached’ appeared first on AFRO American Newspapers.

By Rev. Dorothy S. Boulware
Word in Black

Overview:

One in 6 Black men will be diagnosed with prostate cancer, a potentially deadly disease. However, early detection and treatment can be life-saving.

A member of Wheeler Avenue Baptist Church in Houston, Dewayne Charleston is comfortable talking openly about his belief in God. That faith was put to the test in 2009, when a doctor’s visit ended with a grim diagnosis: stage 4 prostate cancer.

Prognosis: incurable

“I never thought I would be the type of person who would get cancer,” he told KPRC-TV, a local TV station, in a recent interview. “I knew then that I was in for a journey.”

Charlston’s first step on that journey was prayer, together with his physician in his office. He continued to lean on faith through surgeries, treatments and therapies. At one point he told God he would dedicate himself to educating Black men like himself and fighting the disease “if You give me more years.” 

Now, 15 years after he was first diagnosed, Charleston has kept his promise with the Dewayne Charleston Foundation, a nonprofit dedicated to teaching other Black men about prostate cancer and supporting those who have been diagnosed. He also connected it to his bedrock faith with a cancer screening at Wheeler Avenue Baptist Church on Sept. 21.

To honor Charleston, the church has announced it will include prostate health in its health ministry. Congregants are being encouraged to mark the occasion by wearing blue on the second Sunday in September. 

Charleston “has lived and thrived with metastatic prostate cancer for more than 15 years and created his foundation to bring national awareness to the need for African American men to have annual PSA tests,” according to the church’s website. “If you have not had a PSA done this year be sure to get tested at Wheeler.”

Disparities persist

It’s an important message for Black men: according to the National Institutes of Health, 1 in 6 Black men will be diagnosed with prostate cancer, compared with one in eight White men. Making matters worse, Black men are less likely to be covered by insurance or enroll in clinical trials than White men. 

Perhaps most importantly, Black men die from prostate cancer at twice the rate of White men, according to the NIH. 

Charleston is attempting to counter that narrative with his namesake foundation. Aimed at Black men, the Charleston Foundation’s mission, according to its website, is “to help you re-imagine your life and to win the battle against prostate cancer. To share with you personal experiences, clinical trials. beneficial diets and exercise routines, effective treatments, implants, and the advocacy organizations that will help you to live a full and happy life.” 

But he also wants to change the bigger picture, in which Black men are more likely to get diagnosed with the disease, and have worse outcomes, than Whites. 

“Decreasing the racial disparity gap will not only benefit men of color, but will make the cost of medicine and treatments more efficient,” according to the foundation’s website. “In other words, use the treatments best targeted by genes and risk levels and not by color.”

In addition to his foundation, Charleston is also affiliated with the nonprofit Prostate Health Education Network’s Survivor Network (PHEN), which  provides resources and support for  individuals who have been diagnosed.

Spreading the Gospel of good health

The Charleston Foundation also partners with churches like Wheeler Avenue Baptist as well as other organizations to spread the gospel about prostate cancer testing and early detection. Their website offers a range of resources for churches to share with their membership and the surrounding community. 

“We have collaborated with PHEN over a number of years to raise prostate cancer awareness, and we are excited to partner with PHEN to provide educational resources to our churches to support our members and communities in the fight against prostate cancer,” Rev. Dr. Natalie Mitchem, executive director of the AMEC Health Commision said in a statement. “Our goal is to save lives by increasing vital knowledge about this deadly disease.”

Despite the diagnosis and lack of a cure, Charleston has persevered in part by changing his lifestyle — including a healthy diet and plenty of exercise — and by participating in clinical trials, which are structured programs in which the medical industry tests new, cutting-edge medications on volunteers.

Charleston took an aggressive approach to his treatments and experienced a great level of success. As such, he was able to continue his active lifestyle, including a recent trip to Ghana to volunteer at the local schools. He’s still living with the disease, but it hasn’t slowed him down.

Ultimately, Charleston wants to serve as an example for men, inspiring them to take better care of themselves before it’s too late. 

“Don’t be like me,” he said in the TV interview. “Don’t go 10 years — with insurance — and don’t get tested. Don’t eat fried chicken at gas stations. Take care of your health. Take care of your marriage. Take care of your family. All that begins with good health.”

This article was originally published by WordinBlack.com.

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By Rev. Dorothy S. Boulware
Word in Black

It’s no secret Black people in the United States disproportionately occupy Death Row — making up about 14 percent of the populace but 40.05 percent of people awaiting execution. And given that men are nearly 98 percent of the people facing capital punishment, incarcerated Black men are more likely to face death by the state than any other group.

Marcellus Williams, 55, is one of those men, and he’s scheduled to be executed Sept. 24 in Missouri. The prosecutor in his case filed a motion to vacate his conviction due to “overwhelming evidence that Marcellus Williams’ trial was constitutionally unfair, including revelations that the State contaminated the most critical evidence in the case—the murder weapon,” said Williams’ attorney, Tricia Rojo Bushnell. The courts, however, denied the motion.

As such, the case has reignited heated debates about racial injustice and the death penalty — and now faith leaders in the state are joining the fight to get clemency for Williams.

Life instead of death

On Sept. 19, in a letter to Missouri Gov. Michael Parson, 69 faith leaders from Christian, Jewish and Muslim backgrounds asked for mercy for Williams.

“We are advocating for life without parole and that Marcellus will remain in prison, with the message that his life can remain open to redemption, mercy, and the healing power of God and that he will continue to serve the Muslim community,” the faith leaders wrote.

The group pointed out that Williams himself is a faith leader at Potosi Correctional Center, where he is incarcerated. Now known as Khalirfah ibn Rayford Daniels, Williams became an imam and serves his fellow Muslim prisoners at the facility.

“With lifetime imprisonment, Marcellus will have a chance to continue his service to the religious community that he leads as an Imam,” wrote the faith leaders. 

They pointed out that Williams works with “a group of men, many of whom have been abandoned by society and in desperate need of guidance and strength,” and provides “a vital network of support for the prisoners.” 

Members of the Mid Missouri Fellowship of Reconciliation (Mid-MO FOR) a nonprofit organization for “people from many faiths, and no particular faith — all coming together to support nonviolence and justice,” have also advocated for clemency for Williams.

On Sept. 18, they hosted a gathering at the University of Missouri School of Law to discuss the Williams case. One of the speakers was Michelle Smith, co-director of Missourians to Abolish the Death Penalty, who said, “Killing someone is final. We should make sure, as a state, as a community, as a government, that there are no questions.” 

The NAACP is also calling on Parson to halt Williams’ execution, noting that the death penalty has been “historically applied in a racially disparate manner,” particularly in Missouri. 

“Killing Mr. Williams, a Black man who was wrongfully convicted of killing a White woman, would amount to a horrible miscarriage of justice and a perpetuation of the worst of Missouri’s past,” NAACP President and CEO Derrick Johnson and Missouri State Conference President Nimrod Chapel Jr. wrote in an open letter to Parson.

“Put simply, Mr. Williams did not commit the murder for which he was convicted. The prosecutor knows it, and the citizens of Missouri know it,” they wrote.

Accusations of corruption

In 2001, Williams was convicted and sentenced to death for the 1998 murder of Felicia Gayle, a former St. Louis Post-Dispatch reporter. 

The prosecution’s case hinged on witness testimonies and circumstantial evidence. However, DNA found on the murder weapon did not match Williams — a fact that has cast significant doubt on his conviction.

Despite these findings, Missouri courts have repeatedly upheld his conviction and death sentence.

According to the Innocence Project, “The State destroyed or corrupted the evidence that could conclusively prove his innocence and the available DNA and other forensic crime-scene evidence does not match him.” The organization notes, “There is far too much uncertainty in this case to allow Mr. Williams to be executed, particularly when the victim’s family believes life without parole is the appropriate sentence.” 

In January 2024, after an independent review of Williams’ case, St. Louis County Prosecuting Attorney Wesley Bell moved to vacate his conviction. However, the circuit court denied the motion, stating there was insufficient evidence of innocence and that claims of racial bias in jury selection and ineffective assistance of counsel had been previously adjudicated. Bell is now appealing the decision to the Missouri Supreme Court, according to Williams’ filing for a stay of execution in the U.S. Supreme Court.

“We will continue pursuing every possible option to prevent Mr. Williams’ wrongful execution,” Bushnell, his lawyer, said. “There is still time for the courts or Governor Parson to ensure that Missouri does not commit the irreparable injustice of executing an innocent person.” 

This article was originally published on WordinBlack.com.

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“Black Vote, Black Power,” a collaboration between Keith Boykin and Word In Black, examines the issues, the candidates, and what’s at stake for Black America in the 2024 presidential election.

To understand what Kamala Harris said to the National Association of Black Journalists on Tuesday, you gotta understand the Republicans’ cynical race strategy.

Anytime Kamala Harris says something pro-Black, Trump and the Republicans will use it against her to convince white people that she can’t be trusted. And anytime she says something that isn’t pro-Black, they will still use it against her by getting Black people to criticize her for not doing enough.

A month ago, Donald Trump lied to NABJ that Kamala Harris only recently turned Black, so when she sat down with the group in Philadelphia to take questions from Black journalists, she didn’t say everything that some Black people wanted her to say — but she said almost everything she could.

RELATED: Kamala Harris, for the Black People

She forcefully condemned recent lies about Haitian immigrants promoted by Trump and JD Vance: “I know that people are deeply troubled by what is happening to that community in Springfield, Ohio. And it’s gotta stop. And we gotta say that you cannot be entrusted with standing behind the seal of the President of the United States of America, engaging in that hateful rhetoric.” She described Trump’s rhetoric as “a crying shame,” a response based more on empathy than anger.

But, she did not specifically endorse a policy of reparations for slavery. Although she supported legislation to study reparations when she was a senator in California, she spoke in broader terms today as the Democratic presidential nominee.

“We need to speak truth about the generational impact of our history,” she said, mentioning slavery, redlining, and Jim Crow laws. She spoke about student loan debt, medical debt, bias in home appraisals, and Black maternal mortality, but she put the onus to fix these issues more on Congress than executive action.

I support reparations, and I’ve written about it in my two most recent books. But believe it or not, Kamala Harris gave the right answer.

Here’s why.

Her job is to get elected in a country where most Americans oppose reparations. Although 77% of Black Americans support reparations, only 18% of white Americans do. Even in liberal California, nearly two-thirds of white voters oppose reparations. In a country that is 75% white, that’s a non-starter.

We can’t expect a Black woman running for office to explain and sell to white America the complex and unpopular idea of paying reparations to Black people in a three-month campaign while she’s still introducing herself and her policies. To do so is to make her a sacrificial lamb for a movement that we haven’t even built the momentum for on the ground.

To win the presidency, Harris needs at least 42 to 43% of the white vote, which means she has to convince a sufficient number of white Americans that she can represent them —while still holding onto Black and Brown voters. It’s a juggling act. How do you maintain your street cred with Black and Brown voters without alienating sensitive white voters?

RELATED: 10 Ways to Be a Better Black Voter

Some critics point to an out-of-context quote from an interview Harris did in 2019 when she said, “So, I’m not going to sit here and say that I’m going to do something that’s only going to benefit Black people.” What they don’t quote to you is the rest of the answer, where she explains that “any policy that will benefit Black people will benefit all of society.”

Clearly, she supports race-specific policies that benefit Black people, including HBCU funding, affirmative action, and debt relief for Black farmers. But as a Black politician in a predominantly white country, she still has to remind white Americans that those policies benefit them, too, by creating a more equitable society.

A Black Democratic candidate for president faces a frustrating double standard that does not apply to a white Republican like Trump. Trump is not expected to do anything to help Black people, so all he does is show up with a wayward rapper or pastor every four years, and people grade him on a curve because the bar is so low.

But here’s the other part of the equation. Kamala Harris also needs a Democratic Congress to enact her agenda. Republicans now control the House, and Democrats hold a narrow 51-49 seat majority in the U.S. Senate. Republicans are expected to pick up the Senate seat in West Virginia with the retirement of Joe Manchin, and they’re hoping to defeat Democrat Jon Tester in conservative North Dakota. If they win those two seats, Republicans will take control of the Senate and block any progressive legislation, and possibly Supreme Court Justices, for at least the next two years.

If you think Democratic senators are going to win North Dakota and West Virginia with a Democrat at the top of the ticket calling for reparations, you haven’t been paying attention to race issues in America.

There’s a method to the madness from Republicans. They continue to launch racist attacks against Harris because they’re desperately trying to get her to fight on controversial race and culture issues. Trump wants Kamala Harris to attack him for being racist instead of focusing on her broader agenda for America. He knows that if he can get her to engage, they can mislabel her with the “angry Black woman” trope.

That’s why he continues to lie about The Congo releasing inmates from insane asylums into the United States. That’s why Trump and Vance are promoting racist rhetoric about the White House smelling like curry and fried chicken if Kamala Harris gets elected. They’re not just motivating their base. They want Harris to say something to turn off white voters.

She was wise not to take the bait. It may not be the truth we want to hear, but she understood the assignment.

Keith Boykin is a New York Times–bestselling author, TV and film producer, and former CNN political commentator. A graduate of Dartmouth College and Harvard Law School, Keith served in the White House, cofounded the National Black Justice Coalition, cohosted the BET talk show My Two Cents, and taught at the Institute for Research in African-American Studies at Columbia University in New York. He’s a Lambda Literary Award-winning author and editor of seven books. He lives in Los Angeles.

The post How Kamala Harris Talks About Race Issues appeared first on Word In Black.

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By Rev. Dorothy S. Boulware
Word in Black

Overview:

In “Our Confession of Evangelical Conviction,” faith leaders are attempting to roll back the growing link between fundamentalist Christianity and conservative dogma.

In a step unlike any in recent memory, a group of evangelical Christian leaders has issued a confessional document urging the faithful to separate religion and politics, warning against “political idolatry and its messengers” and rejecting “the false idols of power, wealth, and strength rather than the true God.”

Signed by an array of influential pastors and faith leaders, the statement titled “Our Confession of Evangelical Conviction” seems designed to extract their brand of Christianity from conservative politics and left-vs.-right culture wars. It also is framed as a reminder to avoid blurring the lines between the church’s core values and political dogma — or any candidates. 

“We reject the false teaching that anyone other than Jesus Christ has been anointed by God as our Savior, or that a Christian’s loyalty should belong to any political party,” according to the statement. 

In announcing the document with other leaders on Sept. 9, Pastor Raymond Chang, president of the Asian American Christian Collaborative, said the confessional is intended to address the “deep political syncretism that has long taken hold of the evangelical church in the U.S.” 

That school of thought “has conflated partisan politics with evangelical Christianity,” he said. “It’s time to recalibrate and unite in our shared commitment to Jesus beyond the divisions of politics.”

Though it speaks in generalities, the document seems aimed at politicians in general, conservative politicians specifically — and Donald Trump, the Republican Party’s 2024 presidential nominee, in particular. 

The former president is wildly popular among evangelical Christians, despite a public record that includes three marriages, two impeachments, the Jan. 6 attempt to overthrow the 2020 election, a multimillion-dollar civil judgment against him for rape and a criminal conviction linked to paying hush money to an adult film star.

Though Trump is not a regular churchgoer, a majority of conservative voters chose him at the ballot box, and an astonishing 80 percent of them voted for him in 2020. Some pastors and conservative politicians have even referred to the former president as ”God’s imperfect messenger” or “the chosen one”— a viewpoint that accelerated after Trump survived an alleged assassination attempt while campaigning in July. 

For his part, Trump has clearly returned the love. Speaking to a convention of evangelicals in July, the former president promised that if he was re-elected, “you won’t have to vote again, my beautiful Christians.” 

“Christians get out and vote. Just this time,” he said. “You won’t have to do it anymore.” 

The leaders who announced the confessional represent thousands of churches and more than 4 million evangelical Christians. They also announced a commitment to worship and pray together for the week Sept. 8-15.

The tenets of the “Confession of Evangelical Conviction” are to give allegiance to Jesus Christ alone; to lead with love, not fear; to submit to the truth of the Scripture; to believe the Gospel heals every worldly division; to commit to the prophetic mission of the church; to value every person as created in God’s image; and to recognize Godly leaders by their character..  

Dr. Christina Edmondson, co-founder of Truth’s Table, one of the many partner groups, said the statement of faith helps address her concern about Generation Z “because they are concerned about us. They don’t recognize the church that raised them.”

Evangelical Christians are defined as believers who “take the Bible seriously and believe in Jesus Christ as savior and Lord.” The term “evangelical” comes from the Greek word “euangelion,” which means the good news or the gospel. Thus, the evangelical faith focuses on the good news of salvation brought to sinners by Jesus Christ, according to the National Association of Evangelicals.

“In a political realm filled with fear, we have an opportunity as Evangelicals to lead through love rather than fear,” said Karen Swallow Prior, an evangelical Christian author, professor and speaker. “I’m excited about this statement and the vision it casts, cutting across partisan lines to show the world what the church truly is.”

Skye Jethani, author, speaker, and co-host of “The Holy Post” podcast, agrees: “The Confession is designed to hold up a mirror to those who read it. We believe in a God who raises people from the dead, and we certainly believe that God can free Evangelicals from their captivity to political idolatry.”

”Through this revival, we are calling on the church to turn away from fear and divisions and place our faith solely in Jesus Christ,” said Dr. Dan Boom, president of Trevecca Nazarene University and board chair for the Council for Christian Colleges and Universities.

This article was originally published on WordinBlack.com.

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Each year, a Brooklyn church honors their enslaved African ancestors by looking to the past while trying to improve the present.

By Rev. Dorothy S. Boulware
Word in Black

Overview:

At a time when some governments and schools are resisting or eliminating the teaching of Black history, St. Paul Community Baptist Church centers it with eight days of programming, sweeping in self-care and healing from generational trauma.

Each year, St. Paul Community Baptist Church in Brooklyn sets aside time to mark history and remember how enslaved Africans brought to America suffered during the Middle Passage. The mid-September observance is called The MAAFA, a Swahili term that denotes disaster, terrible occurrence or great tragedy.

While other cultures commemorate their history, people of African descent in this country are often encouraged to forget theirs, to the extent that history pages are edited and books are forbidden in public schools in some states. This will never happen as long as St. Paul is insistent on honoring the folks who endured and the people who belong to them.

Over eight days, the church will hold seminars and workshops for teachings and discussion not only about the history, but about the trauma that has transcended generations — and is the backdrop for current issues of pain and deprivation that pervade the African- American community.

The Rev. Dr. David Brawley, lead pastor of SPCBC, says this year’s celebration – coming amid what experts say is the most consequential presidential election in our lifetimes – seems particularly relevant. With Vice President Kamala Harris poised to make history as the first woman of color elected to the White House — but conservative judges and politicians intent on rolling back civil rights protections —  the stakes are high.

“In a year marked by national uncertainty and mounting threats to our democracy, we find ourselves at a critical juncture,” Brawley says. “The dangers posed by certain federal policy proposals remind us of a time when the voices of Black people were silenced, and our human rights were denied.” 

Yet the  challenges “deepen our resolve to fully embrace our cultural identity and fortify our community,” says Brawley, describing the theme of this year’s celebration. “Our focus on ‘Reclaiming the Village, Restorying Our Past’ is not just a theme but a necessary response to the times. It is a resolute commitment to preserving our heritage and empowering future generations to carry it forward.”

The event, which runs from Sept. 14 to Sept. 22, is centered, in part, on health and healing. 

Sessions and events include: 

Trauma and health: How the generational trauma of slavery continues to affect the mental and physical health of descendants of the enslaved, contributing to disparities with whites in chronic health conditions like  hypertension, mental health disorders and chronic stress.

Community healing practices: Creating  a space where art, spirituality, and community come together to facilitate collective healing, an approach that has proven beneficial in managing trauma.

Relevance to current health crises: Connecting  ongoing conversations around racial disparities in health care to the long-term effects of racism and historical trauma on community health.

The week  includes a theatrical production, “The MAAFA Suite…A Healing Journey.” The play explores trauma, ongoing pain and oppression of Africans in America and their descendants living in a White society. 

“The MAAFA Suite is a profound exploration of our shared history, crafted to evoke deep emotions and catalyze healing,” Brawley says. “Each year, we step into the sacred space of remembrance using art as a tool to honor our ancestors and ignite transformative healing within our community.”

The healing intent of the play, he adds, “lies in its ability to create space for both mourning and hope for Black people living in America. It is a spiritual journey that confronts painful truths of slavery and hundreds of years of oppression, while offering a path toward reconciliation and renewal.

“In a world that continues to be divided, this production reminds us that healing is not only possible but necessary for our individual and communal survival.”

The play, he concludes, “is not just a production–it’s a journey of reclamation and renewal.”

This article was originally published on WordinBlack.com.

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The fatal shooting of Warren Curtis Grant, 15, rocked Joppatowne, a suburban neighborhood near Baltimore. Then the faith community stepped in.

By Rev. Dorothy S. Boulware
Word in Black

When news broke that a 16-year-old boy shot and killed a 15-year-old schoolmate in broad daylight in a nearby high school last week, Rev. Stacey Nickerson, pastor of Salem United Methodist Church of Upper Falls, Maryland, was horrified. But she also knew she had to help heal a community traumatized by gun violence.

So Nickerson, whose church is about 20 miles northeast of Baltimore, did what ministers do best: she wrote, she listened and she leaned on personal relationships. 

”I heard about the incident through social media and checked in with our media manager who lives near the school and has ties there,” says Nickerson. Then, she called neighboring faith leaders to get them on board. 

“I raised the question: As we face the tragedy of a school shooting in our own community, how do we show that we value our young people?” she says. “I also challenged us to think about the opportunities we have to nurture young people as they discover and pursue their life’s purpose.”

The result is a grassroots, ad hoc coalition of churches and ministers who lifted up Joppatowne High School, its students and its teachers in prayer, coupled with small but meaningful gestures of support. That included writing encouraging notes to teachers, gathering a collection of snacks for the school and buying lunch — comfort food — from a local Italian restaurant. 

The coalition came together not long after reports that Warren Curtis Grant, 15, was found with a gunshot wound in a bathroom at Joppatowne High. Authorities say Grant died after another student, a 16-year-old, allegedly pulled a gun after the two fought in the bathroom on Sept. 6.

The suspected gunman, Jaylen Prince, was taken into custody not long after the shooting. Although he is still a minor, authorities released Prince’s identity because he is being charged as an adult.

As a result of the gunfire, Harford County public schools officials shut down Joppatowne for several days. The school reopened on Sept. 12 with extra security measures in place.

Within hours of Grant’s death, a group of neighbors, religious leaders and community members came to the school and prayed, according to local TV station WMAR. 

“It’s just been a sad day,” Daniel Mele, senior pastor at nearby Towne Baptist Church, told the station. Several members of the church’s youth group attend Joppatowne High.

Mike Nolan, founder of Harford County-based Breathe 379, said he was there to pray “for the community, and the rest of the kids and teachers.”  

Salem United Methodist, Nickerson’s church, doesn’t have young members who attend Joppatowne, but three catch their morning bus at JoppaTowne to commute to Havre de Grace High School. 

Still, Nickerson, the pastor, was deeply affected by the incident and wanted to find ways to help. The first was a message on social media to let the community know Salem United Methodist stands with Joppatowne High.

”We actually have a working relationship with Magnolia Elementary and Middle schools, but haven’t worked with Joppatowne in the past,” Nickerson says. She noted that the faith community included in prayer Apalachee High School in Georgia, scene of the country’s latest mass school shooting. 

Because the shooting happened two days before Sunday worship, “our youth Sunday School class talked about their experiences and feelings,” Nickerson says. She said Sept. 8 was “Rally Day,” when the church hails the start of a new school year for its young worshippers. 

“I had planned to speak on the prophet Jeremiah with a focus on him being called by God at a young age,” Nickerson says. Because the shooting happened just days before, she says, “I was able to add to my focus some things that addressed the incident and our opportunity to respond.”

Nickerson invited Salem members to wear purple on Sept. 9 to show their support, then connected to a partner in faith.

“I reached out to Pastor Adam Shellenbarger of Joppatowne Christian Church because he is very active in the schools. He shared with me some of what is being planned and I plan to participate,” Nickerson says.

The next day, Nickerson emailed her congregation with additional opportunities to show support, including donating snacks for teachers and staff along with notes of support, and making donations to Sapore Di Mare, a local restaurant that is donating lunch to the school on Sept. 13. 

Nickerson says a group of alumni is sponsoring a get-together at Joppatowne Christian Church on Sept. 25 to write notes as well. 

She says she will also deliver those notes in coordination with what others are doing, and that Salem will continue to be involved with JoppaTowne in whatever ways they are able. 

The post After a fatal school shooting, faith leaders heal a wounded community appeared first on AFRO American Newspapers.

By Renata Sago
Word in Black

As students at four colleges in New York, Ohio and Pennsylvania head back to campus this fall, they will have access to a new resource where they can learn how to dismantle false beliefs about racial hierarchies. 

Seven years after launching its Truth, Racial Healing and Transformation program in colleges, the American Association of Colleges and Universities has expanded the program, opening centers at Antioch University and Bard College, Cuyahoga Community College and Elizabethtown College.

The new centers give professors, administrators, faculty members and students a dedicated space to learn and guide discussions around race, gender, age, class and spiritual beliefs. It’s part of a concerted effort to bring healing dialogues throughout the United States within higher education institutions. 

“We don’t dictate to any institution how they are implementing, how they will implement and realize the goals of TRHT or how they would implement the TRHT areas within their institutional context,” says Tia McNair, senior consultant with the American Association of Colleges and Universities. “They look at their strategic priorities, their student population, their community relationships, and partnerships to develop what we call an action plan. So each institution does it differently.”

The campus centers began in 2017 as a concept that was part strategic, part organic. The ten initial host institutions — a mix of public and private schools — introduced various approaches for dismantling racial bias on campus, including racial healing circles and special dinners intended to create safe spaces for sensitive dialogue. 

Since then, schools have continued to embrace virtual and in-person conversations that provide gentle reassurance — and sometimes uncomfortable exposure — to past and present-day events that have shaped views on race in society. 

The host institutions range from liberal arts colleges and historically black colleges and universities to faith-based institutions and community colleges. The selection process for colleges includes training on how to speak the language of racial healing within the Institute on Truth, Racial Healing and Transformation’s framework. 

The former executive director for the TRHT Campus Centers, McNair says the TRHT program is essential now more than ever. 

“There are attacks happening on the work of diversity, equity, and inclusion, and our institutions within our communities, within our states, across the board,” says McNair. “I think that knowing that the growing majority of undergraduate students in this country are from racially minoritized groups…is critical for us to maintain and expand resources to help the success of all students.”

In its tracking of 196 campuses in 29 states, The Chronicle of Higher Education found that colleges throughout the United States have eliminated their DEI programs due to political pressure, establishing an “inconsistent and confusing landscape.” 

The effects of these changes are unclear, which is why McNair, who is also a partner at SOVA, a higher education consulting firm in Washington, D.C., would like for campus centers to create some opportunities for personal and professional development for marginalized students. 

“Whether you are the student who is coming into the environment that may not be fully prepared — not at a fault of your own, but just because of circumstances – not fully prepared to succeed in the same way as others, then how do we help you? How do we make sure that we actually live our commitment? That we fulfill our commitment to you as being part of this educational journey so that everyone has the opportunity to thrive?” said McNeir. 

When education reform takes place at the federal, state, or local level, it can have predictable consequences, undoing decades of important work. This is why McNair is hoping that the campus centers will serve as a springboard for repairing old wounds and sustaining supportive principles for community building beyond campus. 

The vision is to encourage ways of thinking that transcend the present political uncertainty, inviting ongoing dialogue and action.

“I think we as educators within higher education play a critical role in preparing the next generation of leaders to build more just and equitable communities,” says McNair. “This work is not about trying to get anyone to think in the same way we think, but to actually value each and every person’s human dignity, their contributions, their lived experiences in a way where we can transcend what has been causing division and conflict within our communities.”

This article was originally published by Word in Black. 

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By Quintessa Williams
Word In Black

When Vice President Kamala Harris replaced President Joe Biden at the top of the Democratic presidential ticket, she became the first woman of color with a realistic shot at the presidency and an instant inspiration to Black women — some of whom raised $1.3 million on her behalf in just a few hours. 

Harris’s groundbreaking campaign has now spearheaded another phenomenon: young Black women are currently leading the recent surge in voter registrations.

According to data from TargetSmart, the voter registration rate for young Black women in 13 key battleground states has skyrocketed to 175 percent — nearly triple the rate from the last presidential election four years ago. The registration rate for Black women in general, experienced similar growth — increasing by 98 percent, while the overall Black voter rate also rose by 85 percent, according to TargetSmart data.

Since Harris’ nomination, Democrats have significantly out-registered Republicans, highlighting the effectiveness of the Democratic National Committee’s targeted efforts to engage young Black voters.

The civic origins of young Black women

Public education has long been critical to nurturing the civic identities of Black students. After the landmark Brown v. Board of Education decision in 1954, centered on Linda Brown, a Black girl — the ruling enabled Black students to attend better-funded, previously all-White schools. 

Black girls and young women were integral in organizing and participating in civil rights protests during the Civil Rights movement, such as the Birmingham Children’s Crusade in 1963. Black girls like Ruby Bridges, who became the first African American child to attend a formerly Whites-only school, risked physical and psychological harm to move the United States closer to its democratic principles. 

However, the quality of civic education in these integrated schools often varied, with Black students receiving less emphasis in the classroom on African American history and political engagement. 

Civic education as a pathway to national political participation

A 2022 report from Child Trends found that Black students were more likely than their peers to report an interest in civic engagement and activities. Drawing on this history and experiences with racism, Black students continue to spearhead civic efforts to promote racial and social justice in the United States. Today, Black children are more likely to use pathways such as social media to engage in activism and promote political awareness and participation among their peers. 

Programs like Black Girls Lead and Girls Who Vote have been instrumental in increasing political engagement among Black girls and fostering civic responsibility. These programs provide mentorship and civic education, which are essential in preparing Black girls to become active voters and community leaders.

In addition, Black youth activism is expressed not only at the local level, such as when a group of girls at Pretoria High School for Girls held a protest earlier in July to highlight alleged racism they experienced, — but also in national movements such as those sparked by the murder of George Floyd when 17-year-old Daniella Fraizer took out her cell phone and recorded his murder in 2020. Such incidents speak to young Black children —particularly Black girls—civically advocating for social justice in their schools and communities.

Surging ahead

Black girls, who account for 7.8 percent of the overall K-12 student population in the United States, have led a trend of civic engagement, contributing to increased voter registration among young Black women. Additionally, experts say Harris’ groundbreaking run for the White House has captured the imagination of Black women and girls who see themselves in her. 

However, the surge is not an isolated incident but rather a culmination of years of civic education and empowerment initiatives that have prepared these young women to take their place as influential voters.

Hilary Wilson, a doctoral student studying education in Louisiana, believes that the historical cultivation of civic engagement will likely have a lasting impact on Black K-12 education and voter registration turnout moving forward.

“As these young girls and women continue to assert their political power, their influence could extend into shaping educational policies, like more civic education in the classroom, that will benefit predominantly Black schools and communities.”

This article was originally published by Word In Black.

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Join Word In Black on Sept. 10 for live pre- and post-presidential debate commentary with insights on issues that matter to Black voters.

By Word In Black

Word In Black is excited to announce Debate Night in Black America: A Virtual Conversation, an event designed to engage the African American community during the Sept. 10, 2024, presidential debate. This groundbreaking livestream show offers a platform for insightful discussion and analysis centered on Black viewers.

The virtual conversation — hosted by Word In Black Managing Director Liz Courquet-Lesaulnier and Deputy Managing Director Joseph Williams — will be streamed starting at 8 p.m. EST/5 p.m. PST on Sept. 10, 2024, before and after the ABC presidential debate. The streaming show will provide commentary and perspectives that resonate with the unique experiences and concerns of the Black community, creating a space for meaningful dialogue on the critical issues at stake in this election.

“We believe it’s essential for the Black community to have a platform where our voices are centered in the national conversation, especially during such a pivotal moment in our nation’s history,” said Courquet-Lesaulnier. “With this event, we’ll do what the Black press has done for nearly 200 years: create a space where our community can come together to discuss, analyze, and engage with the issues that matter most to us.”

In addition to the virtual event, participating WIB publishers will host local debate watch parties in communities across America for in-person participation in the conversation. These watch parties will foster a sense of unity and collective engagement, ensuring that the African-American community’s voice is heard loud and clear.

Local participants in the participating cities will share their post-debate thoughts during the livestream — providing a one-of-a-kind opportunity to hear from Black Americans across the nation about their insights and perspectives about the presidential election.

Newsroom outlets participating in the post-debate livestream include the following:

Atlanta – The Atlanta Voice & The Atlanta Daily World

Baltimore – The AFRO

Chicago – The Chicago Defender

Dallas – The Dallas Weekly

Detroit – The Michigan Chronicle

Houston – The Houston Defender Network

New York – The Amsterdam News

Pittsburgh – New Pittsburgh Courier

Sacramento – The Sacramento Observer

St. Louis – The St. Louis American

Washington, D.C. – The Washington Informer
Click here to register for Debate Night in Black America.

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By Quintessa Williams

During the Democratic National Convention, Michelle Obama’s stunning braids and Tennessee Rep. Justin Pearson’s mighty afro were celebrated nationwide as symbols of Black pride, cultural identity and resistance. 

Given that the former First Lady once said America wasn’t ready to see a Black woman with anything but straight hair in the White House, their hairstyles symbolize a growing acceptance and recognition of natural hair in political spaces. 

However, while Black hairstyles are becoming more accepted in politics, a stark contrast exists in America’s public schools. Black hair may be embraced in some spaces, but it remains heavily policed and criminalized in classrooms. 

Hair dress code policies in schools disproportionately affect Black students, leading to higher rates of negative perceptions about their identity, severe psychological effects and students being shoved into the school-to-prison pipeline.

Just weeks before the DNC, a judge dismissed a racial discrimination lawsuit filed by Darryl George, a Black student in Texas, after it was ruled that he was lawfully punished for wearing locs, a hairstyle rooted in African culture and spirituality. The school cited ‘”its dress code”’ as the reason for the suspension.

A national issue for Black students

Savannah Walker, an Andrew Jackson High School senior in Jacksonville, Fla., tells Word In Black that when schools enforce such policies, they are “not only policing hair but identity as well.”

“They’re basically telling us that we as our natural selves are unacceptable and that we must conform to White norms to be seen as respectable and worthy. This is hurtful, especially for young people like me who are still figuring out their sense of self and identity.”

 In 2017, 17-year-old Jenesis Johnson was sent to in-school suspension for wearing her natural afro to school. The school’s dress code mandated that hair be “kept neat and out of the face,” and administrators claimed her afro was a distraction. 

A year later in 2018, Faith Fennidy, an 11-year-old from Louisiana, was sent home because her braided hairstyle allegedly violated the school’s dress code. Fennidy’s case garnered national attention and sparked outrage over discriminatory hair policies in schools.

In 2019, Tyler House, a high school wrestler in Kentucky, was forced to cut his locs on the spot or forfeit his match. The referee insisted that his locs were not compliant with the sport’s regulations despite other athletes with similar hairstyles not being asked to make changes. 

These incidents, and many others like them, highlight the ongoing struggle Black students face in schools across the country.

According to a 2020 report from the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU), Black students, who make up only 15 percent of the U.S. public school student population, account for 45 percent of all school suspensions related to hair being cited as a dress code violation. In addition, 25 percent of Black students reported being penalized for wearing their natural hair, compared to just 5 percent of White students. 

Does the CROWN Act protect Black students?

As of 2024, 25 states have passed the CROWN Act (Creating a Respectful and Open World for Natural Hair), which protects against hair-based discrimination in workplaces and schools. 

The act first became law in California in 2019 and is designed to ban discrimination based on hair texture and protective hairstyles, including locs, braids, twists, and afros. In March 2022, the U.S. House of Representatives passed the federal version of the CROWN Act. The Biden Administration voiced its support for the legislation. However, the bill stalled in the Senate, leaving millions nationwide without protection against hair-based discrimination.

In states without the CROWN Act, 67 percent of Black students report experiencing discrimination or bias related to their natural hair in school. However, states with the CROWN Act have seen a 25 percent decrease in reported incidents of hair discrimination. 

Where do we go from here? 

In May 2024, Democrats reintroduced the CROWN Act at the federal level. New Jersey Sen. Cory Booker, a leading voice in the fight for the CROWN Act, said, “This is not a partisan issue. The federal government would simply be following the lead of our states. This is an issue of justice. This is an issue of fairness. This isn’t just an issue of ending discrimination that has existed for too long. Enough is enough.”

Meanwhile, in Jacksonville, Savannah Walker’s father, Kadeem Walker, says he believes a potential federal ban on discrimination against Black hair will ensure all students are free to express their cultural hair identity without fear of punishment. 

“We must implement federal protections like the CROWN Act and hold schools accountable for discriminatory dress code policies,” he says. “It will be a giant step in ending these discriminatory practices on natural hair across the nation.”

This article was originally published by Word in Black.

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By Rev. Dorothy S. Boulware
Word in Black

In March 2020, when the COVID-19 pandemic forced houses of worship nationwide to shut down, both the ministry and congregants adapted to a new, supposedly temporary reality. Like schools and offices, church services would be conducted remotely, streamed over the internet into homes on pandemic lockdown. 

When asked, around 9 in 10 parishioners insisted they would return to in-person worship, as soon as the pandemic ended. They missed the handshakes and hugs of in-person fellowship, the resonant sound of the choir, the feel and smell of hymnals. 

More than three years after the official end of the pandemic, however, about a third of regular churchgoers haven’t returned to the pews — and only about 2 in 5 Americans regularly participate in church services at all.

A survey shows the situation is a bit more acute when it comes to the Black church, according to Pew Research Center. 

“While 13% of Protestants who belong to historically Black churches say they attend church in person and don’t regularly watch services virtually, most say they join services both in person and virtually (37%) or only watch remotely on screens (20%),” according to the Pew report, issued last June.  

The data illustrates a conundrum for faith leaders struggling to meet the new reality of a hybrid method of worship. 

“Pastoring the virtual church creates an accountability and connection challenge,” says the Rev. Jamal Brown, pastor of Family Restoration Worship Center in Philadelphia. “It’s not dissimilar from the traditional congregation challenges,” but the church as well as the individual bears responsibility for the decline of in-person worship.

Virtual worship “offered people an opportunity to hide from the responsibility of giving time, talent and tenth,” he says, referring to donations and tithing. “However, embracing the virtual church also exposed deficits in the church systems. What existed pre was enhanced in the post virtual church.”

Jason E. Shelton, a sociologist and professor and director of the Center for African American Studies at the University of Texas at Arlington, put a finer point on it in a February interview with Christianity Today.

“The future does not look good for organized religion in Black America, especially the historic traditions,” he said. 

“The Baptists are still the largest, but they’re losing people,” he said. “The Methodists are really down small. The Pentecostals are losing, but they’re not losing nearly as many since they’ve always been small.” 

The numbers are part of an overall trend of declining church worship in the U.S. According to Gallup, 42 percent of U.S. adults regularly attended church services two decades ago; now, that number has slipped to around 30 percent. 

Reasons for the dropoff in attendance vary, according to a Pew Research Center poll. Some former churchgoers are still worried about contracting COVID-19; others say they’re facing new physical challenges that keep them from going to church in person; still others say they prefer worshiping from the comfort of home. 

One can hardly argue with the modern comfort and convenience of watching Sunday home worship services, streaming live over a platform like Zoom or Facebook. Yet data from Lifeway Research found that 91 percent of those polled not long after churches shut down said they would return to the pews when the pandemic was no longer a problem.

But “as of the fall of 2022, the average church had 85% of its pre-COVID attendance numbers,” according to the study. A year later, Pew reported 27 percent of U.S. adults faithfully watch services online, compared with roughly a third who regularly attend church in person. 

Among Black parishioners, 2 in 10 prefer to watch worship services online at home, according to Pew.

Part of the reason for the dropoff is “continuing concern about COVID-19, which struck Black communities with particular force,” according to Pew. At the same time, however, “viewers who are members of historically Black Protestant churches are more likely to say they feel like active participants in these virtual services than are viewers who belong to some other faiths.”

Realizing what’s at stake, faith leaders are taking steps to draw their flock back into the pews. Some are reaching out to absent congregants in person; others are holding social events. One minister found that offering water baptism was a draw to some. 

For Shelton, the University of Texas sociologist, the decline in in-person worship is a worrisome trend for the Black church, an institution with a long, storied history in the community. 

“The church has always been the vessel that we as Black people have used to have community and solidarity,” he said. “It’s the church that connects , so as the nones” — Black people with no religious affiliation — “fall away from that, what does that mean for the community? What does that mean for Black music? What does that mean for Black politics? And what does that mean for the long-standing legacy of racial discrimination in this country?”

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By Rev. Dorothy S. Boulware
Word in Black

Six years ago, I was in Turks and Caicos celebrating my 50th wedding anniversary, walking the entire expanse of the resort and having a great time with the entire family — children, grands, and even great-grands. I had no thought of infirmity of any type. Nothing was slowing me down. 

By 2021, both hips needed surgery, but it was considered cosmetic and had to wait. In the interim, we tried physical therapy and injections. Neither worked. So, in March 2022, I went in for what was to be a typical hip replacement, and the plan was that six weeks later, I’d have another typical hip replacement and get on with my life. Not so much.

It’s 2024. I’m walking with a cane, and I’m grieving the mobility I enjoyed until then. Although I’ve lost too many friends too soon, I chose to mention this loss because it’s often overlooked when we think about grief. 

Grief is all around us. We grieve individually, and we grieve collectively. And it’s compounded by our shared social media culture.

So, what do we do with all this grief? 

I spoke with my favorite counseling psychologist, Toni Boulware Stackhouse, who started her practice, Life Matters Wellness, in 2020 during the pandemic when people were going stir-crazy from being locked up with too many relatives in too little space.

Challenging the Prosperity Gospel

In response to my question of how the church can be more helpful in the grief process, our conversation immediately went to the “prosperity gospel,” which seems t

o suggest, depending on the teacher, that anyone who is on firm ground in their faith should have everything they need and want, and not hurt, be ill, or suffer loss of any kind. She said that’s the problem. 

“One of the things the church can do is be more realistic about the fact that loss and death are parts of life. As much as there will be birth, there will be death. It’s the cycle of life. And that doesn’t speak to people dying prematurely, or prematurely in our sight,” Stackhouse says. “I think the thing with the church is we try to over-spiritualize some things. And we try to make people feel like, in a lot of instances, if you can’t accept things, if you feel like you gotta grieve, or you feel sad, or depressed, or you are anxious, then you are not spiritually mature. Or something is wrong with you. And that’s not true.”

She often references for her clients the scripture that details Jesus’ walk toward the hill of his death and describes him as being exceedingly sorrowful. 

“So when we go through, we use cliches like, ‘I’m blessed and highly favored,’ rather than tell the truth that we’re devastated or in pain. What we have created in the culture of the church is that it’s not OK for you to be not OK, and we need to reverse that,” she says. “The church needs to be the place where we can be and feel whatever we need in that season.

“That speaks to the humanity of Jesus because he came to walk the earth so that he could be an example for us, right? And show us that it’s okay to be human. He knew what he was going to do. He still felt the grief of the process. And the Bible describes it as exceedingly sorrowful. Those words sound like depression, right?” 

Many of Stackhouse’s clients come for more specific situations only to discover the real problem is grief.  For those who find grief to be their current reality, she suggests tools to help get through.

“I tell people to make space for it. When you feel like you need to cry, cry. If you feel like screaming, cussing, whatever it is that you feel like doing, allow yourself to do it because that means you need that release from your body. Grief has stages, and grief also has moments — unpredictable moments,” Stackhouse says.

“Journaling is good, voice or writing. Find ways to keep the legacy or memory of the person, especially for the younger ones in the family. Take up a craft or a hobby of the loved one you’ve lost and keep it going,” she says. “If the person was a gift giver, then give the same kinds of gifts.”

She also encourages people to talk about their loved ones and share memories with those who are also experiencing the loss, allowing them to do the same.  

The Weight of Youthful Grief

Rev. Therm James Jr. ministers to the “cradle to college” crew — between 150 and 175 young people at his church, New Macedonia Baptist Church, in Southeast Washington, D.C. In addition to his gifts and extensive professional training on the subject of grief, this doctoral student is, unfortunately, an expert.

When he was 13, his mother was killed in an automobile accident, and he went through all the expected stages of grief. He argued with God and questioned God’s keeping people addicted to and abusing drugs but taking his mother, “who was always singing and shouting, praising and living a good life.”

He was taken aback when one of his young men said, “Pastor TJ, all this stuff you’re talking about growing up, but who says I’m going to grow up?”

“And it hit me in a different way, hearing ‘I’m not going to be here for a long time, so let me just have a good time,’” he says. “With all the loss they’ve experienced, they raise the question, ‘Who’s to say I’m not next?’”

James says we used to have to pick up the paper to find out what was going on. “But now, every day you’re on your phone, you’re checking out Murder Ink, which houses all the bad things that happen in Baltimore City.”

He says every so often, he just has to disconnect from it. 

Faith in the Midst of Loss

“I see people who look like me, who have murdered people who look like me, and it plays on my emotions. It’s not normal. What we’re trying to make normal is just not normal,” James said, mentioning a recent Bible study on the theodicy of God, when bad things happen to good people. Or what happens when everything goes wrong.

“Job did everything right, and everything went wrong,” he says. “I try to help them understand we just can’t understand God, but that it’s alright to be angry with God. Faith will sustain you, but it always doesn’t feel fair.”

James’ bottom line is, “It’s OK to be angry with God, but just don’t stop talking.”

This article was originally published on WordinBlack.com.

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By Aziah Siid
Word in Black

What was supposed to be a routine field trip to the courthouse turned into a nightmare for 15-year-old Eva Goodman, a Detroit teenager, who found herself handcuffed, forced into jail clothes, and detained for hours — all under the orders of Michigan’s 36th District Court Judge Kenneth King.

The dehumanization and mistreatment of the teen during the Aug. 13 incident sent shockwaves through Detroit, and people across social media asked why the child was treated so poorly, and speculated on if Eva had not been a young Black girl, would she have been treated the same 

The questions highlight the broader issue of the adultification of Black children — how they are often perceived as older and less innocent than their White peers, leading to harsher treatment. Given that the teen is homeless, the incident also put the plight of Black students who are housing insecure in the spotlight.

The adultification of Black kids 

Research shows that due to racial bias, people simply don’t assume the best of Black children, and are apt to criminalize them. Whether they’re in school or on a field trip, because of this bias, Black children are expected to behave like adults, and they’re deprived of the care, concern, grace, and empathy given to their White peers. They are adultified.

“When people see Black children, if they don’t see them as people, they definitely don’t see them as children,” Amir Gilmore, assistant professor of cultural studies and social thought in education at Washington State University, explained to Word In Black last year. 

Indeed, people may fall asleep in court due to medication, a medical condition, the temperature in the courtroom, or not understanding the court proceedings. But instead of assuming Eva was tired for a good reason, King assumed she had fallen asleep to disrespect him. 

“It wasn’t so much, in fact, that she had fallen asleep because I have attorneys that fall asleep sometimes, so that’s not too big of a deal. It was her whole attitude and her whole disposition that disturbed me,” King told 7 News Detroit in an Aug. 14 interview. “I wanted to get through to her, show how serious this is and how you are to conduct yourself inside of a courtroom.” 

Eva and her mother say the judge took an unnecessarily harsh approach to the teen. As a result, Eva — along with her mother Latoreya Hill — is suing Judge King, alleging that he violated her Fourth Amendment rights. The lawsuit states that King’s actions were his own version of “Scared Straight,” a misguided attempt to “teach a lesson” that left Eva traumatized and humiliated. In the wake of the lawsuit, Judge King has been temporarily removed from the docket and is expected to undergo additional training.

“It’s been pretty devastating. Eva doesn’t want to come outside … It’s hard for her to sleep at night. She’s asking me, ‘why did the judge do me like this out of all the kids?’ Like she’s really not understanding the or the whole thing of the system or what happened or was going on,” Hill said at a news conference after the incident.

A Crisis of Housing Insecure Students

The judge was so busy disciplining Eva he failed to learn she and her family are unhoused. Till told NBC News that they have no permanent housing at the moment, and actually arrived late where they were staying the night before the field trip. 

A recent analysis of students in Detroit found that “Black students were at a greater risk of homelessness than their peers of other races at 86 percent of students who were homeless compared to 83 percent of students overall.”  At a national level, an analysis of federal data found that “Black high school students are 2.25 times more likely to experience homelessness.”

Given their lack of housing, Eva’s mom expressed her outrage over what King said to her daughter to Detroit’s WXYZ-TV.

“The fact that he was talking about ‘You go home and get in your bed,’ how do you know my baby got a home? How do you know my baby got a bed, her own bed she could sleep in? She don’t have that right now, so she was tired,” Till said.

King defended his decision to have the teen treated like a criminal, stating he did not like the child’s attitude. He told WXYZ-TV he hadn’t been disrespected like that in a long time.

The negative effect on Eva, however, could last for the rest of the teen’s life. “I wish I could have brought my daughter here for today, but she doesn’t want to be in front of the camera,” her mom said. “She doesn’t want to talk. She’s embarrassed, humiliated, and I can’t blame her.”

This article was originally published by Word in Black.

The post The high price of being a Black, tired and homeless student appeared first on AFRO American Newspapers.

Kamala Harris busted the ghosts of failed Democratic candidates of the past in one of the most successful conventions in history.

By Keith Boykin
Word in Black

“Black Vote, Black Power,” a collaboration between Keith Boykin and Word In Black,
examines the issues, the candidates, and what’s at stake for Black America in the 2024 presidential election.

CHICAGO — A few weeks ago, Democrats were a divided party headed toward a potentially explosive convention in Chicago. Today, those fears are gone, as Kamala Harris has united the party and concluded one of the most successful conventions in American political history.

Democrats came into Chicago haunted by three ghosts: 1968, 2000, and 2016, and Kamala Harris banished all of them.

The ghost of 1968 was the haunting reminder of Chicago, where antiwar demonstrators took over the streets to protest the war in Vietnam.

The ghost of 2000 was when the last incumbent Democratic vice president, Al Gore, tried and failed to follow a president into the White House.

And the ghost of 2016 was when the last woman, Hillary Clinton, tried to break the glass ceiling to the presidency.

Kamala Harris looked all three of those ghosts in the face and busted them. 

This was not 1968. Harris addressed the war in Gaza head-on in her convention speech, refusing to run away from the most divisive internal issue in the party today.

This was not 2000. Harris acknowledged and thanked President Biden but laid out her own hopeful, optimistic vision for America based on freedom.

And this was not 2016. Harris did not dwell on her history-making campaign as a woman. She introduced herself to America in a relatable convention speech, but then told the country how she plans to focus on us and not on her.

It was not only a contrast to the self-centered Trump campaign but a refreshing reminder that Democrats can win if they stay on offense instead of defense. Harris refused to be defensive on Gaza or the border, as she laid out a strong vision of American power as a force for good in the world that can positively reflect our values.

The former district attorney prosecuted the case against convicted felon Donald Trump and forced Americans to use their common sense. 

As she shared the story of how she had to introduce herself in the courtroom, “Kamala Harris, for the people,” she told America that she had spent her career with only one client: the people. While Trump, on the other hand, had spent his life focused only on himself.

In a night that also featured the Exonerated Central Park Five, no serious African American could watch Harris compared to Trump’s long-winded, rambling Milwaukee speech and conclude that he was the better candidate.

She even brought out her adorable grand-nieces to teach Americans how to say her name: Comma – LA.

By nominating Kamala Harris, Democrats have busted the ghosts of the past and embraced a new future that recognizes their strength. 

Nothing is more powerful than an idea whose time has come, and this week Kamala Harris proved that her time had come. As she always says, when we fight, we win.

This article was originally published on WordinBlack.com.

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By Joseph Williams

In Georgia four years ago, Stacey Abrams was well positioned to make history as the first Black woman in the U.S. to ever occupy a governor’s mansion. Running neck-and-neck with Gov. Brian Kemp, a White Republican, heading into election day, Abrams had the Black vote largely behind her, and many believed it would power her to victory.  

Political analysts and pundits, however, detected an Achilles’ heel: polls repeatedly showed her struggling to fully win over Black men, a constituency that most believed were politically aligned with her. Her outreach, though, came too late in her campaign and she lost to Kemp by 8 percentage points. 

Now comes Vice President Kamala Harris, the first woman of color to hold the office, and the parallels between her and Abrams are hard to miss. Like Abrams, Harris is a Democrat and well-positioned to win a tight, highly consequential election. Like Abrams, Harris has generated excitement and enthusiasm, particularly among Black women voters, who see themselves in her. 

And, like Abrams, it’s unclear whether Black men — feeling politically frustrated, unempowered, and disillusioned to the point of skipping elections — will fully support a Black and South Asian woman presidential candidate, even if her run for the White House makes history.

Considering the question, Mondale Robinson, founder of the Black Male Voting Project, told ABC News that Black men feel abandoned and ignored by both political parties, until the next election comes around. They vote, he says, but feel politicians have given them little in return.

“There’s no apathy in Black men. There’s a level of antipathy,” he said. “Antipathy is a whole different emotion. You hate what politics is and does because you’ve not seen the growth, or benefit of it. Black men are not better off because of politics.” 

But data also suggests a strain of lingering sexism could have been a factor in Abrams’ struggles with Black men — and a potential pothole for Harris’s groundbreaking run. 

A 2023 survey on gender attitudes by PerryUndem, a public attitudes research firm, found that 4 in 10 Black men don’t agree that the country would be better off with more women of color in elected office, 48 percent believe women are easily offended, and nearly half think society punishes men “for acting like men.” 

Dr. Moya Bailey, a Northwestern University professor, told The New York Times that patriarchy is not unique to the Black population, but “the consequences are much higher” in what’s seen as a do-or-die race against Trump.  

There are other troubling signs for Harris, including disparities when Black men do show up at the ballot box. According to the Pew Research Center, Black women vote at higher rates than Black men, and are overwhelmingly more likely to choose the Democratic Party. In the 2020 presidential election, for example, 95 percent of Black women voted for Biden, while 13 percent of Black men voted for Donald Trump, Harris’s opponent. 

To be clear: Black men still vote in large numbers, and, like most Black women, tend to vote for Democrats. While the differential between Black men and Black women may seem small, it could make a big difference in Harris’ race against Trump, an election most experts believe will be won or lost at the margins.

“As Kamala Harris inherits the presidential campaign of Joe Biden, she also inherits his sagging poll numbers with working-class Black men,” Roger House, an American studies professor at Emerson College, wrote in an essay for The Hill. “The historic nature of Harris’s candidacy will be viewed by many Black male voters as cold comfort unless she finds a way to address their material and cultural concerns.”

Then there’s Harris’s past career as a prosecutor in California, a background that has Black men wary of her. Disinformation and misinformation have spread on social media that Harris contributed to the over-incarceration of Black men, locking up tens of thousands of them. It’s an incorrect notion her campaign has tried to dispel.

An analysis by The Marshall Project found Harris’s record is more nuanced: on the job, she advocated for progressive criminal-justice policies, including re-entry programs for the formerly incarcerated. Politically, however, she adopted a tough-on-crime stance when critics accused her of coddling criminals. 

Of course, not every Black man will vote for Harris but there are positive signs a majority know what’s at stake in November and plan to cast a ballot for her.

Not long after Harris replaced Biden at the top of the Democratic presidential ticket, a virtual fundraiser called specifically for Black men drew 40,000 participants who poured more than $1 million into her campaign coffers. 

“Sometimes as Black men we get confused as to what strength is, and sometimes we think that standing behind a Black woman as a leader does not display strength as Black men,” said Illinois Attorney General Kwame Raoul, who spoke on the call. “I’m here to tell you all tonight that it does the opposite of that: it displays strength.”

Mr. Raoul then cut to the point. “I’m standing behind a Black woman to be president of theUnited States, and it doesn’t make me any less of a Black man,” he said. “I’m asking all of you all to do the same.

For her part, Harris has personally reached out to groups and organizations that speak to Black men, held White House listening sessions with influential Black business leaders and pledged to earn their vote — not take it for granted. 

“There is a trope in this election which I take issue with, because the underlying premise suggests that Black men should be in the back pocket of Democrats,” Harris told The Nation magazine in an interview last month. “And that is absolutely unacceptable. Here’s why: Why would any one demographic of people be different from any other demographic? They all expect you to earn their vote! You’ve got to make your case.”

This article was originally published by Word in Black.

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By Joseph Williams
Word In Black

Project 2025, the far-reaching Republican Party plan to demolish and radically remake the federal government under a Trump presidency, has gotten a lot of attention lately, and not necessarily in a good way. 

President Joe Biden warns it’s a threat to democracy. Former President Donald Trump says he had nothing to do with it, even though members of his administration helped write it. Actress Taraji P. Henson sounded the alarm while hosting the Black Entertainment Television (BET) Awards last month, urging viewers to “look it up! Project 2025 is not a game!”

What’s been missing in the conversation so far about Project 2025 — which calls for eliminating the Department of Education, replacing career civil servants with political appointees, ending affirmative action in government hiring and virtually eliminating access to abortion, among other sweeping changes — is what it would mean for Black America. 

To answer that question, Word In Black took a look at Project 2025’s potential effect on five issues important to Black communities: education, healthcare, the environment, criminal justice and faith. 

While some proposals are explicit, others are unclear and likely would face significant, insurmountable barriers. But it’s likely that Trump would use much of it as a roadmap for his second term. 

Education

While the document contains dozens of controversial proposals, arguably the biggest one is to shut down the Department of Education (ED), an institution created in 1867, not long after the end of the Civil War. The theory, according to the blueprint, is to eliminate red tape so that families will be “free to choose from a diverse set of school options and learning environments.” 

But the plan also would wipe out the ED’s Office of Civil Rights (OCR), a sub-agency that enforces civil rights laws and investigates schools accused of engaging in discrimination. Although it’s been 70 years since the Supreme Court outlawed separate-but-equal education in public schools, OCR is not lacking for work: in 2023, it handled more than 19,000 complaints, roughly 1,000 more cases than in 2022. 

“The total number of complaints has almost tripled since fiscal year 2009, and during this same period OCR’s number of full time equivalent (FTE) staff has decreased from 629 to 556,” according to the ED’s annual report.  

Dismantling a cabinet-level agency that’s been around for 157 years and has more than 4,000 employees would probably be a very heavy lift for any administration. But other proposals in Project 2025 would be far easier to initiate: replacing Title I funds to struggling schools with block grants, allowing states to decide how to spend their share of federal tax dollars, expanding school-choice programs, using federal dollars to fund private schools, cutting “wasteful” school meal programs, swapping Pell grants for private loans while eliminating Biden’s student loan forgiveness program and curbing the teaching of race in schools. 

Ultimately, the plan essentially cripples the struggling public education system, which educates the bulk of Black students. It would make it harder to file a discrimination lawsuit. And fewer college-bound Black students — most of whom depend on the federal government to help pay tuition — would be able to pay for higher education. 

Health

One of the project’s core objectives is to reduce the federal government’s involvement in healthcare. This means the incoming president could take a battleax to the agencies that run Medicare and Medicaid as well as affiliated offices that research treatments for insidious diseases and approve prescriptions, medical devices and personal products like cosmetics. 

The main goal: fewer Black or low-income people will have healthcare. Black women, especially expectant mothers, will continue having the worst health outcomes, and the practice of medicine will become more politicized than ever.

Although the plan doesn’t explicitly call for a federal ban on abortion, it does list “abortion, reproductive health, reproductive rights” as terms the incoming president must delete from every federal government document to make “institutions of American civil society hard targets for woke culture warriors.” And it removes federal protections for members of the military and their families if they choose to terminate a pregnancy.

The guidebook argues that “the US Department of Health & Human Services (HHS) also pushes abortion as a form of ‘health care,’” and that the “US Food & Drug Administration (FDA) should…reverse its approval of chemical abortion drugs because the politicized approval process was illegal from the start.”

The plan also proposes restrictions that effectively criminalize abortion: besides increasing the prospect that abortion providers would face criminal penalties, it calls for the government to track miscarriages, stillbirths and abortions. It would also restrict access to Plan B contraceptives — even if insurance covers the drugs.

The standard GOP goal of reducing regulations is frequently mentioned and would decrease oversight of healthcare providers and insurers, pharmaceutical companies and major wrongdoers like the tobacco industry. 

Project 2025 also proposes significant changes to Medicaid, including a work requirement, and making Medicare Advantage, currently the paid supplement to Medicare, the default option. 

Criminal justice

Since it began garnering attention, the criminal justice-related headlines from Project 2025 have focused on its proposed politicization of the Justice Department, allowing Trump to salt the department with political appointees and order investigations of his political enemies. But the blueprint also proposes a range of low-key reforms that would have a significant impact on Black communities.

It argues for the undoing of police reforms enacted in the wake of George Floyd’s murder, absolves police departments under federal oversight because of racial discrimination, calls for more draconian sentencing guidelines and puts federal district court prosecutors on very short leashes.

The justification, according to the report, is that a left-wing approach to law enforcement — including progressive prosecutors, lenient judges and hamstrung police — has led to a “catastrophic” rise in violent crime. 

“In recent years, federal and state officials have succumbed to calls from anti-law enforcement advocates for so-called criminal justice reform,” according to Project 2025. “This campaign is not just ill-advised; it has had real-world consequences.”

In reality, crime has decreased substantially, nationwide, over the last four years. Police departments under federal supervision usually end up that way because an investigation has revealed long-standing patterns of misconduct. Unleashing those departments increases the likelihood that more Black people will end up like Floyd — dead at the hands of aggressive law enforcement with no federal consequences.

And harsher prison sentences for federal offenders are likely to increase the over-incarceration of Black men, a trend that not only harms Black families but also disrupts Black communities.

Faith

Like the priests who blew their horns in the Biblical battle of Jericho, Project 2025 is a clarion call for demolishing the Constitutional wall separating church and state. And it’s not good news for Black Americans. 

The plan integrates “Judeo-Christian tradition, stretching back to Genesis,” directly and indirectly, into official government policies, from using taxpayer money to fund parochial schools — which would further undermine public schools — to pushing businesses to close on Sunday, a move experts say would damage the economy. 

The project calls for dismantling same-sex marriage, erasing specialized lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender and queer (LGBTQ) healthcare programs, sharply curbing the sale of abortion pills by mail or in person and criminalizing pornography. While it doesn’t explicitly ban abortion — the top goal of far-right conservatives — it outlines policies to make the procedure as difficult as possible.

It allows churches to retain tax-exempt status, even if they engage in racial discrimination or partisan political activity. And it reinstates the ban on Muslims immigrating to the U.S. 

In short, Project 2025 reads like the fantasy wish list of Christian conservatives while dropping a nuclear bomb in the decades-long, left-vs-right culture wars. Critics say it eliminates individual rights and all but establishes Christianity as a state religion, but supporters say it simply restores traditional values to a nation founded on them. 

Leslie Tune-Copeland, senior associate general secretary of the National Council of Churches, says the faith-based portion of Project 2025 does “the absolute opposite” of Christ’s teachings about tolerance and love.

“It’s the absolute opposite in the Bible. Jesus doesn’t force his will on anybody, right?” Tune-Copeland says. “If we’re disciples of Christ, we can encourage people, we can support people, we can minister to people, but we don’t force people to do what we do or to think what we think. But there are people out there who are telling you that that’s exactly what you should be doing.”

Those people, she says, “unfortunately, have manipulated our faith in such a way that people have bought into it. They have bought into some of the lies that White Christian nationalism has told us.”

Climate justice

When it comes to the American government, there are few things conservatives fantasize about more than cutting programs related to climate change. So, it’s no real surprise that Project 2025  is full of ideas for slashing regulations, weakening government enforcement mechanisms and cutting federal investment in programs related to the environment. 

At this point in history, however, when the window for saving the climate is rapidly closing, those plans would be disastrous — and, like most extreme weather events, the consequences for Black and Brown Americans would surely be even worse.

Project 2025 proposes slicing up the Department of Energy (DOE), the Environment Protection Agency (EPA) and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Agency (NOAA), to name a few. All have a role in either addressing or monitoring climate change. The plan also calls for using the Department of the Interior to expand oil and gas exploration on all public lands. The federal government would eliminate funding and programs for renewable energy, like wind and solar, and would fast-track fossil fuel production. 

At the same time, Project 2025 recommends moving climate-related decisions from the hands of actual climate scientists to political officials. 

Considering that Paul Dans, the architect of Project 2025, believes “the science is still out” on human-caused climate change, you can only guess what kind of political decisions would be made if this plan is put into action.

Heritage’s Paul Dans, director of Project 2025, told The New York Times that one of its aims is to “investigate whether the dimensions of climate change exist.” In terms of the role of fossil fuels in driving climate breakdown, he told the Times: “I think the science is still out on that, quite frankly.”

The plan also proposes eliminating multiple clean energy programs and offices within the Department of Energy — such as the Office of Clean Energy Demonstrations, the DOE Loan Program, the Office of Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy and DOE’s Clean Energy Corps.

The agenda further says that NOAA should be “broken up and downsized,” claiming it has become “one of the main drivers of the climate change alarm industry.”

This article was originally published by Word In Black.

The post How will Project 2025 impact Black America? appeared first on AFRO American Newspapers.

By Rev. Dorothy S. Boulware
Word in Black

Modern grandparents seem to customize their titles, not preferring the “grandma” and “grandpa” of the past. Some want to be called “Glamma,” “Nanee,” or “Pop” or even by their first names — which makes sense since most look nothing like the grandparents of previous decades. 

But no matter what they’re called, their influence remains strong. And this year, churches and community groups are stepping up to celebrate their contributions. So as Grandparents Day approaches on Sept. 8, faith communities nationwide are finding creative ways to honor the elders who play a pivotal role in family life.

The day “is an appreciation acknowledgement for grandparents who are caregivers. Not to mention, share wisdom, love, and family history with members of the family and friends,” according to the website of the 107-year-old Pilgrim Baptist Church in Omaha, Nebraska.

Just as the age and appearance of grandparents has gotten increasingly younger, the role of grandparents has changed so much in the last few decades too.

“I look at the adults who were children when I came having their own children, the cycle of life coming full circle,” says Rev. Stephen Russell, pastor at Calvary Baptist Church in northwest Baltimore. 

His congregation has a substantial number of seniors, like most congregations these days. 

And over the 18 years he’s spent as pastor there, Russell has seen “the integral role grandparents continue to play in the family.”

He referenced Paul’s advice to his young mentee in the familiar text in II Timothy 1:5.

“Paul told Timothy to hold onto the faith given to him, first, by his grandmother and then his mother, Lois. They have a unique position, parenting in both generations,” Russell says. “Paul was letting Timothy know the importance of that guidance. It’s just great to give special space and salutation to our grandparents.”

The History of Grandparents Day

National Grandparents Day was officially enacted by President Jimmy Carter in 1978, although its roots began in 1969, when 9-year-old Russell Capper decided to write a letter to President Richard Nixon. Capper suggested a special day be set aside to honor his and all other grandparents in this country. He received a response from Nixon’s secretary that the president couldn’t declare such a day, but could only act on a congressional resolution authorizing him to do so.

Almost a decade later, Congress finally acted, and President Carter signed a proclamation declaring National Grandparents Day on the first Sunday after Labor Day each year. 

The Catholic Church actually celebrated World Day for Grandparents and the Elderly on July 28, the Sunday nearest the feast of Saints Joachim and Anne, Jesus’ grandparents. Pope Francis, who declared the first of these days in 2021, chose a line from Psalm 71 as the theme for this year: Do not cast me off in my old age.

“By cherishing the charisms of grandparents and the elderly, and the contribution they make to the life of the Church, the World Day seeks to support the efforts of every ecclesial community to forge bonds between the generations and to combat loneliness,” the Pope said in a statement.

A Blessing From God

“Grandparents are a blessing from God,” says the Rev. Lorraine Heigh, who will be the guest preacher on Sept. 8, when residents of Resorts of Augsburg —  a nursing and assisted living facility in Lochearn, Maryland — will be honored with citations signed by Adrienne Jones, the first Black and first woman speaker of the Maryland General Assembly. 

“They play a pivotal role as the foundation of family passing down cultural values and instilling valuable lessons in life with love and compassion to enrich the lives of their grandchildren,” Heigh says.

The event was planned and is being carried out by Augsburg’s chaplain, Eric T. Campbell, who is determined that the “resident grandparents not just know they are not forgotten, but realize how much they are appreciated by their families and by the Augsburg family.”

And in “recognition of their incredible contributions…and profound impact,” Calvary’s grandparents will receive citations from the members of Baltimore’s City Council, signed by Sharon Middleton, the church’s designated representative.

A Global Day of Prayer

The significance of Grandparents Day goes beyond individual congregations, though. The Christian Grandparenting Network designates the September observance as a global Grandparents’ Day of Prayer. The network emphasizes the need for spiritual guidance in an increasingly complex world.

“We recognize the desperate moral and spiritual climate our grandchildren must navigate in a world hostile to truth,” according to their website. Perhaps at no other time in human history is a call to prayer more urgently required than it is today.”

So whether through prayer, celebration, or simple recognition, faith communities are united in their appreciation of grandparents. Their lived experience, wisdom, and unwavering support are not just vital to their families but also foundational to the strength and growth of the community.  

This article was originally published on WordinBlack.com.

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By Rev. Dorothy S. Boulware
Word in Black

As the national conversation around reparations gains momentum, communities across the United States are taking action to address the enduring legacy of slavery and systemic racism. And one Midwestern faith-based organization, the Justice League of Greater Lansing Michigan, is turning talk into action by addressing the racial wealth gap.

Founded in 2021, the organization is all about repairing the deep wounds left by slavery and systemic racism. White members of area churches committed to healing their relationships with the Black community and making amends for racial harms. Because of that, the “reparations will be committed mainly from predominantly white Houses of Worship as part of their efforts to repair the breach caused by centuries of slavery, inequality of wealth accumulation, and the failure to live into God’s Plan,” according to the Justice League’s website.  

Indeed, the Justice League’s commitment to making things right resulted in them raising a reparations fund of more $400,000, built by payments from area churches and individuals who’ve taken a proactive approach to social justice. And so in early August, the Justice League handed out $5,000 scholarships to 10 college-bound high school grads. 

Recipients were selected based on their 500-word essays that examined the racial wealth gap or generational wealth in America and how that gap has affected their families. Academic grades counted for 25 percent of the total score and finalists were also interviewed.

“A common thread in their essays is that discrimination today has resulted from years of social injustices, and it continues to limit African-American families’ access to basic wealth builders–education, higher paying jobs and home ownership,” says Willye Bryan, founder and vice president of the Justice League. “This doesn’t allow for generational wealth building, nor does it allow for closing the racial wealth gap.”

When he thinks of generational wealth, scholarship winner Zachary Barker, who’s headed to Michigan State University, wrote that, “I think of families like the Rockefellers, Gateses, and Buffets. Recently, some famous Black people have achieved billionaire status like Michael Jordan, Jay Z, Lebron James and Oprah. But the rest of us are still struggling to get by.”

Olivia Burns, who will attend Michigan State University’s Honors College, is a Black transracial adoptee who was exposed first-hand to the racial wealth gap. She wrote about the relative wealth in her White parents’ household compared to her Black biological family’s household.

“Both my adoptive parents went to college paid for by their parents and received bachelor’s degrees,” Burns wrote.  “Neither of my biological parents nor siblings have had the opportunity to attend college, and most were barely able to finish high school because they had other responsibilities like working or providing childcare for my younger siblings. Today my adoptive family owns their homes and no one in my biological family owns their homes.”

Marvin Deh, another scholarship winner who’s also off to Michigan State, reminded us that legal racial segregation was only two generations ago ‚ and so the racial wealth is still very much ongoing.

“Most of our grandparents can describe what it was like to be African-American back then and the struggles they had to face,” Deh wrote. “They couldn’t build generational wealth when the world was actively pulling the rug from underneath them. There’s only been two generations to be given a ‘fair’ chance and enough time to build upon …. On paper the odds are ‘fair’ but in reality we still have to face racism, police brutality, injustice, systematic oppression, lack of influence, stereotypes, and societal pressure.”

“This is not charity and it’s not designed to make you feel better about giving a check,” Bryan said in an interview last year. Along with raising funds for the scholarships, the Justice League hopes to address other systemic barriers to wealth creation by supporting Black home ownership and entrepreneurship.

As J’Kyla Hobbs, who will be attending the University of Michigan, put it: “Investing in affordable housing, improving access to quality education and healthcare, and reforming the criminal justice system are critical steps toward building a more equitable society.”

This article was originally published on WordinBlack.com.

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DNC chair Jaime Harrison breaks down how Kamala Harris has improved the lives of hardworking Americans — and Trump can’t say the same.

By Jaime Harrison
Word in Black

Last week, Donald Trump once again showed the world what he truly is: racist, disrespectful, and unfit to lead. In a conversation with the National Association of Black Journalists, Trump claimed that Vice President Kamala Harris “could be” a “DEI hire” and “happened to turn Black.”

Those despicable comments say a lot about Trump’s character, and they also tell us something else — Trump and JD Vance don’t think they can beat Vice President Harris so they need to resort to racist and sexist comments. They know they can’t win an election on the merits of policy ideas or leadership ability. And we know that they are scared. 

Trump and Vance should be scared because Vice President Harris has done more good in the last three-and-a-half years as vice president than they’ve done in their entire lives. 

Vice President Harris played an essential role in President Biden’s initiatives that invested an unprecedented $16 billion in HBCUs and to date have forgiven $167 billion in student loan debt for nearly 5 million Americans. The Biden-Harris administration also capped the cost of insulin at $35 per month for seniors and acted to lower prescription drug costs. Over the last three years, we’ve seen Black unemployment go down, and new Black-owned small businesses are opening every day. 

In every corner of our nation, the vice president has improved the lives of hardworking Americans. Trump certainly can’t say the same. 

But that’s nothing new for Kamala Harris. Let’s take a look at some of the work she has done before taking office:

As a young lawyer in California, she fought against a measure that would allow prosecutors the option of trying juvenile defendants as adults. During her tenure as district attorney of San Francisco, she made history when she officiated the first same-sex wedding in California after Proposition 8 was overturned, and created a groundbreaking program to provide first-time drug offenders with the opportunity to earn a high school degree and a pathway to employment. While she was attorney general of California, Vice President Harris defended the Affordable Care Act in court and took on big banks that were preying on vulnerable Americans. 

Now when you consider her accomplishments, think about the fact that she is the first woman and first person of color to hold these jobs in California. She has spent a lifetime making critical decisions when all eyes were on her, and she has more than enough experience handling doubters who scrutinize her every move. The pressures of the presidency will be nothing new. 

That is why we know she will not back down when it comes to supporting the Black community. She’s not planning to coast on past accomplishments. Once she’s in office, she will continue fighting for policies that create equity and opportunity for Black Americans across the country and uplift our voices in every corner of the world.

I can guarantee you that promises made by the vice president are promises kept. Because over the past three years, I’ve had the privilege of getting to know her well. She reminds me so much of the Black women who shaped my life. I see the strength and determination of my grandmother, who picked cotton and raised a family on next to nothing. I see the warmth of my mother who had me as a teenager and worked three times as hard to make sure I could be anything I wanted. And I see the brilliance of my wife who succeeds at literally everything she does. 

The vice president embodies the best qualities of our community and our country. And she needs us now to rally around her and show her the same love and respect we show the women in our lives.

We’re already seeing that support through record fundraising numbers, droves of new volunteer signups and the unbelievable attendance at rallies. There’s renewed energy around this election. But we have to keep that energy going all the way through November because we cannot risk another four years of Donald Trump.

No matter what he says, Trump is not fighting for us. At best, he’s fighting in spite of us. We cannot let the world forget the division and violence that took place on his watch. His policies did not make Black communities any wealthier. 

Trump’s rhetoric at the NABJ conference told us that not only will nothing change if he’s back in the White House, but there is much more damage he can do. 

Thankfully, we have the power to stop him. We can usher in a new generation of leaders and an America that works for all of us. 

That starts when we elect Kamala Harris to serve as president of the United States. 

Jaime Harrison currently serves as the Chair of the Democratic National Committee. As the son of a single teenage mom, Jaime Harrison was raised by his grandparents in Orangeburg, South Carolina. Jaime knows what it’s like for a family to have to choose between paying the electric bill and putting food on the table, and what it feels like to go to sleep in a home with no heat, because the power was shut off.

But thanks to a good public school education, the love of his family, and the support of his community, Jaime was able to earn a scholarship to Yale University and attend Georgetown Law. After college, Jaime came back home to Orangeburg to teach at his old high school, then worked to help empower disadvantaged kids to attend college. Jaime also served as an aide to legendary South Carolina Congressman Jim Clyburn. In 2013, Jaime was elected the first African American chair of the South Carolina Democratic Party, a position he held until 2017, when he was appointed by DNC Chair Tom Perez as an Associate Chair of the DNC. In 2020, Jaime ran for the U.S. Senate from South Carolina, building a national grassroots movement and setting a fundraising record for the most raised by a Senate candidate. Jaime and his wife Marie live in Columbia, South Carolina, where they raise their two young sons.

This article was originally published on WordinBlack.com.

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The Moral Mondays leader and other clergy prayed at the Supreme Court for the poor, seeking action to ensure their voices and votes are heard..

By Rev. Dorothy S. Boulware
Word in Black

On July 29, leaders from various faiths gathered in front of the Supreme Court in Washington, D.C., to demand justice. Together, they called for equality in pay, housing, voting rights, public safety, and health care.

This group regularly collaborates with the Right Rev. William J. Barber II, president of Repairers of the Breach and co-chair of the Poor People’s Campaign. Barber has instituted a year-long effort to engage eligible voters who haven’t voted in the past because their concerns have not been addressed by those in power.

“We come in all of our rich diversity, seeing the divinity in our diversity, to pray keeping faith with the highest ideals,” said the Rev. Dr. Alvin O’Neal Jackson in his opening remarks. “Praying that we would use our voices and votes to get closer to what we say we want to be…one nation under God.”

Barber said, “We come as clergy because the right to vote is from God, not from humanity or a constitution. God gives us the ability to choose this day. My Jewish friends taught  me that the words for voice and vote are the same in Hebrew. Something is deeply wrong when any candidate says vote for me and I alone can fix things. Vote for me and it will be the last time.”

Rev. Rob Stevens introduced the first leaders to pray, reminding that prayer changes things, “but more importantly prayer changes us.” 

“It can help us come closer to what we say we want to be, one nation under God with liberty and justice for all,” he added. “Kneel before our Creator with many names.”

Rabbi Jonah Pesner, director of the Religious Action Center of Reform Judaism, echoed the synonymous meaning of voice and vote. He also, with one biblical story, summed up issues of justice for women. He referenced the least familiar Noah in the Bible, a young woman and her four sisters. Because of the times, they were not being considered as heirs to their now deceased father. But they insisted they would not be left out of their fair share just because of their gender and the lack of a man to protect them. They appealed to the prophet who appealed to God. The verdict was that God pronounced their cause just.

Rev. Jimmy Hopkins of the Presbyterian Church USA prayed for guidance during the election, condemning those in office who prioritize their interests over the public’s. He criticized their focus on legislation benefiting the wealthy while disparaging and neglecting those who have too little..

He closed with a plea: “Open our eyes to elect those who have a determined heart to do justice and to love kindness in a humble walk with our God.”

The prayers continued and will be offered the last Monday of each month until the General Election on Nov. 5.

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By Fedrick C. Ingram
Word In Black

Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis isn’t interested in being a leader.

Leaders listen to the people, even those they don’t agree with, in order to foster democracy and empathy for the communities they’ve been elected to serve. 

That is what leaders do.

Last year, at the start of Black History Month, DeSantis blocked the country’s first AP Black Studies course for being “too woke.” This year, just in time for Black Music Month in June, DeSantis vetoed $32 million in cultural and museum grants from his state budget. He clearly wasn’t listening to the voices of his constituents, none of whom asked for such an unprecedented attack on art and culture. A principled leader wouldn’t even imagine eliminating the entire arts budget for the third largest state in the country, depriving countless communities of a vital human endeavor.

That is what autocrats do. 

While slashing the entire arts budget for the state is not a legal crime, it is a moral crime. Art is one of the most important things humans create and an outlet for the frustrated and the forgotten. It can also free the soul from place and time so we can experience the sublime.

That is what art and an arts education did for me. 

As I have written before, music changed the entire trajectory of my life. From a kid born in the Miami projects with a bad stutter to an accomplished leader in education, I needed art to better understand my own potential. 

Learning to sing and then play an instrument before graduating boosted my self-esteem, taught me discipline and stoked my desire to master something on my own steam.

I found new heroes through arts education, too. Names like Branford Marsalis, Prince and Gerald Albright were just as big to me as Michael Jordan or Eddie Murphy. They not only showed me beauty but revealed my connection to my people’s legacy. Of course, I already knew names like Harriet Tubman, Frederick Douglass or A. Philip Randolph, but to understand the soundtrack of Black America as it strove from slavery to freedom was a new frontier. Understanding the music I was playing connected me to the triumphs of my people, made me puff out my chest a bit more and stand a bit straighter.

Studying the arts can also have tangible academic benefits as well. We know it can have a marked increase on standardized reading scores and reduce the need for teacher discipline — a big deal for Black students who are disproportionately punished for behavior in school. Students engaging with arts education had a nearly 4 percent reduction in discipline, a 13 percent increase in standardized writing scores, and an 8 percent increase in compassion for others.

The good news is that most public school children have access to arts education—whether that’s painting, music, writing or many other forms. According to a 2019 report from the Arts Education Data Project, 96% of K-12 students have access to arts education, with 65% participating. 

However, that access is not guaranteed for all children, especially in Florida where public schools are being hollowed out by school vouchers at an increasing rate. So what does this mean for low-income and Black children who, according to a 2020 Knight Foundation study, “report lower levels of access to arts and cultural activities than higher-income or White residents.”

Without the arts, there are voices that will go unheard, and their attachment to the community will be diminished.

It’s hard for me to think that was not the goal.

The beauty of art, aside from the aesthetics, is that it not only comments on the status quo, but challenges it. Nina Simone, Marvin Gaye, and Public Enemy have turned art into social commentary. That commentary spawns action and activism. To undermine that endeavor feels like a calculated move from a governor who has regularly shown his disdain for dissenting voices.

This is the same governor banning books by authors whose stories and identities veer too close to some ugly truths instead of the jingoistic fantasy he has in his head. His rejection of AP Black Studies was partly due to his inability to reconcile how queer experiences related to the Black experience — has he never heard of playwright Lorraine Hansberry, author James Baldwin or dancer Alvin Ailey? 

I suspect he does know who these people are — but they all made art that challenges his worldview that America is a land with no rough edges, no deep-seated conflicts that have left scars on multiple generations. He and his extremist pals prefer an America that has only done the right thing. In this way, there is no trouble — only troublemakers; anyone who dares to remind us that we still have a long road to true equality must be silenced.

To paraphrase the great John Lewis, we must remain troublemakers. Whether we do that by casting a ballot or writing a song, we must insist on searching for an imagined tomorrow to make today a better place. We must stay connected to the ones before us who inspired us through music, books, plays and movies. Let’s dance, paint, sculpt, and write our brave new future into the soil of this country so we will never forget our past or give up on our glorious future.

This article was originally published by Word In Black.

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Word In Black’s owners and publishers tell why Harris has the leadership experience we need for a free, prosperous, and more just future. 

By Word In Black Owners

As the next presidential election rapidly approaches, our nation is, without question, at a crossroads. To the left is continued racial, economic and social progress; to the right is regression, division and the ongoing resurrection of overt, violent White supremacy. 

Therefore, the result of November’s vote will not only define the trajectory of America in general but also determine the fate of Black America in particular, with far-reaching consequences that could last for generations. 

With such historically high stakes on the table — and an election in which the Black vote could be a decisive factor — we at Word In Black wholeheartedly, and without question endorse Vice President Kamala Harris for the next president of the United States. It is our first-ever political endorsement, and we make it without reservation.

At this pivotal moment in American history, Harris represents the change we want to see now. She is a transformational figure, poised to make history not only as the first woman to serve the nation as commander-in-chief but also as the first Black woman, first HBCU graduate and first member of a Black Greek letter organization to hold the most powerful job on earth.

Our endorsement, however, begins with President Joe Biden, who is among the most effective champions for Black America in history and who chose her as his running mate. The Biden-Harris administration created 2.6 million jobs for Black workers, cut child poverty in half, grew Black household wealth, and slashed insulin and asthma inhaler prices. They forgave $168.5 billion in student loan debt, pushed to close the Black-White digital divide, made meaningful investments in policies to fight climate change, and appointed a record number of Black judges to the federal bench. 

The president also demonstrated unparalleled leadership, selflessness and patriotism by withdrawing from the 2024 presidential race and endorsing Harris to replace him on the Democratic Party ticket. She will almost assuredly continue his agenda, but with the added perspective of her lived experience in Black spaces.

Harris has impressive credentials: former San Francisco district attorney, former California attorney general, former U.S. senator, current vice president. Her personal story — child of immigrant activist parents, Howard University graduate, member of Alpha Kappa Alpha Sorority Inc., the first Black woman to hold statewide elected office in California — is compelling. She is a fearless champion of civil rights and has advocated for criminal legal system reform, access to health care and investment in underserved communities.  

Furthermore, Harris’s intelligence, tenacity, charisma and joy on the campaign trail sets her apart from her Republican opponents. Her elevation as the Democrats’ presumptive presidential nominee has electrified the campaign, generating excitement not seen since Barack Obama’s historic 2008 run to become America’s first Black president.

Consider: within the first 24 hours of Harris’ candidacy, her campaign took in a stunning $81 million — the largest single-day fundraising effort in American political history. The total included some $3 million in small-dollar, grassroots donations from an impromptu fundraising drive led solely by Black men and women. 

It is clear evidence that Harris’ presence in the nation’s highest office will be an unprecedented step toward greater representation and inclusion of diverse voices at the highest levels of government.

For nearly 200 years, we in the Black press have stood for freedom, justice, equality, and democracy. We have spoken truth to power, especially when others in the mainstream, White-owned media have avoided it, or have actively spread falsehoods about our leaders and our communities. 

Hear us, then, when we say Harris represents the best hope of defeating two existential threats to Black America: the return of the former president, a bigoted, twice-impeached convicted felon and purported rapist who is attempting to divide America; and Project 2025 — a radical, far-right political, economic and social agenda he will almost certainly implement if he wins the White House. 

For us at Word in Black, the choice for president is as obvious as it is historic. The Republican nominee represents an America that will return to its ugly, violent, racist past, a time when we were treated like second-class citizens and our communities were under constant threat. Harris represents a new generation of leadership, a future built on optimism, inclusion and continued progress toward a more perfect union. 

On Tuesday, November 5, 2024, Black Americans have an opportunity to determine which version of the nation we want for ourselves and our children. We, the owners and publishers of Word In Black, encourage our readers and supporters to join us in supporting Vice President Kamala Harris in her extraordinary presidential campaign.

Together, we can make a difference and ensure that our voices are heard in shaping the future of our country.

The post Kamala Harris for President appeared first on AFRO American Newspapers.

By Tierra Stone
AFRO Intern
tierrastone@afro.com

As the rain came to a standstill on the afternoon of July 21, family and friends gathered at Leith Walk Elementary and Middle school to celebrate the life of Cortez Lemon. The teen was fatally stabbed on July 10 after a verbal altercation on a Maryland Transportation Authority (MTA) bus. 

Cortez completed his eighth grade year in June 2024 at Leith Walk Elementary and Middle School, which is located in the heart of Northeast Baltimore. He had hopes of attending highschool thereafter. Unfortunately, his life ended in the hot summer months that preceded the first day of his freshman year.

Leith Walk principal, Ashanti Porter, opened the ceremony and had the attendees gather around in a circle as the ceremony began. 

“As a school leader you pray to God that you never have to do one of these moments,” said Porter. “You pray that when you bring the community together that we’re doing it for a joyous reason, but today– as the Leith Walk family– we come together to honor and celebrate the life of our Cortez Lemon.” 

Throughout the ceremony some of Lemon’s family and friends came up gradually to share their memories of the late 14 year old. Many people described him as a leader who loved to play football and who Porter endearingly called “our baby” as she explained the relationship between Lemon and the student body.

“You had him in the evening time, but he was our baby in the daytime— it didn’t matter what he did, he was our baby,” said Porter, as she addressed the Lemon family.  

As the vigil drew to a close, the attendees blew bubbles and stood in a moment of silence in remembrance of Lemon. The AFRO caught up with some of the attendees as they shared some of their fondest memories with Cortez. 

Vonela Lancaster, who works with the IEP department for Leith Walk, shared that Lemon was considered a peacemaker around his peers. 

“I’ve been here for 28 years. I watched him grow from five all the way to fourteen,” she said. 

“When he was in middle school and if his friends would get into a little situation, he was the person who would say ‘look we’re gonna leave this alone, we’re not fighting and we’re not having all this bad behavior—just let it go man it’s gonna be ok’ and that’s who he was,” said Lancaster. 

Bethany Newsome, the school’s counselor, shared insight into Lemons’ personality on a daily basis. 

“Cortez was kind, he was sweet, he was thoughtful, reflective, funny, and very polite—he was a gentle soul,” she said. 

Even though Baltimore has been known to have an enriching history, in recent years it has garnered the reputation of being one of the most dangerous cities in America. The vigil served not only as a tribute to Lemons’ life, but some of the attendees wanted this day to be a message of putting a stop to the inner city violence. 

Newsome didn’t hold back as she explained what she wanted the vigil to represent to the youth that were in attendance. 

“It’s an opportunity to reflect and remember to spread love, peace and kindness,” she said.

Porter agreed as she shared what message she wanted the youth to gain from the ceremony and how she wants all of her kids to be safe. 

“I just want all my kids to be safe,” she said. “I want all of my babies to understand that there are some real life consequences for the things we do. We have a huge support community for all of our students right now, and we want them to know that they are loved, they are appreciated, they are honored, and we just want them to do their best all the time.” 

Eighth grade science teacher Zakiya Kent, not only weighed in on the kind of student Lemon was but how she wants him to be remembered. 

“I want people to remember that he was still a child,” she said. “He was somebody’s child and he still had a lot to learn and he deserved that time to learn those things, and with him being a child he made mistakes, but he always tried to make them right — and that’s a sign right there that he would have grown up to be a wonderful man.”

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The Democratic Party says it’s an inclusive of women and people of color. It’s time to prove it and get behind Kamala Harris.

By Keith Boykin
Word in Black

“Black Vote, Black Power,” a collaboration between Keith Boykin and Word In Black,
examines the issues, the candidates, and what’s at stake for Black America in the 2024 presidential election.

“There are decades when nothing happens, and there are weeks when decades happen.”  

That’s what it felt like this week when President Joe Biden dropped out of the race for re-election and endorsed Vice President Kamala Harris to be the Democratic Party’s new nominee.

Now the party must unite behind Kamala Harris, allow her to pick a new running mate, and move on to defeat Donald Trump.

After weeks of Democratic in-fighting, Biden’s historic withdrawal shifts the momentum away from the Republican Party and back toward the Democrats heading into their convention in Chicago next month.

The great stunt queen, Donald Trump, thought he won the publicity wars last week when he dramatically announced his new running mate, the inexperienced freshman Ohio Sen. J.D. Vance, and told the world the story of surviving an assassination attempt in his rambling 90-minute convention speech.

Now that’s old news, and we have a fundamentally different race. Instead of a contest between two unpopular, old White guys, the new race pits a 59-year-old Black woman against a 78-year-old convicted felon. 

It’s the past versus the future. An all-White-male Republican ticket or a Democratic ticket led by an accomplished Black woman. A party that carries the heavy baggage of scandals, impeachments, indictments, and 34 felony convictions from Donald Trump or a party that has an opportunity to reinvent itself with Kamala Harris.

I’ve said all along that I will support the Democratic nominee for president, but I’ve publicly worried about the donor class and wondered if they would accept Harris as the new nominee. 

Some floated ideas of an open primary or a “blitz primary” with candidate forums moderated by Republicans like Condoleezza Rice. And TV producer Aaron Sorkin even suggested the ridiculous idea that Democrats should nominate Republican Mitt Romney for president.

No, no, and no.

Now is the time for the Democratic Party to step up. 

All those Democratic donors and party insiders who spent the past few weeks pushing Biden out of the race better pony up their money, time, and energy and start contributing to Kamala Harris’ campaign and the Democratic Party. This is the new Plan B.

We’ve heard a lot of Democratic names floated for president in the past few weeks: Gavin Newsom, Gretchen Whitmer, Josh Shapiro, Pete Buttigieg, Wes Moore, Andy Beshear, and Mark Kelly. But now that President Biden has endorsed Vice President Harris, I hope and expect those leaders will stand down and support her, if for no other reason than loyalty to President Biden. 

But also because there are financial obstacles if Democrats nominate someone other than Harris. Harris was Biden’s running mate, so she can tap into the $96 million Biden has in the  bank. Any new candidate may have to start from scratch. Let’s not make this any more complicated than it needs to be.

Now is the time for the Democratic Party to step up. You say you are an inclusive party of women and people of color. It’s time to prove it and get behind Kamala Harris. The Congressional Black Caucus quickly announced its support for Harris.

Donald Trump is a threat to democracy. He must be defeated. We have the power to stop Project 2025 and Agenda 47. 

The wind is finally at our backs. Let’s get to work.

Keith Boykin is a New York Times–bestselling author, TV and film producer, and former CNN political commentator. A graduate of Dartmouth College and Harvard Law School, Keith served in the White House, cofounded the National Black Justice Coalition, cohosted the BET talk show My Two Cents, and taught at the Institute for Research in African-American Studies at Columbia University in New York. He’s a Lambda Literary Award-winning author and editor of seven books. He lives in Los Angeles.

This article was originally published on WordinBlack.com.

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By Anissa Durham
Word In Black

If you’re feeling suicidal or concerned that someone you know may be in danger of hurting themselves, call or text the National Suicide Prevention Lifeline at 988. The lifeline is available 24 hours a day, seven days a week and is staffed by trained counselors.

How much time do you spend on social media each day? 

The use of social media has recently come under fire by politicians proposing a ban on TikTok and advising parents to set restrictions for their children. More and more research is coming out that says social media is linked to poor overall mental health. Teens often use popular platforms to connect with others and get support. 

But, for Black teens, what is the danger? 

Here’s what we know 

On average, teens spend about five hours a day on YouTube, TikTok and Instagram. In a 2023 Pew Research Center survey of 13- to 17-year-old teens, Black and Hispanic teens are more likely to say they are online almost constantly. 

The 2023 Gallup Familial Adolescent Health Survey shows that teens who spent four to five hours on social media per day experienced higher rates of worry, sadness, anger and overall poor mental health. Higher social media use was associated with a significantly higher risk of mental health problems for teens. 

Mental health outcomes are reportedly worse for teens with weak parental relationships. The strength of the relationship, in addition to regulation of screen time and supervision contributes to less social media use. 

According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, suicide rates for Black people aged 10-24 changed significantly from 2018 to 2021, with an increase from 8.2 percent to 11.2 percent. As a result, researchers have been exploring what factors are contributing to suicidal ideation and suicide among Black youth. 

A 2024 study explores how Black adolescents experience online racial discrimination and the link to suicidal ideation and traumatic stress. Researchers found an indirect association between online racial discrimination and suicidal ideation among the 525 participants. 

Additionally, the Gallup survey found that teens who spent five hours or more on social media experienced two to three times higher rates of suicidal ideation, self-harm behavior in the past year, and poor body image.

A psychiatrist weighs in

Khadijah Booth Watkins, associate director of the Child and Adolescent Psychiatry training program at Massachusetts General Hospital, says racism and discrimination are considered an adverse childhood experience — alongside domestic violence, neglect, abuse and poverty. 

It’s important for teens to feel safe and connected, but the repeated exposure of people who look like them being victimized on social media is stressful. This reverberates into mental health issues, how the body functions and sleep disturbances. 

“For Black and Brown kids, there’s an extra layer of being exposed to so much discrimination and racism … that makes them vulnerable to depression and anxiety,” she says. 

Watkins also has concerns about how often teens are using social media and what it takes away from them. For example, social media often provides a false sense of reality, which can make it difficult for young people to have realistic expectations. 

“Young people are incredibly impressionable,” she says.  

Research on long-term effects is still underway. But Watkins says it’s becoming more challenging for young people to understand how to read between the lines on social media. 

“What we’re seeing is a group of people who can’t tolerate adversity, frustration and an inability to understand the concept of delayed gratification,” she says. “You can scroll endlessly … and for young people, it stimulates this area of the reward system. It’s harder for them to pump the brakes … so they’re constantly chasing this sense of pleasure and gratification.”

Last summer, the U.S. Surgeon General, Vivek H. Murthy, released an advisory on social media and youth mental health. The 25-page report details the positive and negative impacts of social media on children and adolescents. And examines the different harms youth experience as they use social media.  

A few weeks ago, Dr. Murthy published an op-ed in the New York Times, calling for a warning label to be placed on social media platforms — similar to warning labels placed on cigarettes. 

“An advisory warning is great,” Watkins says. “But, I think the solution is going to be education around what you do. Modeling and teaching young people how to build healthy habits and a healthy relationship with social media.” 

This article was originally published by Word In Black.

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By Rev. Dorothy S. Boulware
Word In Black

When you talk to Rae Lewis-Thornton, you discover that she’s full of faith and humor—and she’s determined to live life to the fullest. 

The ordained Baptist minister, 62, does so even though she has AIDS. Her days, which she spends educating people about the disease, demand a strict regimen of survival strategies. But she’s up to the challenge.

“The life expectancy of AIDS is certainly different than when I was diagnosed in 1987. I mean, if you had lived three years, you were a long-term survivor,” Thornton says. “But living with AIDS is a lifelong challenge.” 

And her life has always been about faith and purpose.

The role of faith in her journey

Thornton’s faith journey started in childhood, guided by her grandmother who took her to church. She says she was always loved by the pastors of the two churches she attended until she was on her own. Later, the support she received from her pastors and other members of the faith community helped her navigate the difficulties of her diagnosis.

“AIDS was still new, and people didn’t know what to do,” she says. “We knew about gay, white men being afflicted, but when it landed in the Black community — especially the church community — it was a real problem.”

However, Thornton says “The church has come a long way since many pronounced AIDS to be a punishment from God.” 

The enduring HIV/AIDS crisis

While her personal faith community has always been present and supportive, Thornton is concerned that many people mistakenly think HIV and AIDS are a thing of the past, or at least not much of a problem. Data, however, shows exactly the opposite.

According to the latest estimates from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, approximately 31,800 new HIV infections occurred in the United States in 2022. Annual infections in the U.S. have been reduced by more than two-thirds since the height of the epidemic in the mid-1980s. Further, CDC estimates of annual HIV infections in the United States show hopeful signs of progress in recent years.

Although people who identify as Black and/or African American made up approximately 12 percent of the population of the United States in 2022, they accounted for 37 percent of the estimated new HIV infections — more than any other racial or ethnic group. 

Thornton says people also think care and maintenance if you get HIV is minimal, as is the need for testing. Nothing could be further from the truth.

“I’m no longer on 31 pills a day,” she says. “My specific HIV regimen is eight pills, but I’ll never be able to do the one pill a day because I’ve been infected for a very long time, and I’ve developed a resistance to some of the meds because that was all we had. And compliance is incredibly important.” 

Caring for her mental health

And it’s not just the physical concerns that she deals with. 

“I experience a couple days a week with some level of fatigue, which shouldn’t happen theoretically if your viral load is undetectable. But sometimes, it’s just hard to get through the day. Depression is also common with HIV,” Thornton says.

“So I take my antidepressants and see my therapist regularly. People say to me, well, you’re happy. Yes, I’m happy because I’m doing what I need to care for my mental health as well as the physical.”

She says she’s probably happier than she’s been in a very long time because she’s at peace.

A private diagnosis made public

Thornton initially kept her HIV diagnosis to herself. But in 1994, she made the transition to AIDS. 

The first person she told was Rev. Jesse Jackson — then head of Rainbow/ PUSH. Thornton worked as the national youth director for Jackson’s presidential campaign in 1984 and 1988. She also told his wife, Jacqueline Jackson, who had taken Thornton under her wing as her special charge. 

“They immediately prayed for me and even suggested I move back into their household, because a diagnosis back then was nothing less than a death sentence and they didn’t want me to die alone,” she says.

A mission to educate others

That same year, she became an AIDS educator, speaking at public schools across Chicagoland. She soon took her message of hope wherever she was called to go. In December of 1994, her activism landed her on the cover of Essence. The headline read: “I’m young, I’m educated, I’m drug-free, and I’m dying of AIDS.”

Two years later, “in 1996, I did a series with CBS ‘Living with AIDS’ that I won an Emmy award for,” she says.

Those same two pastors from her childhood churches found out about her status after they saw the program on their local Chicago CBS affiliate.  

“The one pastor who always called me Rae Rae, called the television station. When I answered, he asked, ‘Is that my Rae Rae?’ As he had done since I was a child.”

She was likewise supported by her Chicago pastor, Rev. Clay Evans, an internationally known gospel singer, and pastor of Fellowship Chicago Church of God. 

“He was loving and tender and also found out by seeing me on television. He called me to the front of the church during the service, and I was terrified because this was something he was known to do, and who knew what would come next? He asked if that had been me he had seen on television. When I said yes, he just said, we’ll have to have you talk to our young people. And that was that.”

As she wrote in her memoir “Unprotected,” published in 2022:  

“I was a full member of the Christian family. I now belong to a family that wanted me. I cried tears of happiness… I was too young to fully understand what it meant to become a Christian… but if I had not found the church when I did, I don’t know how I would have made it… what I know for sure today is that God heard my cry literally and created a path for me that the light to help me maneuver through the darkness in my life.”

Her faith family has been an unexpected — but so necessary — gift to Thornton’s survival. Despite the headline of the Essence cover story, Thornton’s still alive and aging with HIV. She continues to advocate for HIV/AIDS awareness, proper testing, and comprehensive care, and she’ll never stop giving thanks to God.

“You’re going to need a God, whoever your God is,” Thornton says. “It’s imperative. You’re going to need God every step of the way.”

This article was originally published on WordInBlack.com.

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On June 29, Rev. William Barber III will convene The Mass Poor People’s and Low-Wage Workers’ Assembly and Moral March on Washington D.C. and to the Polls, a somewhat unwieldy name for what could be a big political flex.

By Rev. Dorothy S. Boulware
Word in Black

Overview:

Reminiscent of Rev. Martin Luther King Jr.’s March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom, the upcoming rally on the National Mall is intended to change the narrative around poverty and politics.

There are over 140 million poor and low-income people in the U.S.  In most cases, in the richest nation on Earth, their lives are defined by what they don’t have — healthcare, food, housing, a job that pays a living wage. 

The Right Rev. William Barber, an anti-poverty activist and community organizer, will try to change that narrative this weekend by reminding politicians what poor people do have: the power to vote. 

On June 29, Barber, the founding director of the Center for Public Theology at Yale Divinity School, will convene the Mass Poor People’s and Low-Wage Workers’ Assembly and Moral March on Washington D.C. and to the Polls, a gathering on the National Mall designed to flex the political muscle of low-income Americans. 

Though it echoes a similar rally Martin Luther King Jr. held some six decades earlier, the Mass Poor People’s March march will “launch a season of continued outreach to 15 million poor and low wage infrequent voters ahead of the 2024 U.S. elections and beyond,” Barber said in a statement.

“We will be demanding that both political parties heed the needs of poor and low-wage people, who we will be working to organize into America’s most potent swing voting bloc,” he said, adding his signature phrase: “It’s not just a march, it’s a movement.”

In other words, the event is intended to send a message to both President Joe Biden and his rival, former President Donald Trump and lawmakers in Congress: poor people will no longer be ignored. And in 2024, where Biden and Trump are running neck-and-neck for the presidency, every vote will matter. 

With poverty defined as a household of four making less than $31,000,  the data alone hints at poor voters’ potential to move the political needle. 

Consider:  almost 39 million children are living in poverty, according to the Repairers of the Breach website. But the largest number of poor people in the U.S. are White, at around 65 million. 

Still, economic justice issues have remained on the fringes of our nation’s public and political discourse for decades, 

At a rally earlier this month, the Rev. Dr. Liz Theoharis, co-chair of the Poor People’s Campaign, said the nation must do better for the less fortunate.

“Given the abundance that exists in this country and the fundamental dignity inherent to all humanity, every person in this nation has the right to demand dignified jobs and living wages, housing, education, health care and welfare,” she said. “But the truth is that millions of Americans are denied those fundamental rights, and thousands are dying as a result.”

Along with demonstrating political power, the event comes with a list of demands for lawmakers. They include abolishing poverty as the fourth leading cause of death in the U.S., hiking the minimum wage to at least $15 per hour, expanded access to the ballot box and universal healthcare. 

Appearing on “The Daily Show with Jon Stewart” last week, Barber said he also wants to change racial stereotypes and erase perceptions about poverty in America — including the fact that White people make up the majority of low-income households. 

“I told him (Stewart) the truth about poverty in America: that we have over 135 million poor and low-wage people in this country, 60 percent of Black people are poor or low wealth,” said Barber, co-author of  “White Poverty: How Exposing Myths About Race and Class Can Reconstruct American Democracy, in a statement. “That’s 26 million people. But in terms of raw numbers, a whopping 66 million White people are in the same category – 40 million more people.”

On June 29 at the march, “we plan to address the needs of all of America, poor and low wage people, by building a moral fusion movement,” he said. 

Barber went further in an appearance on CNN. 

“We will have White women from West Virginia and Black women from the Delta standing together to demand a moral public policy agenda that makes it so that poverty is no longer the fourth-leading cause of death in the United States,” he said. 

This article was originally published on WordinBlack.com.

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By Rev. Dorothy S. Boulware
Word in Black

One of the most exciting pieces of news from the 2024 Hampton Ministers Conference is the launch of Hampton University’s School of Religion, which offers the usual degrees in religion and theology, and is now the first HBCU to offer a doctorate. 

“It’s more than a dream come true. It’s much needed at this time in the life of the Black church and the Black community. Churches need as much support and assistance as we can give them,” says the Rev. Dr. Debra L. Haggins, founding dean of the School of Religion, executive director and treasurer of the Hampton University Ministers’ Conference, and Hampton’s first woman chaplain.

“Theological education is changing. It’s a post-COVID education. People are going to church differently with different expectations,” Haggins says.

She says COVID brought to the forefront a culture of consumerism in the church, and people are making choices unlike those previously made.

“Not only have we survived COVID, but the paradigm has literally shifted. We now rely on the creative side of worship; technology to broadcast, social media platforms like Meta live. Technology came together to keep the church alive, and we rely heavily on it now,” Haggins says. 

Not only is the school already in full operation, but its first partnership has been formed with the Church of God in Christ Second Jurisdiction of Virginia.

“We are thrilled to announce that the Church of God in Christ is our very first partner with the School of Religion,” said Hampton University President Darrell K. Williams in a statement. “Together, we are shaping the future of religious education and leadership, stepping forward to support our mission of preparing inspired and effective leaders for the 21st century.”

The Church of God in Christ (C.O.G.I.C.) is one of the largest Pentecostal denominations in the world. Founded in 1907, C.O.G.I.C. is known for its commitment to spiritual growth, community service and social justice.

“The collaboration between C.O.G.I.C. and Hampton University’s School of Religion is a remarkable opportunity to enhance spiritual education and leadership,” said Bishop Michael B. Golden Jr., one of the youngest bishops of C.O.G.I.C. “We are honored to be the inaugural partner in this endeavor, and we look forward to the positive impact this will have on our communities and beyond.”

“The School of Religion is a dream realized for Hampton University and the faith community,” said Haggins in a statement. “This institution will provide a comprehensive and inclusive platform for theological education, research, and spiritual development. We are excited about our partnership with C.O.G.I.C. and we’re committed to fostering a new generation of leaders who are well-equipped to address the challenges of our time.”

The School of Religion offers a diverse range of programs and initiatives, including:

• Degree Programs: Undergraduate, graduate, and doctoral programs in theology, religious studies, and ministry.
• Continuing Education: Workshops, seminars, and certificate programs for clergy and lay leaders.
• Research and Publications: A robust agenda of research projects and publications aimed at advancing religious scholarship and practice.

“Our online classes are cutting edge technology, custom built and contextually appropriate,” Haggins says, adding that applications are being accepted for the doctoral level through July 15 and all other levels through July 30.

The new school is also bringing 32 new professors to Hampton, and they’ve already experienced extensive training and two faculty retreats. 

One of those new professors is the Rev. Drew Kyndall Ross, senior pastor of New Hope Baptist Church in Hackensack, New Jersey, who says his passion for teaching at a seminary level started while studying for his master of divinity in 2011. 

“It was then that I began having a desire to teach preaching,” Ross says. “Last year, I started a Ph.D. program to eventually teach preaching. When I saw that Hampton University’s new School of Religion was accepting new professors, I quickly applied.

“The opportunity at Hampton has been a dream come true. It gives me a chance to teach in a field of study that I love. It also allows me to make an impact on preachers who are seeking to sharpen their skills. I am looking forward to this new journey as an extension of my preaching and pastoral ministry.”

This story was originally published on WordinBlack.com.

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Jeremy Allen, Executive Editor
Michigan Chronicle

Dr. William “Bill” Pickard – entrepreneur, philanthropist, education advocate, business titan, mentor, and visionary – passed away peacefully Wednesday, June 12, at his West Palm Beach, Fla. home, surrounded by family and loved ones.

Dr. Pickard’s daughter, Mary Pickard, issued the following statement: “On behalf of the Pickard family, we extend our heartfelt gratitude for the love and support during this difficult time. Your kindness has provided immense comfort. We are deeply touched by the memories shared, which highlight the impact my dad had on so many lives. Thank you for standing by us as we navigate our grief. We kindly ask for privacy to allow our family to heal. Funeral arrangements will be announced soon.”

Born in the modest confines of Georgia, Dr. Pickard’s early life was steeped in the values of hard work and education. His family’s migration to Flint, Michigan, was a pivotal moment that set the stage for his future successes. It was in Flint that Dr. Pickard began to forge his path, starting with an associate’s degree from Mott College in 1962. His academic journey did not stop there; he earned a degree in sociology from Western Michigan University in 1964, followed by a master’s degree in social work from the University of Michigan in 1965, and ultimately a Ph.D. from Ohio State University.

Dr. Pickard’s entrepreneurial spirit was ignited in 1971 when he purchased his first McDonald’s franchise in Detroit. This initial venture was the cornerstone of a business empire that would span several industries and impact communities across North America. By 1989, Dr. Pickard founded the Global Automotive Alliance (GAA) Manufacturing, a holding company that generated over $5 billion in sales through its network of automotive parts manufacturers. His ability to navigate and succeed in the competitive world of business was unparalleled, making him one of the most influential Black businessmen in the nation.

However, Dr. Pickard’s legacy extends far beyond his business achievements. His commitment to philanthropy and community service was equally remarkable. A proud member of Alpha Phi Alpha Fraternity, Inc., Dr. Pickard was deeply invested in the upliftment of the Black community. His contributions to education were vast and impactful, highlighted by his more than $3 million donations to his alma mater, Western Michigan University, resulting in the construction of new campus facilities named in his honor. Additionally, he donated more than $2 million to Morehouse College to support Black male students from Detroit, Flint, and his birthplace, La Grange, Georgia.

Pickard, who co-owns Real Times Media and Michigan Chronicle, has generated more than $5 billion dollars in sales through GAA, with eight plants in the U.S. and Canada, servicing Boeing, Mercedes Benz, Ford, General Motors, Delphi, Johnson Controls, Starbucks, The Home Depot and Merck & Co. Pharmaceuticals. Black Enterprise honored Dr. Pickard as one of the 50 most Influential Black Entrepreneurs over the past 50 years.

Beyond that, Dr. Pickard has served on numerous business and non-profit boards including Asset Acceptance Capital Corporation, Michigan National Bank, LaSalle Bank, Business Leaders for Michigan, National Urban League, Detroit Symphony Orchestra, Detroit Black Chamber of Commerce, the Board of Directors of the National Park Foundation, and is a lifetime member of Alpha Phi Alpha Fraternity.

In 2019, Michigan Governor Gretchen Whitmer awarded Dr. Pickard “The Michigan Lifetime Humanitarian Award,” and he was awarded “Michiganian of the Year” for his exemplary business success, civic leadership, and philanthropy.

He was the first Chairman of the African Development Foundation in 1982, appointed by President Ronald Reagan, and under President George H.W. Bush, he was appointed to The National Advisory Committee on Trade Policy Negotiations (1990) and the Federal Home Loan Bank Board – Indianapolis Bank of Indiana (1991). In February 2021, he was appointed by the Commonwealth of the Bahamas as the first-ever honorary consul for the State of Michigan.

“The world has lost a true visionary and trailblazer with the passing of Dr. William F. Pickard. He was not only my esteemed business partner and colleague, but a dear friend whose wisdom, guidance, and unwavering belief in me changed the course of my life,” said Hiram E. Jackson, Publisher of Michigan Chronicle and CEO of Real Times Media.

“Dr. Pickard’s pioneering spirit, coupled with his brilliant mind and generous heart, left an indelible mark on the business world and inspired countless others to dream big. His legacy of entrepreneurship, philanthropy, and uplifting the Black community will forever be etched in history. I am eternally grateful for the opportunity to have walked alongside this giant among men. While his physical presence may be gone, Dr. Pickard’s impact on me and so many others will reverberate for generations to come. Rest in eternal peace, my friend and mentor.”

Born on Jan. 28, 1941, Dr. Pickard notably said to the Clark Atlanta graduating class of 2017: “I’m from LaGrange, Georgia, a very small town, but I have a simple belief about life. Anybody from anywhere can accomplish anything. But you must put the work in.”

That was Dr. Pickard’s spirit. That’s what made him special.

Funeral arrangements will be forthcoming. The family has asked for privacy at this time but wants to thank the community for their prayers and support.

Senior Reporter Ebony JJ Curry contributed to this report.

This article was originally published by the Michigan Chronicle

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By Renata Sago
Word in Black 

Erika Broadwater’s career began 33 years ago with a phone call. A former colleague had seen her work as an intern and invited her to apply as a marketing administrator. The position was ideal. She had just earned a business degree. 

“My résumé was by typewriter,” she remembers. “But you had to, back then, go to the location and complete a paper application. There were no online portals for you to digitally apply.”

Broadwater now manages recruiters and implements some of the applicant tracking systems (ATS) that collect data from job websites. She is also CEO of the National Association of African Americans in Human Resources. Although how people navigate the market has greatly shifted from when Broadwater started working, she says one thing has remained the same: name bias. 

“We have been paying a lot more attention in bringing more awareness to that stereotype, and it really is both gender and ethnic-focused,” she says. “We do know through common language — and this is in every culture for the most part, except for, perhaps, those countries and continents within the Middle East — where a name with the ending of an A is usually associated with a woman. But there are some cultures that it’s not.” 

The pressure to secure employment in this economy can lead Black job seekers to think about changing their names. An analysis of 2022 data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics finds that 83.6 percent of Black graduates, ages 20 to 29, were employed soon after receiving associate, bachelor’s, or advanced degrees. The percentage of unemployed talent was 8.7 percent — higher than self-identifying Asian, Hispanic, and white graduates.

A report out this year from Strada Institute for the Future of Work and the Burning Glass Institute finds that one year after graduating, 60 percent of Black graduates were underemployed. This percentage was higher compared to other groups. Five years later, the underemployment percentage rate was higher than other groups, too. 

Social media influencers humorize the job search process, boasting in mockumentary-style interviews about how proficient they are at Excel formulas or group projects while displaying extreme incompetence once hired. Exaggerating skill sets might be a typical practice among entry-level candidates. Shortening and completely changing names takes place at all levels. Candidates with strong ethnic names might put a more ethnically ambiguous or “whitened” version of their name on an application. This can draw more attention from the hiring team. 

“I can guarantee my name has positively influenced my chances for employment,” Amber Chatham tells Word In Black. “I can recall multiple instances of the hiring manager or whoever was conducting the interview, having a look of slight, almost imperceptible shock on their face when they called me from the lobby, expecting to see someone else. As a biracial woman, I’ve encountered this both professionally and in my personal life countless times.” 

Chatham is a human resources practitioner who screens hundreds of applicants with algorithms that she believes sometimes overlook qualified candidates. It’s tougher in this economy, especially for entry-level candidates. Hundreds of people might be applying for one position that decision-makers don’t fill for different reasons, she says. 

The stability of certain industries fluctuates from year to year, with some candidates pivoting temporarily until their desired industry is back afloat. According to a surveyfrom the National Association of Colleges and Employers, social services and engineering employers are planning to increase hires for the 2023-2024 academic year. The accounting services and electronics manufacturing industries are planning to decrease hires. 

Broadwater with the NAAAHR says Black graduates entering the market this year need to seek professional mentors to talk them through their résumés, salary expectations, and long-term goals. “This generation seems to only want to stay in a job for two to three years. There is no longevity, so there is essentially no commitment. You couple that with looking to come out of school making six figures, and that’s almost unheard of in very competitive instances.”

Staying connected to alumni groups is helpful for learning about opportunities and staying motivated. There are also several organizations — Blacks in HR, Hire Black Now, and The Black HR Society, for example — that offer virtual and in-person support. 

This article was originally published by Word in Black. 

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By Joseph Williams
Word In Black

What some teachers see as disruptive behavior in Black children closely tracks broader symptoms of attention-deficit disorder 

When a new Centers for Disease Control and Prevention report last week revealed that one in nine children in the U.S. are diagnosed with attention deficit hyperactivity disorder, experts said the data reflects a surge in cases since 2016 — and a growing understanding of how the disorder affects children, including struggles with attention, hyperactivity and impulsiveness.  

The rise in ADHD diagnoses, however, comes at a time when several studies show Black children are substantially more likely to face punishment in school than White children for vaguely defined disruptions — defiance, disruption and insubordination — that could mirror ADHD symptoms.

Coupled with the fact that Black children are less likely to receive treatment for the disorder than White children, it’s easy to see how school suspensions and ADHD overlap. That nexus could shine new light on the disproportionately high disciplining of Black children in public schools as well as the lack of resources and counseling for the disorder.

“I think it’s a really important issue,” says Sharif El-Mekki, founder and CEO of the Center for Black Educator Development, a nonprofit organization. “On one hand, Black kids — Black boys in particular, but Black girls too — are misdiagnosed” with more severe psychological problems such as schizophrenia when it could be ADHD. 

“I think it’s a combination of being under-diagnosed and over-diagnosed for, you know, for sometimes the very same thing,” he says.

According to the CDC report, an estimated seven million children ages three to 17 have been diagnosed with ADHD, or roughly 11.4 percent of the nation’s school-age population. The data, compiled from a national survey of parents in 2022, also found that boys are nearly twice as likely to get a diagnosis than girls, and that Black and White children are diagnosed at the same rate (12 percent). 

The report found nearly 80 percent of kids with ADHD diagnoses had a co-occurring problem, like anxiety or depression. But almost half of the children had a behavior or conduct problem, including oppositional defiant disorder, a condition whose symptoms include anger, refusal to comply with instructions, or resentment. 

Although the CDC study found they are about as likely as White children to get an ADHD diagnosis, Black children diagnosed with ADHD “are less likely than their White counterparts to receive treatment,” according to a 2022 study published in the journal Psychiatric Services. Further, “Once Black and Hispanic children with ADHD receive treatment, they may be more likely than White children to disengage from treatment or to receive poorer-quality care.”

The reasons range from cultural issues with mental health to less access to quality healthcare and bias among caregivers in the largely-White field of behavioral medicine. 

Those problems can manifest themselves in the classroom, experts say, resulting in the kind of behavior that gets students disciplined, suspended, or kicked out of school. But El-Mekki says the problem runs more deeply, including unequal resources between Black and White schools — particularly when it comes to school counselors and resources. 

“One thing is just the cultural incompetence that occurs by educators” who are more likely to be White, he says.  “The lens (they) use to view students — what might be normal (ADHD) behavior is often viewed as problematic” to the point where “children get over-policed.”

At the same time, there may be other factors that can exacerbate that behavior, ranging from a tumultuous home life to poverty or abuse, as well as environmental factors, such as lead and asbestos in homes, El-Mekki says. 

Making matters worse, he says, is the fact that Black students attending mostly-White schools don’t usually have access to school counselors that look like them, while Black students at mostly-Black schools typically don’t have access to counselors at all. Studies have found that only about 18 percent of U.S. teachers are people of color, while nearly 90 percent of mental health professionals are non-Hispanic White.

“But often, we find it easier to blame children, and label them and then put them in a corner box and say, ‘This is what their problem is,’” El-Mekki says. “When that happens, it’s very easy to make excuses about why we can’t teach them — why they can’t be successful.”

This article was originally published by Word In Black.

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By Renuka Rayasam
Word in Black

For the past year and a half, Tandra Cooper Harris and her husband, Marcus, who both have diabetes, have struggled to fill their prescriptions for the medications they need to control their blood sugar.

Without Ozempic or a similar drug, Cooper Harris suffers blackouts, becomes too tired to watch her grandchildren, and struggles to earn extra money braiding hair. Marcus Harris, who works as a Waffle House cook, needs Trulicity to keep his legs and feet from swelling and bruising.

The couple’s doctor has tried prescribing similar drugs, which mimic a hormone that suppresses appetite and controls blood sugar by boosting insulin production. But those, too, are often out of stock. Other times, their insurance through the Affordable Care Act marketplace burdens the couple with a lengthy approval process or an out-of-pocket cost they can’t afford.

“It’s like, I’m having to jump through hoops to live,” said Cooper Harris, 46, a resident of Covington, Georgia, east of Atlanta.

Supply shortages and insurance hurdles for this powerful class of drugs, called GLP-1 agonists, have left many people who are suffering from diabetes and obesity without the medicines they need to stay healthy.

One root of the problem is the very high prices set by drugmakers. About 54 percent of adults who had taken a GLP-1 drug, including those with insurance, said the cost was “difficult” to afford, according to KFF poll results released this month. But it is patients with the lowest disposable incomes who are being hit the hardest. These are people with few resources who struggle to see doctors and buy healthy foods.

In the United States, Novo Nordisk charges about $1,000 for a month’s supply of Ozempic, and Eli Lilly charges a similar amount for Mounjaro. Prices for a month’s supply of different GLP-1 drugs range from $936 to $1,349 before insurance coverage, according to the Peterson-KFF Health System Tracker. Medicare spending for three popular diabetes and weight loss drugs — Ozempic, Rybelsus, and Mounjaro — reached $5.7 billion in 2022, up from $57 million in 2018, according to research by KFF.

The “outrageously high” price has “the potential to bankrupt Medicare, Medicaid, and our entire health care system,” Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.), who chairs the U.S. Senate Committee on Health, Education, Labor and Pensions, wrote in a letter to Novo Nordisk in April.

The high prices also mean that not everyone who needs the drugs can get them. “They’re kind of disadvantaged in multiple ways already, and this is just one more way,” said Wedad Rahman, an endocrinologist with Piedmont Healthcare in Conyers, Georgia. Many of Rahman’s patients, including Cooper Harris, are underserved, have high-deductible health plans, or are on public assistance programs like Medicaid or Medicare.

Many drugmakers have programs that help patients get started and stay on medicines for little or no cost. But those programs have not been reliable for medicines like Ozempic and Trulicity because of the supply shortages. And many insurers’ requirements that patients receive prior authorization or first try less expensive drugs add to delays in care.

By the time many of Rahman’s patients see her, their diabetes has gone unmanaged for years, and they’re suffering from severe complications like foot wounds or blindness. “And that’s the end of the road,” Rahman said. “I have to pick something else that’s more affordable and isn’t as good for them.”

GLP-1 agonists — the category of drugs that includes Ozempic, Trulicity, and Mounjaro — were first approved to treat diabetes. In the last three years, the Food and Drug Administration has approved rebranded versions of Mounjaro and Ozempic for weight loss, leading demand to skyrocket. And demand is only growing as more of the drugs’ benefits become apparent.

In March, the FDA approved the weight loss drug Wegovy, a version of Ozempic, to treat heart problems, which will likely increase demand, and spending. Up to 30 million Americans, or 9 percent of the U.S. population, are expected to be on a GLP-1 agonist by 2030, the financial services company J.P. Morgan estimated.

As more patients try to get prescriptions for GLP-1 agonists, drugmakers struggle to make enough doses.

Eli Lilly is urging people to avoid using its drug Mounjaro for cosmetic weight loss to ensure enough supplies for people with medical conditions. But the drugs’ popularity continues to grow despite side effects such as nausea and constipation, driven by their effectiveness and celebrity endorsements. In March, Oprah Winfrey released an hour long special on the medicines’ ability to help with weight loss.

It can seem like everyone in the world is taking this class of medication, said Jody Dushay, an assistant professor of medicine at Harvard Medical School and an endocrinologist at Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center. “But it’s kind of not as many people as you think,” she said. “There just isn’t any.”

Even when the drugs are in stock, insurers are clamping down, leaving patients and health care providers to navigate a thicket of ever-changing coverage rules. State Medicaid plans vary in their coverage of the drugs for weight loss. Medicare won’t cover the drugs if they are prescribed for obesity. And commercial insurers are tightening access due to the drugs’ cost.

Health care providers are cobbling together care plans based on what’s available and what patients can afford. For example, Cooper Harris’ insurer covers Trulicity but not Ozempic, which she said she prefers because it has fewer side effects. When her pharmacy was out of Trulicity, she had to rely more on insulin instead of switching to Ozempic, Rahman said.

One day in March, Brandi Addison, an endocrinologist in Corpus Christi, Texas, had to adjust the prescriptions for all 18 of the patients she saw because of issues with drug availability and cost, she said. One patient, insured through a teacher retirement health plan with a high deductible, couldn’t afford to be on a GLP-1 agonist, Addison said.

“Until she reaches that deductible, that’s just not a medication she can use,” Addison said. Instead, she put her patient on insulin, whose price is capped at a fraction of the cost of Ozempic, but which doesn’t have the same benefits.

“Those patients who have a fixed income are going to be our more vulnerable patients,” Addison said.

KFF Health News is a national newsroom that produces in-depth journalism about health issues and is one of the core operating programs at KFF—an independent source of health policy research, polling, and journalism. Learn more about KFF.Subscribe to KFF Health News’ free Morning Briefing.

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And the advice is pretty useful for the rest of us, too.

By Rev. Dorothy S. Boulware
Word in Black 

This is the time of year when connectional church bodies — like AMEs, United Methodists, and AMEZs — meet and renew their covenant, mission and goals. They also send returning and new pastors to begin a new ministry year. There’s something about newness that always sparks the heart and mind to start out with new energy, conviction and direction.

How many pastors fail within the first couple of years? Many tales are told of unhappy unions between pastors and people that ended badly and much too soon. How many make regrettable first steps that could have been avoided with the right counsel? There’s no way to know. But a little advice might be helpful.

1. Be clear about who you’re married to

“If you’re married, always remember you’re married to your spouse, not the church,” says Pastor Eric Scott, who pastors the Lighthouse Worship Center in Baltimore along with his wife, Pastor Marcia Scott.

“The church is God’s bride!” 

This must work for him since they’ve been married for more than 30 years.

2. Remember people are people

Scott also says not to allow the size of the crowd to affect your delivery, how you minister and preach.

“If 10-20 people show up, feed them the best meal you can,” he said.

It’s also important to remember church people are just people.

“I will never forget the deacon who could barely read, but who loved the Lord and me. Nor can I forget another church member who confronted me with an attitude that was hardly godly,” says Dr. Chuck Lawless, dean of doctoral studies and vice president of spiritual formation and ministry centers at Southeastern Seminary in Wake Forest, North Carolina. “God’s church is people — and people can be a blessing one day and a heartache the next. Nevertheless, they are all God’s people, and they deserve our love.”

3. Get comfortable being uncomfortable

Perhaps the first thing is to get comfortable living in the land of the awkward because you’re going to spend the rest of your ministry there, as suggested by the Center for Preaching and Pastoral Leadership to young pastors.

“Engaging with diverse personalities, comforting the grieving, or addressing sensitive topics can often feel awkward and uncomfortable, remembering that even Jesus faced awkward moments during his ministry, and it is in those moments that we often experience breakthroughs and connections,” senior pastor Steve Tillis wrote in his blog.

4. Accept that you aren’t perfect

Another suggestion is to accept the fact that you will make a wrong decision, let someone down, or say something you regret.

“Perfection is an unattainable goal, even for pastors. It is essential to remember that mistakes are opportunities for growth and humility, and when you stumble, seek forgiveness,” Tillis wrote.

With all the things sure to create stress in a pastor’s life, such as weekly sermon preparation, fundraising and relationship building, finding and maintaining balance between work and play, church family and personal family is a must-do.

The post Words of wisdom for new pastors appeared first on AFRO American Newspapers.

By John Celestand 
Word in Black

John Celestand is the program director of the Knight x LMA BloomLab, a $3.2 million initiative that supports the advancement and sustainability of local Black-owned news publications. He is a former freelance sports broadcaster and writer who covered the NBA and college basketball for multiple networks such as ESPN Regional Television, SNY, and Comcast Sportsnet Philadelphia. John was a member of the 2000 Los Angeles Lakers NBA Championship Team, playing alongside the late great Kobe Bryant and Shaquille O’Neal. He currently resides in Silver Spring, Maryland, with his wife and son. Credit: Courtesy photo 

Back in early March, in a statement released on social media, legendary Dallas Cowboys running back Emmitt Smith blasted his alma mater, the University of Florida, for eliminating its diversity, equity, and inclusion program. Smith warned minority athletes at Florida to “please be aware and vocal” about the decision the university was making, which in essence meant closing the doors on students of color. 

A few days later, NAACP president and CEO Derrick Johnson asked “current and prospective” student-athletes to “reconsider any potential decision to attend, and compete at a predominantly white institution in the state of Florida.” He pointed out that “these institutions reap considerable financial benefits from the very individuals they fail to stand by in matters of diversity, equity, and inclusion.”  

So, should Black athletes refuse to attend schools that defund DEI? 

After all, today’s athletes command major coin when it comes to NIL (name, image, and likeness) dollars. Their ability to enter the portal and transfer to other universities without repercussion could, if leveraged correctly, have a tremendous influence on how universities handle DEI.

The question came up again this week for me after news broke that the University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill, plans to divert the school’s entire $2.3M DEI budget toward public safety and policing. 

Basically, UNC “said that the opposite of funding DEI programming is funding police,” writer, researcher, and Harvard Kennedy fellow Anna Gifty Opoku-Agyeman wrote on X this week. 

North Carolina brought in nearly $123 million in revenue from athletics in 2022. If every Black athlete at the school refused to play until the DEI budget was restored, that would undoubtedly put pressure on the school.

But even though today’s college athletes are in a prime position to effect change around DEI at universities because of their platforms, power, and heavy influence, is this really their responsibility?

Who should stand up for DEI?

“I don’t think it is their responsibility” says Leashia Lewis, assistant athletic director for diversity equity and inclusion at Villanova University.“They have an opportunity to use their platform and voices to make change, but it is also the responsibility of athletic departments to support them in doing that. My question would be, are athletic departments willing to or in a position to support student-athletes when they have something to say or want to fight for change?” 

There’s also the reality that Black athletes of the past were fighting for basic civil rights, which made it easier to think from a collective standpoint. 

“The risk of being a social justice activist and using your platform is different now. Many student-athletes are not willing to take the risk,” Lewis says.

“The risk is playing time, reputation, belief that your coach may see you as an outcast —, especially if you are not the superstar. There is also their personal branding, and NIL deals they may not want to risk. Especially for football and basketball players who have the highest platforms. Some of them are not prepared to take that risk.” 

How did we get here?

The murder of George Floyd on May 25, 2020, opened a floodgate of pledges to support DEI across corporate America and beyond. Companies and universities jostled to be first in line to beat their chests and voice their support and commitment to increasing opportunities to hire, accept, and retain people from underrepresented, underprivileged, and less advantaged communities.  

I was always skeptical. I kept waiting for the other shoe to drop. And now it has — falling harder than Humpty Dumpty ever did.

In 2023, Florida, under the leadership of Republican Gov. Ron DeSantis, became one of the first states to enact a law restricting DEI efforts. It banned the state’s public universities from spending money on DEI initiatives and placed restrictions on how educators could discuss discrimination in mandatory courses. Texas, North Carolina, and North Dakota passed similar bills later in the year. So far in 2024, Idaho, Utah, Wyoming, and Alabama have passed bills that are set to go into effect July 1.  

The University of Texas and Alabama are both ranked in the top five of the AP Top 25 College Football Poll. According to USA Today’s tracking, in 2022, these schools brought in over $239 million and $214 million, respectively.

Translation: Athletes most definitely have some pull. 

Athletes have always been on the frontlines.

Athletes and college students have almost always been on the frontline of change. Many professional athletes, such as Muhammad Ali, Bill Russell, Jim Brown, Mahmoud Abdul-Rauf, Colin Kaepernick, Tommie Smith, and John Carlos, took stances but also sacrificed their personal lives and careers. 

“Historically, athletes have used their platforms to speak for justice or to make change and bring attention to injustices that are in our society,” Lewis says.

“Much of the DEI work in athletics right now has existed as a result of athletes speaking up in response to Colin Kaepernick in 2017 taking a knee and also in response to George Floyd being murdered,” she says.

As everyone knows, though, Kaepernick’s football career was destroyed by his decision to protest.

Is this what we are expecting of today’s college athletes?  

What if they are prepared to take that risk? 

“Right now, the climate in college athletics across the country in terms of DEI is not as active as it was in 2020,” Lewis says. “There are other things taking priority now like NIL, the transfer portal, unionizing the student-athlete, and having them be considered employees for the institution.” 

There is no definitive answer to this dilemma. If student-athletes covet their individual earnings and opportunities more than the collective justice for the silent, minoritized, and marginalized communities lacking the power to speak up for themselves, then the conversation about risk doesn’t matter. 

And riddle me this: What would I have done back when I was a student-athlete in the late 1990s if I had a million-dollar NIL deal on the table?  

Would I have sacrificed for the collective? If that were the case, then should I have even been asked to?  

Lewis doesn’t believe so. 

“My call to action is to the ecosystem around them,” she says. “Why do they (athletes) have to risk everything for justice when we’ve talked so much about supporting the whole athlete and that we need to give them everything they need to perform? So, in a sense, this is a performance, and we need to give them everything they need to succeed.”

This article was originally published by Word in Black. 

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By Rev. Dorothy S. Boulware
Word in Black

On June 2, when thousands of ministers representing all ages, genders, and cultures descend upon Hampton University’s campus in Hampton, Virginia, the convergence will be unlike any other in the world.

For the 110th time, ministers, chaplains, pastors, choir members, organists, musicians and directors will gather with great anticipation of yet another time of worship, learning, and fellowship, to attend the school’s annual Ministers Conference and the 90th Choir Directors and Organists Guild Workshop.

Attendance at last year’s conference had not yet returned to pre-COVID numbers. But this year’s registration numbers seem to indicate that people are ready to come back — and that doesn’t include those who register on-site, as many do.

“I’m excited because of the number of women participating,” says the Rev. Dr. Cynthia Hale, founding and senior pastor of Ray of Hope Christian Church in Decatur, Georgia, and current president of the conference. “My goal was to increase the numbers of women in ministry as well as the young ministers and pastors of all cultures.” 

Dr. Hale says there had been wisps of dissension because of the ongoing changes, but she knows her assignment. “Finally, I’m at a place where I can do what God has called me to do, and that is to position ministers so they can grow and excel.”

The theme for this year is “Tools for Transforming the Life of the Leader,” and the highly anticipated presenters for this year are:

• Rev. Dr. Howard-John Wesley, mid-day preacher, senior pastor of Alfred Street Baptist Church, Alexandria, Virginia.
• Rev. Marissa R. Farrow, morning preacher, associate at Allen AME, Jamaica, New York
• Rev. Dr. Otis Moss III, lecturer, senior pastor
• Rev. Dr. Shareka Newton, women in ministry hour
• Rev. Dr. Frederick Douglas Haynes, conference preacher
• Rev. Dr. Cynthia James, senior stateswoman
• Rev. Dr. Raquel Lettsome, lecturer

The Ministers’ Conference got its start in 1914, born from the collaboration of the Negro Organizational Society, the Conference for Education in the South, the Southern Education Board, and the Cooperative Education Board. These groups, confronting the urgent issues facing African-American churches and their communities, found a powerful ally in Hampton Institute. This institution, with its strong community ties, became the birthplace of the original Ministers’ Conference, then known as The Conference of Negro Ministers.

Its first home was in the campus chapel, Memorial Church, with only 40 ministers from four denominations. By its 14th anniversary, attendance had grown to 800 ministers representing 19 different denominations. And in 1934, the conference grew by the addition of the Choir Directors’ and Organists’ Guild.

More than a century later, “We are pleased to present a stellar program of powerful prolific preachers and proclaimers of the gospel of Jesus Christ from across the nation,” Dr. Debra L. Haggins, executive director and treasurer of the Conference, said in a welcome statement online. 

Hale is especially excited about the young preachers and how they worship after all the other planned activities for the day are over.

“They have their own preaching series, and it is absolutely incredible. They’re in all stages of their journeys, some in seminary, some pastoring, others preaching. They have praise and worship, but then this ring, I call it a boxing ring, in the middle of the floor in the Student Life Center; and the preacher goes up there, and they literally just circle the preacher,” she said. “There is wonderful affirmation and excitement.”

There is also much opportunity for learning during the week. Participants can attend two sessions of workshops. 

“They are relevant, they are practical, and speak to their needs right where they are,” Dr. Hale says.

This article was originally published by WordinBlack.com.

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A member of Calvary Lutheran Church says they’ve learned to be “gentle with each other so we can be dangerous together.”

By Rev. Dorothy S. Boulware
Word in Black

May 25, 2024, marks four years since George Floyd was murdered — on May 25, 2020 — by White former Minneapolis police officer Derek Chauvin. Chauvin, who was found guilty of second-degree murder in April 2021, rested his body weight on Floyd’s neck as Floyd cried out, “I can’t breathe.” Chauvin stayed there for 9 ½ minutes until Floyd died.

Floyd’s murder happened outside the Cup Food Store at East 38th Street and Chicago Avenue in the Powderhorn Park neighborhood of Minneapolis. Just a block away, at 39th Street and Chicago Avenue, stands Calvary Lutheran Church, whose pastor is Hans Lee. 

Little did the congregation know how this moment in history would catapult them into a central role in the transformation of their neighborhood.

Word in Black spoke with Shari Seifert, a member of Calvary who allowed herself to be swept up into the emerging community that has become George Floyd Square, a gathering place for comfort, sustenance, and the assurance that one need not be alone. She told her story in her book, “Ashes to Action,” and shared some of her experiences with Word in Black.

Word In Black: How did you first learn of George Floyd’s murder?

Shari Seifert: I received a video in the middle of the night. The same night. That was how I found out. And the video was the first I’d heard of his murder.

WIB: What did you do after seeing the video?

SS: I tried to go back to sleep, but I was horrified. And then this person reached out to me and we talked about doing a protest march. So I called — it was the first of many calls to my pastor — to say, ‘Hey, Pastor Hans, can we launch this march out of our parking lot?’ He agreed, so we just jumped into action and did that. Of course, it was huge. And honestly we had many members that joined the march.

I didn’t join in. I’m not sure why. But I stayed back at the church, and I made sure everyone got home. You know, it was COVID and people weren’t sharing rides together. But we figured out how to get everyone home from the Third Precinct building. And I thought that was going to be it. Because Philando Castile had been killed not that long ago, and it was on video, and nothing happened.

WIB: What happened the next day?

SS: I belong to a group called the European Descent Lutheran Association for Racial Justice. We got together, and we made a statement about the brutality, including the murders of Breonna Taylor and Ahmaud Arbery.

People were streaming into the Square to pay respects. And some people were driving crazy. And so just regular neighbors put up barricades with whatever they could find to slow down the traffic so people wouldn’t be hurt. And people began to bring stuff, like it’s a funeral. They brought food and water, masks and all kinds of stuff that we shoved into the narthex of the church.

WIB: What did you do with it all?

SS: We started what we eventually called the community table. So we just had a table on the corner with food and water and snacks and all kinds of drinks. We kind of laughed about it, but it was a serious need. We called it the “ministry of bathroom” because we would let people come in and use our bathroom. Now we have porta potties in the square because that’s just what the community does.

WIB: What was going on beyond the square?

SS: Within a few days, all the grocery stores were burned down. We didn’t have public transportation. The pharmacies were burned down. The post office was burned down. It was kind of a mess. My wife was running the food shelf, which went from serving 25 families a week to serving 177 families a week. There was a lot of need, so we were scrambling.

WIB: What else was going on?

SS: The National Guard came in. What was really interesting is most of the time, the square — the center is at 38th and Chicago, and then it would extend out to the ends of those blocks — was really relatively peaceful. The police came in and messed up some of the stuff. I think that was before we had the barricades up. But they were bad actors. And many of the National Guard were bad actors. It was dystopian.

WIB: Did they feel you were being disloyal by helping the folks, as opposed to, in some way supporting them?

SS: I don’t know what was going on in their minds. They were against everyone, you know? Even the journalists. My pastor had a tear gas canister whiz past his head. And you know, standing there in his collar. But yeah, the journalists were not protected like they normally are. 

There was a show, I guess, they called it “The Reckoning,” I think. It was put on by the journalism department at the University of Minnesota. Journalists came from all over and they had photos up and all that. They were just talking about their experience. Many of them had covered wars, and they said this was the most dangerous they had ever felt. And it was because of the police.

WIB: Why was your church so ready for this? You sprung right into action.

SS: Calvary was ready to meet the moment after George Floyd was murdered because of the years of work we did on anti-racism and dismantling White supremacy. Because Calvary is a close community with resilient relationships, and simply because of where we were located. We also had a pastor who understood that his place at this time was not to be front and center, but to run interference as needed.

So we had really been doing some deep work for a long time, starting in about 2011. We had like a really nice, solid, multiracial race equity committee. 

WIB: Tell me about the Five Assumptions of George Floyd Square.

SS: First, assume everyone has COVID. Mask up or back up. Secondly, this is America, assume everyone is armed. It pays to be patient and polite. Third, assume everything you say and do is being recorded. If you don’t want someone to hear it or see it, don’t say it or do it. But if you say something around the circle, say it with your whole chest. The fourth is, assume that not everyone has your idea of liberation in mind. You can’t be betrayed if you know what’s up. And the fifth is, assume we’re all crazy. Anyone in movement space has been through some trauma. Thwarted expectations can come out sideways. Let’s be gentle with each other so we can be dangerous together. 

Responses were lightly edited for length and clarity.

This article was originally published on WordinBlack.com. 

The post After George Floyd’s murder, a Minneapolis church builds community appeared first on AFRO American Newspapers.

A Howard University student renouncing her membership in Delta Sigma Theta, reopened the debate over whether Black Greek Letter Organizations are cults.

By Rev. Dorothy S. Boulware
Word in Black

Choosing which sorority or fraternity to pledge is a decision often made before college students arrive on campus — usually based on chosen occupation, what your friends may be doing, and which group offers the most prestige for their future. And, of course, if legacy plays a part, it’s really decided. 

Every now and then, however, the issue arises as to whether the values of the Divine Nine — historically Black fraternities and sororities — are in sync with students’ personal Christian values.

Such was the case on May 20 when Howard University rising senior Zora Sanders posted an open letter to Instagram that said she was renouncing her membership in one of these Black Greek Letter Organizations.

“I am a Spring 2024 Initiate of Alpha Chapter, Delta Sigma Theta Sorority, Incorporated. I am writing this letter to inform Nationals that I have officially renounced and denounced membership in this organization,” Sanders wrote.

Sanders said that she’d done her due diligence in researching her chosen sorority, but “despite all the research and information I had gathered, I was not aware of the specific requirements.” She then detailed what she now considers to be ritual parts of the Delta initiation that she felt betrayed her faith.

“In order to become a member, I had to make a pledge, swear an oath of allegiance, and perform a ritual ceremony that involved kneeling/bowing at an altar,” Sanders wrote. 

Ultimately, she concluded the process of crossing over to become a Delta involved “idolatry, a sin that costs eternal life.”

Going public in this manner sparked a firestorm of reactions across social media platforms, with many folks upset that Sanders denounced her membership in the Alpha chapter — the first chapter of Delta Sigma Theta. Folks pointed out that she may have taken the spot of another woman who wanted to be in the sorority. Other folks were upset that Sanders shared private information about the initiation process in a public forum. But most of all, folks took issue with the insinuation that BGLOs are in some way cultish or satanic. 

Dr. Karsonya (Kaye) Whitehead, host of WEAA’s “Today with Dr. Kaye” show in Baltimore, has been a Delta since 1989. She finds Sanders’ assertion surprising and thinks it’s just TikTok fodder, where everything is done publicly for likes and monetization.

“I am a Christian, a pastor’s kid, and a Delta. I am what people call a crib Baptist, in that I was stuffed with the word when I was in the crib. There has never been a moment when I felt that my faith conflicted with my sorority values,” Whitehead says.

“We pray together, attend church together, and lift each up,” Whitehead says of her fellow Deltas. “We have a large number of members active in their local churches — from deaconesses to pastors to ministers to bishops to prayer warriors.”

Poet, theologian, and educator Ajanaé Dawkins, a fourth-generation member of Alpha Kappa Alpha Sorority, Incorporated, wrote on X, formerly known as Twitter, that she was once “deep in a toxic religious space that almost convinced” her to denounce her membership. 

“Theologies that isolate you, demonize the world around you, & demand allegiance to God through public performance creep slowly.”

Dawkins wrote that initially, her membership in AKA wasn’t an issue in her faith community. But the idea of denouncing her membership “was introduced slowly until one day it was being demanded in altar calls.”

And in an op-ed he wrote in February, Rev. Keith Magee, chair and professor of practice in social justice at Newcastle University noted that “some Christians have denounced their BGLOs, publicly attacking them for being ‘idolatrous’ in their use of symbolic Greek letters and for causing members to put loyalty to their organization above loyalty to their faith.”

Magee is convinced “that through the story of Jesus’ life, death, burial, resurrection, ascension and soon-to-come return, the message He is sending us, in His wisdom, is one of love. I try to embody that message in everything I do.”

He also said he’s “a proud member of two Black fraternities, Kappa Alpha Psi (one of the Divine Nine collegiate BGLOs) and Sigma Pi Phi (for professionals). Kappa was founded by 10 principled Christian men. With Kappa, I was younger when I crossed and not quite as knowledgeable as I am now about my faith.  Nevertheless, at no point in my life have I ever entered into an unorthodox, uninformed, or ungodly alliance with a Greek deity. Nor have I ever sworn an oath that would in any way hinder, absolve, or negate my Christian beliefs.”

The Rev. Dr. Danielle L. Brown, senior pastor of Shiloh Baptist Church in Plainfield, New Jersey, encouraged some of the upset commenters on social media to leave Sanders alone. She also raised the issue of whether denouncing has become a trendy thing to do.

“Unfortunately she represents a generation where social media is an idol,”  Brown wrote in a comment on Instagram about Sanders. “Denouncing is the latest trend. If this was done out of a new found desire to represent the Lord loudly, let’s just pray it goes beyond this one post. Nothing else on this page suggests such devotion, so perhaps it’s new.”

Brown also wondered if what Sanders “considers idolatry extends beyond an organization. Ultimately, her money, her choice, and wasted time.”

And, as Dawkins warned folks on X, “If you’re a Black woman or Black queer person being swept up by neo-conservative/harmful theologies, you aren’t the first or last. Avoid echo chambers. Question everything. Learn the difference between man made shame & the voice of God.” 

This article was originally published by WordinBlack.com.

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By Rev. Dorothy S. Boulware
Word in Black

Given its rich history, it’s safe to say that New Psalmist Baptist Church is as much a part of  Baltimore as crab cakes, Orioles baseball games and “The Wire.” 

Founded in the basement of a house just a few decades after the CIvil War, the church grew from a few dozen souls in the late 1800s to a congregation that at one point reached 7,000 active members. Revs. Martin Luther King and Jesse Jackson have visited; so has Pastor T.D. Jakes, former President Bill Clinton and then-Sen. Barack Obama. It ministers to the poor, the deaf, the homeless and the formerly incarcerated, among others.  

Yet in 125 years of existence, through growth and change, New Psalmist has had just three pastors shepherding its congregation: its founder, Rev. Junius Gray; his successor, Frederick C. Atkins; and its current leader, The Right Rev. Walter Scott Thomas Sr. 

Passing the torch

Recently, however, the church received its fourth leader. After 49 years at the helm, Bishop Thomas stepped down as the church’s pastor to make way for New Psalmist’s next leader: his son,  Dr. Walter Scott Thomas Jr. 

“I’m excited to see him run against the wind and to accomplish the sight you see when you make that last turn and start heading down the straightway,” he says. 

As one of the nation’s most influential Black churches — and Thomas’ profile as Bishop and Presiding Prelate of The Kingdom Association of Covenant Pastors — the installation ceremony received national attention. 

But Bishop Thomas also knows it’s time to pass the torch. 

“The last thing I wanted for New Psalmist was for them to be left with a vision of me dying in the pulpit,” he joked, acknowledging it’s not an unusual occurrence. “We often see a church in transition because someone has died or even left the church, and there’s no time for the new leader to glean from the previous leader.”

A lifetime of preparation

Fortunately for him, Dr. Thomas has had a lifetime of preparation to fill his father’s enormous shoes, even though he found the idea daunting in the beginning. 

“First, just the thought that my pastor was retiring — that was a big thing to take in,” he says. Then came the decision whether to leave First Baptist Church of Steelton in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, where he’d been senior pastor since 2014, and move his wife and young children to Baltimore. 

But the young minister said he and Jarrette, his wife of 15 years, prayed continually until they were content with their decision. 

Dr. Thomas grew up in New Psalmist and will now pastor people who have known him his entire life. As with most preacher’s kids, his experience included doing maintenance, cleaning up trash, working with the catering ministry, serving food and cleaning the bathroom. But his call to ministry seemed almost preordained. 

After hearing the call to ministry in 2001, the preacher’s son graduated Cum Laude from Morehouse College, majoring in religious studies with a minor in psychology. He then went on to obtain his master’s of divinity from Howard University and his doctorate from United Theological Seminary.  All the while, his ties with New Psalmist deepened. 

The succession process

Dr. Thomas says him being his father’s successor wasn’t guaranteed. 

“The church had to vote and they could have said yes or no,” he says. “I’m grateful that the process was one where the vote happened while my predecessor, my pastor, is still in position, so we can walk this journey together.” 

As for the ceremony itself, it was filled with “praise and worship, great preaching by the Bishop, as well as much of the traditional pomp and ceremony,” Dr. Thomas says. “We were trying to streamline the service, but we agreed this was a time to do what was needed and desired, and not worry about the time.”

He hopes other churches will follow the succession model they’re putting into practice, leaning into what a blessing the senior pastor can be to the incoming pastor.

For Bishop Thomas, it was an emotional moment watching his son take the church into the future. But he plans to share the space with Dr. Thomas as the handoff takes place. After that, “I’ll serve with him through the year and then he will be running that race — and I’m excited to see what that leg will look like.”

This article was originally published by Word in Black. 

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While violence in houses of worship isn’t new, attacks have more than doubled since 2022 — including an attempted shooting near Pittsburgh last weekend.

By Rev. Dorothy S. Boulware
Word in Black

The Rev. Glenn Germany, pastor of Jesus’ Dwelling Place Church in Pittsburgh, was halfway through his sermon last Sunday when a young man in jeans and a black T-shirt got up from one of the pews and walked to the altar. 

Holding a silver handgun, he aimed at the preacher and pulled the trigger. Germany dove behind a wooden lectern, the only cover he could find. 

That’s when the gun jammed. As a parishioner tackled the gunman, Germany ran over and wrestled the gun out of his grip and helped hold him until police arrived. 

Unfolding on the church’s live webcast, the incident was shocking, but not uncommon. This year alone, armed intruders have opened fire inside several houses of worship, including the Texas megachurch of celebrity pastor Joel Osteen. There, security officers shot and killed a woman who shot and wounded several people, including an 11-year-old boy. 

Studies show the number of shootings in houses of worship — fueled by political dissent, personal conflicts, non-specific mental health outbursts and even the overflow of domestic disputes — have more than doubled from 2022 to 2023. And  threats against both Jewish and Muslim worship communities have spiked since the  Israel-Hamas war began. 

The worrisome trend has prompted the federal government to set aside more than $400 million to help 

churches protect themselves with extra security equipment, with an application deadline of May 21. But there has also been an emergence of private companies that are specializing in providing security to churches. 

Donell Trusty, owner of Trusty Training Solutions, has provided security to churches since launching his company  in 2021. He says he trains his agents to assess the situation, then handle it swiftly and calmly. 

“We have encountered individuals with mental issues who have come into the place of worship and caused disturbances,” Trusty says. “In these instances we have to understand the condition of the person and be able to navigate in a manner that will not disrupt the service or drive people away from future worship opportunities.”

Violence against communities of faith in houses of worship is not new.

The Sept. 15, 1963 bombing at the 16th Street Baptist Church in Birmingham, Alabama — an attack that killed four little girls — is etched in civil rights history. In June 2015, a gunman hoping to stoke a race war killed nine worshippers attending Bible study in Mother Emanuel AME Church in Charleston, South Carolina. Three years later, an assailant gunned down 11 people at Tree of Life Synagogue in Pittsburgh, the deadliest mass shooting at a place of worship in U.S. history.

Still, the violence has become more common in the era of mass shootings and widely available handguns. Some 430 incidents occurred in 2023, more than double those in 2022 and eight times those of 2018, according to a Family Research Council Report.

Trusty, the security company owner, says providing security for a house of worship typically calls for discretion, among the key traits he looks for in prospective employees.  

“We always screen individuals to ensure they understand the sensitivity of the assignment. We don’t just find a random security office and send them,” Trusty says. “We want to ensure that they are sensitive to the needs of the house.”

Besides providing security, Trusty says he also provides training to help churches enhance their own security. 

“We have encountered individuals who have had life-threatening situations occur to them” who have come for training “to help deal with the trauma,” he says. “But they were able to overcome their issues. So while we do provide training for people to get certified for firearms, tasers, etc., our training also can serve as a form of therapy.”

Janice Lee, owner of Afterhourz Security Consulting and Protection Services, counts churches among her government and business clients. She even attends services herself.

When her agency was smaller she had to personally guard the pastor. But it’s grown large enough that she can enjoy worship, knowing her agents are in place. Most churches need someone to guard the offering time and space and someone for the pastor, “unless there’s a particular threat,” Lee says.

This article was reprinted with permission from WordinBlack.com.

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By Rev. Dorothy S. Boulware
Word in Black
Residents of Flint, Michigan, still don’t drink the water. 

They drink bottled water. They use filters to purify the water that flows from their faucets. But after 10 full years, and much assurance from political leaders, they still don’t trust that the quality of their water — once so contaminated it was compared to an Environmental Protection Agency Superfund site — is now safe enough for their consumption.

Therefore, the churches of Flint still don’t regularly conduct baptisms. Not yet.

“For many years since the inception of the problem, we did not baptize at all,” says Bill R. Quarles, deacon at First Trinity Missionary Baptist Church in Flint. “We had one about eight months ago, but we still don’t baptize on a regular basis.”

It’s a stark departure from their faith, given the importance of baptism in religious ceremonies. But it also indicates the degree of trauma inflicted on the church by the Flint water crisis a decade ago, and a desire to keep congregants safe.

The problem, however, is much more than just the loss of the baptism ritual. 

In 2014, Flint had a population of just under 99,000 people. By 2022, the most recent year U.S. Census Bureau data is available, only 79,854 residents remain in the city. 

“Five Black churches have closed in the last three months,” says Rev. Derrick Aldridge, senior pastor of Second Chance Church. And due to the inability to easily cook with water, First Trinity still has no fellowship meals, which is a hardship in Baptist churches.

Roots of the crisis

On April 25, 2014, not long after officials switched the city’s water source from Lake Huron to the Flint River in a cost-saving move, residents began to complain the water looked filthy, smelled foul, and tasted of chemicals. Officials insisted the water was safe, but those who could afford it switched to bottled water. 

Further testing, however, revealed that the water contained dangerous levels of bacteria and lead, leaching from the city’s aged, decrepit water system. The crisis became a national scandal: a majority-Black city with a 40.1 percent poverty rate became a high-profile example of environmental racism. 

Then-Gov. Rick Snyder sent in the National Guard to distribute bottled water to poor residents while local, state, and federal government officials bickered about how to solve the problem, who was to blame — and who would pay for it. 

As the crisis dragged on for many months, officials eventually agreed on a plan to overhaul Flint’s water system, gradually upgrading pipes, enhancing the filtration system and making the water safe for all. By then, however, residents had come down with mystery illnesses, strange rashes, and hair loss, and tests revealed children had alarmingly high levels of lead in their blood. 

While the water crisis disrupted everyday life, from doing dishes to learning loss in schools, not much attention was paid to how it affected the city’s faith community. 

The toll on Black churches

Quarles, of First Trinity Missionary Baptist, has been closely involved with the church for over 42 years. He says he has worked tirelessly to find solutions when people’s lives and health were threatened by unfit water.

Through their Flint Water Relief Mission, Alfred Street Baptist Church in Alexandria, Virginia, partnered with First Trinity for over two years, providing 20,000 cases of water to Flint residents. “They sent teams to work with us, and we’re still in touch,” Quarles says.

Nowadays, the church is still “blessed to have partners, so we have water boxes that hold and filter water before it’s given out in 2- or 5-gallon containers,” he says, which they do every Wednesday and Thursday.

Some churches joined in the distribution of bottled water to poorer residents, and churches served as repositories of important information and updates. They also helped bring people together, forging resiliency in a time of crisis. But not much thought was given to how it changed the ritual of baptism. 

Redefining baptism

Flint-area pastors collectively reflected on and developed principles around baptism in the city. In a 2022 paper published in “Sacramental and Liturgical Theology of Healing and Crisis Rites,” the pastors wrote that “Baptismal faith and identity were expressed in networks of solidarity that both facilitated church parking lots piled high with pallets of water and sustained those who sat around countless tables in tense rooms demanding accountability and justice.”

They “found themselves examining their own understanding of baptism — what it is, what it means — during a time when the water was a sign of dehumanization and environmental racism.” 

As a result, “The call to pastoral care rapidly expanded outward as folks recognized a need to act beyond the church walls,” according to the paper. 

Significance of baptism

Most churches celebrate new membership with some form of baptism, christening, or drizzling. For Baptists, full immersion is the most often employed method — dipping the new member’s entire body into a water-filled tank, or a nearby body of water. But if the water is not clean enough, most pastors look for alternatives.  

While salvation is not dependent upon baptism — baptism is an outward sign of an inward transformation — it is quite important in the life of the church and of the family. Fully immersing a candidate in water symbolizes a formerly sinful person’s metaphorical death and resurrection into a new life in faith. 

Faith-based calls for accountability

Despite an ongoing, massive overhaul of the city’s water system, Flint’s faith community is still not sure their water is safe enough for baptism, one of the church’s most sacred rituals. 

Aldridge, of Second Chance Church, says baptism “was a big deal, like a bar mitzvah.” Families would gather to celebrate the event, with meals and fellowship with the congregation. 

Since the water crisis emerged, Aldridge says, baptism “has lost momentum and is now disconnected from the church’s purpose.”

Fortunately for Aldrige, his church building gets water from a different source.  But he is frustrated that, a decade after the first cup of dirty water was drawn from the Flint River, no one has been held to account for the problem. 

“Someone needs to take responsibility,” he says “Someone needs to be held accountable. The people of Flint need to be made whole again.”

This article was originally published by Word in Black. This story is part of “Flint’s Still Fighting,” Word In Black’s series about the decade-long water crisis, and the struggles and triumphs still transforming the majority-Black city.

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By Aziah Siid
Word In Black

April 25 marked exactly 10 years since a tragic story of environmental and racial injustice began in Flint, Mich. An unelected bureaucrat decided that saving $5 million over two years was worth risking the health and futures of thousands of children in the majority-Black city. The city’s drinking water supply was switched from the reliable Lake Huron to the toxic Flint River, releasing a torrent of lead and poisoning a generation.

Due to the crisis, health researchers found blood lead levels in Flint’s children doubled from roughly 2.5 percent to 5 percent. Under CDC guidelines, even minuscule detectable levels of lead in blood are associated with difficulties in learning, developmental delays and behavioral issues. 

And now a new study published in “Science Advances” by a team of researchers from Princeton University and the University of Michigan finds that the seemingly benign decision to switch the city’s water source — and the lead poisoning that accompanied it — triggered an academic setback for a generation of Flint schoolchildren.

Analyzing standardized test scores from 2007 to 2019, researchers found that, after the crisis, students lost the equivalent of five months of learning progress in math — and they hadn’t recovered by 2019. They wrote, however, that they “did not observe a significant detectable effect on reading achievement in our main analysis.”

But that’s just what can be quantified on standardized tests.

One former Flint public school teacher, reflecting on her classroom experience, believes the literacy rate among the city’s schoolchildren may have plunged drastically — motivation for her to create a nonprofit organization to help them catch up. 

“One of the big things we dealt with was the declining literacy rates due to the water crisis,” says Danielle Green, who taught for two decades and is CEO of EMPOWER The People, an organization she founded to help Flint’s youth.

“I think the literacy rates dropped 75 percent” since the crisis, she says.  

Black students left behind 

To be clear, there were problems in Flint’s schools before the water crisis made headlines. A decade ago, in 2014, roughly 56 percent of Flint’s population was Black and 37 percent was White, but four schools had fewer than 10 percent White students — meeting the threshold of “intensely segregated,” according to UCLA’s Civil Rights Project.

“It tells me about an exodus of the White population,” retired principal Willa Hawkins said at the time.

A 2017 report on the Flint Water Crisis from the Michigan Civil Rights Commission found that in Flint, “White students’ needs were almost always addressed first, including placement in the newer and better schools, while all but a very few black students were denied access to programs that would open the door to higher education and greater opportunity.”

In addition to experiencing these harms related to racial and educational segregation, just over 42 percent of Black people in Flint were living in poverty in 2014. 

Poverty had a disproportionately negative impact on the Black community in Flint, particularly for children. Previous studies have shown that children from low-income households nationwide typically struggle in the classroom compared to their more affluent peers, due to factors ranging from hunger to homelessness. And schools in poorer neighborhoods are usually under-resourced compared to schools in wealthier districts.

But the water crisis made a bad situation in Flint even worse.

People complained about the look, foul smell, and taste of the water, but city officials repeatedly assured them it was safe. As the crisis wore on, however, adults and children using water from the tap began coming down with strange rashes and other illnesses. Detailed tests on the water found it had been contaminated with dangerous levels of bacteria and lead from aging pipes in the city’s water system. 

“In light of what high levels of lead can do to our children’s cognitive and emotional well-being, we clearly need a long-term solution to ensure our children have access to clean, safe drinking water,” then-Flint Community Schools Superintendent Bilal Tawwab said in fall 2015. 

Outraged residents demanded action, but the city, state, and federal governments were at odds on how to proceed and who was to blame.

‘How did we get so lucky?’

Meanwhile, the effects of the water crisis began showing up in the classroom — and not just among children exposed to lead in water at home. Math scores plunged, particularly among boys, and the city’s school system saw an 8 percent increase in the number of students referred for special education.

Green, the former Flint teacher, was working at Durant-Tuuri-Mott Elementary School as a classroom teacher and saw what was happening to her students in real time, long before academic studies caught up to them. She recalls a meeting in which the Flint school board waved away concerns about lead pipes in her school’s water system.

“I remember asking about the pipe, and they said that our pipes did not need to be replaced in the school, and I said, ‘Why?’” Green says. “How did we get so lucky? So everything around us, everything in front of us, in the back of us to the left, and to the right of us needs to be replaced, but we don’t?’ 

In 2020, Flint’s public school system saw more than 1 in 4 kids receive special education services, as previously reported by Word In Black. The overdiagnosis of Black students for special education is real, but there’s no safe amount of lead to consume. 

Lead exposure in early childhood is associated with a host of negative outcomes aside from the decline in scores, including “increased anxiety, increased behavioral problems, decreased executive functioning, decreased academic achievement, decreased brain volume, higher rates of criminal offending, and decreased social mobility,” according to the Science Advances study. 

“While lead exposure in Flint children increased modestly on average, some children were exposed to high lead levels,” the authors wrote. “We find decreases in math achievement and increases in special needs classification, even among children living in homes with copper (rather than lead) water service lines.”

Perhaps not surprisingly, “Low socioeconomic status students and younger students experienced the largest effects on math achievement, and boys experienced the largest effects on special needs classification,” according to the study. “Our results point toward the broad negative effects of the crisis on children and suggest that existing estimates may substantially underestimate the overall societal cost of the crisis.”

Teachers called child protective services

Beyond the academic toll she saw, Green also witnessed the horror of students suffering from the health effects of consuming the toxic water. 

“I would do one-on-ones with children, and I would start to see a lack of hair, bald spots, patches,” Green says.

In addition, teachers themselves sometimes ignored what was going on with their students. Green notes that many of the teachers who worked at her school and others in the city didn’t live in Flint. 

“A lot of the educators are not Flint teachers,” she says. So, while the city’s children quite literally had their futures poisoned, the very educators entrusted with their care and development proved unwilling to help — and sometimes made things worse.

“They didn’t concern themselves with as much as I think they needed to,” Green says. “So it was to the point where there were conversations being had on calling child protective services on parents because they weren’t bathing their children.”

All children living in Flint

Researchers also found that children who weren’t directly exposed to the contaminated water, whose homes didn’t have contaminated pipes, still face academic challenges. They study authors wrote that the Flint Water Crisis “affected all children living in Flint, not only those children who experienced elevated lead exposure (just as the COVID-19 pandemic affected children who never contracted the virus).”

That may be due “to the psychosocial impacts of a child experiencing a crisis or may have operated through other non-lead pathways.”

In other words, a constant backdrop of racial trauma and upheaval, of scared parents and oblivious teachers failing to grasp the crisis. The anxiety of watching friends get sick while adults debate what to do. The fraying of communal trust and the looming threat of invisible toxins casting a shadow on their lives.

Or maybe the children understood the racial subtext of a predominantly Black city being poisoned by its own government, sacrificed in the name of austerity. The realization that their lives had so little value to those in power. A new generational scar tissue forming over the open wound of structural racism.

And it was all preventable.

Hey Super Girl

Green now devotes her time to “things to make sure children fall in love with reading” and boost their self-esteem. Over the past few years, she developed several children’s book series—”Sky’s the Limit” for little boys and the “Hey Girl” collection, with titles like “Hey Pretty Girl,” “Hey Smart Girl,” and “Hey Super Girl.”

Green says she wants Flint’s kids to be able to say, “Oh, that looks like me, I can relate to this.” And she wanted them to know there’s still hope in the world and they can change Flint for the better. In “Super Girl,” Green says “the main character name is Michaela, and it’s about a little girl who helps with the water crisis.”

But her heart still breaks over what’s happened in Flint, and she’s still angry at the willingness to let children get sick and suffer.

“I’m not sure what the angle on any of those things was,” Green says, “where people just decided we’re not gonna get these babies’ pipes replaced or clean water.”

This article was originally published by Word in Black.

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By Joseph Williams
Word In Black

It’s been one thing after another with the new-but-not-necessarily-improved Free Application for Federal Student Aid (FASFA), a form that helps students pay for college. 

First, the long-anticipated rollout of the redesigned online application was delayed for three months because it just wasn’t ready. Then, when it finally did appear, a variety of bugs and glitches, including some that could reduce the amount of federal tuition aid, kept students and their families from completing it. Now, Chronicle of Higher Education reports that schools are receiving FAFSA applications with incorrect tax information from families.  

None of this is good news for Black students, some 80 percent of whom depend on FAFSA to help pay for ballooning college costs.

According to the nonprofit National College Attainment Network, roughly 34 percent of all eligible high school seniors have submitted FAFSA applications through March 22, an overall decline of nearly 29 percent since last year. But the problem is most acute, according to NCAN data, among low-income schools and schools with high concentrations of minority students. There, the percentage decline in 2024 FAFSA applications is slightly more than 35 percent.

Besides worsening an already-bad time crunch for colleges and students who needed the financial information weeks ago, the FAFSA fiasco could keep Black students — an outsized number of whom rely on federal aid — out of college classrooms this fall. 

“Because Black students are disproportionately FAFSA filers, this has a huge impact on their ability to make a decision about both where, and if, they go to college,” says Bryan Cook, director of higher education policy at the Urban Institute Center on Education Data and Policy. 

Cook worries that some frustrated Black students, worried that they can’t pay for college without federal assistance, may downgrade their college choice or give up on college completely. Either option, he says, would have negative, long-term effects on their earning power in the job marketplace.

The FAFSA process, which colleges use to calculate their share of financial aid for a student, is already months behind schedule, Cook says. Unless the problems get resolved quickly, he says, ”Black students are going to have to make some really tough decisions about whether or not they continue to stay in this process.” 

The unequal impact on Black college-bound seniors is the latest headache for the federal Ed Department’s FAFSA reboot, which stumbled out of the gate late last year.  

Instead of the FAFSA application being open Oct. 1, enough time for students and colleges to prepare for the fall 2024 semester, the form didn’t launch until Dec. 31, setting off a scramble. The subsequent series of errors and submission problems didn’t help; at last count, only around 20 percent of applications have been processed, resulting in a nationwide backlog of some 6 million applications. 

Even though the Ed Department delayed the rollout to fix problems it knew about, a technicality it overlooked could end up costing students almost $2 billion in aid. And that’s before the cascade of issues that have surfaced in recent months.

Cook says those numbers are exacerbated by the fact that low-income, high-minority schools have fewer guidance counselors who can help guide students through the process. That can be important, experts say, because heads of low-income minority households tend to have lower rates of college degree attainment.

“We know that Black and Hispanic students disproportionately attend high-poverty schools, where their ratio of guidance counselors to students is double what that what they are in more wealthy schools,” he says. “So the combination of Black students disproportionately filing FAFSAs and disproportionately having less access to guidance counselor’s means that this issue with the rollout of the new FAFSA is having a much harder impact on Black students.”

Indeed, studies have found that Black students are 1.2 times more likely than White students to attend a school with a law-enforcement officer but without a guidance counselor. The counselors can be critical to completing the FAFSA. 

And every bit of financing helps: According to a study by College Board, for the 2022-23 academic year, average tuition and fees for a public four-year school averaged $10,940 for in-state students and $28,240 for out-of-state students, according to the latest data from College Board. Private nonprofit four-year schools amassed a much higher $39,400 average. Add room and board, books and other expenses to the mix, and that bill goes up several thousand dollars more.

Given those hurdles, Cook worries that Black student enrollment in college — already on the decline in part because of skyrocketing tuition and the Supreme Court dismantling of affirmative action in school admission decisions — is about to take another hit because of the FAFSA snafu. 

Students depend on the financial aid form to get “a better sense of what schools they can afford,” he says. That matters, he says, because a degree from a more selective college tends to bring higher wages after graduation. 

Without knowing how much federal aid they’ll get for tuition, “high school students may decide  to now go to maybe a regional, public school that’s more affordable, or even a community college that they can afford,” Cook says. “Or — worst case scenario — opting out of pursuing a college education this year, altogether. And we know any sorts of delay for low income students could ultimately mean they choose not to go on to college.”

Fortunately, Cook says, many colleges are doing what they can to help, pushing back deadlines and trying to work with students. But the ripple effects of the FAFSA revamp, Cook says, spotlights the bigger, thornier problem of college affordability.

“I think it just underscores how much of a reliance students have on federal financial aid,” he says. Unfortunately, “there is no silver bullet.”

“My biggest fear,” Cook says, “is that we may have already lost some students.”

The article was originally published by Word In Black.

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By Cheryl Calhoun

When I was 16, I moved from Washington, D.C. to midtown Los Angeles (LA). I expected my life in LA to be different. Yet, I never imagined the air I breathed would be so different. Every day, our family would judge the air quality on whether we could see the mountains or if the brown haze of smog covered them. I remember when the city would shut down because the smog was so bad we weren’t allowed outside. 

Forty years later, the air is better.  Los Angeles, Calif., and the country have made much progress in cleaning up air pollution. Unfortunately, LA consistently remains the smoggiest city, or the city experiencing the worst ground-level ozone pollution, in the country. And that burden of air pollution is not shared equally. Black communities are disproportionately exposed to it due to a long legacy of environmental injustice.

In the 1930s, the federal government’s redlining and the resulting disinvestment in Black communities contributed to lasting disparities in air quality. Even today, Black individuals are disproportionately exposed to air pollution. While this racist practice was outlawed in 1968, it is still more likely for freeways, power plants, and other polluting sources to be placed in neighborhoods where African Americans and other communities of color live.

Today, racial disparities are still very much evident living in LA. The difference in air pollution levels between south LA, predominantly communities of color, and western LA is so stark that they are like two completely different cities. Unfortunately, this is the case in too many Black communities across the country.

The American Lung Association recently released its 2024 “State of the Air” report, which grades exposure to unhealthy levels of ground-level ozone air pollution (also known as smog) and short-term spikes and the annual average of particle pollution (also known as soot) over a three-year period. 

The report cemented what too many like me know to be true — Black people and other people of color are disproportionately exposed to unhealthy air. The report found that a person of color in the U.S. is 2.3 times more likely than a White individual to live in a community with a failing grade on all three air pollution measures. On top of that, people of color are also more likely to be living with one or more chronic conditions that make them more vulnerable to the health impact of air pollution, including asthma, diabetes and heart disease.

Breathing clean air is a right, not a privilege, so we need to do more to ensure that everyone — no matter where they live, what they earn, or who they look like—has clean air to breathe. While we can all make personal changes, the federal government has the power to make changes that impact millions. In fact, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) has recently finalized several strong rules that will help clean up the air, including standards to make our cars and trucks cleaner and tighter limits on soot. However, one big remaining item on their to-do list is the EPA must set long-overdue stronger national limits on ozone pollution. 

Ground-level ozone pollution, which I experienced growing up in LA, is one of the most widespread pollutants. More than 100 million people in the U.S. live in places that experience unhealthy levels of ozone pollution. When ozone levels are high, many people experience breathing problems such as chest tightness, coughing and shortness of breath, often within hours of exposure. Even healthy young adults may experience respiratory symptoms; however, children, seniors, those who are pregnant, and people with lung disease are among those at greater risk, as are low-income communities and communities of color.

Stronger limits would drive cleanup of polluting sources across the country, including in the most impacted neighborhoods. They would also give people more accurate information on when they are breathing unhealthy levels of ozone pollution so they could take steps to protect themselves. 

It is unacceptable that health disparities persist in my community. While many factors contribute to the health disparities experienced by African Americans, and it is a complex issue, we have solutions and the technology to improve our air quality. Cleaner air means fewer asthma attacks in kids, better pregnancy outcomes, fewer trips to the hospital for our elders with chronic lung disease, and so much more. 

Certain industries oppose increased EPA action to set stronger ozone pollution standards. They even sometimes assert that after decades of reductions in air pollution, the air is “clean enough.” While we have made progress in cleaning up ozone pollution, many communities still breathe in dangerous levels. Climate change makes it easier for ozone to form and more difficult to clean up. On top of that, just one day of exposure to unhealthy levels of ozone pollution can result in a person struggling to breathe or even being hospitalized. 

The bottom line is that stronger air pollution standards improve our health and save lives. It is especially critical in my community, which is impacted most by chronic health conditions and poor air quality. Now is the time for President Biden and the EPA to set stronger standards for the most widespread pollutant in the U.S., ozone pollution. The time is now to drive toward a future of environmental justice in this country.

This article was originally published by Word in Black. 

The post The ‘State of Our Air’ is not equal, but it can be appeared first on AFRO American Newspapers.

By Rev. Dorothy S. Boulware
Word in Black

From helping businesses with recruitment or workforce development, to aiding folks who need help tailoring their resumes and prepping for interviews, Hennither Gant has it covered. The Baltimore-area resident and founder of Career Image Solutions, has spent the past 12 years bringing her human resources expertise, entrepreneurial expertise, and common-sense approach to her work.

“Through insightful consultations and assessments, we collaborate closely with our clients to uncover their professional identity and chart a course toward rewarding career paths aligned with their values and goals,” she tells Word In Black.

Gant’s drive is rooted in her faith. 

“I love God, all things business and HR is my vehicle to bring change in the world,” she says on her website. Indeed, her enthusiasm for effective hiring strategies and integrity-based leadership in the workplace makes her a sought-after coach, panelist, and trainer. Word In Black caught up with her to find out more about how faith drives her work, and her approach to bringing the best out of everyone.

Q: What tools do you use to place people in the appropriate jobs?

Hennither Gant: Through an initial discovery call and a series of questionnaires focusing on their passions, work history, aspirations, and work habits, I guide individuals towards suitable career paths. By delving into their intrinsic motivations rather than simply following trends, I strive to align them with roles that resonate with their true calling. Sometimes, I incorporate personality assessments to gain deeper insights.

Q: Do people who already have a job often come to you because they are not satisfied with their job?

HG: Absolutely! It’s a common scenario. I often advise professionals that the optimal time to seek a new role is when they’re currently employed. Interestingly, dissatisfaction with the current job often stems from a deeper disconnect rather than surface-level grievances. Through coaching, we unearth that individuals may not be in touch with their authentic selves and aspirations. Taking the time for self-reflection often reveals their true desires and directions.

Q: In your dealings with employees, do they seek people who are spiritually gifted, or naturally gifted in certain areas?

HG: Yes, many employers, particularly smaller ones, emphasize desired personal attributes alongside technical skills. These qualities often include self-motivation, intuition, emotional intelligence, effective communication skills, solution-oriented mindset, and strong work ethic. I have particularly found that working professionals who are confident in who they are and know what they want, tend to stand out among the crowd of other applicants. Employers recognize the significance of holistic traits in potential hires beyond just technical proficiency.

Q: From your experience, what’s the value or outcome of having job satisfaction? Mentally, emotionally, and socially.

HG: Numerous studies consistently highlight the profound impact of job satisfaction on various aspects of well-being. It intricately links to mental and emotional health, productivity, and even physical well-being. Chronic dissatisfaction at work can elevate stress levels significantly. Considering that a considerable portion of one’s life is spent at work, aligning with meaningful pursuits can foster fulfillment and happiness, positively influencing other areas of life, including social connections and personal relationships. A helpful strategy is to reassess your life every 3 to 6 months, posing the question: “What should I stop, start and continue?”

This article was originally published by Word in Black.

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By Sabreen Dawud,
Special to the AFRO

The rising cost of childcare is causing concern for parents or people considering having a child.

According to a brief issued by the U.S. Department of Labor Women’s Bureau last year, median childcare prices for one child ranged from $4,810 to $15,417 per year. These prices make up 8 percent to 19.3 percent of average family income.

With many families in need of childcare services for multiple children, the cost of childcare can significantly strain even the best, carefully thought out budget. When considering care type, age group and county population size, the report found that childcare was still reported to cost a considerable portion of family income. 

Early childhood education experts recognize the need for more funding of childcare, describing it as a necessary resource for the public. 

“Childcare needs to be funded as a public good, just like we fund the libraries, third grade classrooms– in some cases– [the] metro, [and] the parks,” shared Marica Cox Mitchell, vice president of early childhood for the Bainum Foundation. “It should just be funded as part of the public good because it benefits young children, it benefits their families, it benefits the economy.”

The high rates of childcare do not come with no explanation. 

Kathy Hollowell-Makle, executive director for the District of Columbia Association for the Education of Young Children, notes how the smaller classroom sizes required in early childcare institutions play a role in the high costs.

“It’s very expensive and that’s mostly because the ratios have to remain small,” she stated.

“For instance, infants usually have maybe six [children] and, depending on the square footage, maybe eight, and they’ve acquired two teachers. They have two teachers in a classroom with six kids. That’s expensive when you look at that same cost of two educators being in a classroom of 25 kids,” she explained.

Hollowell-Makle also emphasizes how pricey childcare often leads parents to receive childcare services from family members. However, when said family members do not implement early childhood education practices in their services, there can be concern surrounding the benefit of this approach in comparison to enrolling a child in an educational institution.

“We want to make sure children have exposure to high quality experiences where the educators are credentialed, they have experience, and they have the supervision and regulatory oversight that makes sure that children remain safe and healthy,” she added.

The impact that expensive childcare can have on certain communities also remains a concern as parents in low income, marginalized communities may be unable to access childcare altogether.

Cynthia Davis, executive director for the District of Columbia Family Child Care Association, spoke of the contributions of women in the workplace and the impact of high child care costs on their ability to be successful in their careers.

“Black and Brown women have always been in working positions. We always served the public [and] we always served in help positions– positions where we had to serve children, serve families [and] cleaning positions,” she expressed. “It’s very crucial that it be affordable for them to be able to [maintain]. Every woman doesn’t want to stay home and those options need to be available for them to be able to experience work.” 

As parents continue to navigate through costly childcare options, early childhood experts advocate for more educational and affordable care for children. 

“We really have to step up and start funding and treating early childhood education as a public good like we treat K-12 or Pre-K,” Mitchell said.

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By Bria Overs,
Word in Black

Will Edmond, vegan chef and travel content creator, had had enough. After spending 13 years living in Atlanta and a couple of years in Louisiana, he decided it was time for a change. It was time to return to his roots.

“Cities are becoming more stressful,”said Edmond, 39, to Word In Black. The appeal of urban living has declined for some due to the traffic, crime and the rising cost of living. 

“I know my family has land back in East Texas. I can go back, clean it up, get it together, and build some unique structures on it. And that’s what led me here,” he said. 

In 2022, Edmond and his partner, Austyn Rich, moved back to Edmond’s ancestral hometown in East Texas, also known as Piney Woods. It’s a rural area known for its beauty, pine trees, lakes, and nature trails. And it’s here that Edmond’s family land — a whole 45-acres passed down through generations — is located.

But this experience, where Black folks keep land in the family, is rare.

Financial experts frequently laud homeownership as the key to wealth building. Yet, the Black homeownership rate has never been above 50 percent — a level other ethnic and racial groups have reached and surpassed. For the Black community, the loss of land and property contributes to the widening homeownership gap and the even wider racial wealth gap.

“The immediate cause of home loss is the lack of estate planning,” says Nketiah “Ink” Berko, an Equal Justice Works fellow at the National Consumer Law Center. “Either someone didn’t write a will, or maybe they did, but in the will, they left the home to five or six people. And by doing that, they’ve fractured the homeownership interests in the property.”

According to a 2022 Consumer Reports survey, one in three Americans has a will, but 77 percent of Black Americans lack one.

Estimates vary on the exact amount of Black-owned land lost. The Land Trust Alliance, a land conservation advocacy organization, estimates that between 1865 and 1919, Black folks in the South owned 15 million acres of land. By 2015, Black Americans had lost 97 percent of their land.

The American Bar Association offers a similar statistic: between 1910 and 1997, Black farmers and families lost more than 90 percent of the 16 million acres they owned — and the organization considers that to be a conservative estimate.

Splitting land between family

Berko says that land initially divided by a few children can become further divided by several grandchildren and even more so by subsequent generations. This division, known as “heirs property” or “tangled title,” creates challenges and difficulties in maintaining and keeping the property within the family.

This phenomenon also affected Edmond’s family. “My family, we own about six acres, and then my cousins up the street own some of the land as well,” he says. “We have all of the land still in our family to this day.”

On his father’s side of the family — which also owns a lot of land — a relative sold off their portion. Selling is one way to lose land, but other ways are incredibly burdensome to families.

A National Consumer Law Center report co-authored by Berko highlights laws and policies that could protect, resolve, or prevent heirs property. According to the report, heirs property owners are at greater risk of property tax lien foreclosure and frequently miss out on benefits or disaster relief.

Or, mortgage companies may refuse payments from “people who are not the borrower, refuse to provide information about how much is owed, and refuse to consider heirs for loan modifications or other foreclosure avoidance options,” according to the report.

“A lot of people lose their land for $4,000 because nobody in the family can agree to even pay anything on it, and then they lose it,” Edmond says. “Well, you only owe that much on it, and the land was worth $100,000. Now somebody else has it. I see that a lot around here.”

Tax and mortgage foreclosures leave families vulnerable to investors who offer to purchase the property for much less than it is worth, adding to the racial wealth gap.

Keeping it in the Family

In 2023, Edmond, Rich, and their family members turned the abandoned land into a homestead and “glamping” destination called Glamping Remote. When the project was complete, they shared their story publicly.

Edmond says it was important for him to share his journey and his family’s story because it can serve as an example of what’s possible for Black people. With it being unlikely that houses and property will get cheaper, Edmond believes if people can work with the property in their family or help pay the property taxes, they should.

“If people want to have any type of wealth or to hold on to land that’s been passed down from generation to generation, they need to come back to their grandfather’s and uncle’s land,” he says. “Land is something that’s only made one time.”

This article was originally published by Word in Black.

The post Why experts say keep land in your family if you can appeared first on AFRO American Newspapers.

By Bria Overs
Word In Black

On this year’s Equal Pay Day, observed March 12, there was little to celebrate. Although women now earn more than ever have, the gender wage gap persists. And they’re feeling the pain in this current economy and political climate.

In 2023, women earned, on average, 21.8 percent less than men, according to the Economic Policy Institute. While that’s better than 2022, where women made 22.9 percent less, it’s not necessarily because jobs are starting to pay better — and higher education and self-advocacy only improved wages so much. The EPI found that the pay improvement is likely because men’s wages have stagnated.

Research from the National Partnership for Women and Families found that women lose $1.6 trillion yearly because of the wage gap. “That’s a lot of money that we want in the pockets of women and their families,” Jocelyn Frye, president of the organization, says.

For Black, Latina, and Indigenous women, the wage gap problem is compounded by racial and gender discrimination, along with occupational segregation. These factors not only contribute to pay disparity with White men, but also Asian women and White women. Because of the type of jobs these women work, many of which are hourly positions with little to no options for retirement savings, health insurance and other benefits, this pay discrepancy adds to the racial wealth gap for each racial and ethnic group.

Frye adds that Black and Latina mothers, in particular, are more often the primary or sole breadwinners of their families, making them the “key to economic stability for their families.”

“When you ensure that they can participate in the economy equally, then they will do better, and their families will do better,” she says. “We know that centering women of color and the economic narrative is really critical to the economic growth of our families and our nation.”

The wage gap and reproductive justice

When women enter motherhood, they are hit with the “motherhood penalty” — a unique phenomenon where women see a decline in their earnings that can last the rest of their working years.

But beyond that, since the Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade in June 2022, several states have made women’s reproductive health a legislative target. So far, 14 states have banned abortions, while 11 states have gestational limits between six and 22 weeks, according to KFF.

“Many of the attacks we see, we believe, have multiple effects as we’ve seen across the board,” Frye says. “It’s not just about abortion, it’s access to IVF, access to OBGYN care writ large, it’s maternal health. All of those things affect the economic stability of families.”

Businesses could help solve the gap

Both Frye and the Economic Policy Institute believe federal and state policymakers should do more to close the pay gap. In 2017, the Trump administration suspended an Obama-era wage gap initiative that required companies with 100 or more employees to confidentially report to the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) what they pay employees, categorized by job type, sex, race and ethnicity.

The Salary Transparency Act and Pay Equity for All Act were introduced in Congress in March 2023, but there has been no movement in the year since. States like California, Maryland and New York have passed laws requiring salary ranges on job postings.

However state efforts only partially solve the pay gap issue because women could easily fall on the lower end of the salary range. Besides, some employers still ask for previous pay history, making it more challenging for women to negotiate pay that reflects their worth.

While the nation waits for legislation, business owners can help with this issue by examining and addressing how they pay women in their workplaces.

“We really have to rely on employers to do their own due diligence and to include race and gender into the analysis they do because many will say they are looking at their gender pay gap, but then won’t look deeper,” Frye says. They should “look at how they’re enforcing and ensuring they’re looking at their workforce on a regular basis to minimize inequality.”

This article was originally published by Word In Black.

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By Ariyana Griffin,
Special to the AFRO

A refund check is received when a student at a college or university has loan money or financial aid funds that are left over after paying for a semester. The school will use the funds provided for big ticket items such as tuition, books and room and board, with any remaining funds disbursed to the student in the form of a check or direct deposit. The infamous “refund check,” as it is often called, is usually dispersed several weeks after the start of the semester.

The amount ranges per person, it can be a few hundred or a few thousand. What students do with their refund money can help them tremendously in the future– if they budget and plan properly. But, sometimes this is the largest amount of money a student has seen at one time, making it hard to manage the money and make good decisions on how to utilize it.

While buying into the latest trends or splurging on your wish list seem like a great idea, there are a few alternatives that could help you throughout your collegiate career and beyond. 

Yasmin Eady, a first year Ph.D. student at North Carolina A&T shared that using your refund to handle necessities first can really put you ahead of the game and have less stress throughout the semester. 

“If you are going to buy a new laptop or tablet, keep the receipt so you can write it off on your taxes because you can use it for school,” she said. Eady also suggested using the money to pay off a few months of rent, or using the money to build up an emergency fund. 

Similarly, Dr. Kelly Carter, an assistant professor of finance at Morgan State University’s Graves School of Business, expressed that saving the excess money– after taking care of necessities– is the best thing you can do. 

“If you’ve made it without the refund check, you can continue to make it without the refund check. So that means take it, deposit it [and] leave it alone,” said Carter. He shared that paying off credit card debt is important, however it is important to only spend what you have on your credit card. “You only take on debt that you can afford, only debt that you can pay back,” he said. 

Taylor Thomas, a senior biology student at Morgan State University and a student worker for the Office of Student Success and Retention expressed that she used her refund check to invest in herself. 

“I invested into my schooling, whether that be new equipment in terms of laptops or iPads,” said Thomas. “I also am an out-of-state student, so I struggle with transportation. Over time, I was able to invest a down payment for a car,but I ensured that I had a job at the university that would cover payments and things like that.”

On the other hand if you feel like you deserve a break or vacation, and your refund check came just in time,just know that memories can be a great thing to invest in. 

Christine Harris, a Shaw University alumna, shared that she used her check to go on her first solo trip. 

 “I went to Jamaica for a week. It was my first time traveling alone as when I traveled internationally it was studying abroad,” Harris said. “I don’t regret what I spent my money on. The memories I made were priceless.” 

Erika Berry, a bank teller, encourages people to have fun and make memories that will last a lifetime as well.

“As a banker I could give you some great advice about saving or paying off debts but, instead I’m going to advise you to blow it! Now, before you just start throwing the money up in the air and rolling around on the fresh rainfall, I’m saying that I want to see you invest in yourself!” said Berry.

She brought up some good questions for someone with the new lump sum of money to think about.

“Do you have your passport? Is there some beat making software that you’ve been interested in? Perhaps you’d do well with a ring light to make better content for your page,” she said. All of these could be used as an investment in yourself and your career in the long run. However, think about what things you would need to invest, and how you can best use them.

“Basically, my advice would be to purchase things that will bring you joy now and later– being smart with your money doesn’t mean not having fun with it,” said Berry.

There are plenty of ways you can spend your money when you get a refund check, but the best thing you can do is put extra thought into how you want to spend the money before you do.

The post A time to plan: You have your college refund– now what? appeared first on AFRO American Newspapers.

By Bria Overs,
Word In Black

Parents want the best for their children — to see them thrive, graduate college, get a good job and start a family of their own. Young adults turn to their parents for advice and, on occasion, financial assistance to achieve these key milestones of adulthood.

Texas resident Kayla G., 28, is one of those young people. She used a full-ride scholarship to get through college, but her parents provided support — filling out her FAFSA and paying for groceries — while she completed her undergraduate degree. After graduation, she moved home rent-free, got a marketing job, earned a master’s degree and paid off her car. 

While rent is not something she worries about, she does cover other expenses, including her phone bill, car insurance and health insurance.

“They definitely don’t just pay for everything, and I’m not living a complete ‘princess life’ over here,” she tells Word In Black. “But it is helpful. For all of my 20s, I’ve been able to save.”

According to the Pew Research Center, 23 percent of young adults in America say they are mostly financially independent, while 45 percent say they are completely independent from their parents. The study doesn’t break things down by race, but other research gives insights into the Black parent and Black young adulthood experience.

Links to the racial wealth gap

A 2021 study exploring the intersection of the Black-White wealth gap and parental financial assistance by researchers and professors at The New School and the State University of New York at Buffalo found that for some Black parents, giving money to their young adult children is quite difficult — through no fault of their own. Their ability to financially assist is not only affected by the long-standing racial wealth gap, but it can also contribute to its widening as well.

“The racial wealth gap is largely linked in an intergenerational way to policies and structures in which Black people have been excluded from,” says Darrick Hamilton, Henry Cohen professor of economics and urban policy and founding director of the Institute on Race, Power and Political Economy at The New School. In other words, it may be easier for White people to build and maintain wealth than it is for Black people because of government policies, for example, such as ineligibility for benefits from the G.I. Bill after World War II.

Black young adults are less likely to receive financial assistance from parents for education, homeownership, and other things than their White counterparts. 14 percent of Black people surveyed for the study reported receiving parental aid for college, 2 percent for homeownership, and nearly 20 percent for other reasons.

The researchers wrote these numbers are low in comparison to White survey takers, not because Black parents don’t want to help their children. The inability to give has more to do with the “socioeconomic position of Black parents,” and “in turn, translates into the intergenerational reproduction of the racial wealth gap.”

Effects of financial assistance for parents and their children

Low-income parents, especially, face trouble by providing aid. Nearly half of lower-income parents and 37 percent of middle-income parents said helping their young adult children financially hurt their own finances. In the reverse, though, a third of young adults said they were helping their parents and those with lower incomes were more likely to help.

Kayla’s three other siblings, who are in their 30s and mid-20s, also live at home. She says, in the past, her parents hadn’t expressed any issues with all six family members living under one roof. That is, until recently. 

“Those conversations are happening, and there may be some shifts,” she says. “I can’t say they ever said they felt like we were taking money out of their pocket — not verbatim, at least — but I definitely feel like there’s starting to be a bit of financial strain because we’re all grown.”

On the flip side, that same 2021 study noted Black young adults fare better in terms of income and net worth when they have assistance from their parents. This has been the case for Kayla. She says thanks to her parents, she’s been able to “grow up slowly” and prepare for her 30s by learning how to budget, save and invest.

“I think that’s a really undervalued thing in our society because everyone’s so quick to grow up fast and jump right into the world,” she says. “Being home has allowed me to mature slowly. I feel like I’m much wiser about things like how I view money. I’m better prepared to kind of go out there, and when I’m ready because I’ve been able to save up, I can purchase my own place.”

This article was originally published by Word In Black.

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By Anissa Durham,
Word in Black

Sanieqwa Wilson has lived with Type 1 diabetes since she was 11. One of the challenges she has faced is getting an insulin pump. She first requested it when she was 25. Now, at 40, the Columbus, Ohio, resident finally got a new endocrinologist who approved it two months ago.  

It took 15 years. 

Part of the problem was the constant switch in doctors, Wilson says. Every few months or years, she was assigned a new endocrinologist. But it’s not just diabetes that she has to worry about.  

In June 2017, she had a heart attack. And 10 months later, on March 31, 2018, she had a sudden cardiac arrest — which subsequently left her in a coma for eight days. Wilson lives with kidney disease and congestive heart failure. 

“I have a lot of anxiety with my diabetes…it’s extremely traumatic,” she says. “I have PTSD from the sudden cardiac arrest.” 

Adults like Wilson who live with a disability report higher rates of delayed access to medical equipment and supplies than adults without a disability, a new Urban Institute report finds. This contributes to worsening health outcomes, chronic pain, and mental health issues.  

The analysis comes from the Institute’s June 2022 Health Reform Monitoring Survey of nearly 10,000 adults ages 18-64. And researchers who spearheaded the report told Word In Black the findings are not surprising.  

“What is surprising…there’s not a lot of national data on barriers adults with disabilities face to get medical equipment, supplies and other home and community-based services,” Michael Karpman, principal research associate in the Health Policy Center at the Urban Institute, says. “This is filling an important data gap that is really not covered by federal surveys.” 

Some of the most common types of equipment and supplies that were delayed or not received included eyeglasses, breathing equipment, mobility equipment, diabetes supplies, and hearing aids. And adults with a disability were six times more likely than non-disabled adults to say they experienced delayed physical and occupational therapy.  

Beyond the data are the people living with and experiencing first hand complications and delays in the health care system.   

With multiple health conditions to manage, Wilson, like many Americans, is left to navigate a complicated health care system. And as a Black woman, she faces additional inequities. For example, when she explains to physicians that she’s in pain, they assume she can handle it since she’s lived with diabetes since childhood. And Wilson says anytime she goes to the hospital, even if it’s not related to her diabetes, it’s automatically blamed on the autoimmune disease. 

“It’s a whole ball of frustration that comes along with diabetes,” she says.  

After the sudden cardiac arrest, she was put on disability and assigned Medicaid insurance. Three years ago, she got married and was put on her husband’s UnitedHealthcare insurance. 

A tale of two insurances 

“Medicaid is like a catch-22,” she says. “I can see the difference between having Medicaid and having UnitedHealthcare. It’s sad, but you’re literally treated two different ways.” 

Prior to getting UnitedHealthcare, Wilson had ongoing issues getting insulin. And she faced similar problems when accessing her prescription heart medication. Medicaid refused to refill her heart medication even though she ran out. However, a CVS program refilled it for 10 days until her insurance company would refill the prescription. 

“It’s almost like the insurance company was deciding what I needed and what I didn’t need,” Wilson says. “But the insurance company is not here with this diagnosis with me.” 

Adults living with a disability and insured with Medicare or Medicaid were more likely to report delayed or unmet needs for medical supplies, like prescription drugs, than those with private insurance, the Urban Institute report states.  

“Medicaid is the payer of last resort,” Karpman says. But he says having insurance is better than having nothing. 

“There’s no question that having health insurance is helpful. People gain much more protection from having insurance than being uninsured,” Karpman says. “The problem is there is still a large number of gaps in coverage. Too much complexity in health insurance. And there’s often a lack of transparency.” 

With so much convoluted information about insurance plans and the health care system, it can be difficult to know where to start. Jackie Pilgrim, a representative of the National Black Disability Coalition, has spent more than two decades navigating the health care system for her son.  

Pilgrims’ son Hunter, now 24, was born seven months prematurely. When he was one week old, he had one-third of his small intestine removed. Months later, he developed lung disease after being intubated in the NICU. She says he came home with a colostomy bag and now lives with autism and other intellectual disabilities.  

When Hunter was four months old, Pilgrim found out her existing insurance didn’t pay for anything. But she was able to get emergency Medicaid — which paid for those initial months of hospital bills. Medicaid continues to cover his medical bills. 

Despite all the challenges, she says she never went into medical debt. Additionally, having a good support system has significantly helped her navigate and access everything from insurance coverage to prescription drugs to specialized physicians.  

“I know my situation is probably different from a lot of people,” Pilgrim says. “But because I’m deep into the disability world, I’ve been very informed and savvy about getting things done.” 

The power of informed advocacy 

As a child, Wilson was constantly told her diabetes diagnosis was a death sentence. With doctors putting an expiration date on her life — telling her she wouldn’t live past 15, then 18, then 21. Now as an advocate for people living with diabetes and chronic disease, she’s adamant that “diabetes is not a death sentence.” 

“Give yourself some grace,” she says when asked what she would tell a parent or a child living with diabetes. Wilson recognizes that it’s not easy and it is a life-changing diagnosis, but she emphasizes that it’s important to live and not just survive.  

Pilgrim, whose son is nonverbal, encourages parents not to take no for an answer. Something that helped her navigate the health care system, after her husband left when Hunter was 9-months old, was being assigned a social worker. Now, she encourages parents to seek out other parents who have gone through the system. And she emphasizes to parents the importance of being well informed about their child’s diagnosis. 

“Initially, we have to get past the pain of discovering that our children are going to be disabled,” Pilgrim says. “You need to go into this with a healthy mind.” 

This article was originally published by Word in Black. 

The post Black, disabled and dealing with the maze of health care appeared first on AFRO American Newspapers.

In a country growing more diverse by the day, we have the power to stop book bans and other attempts to erase Black history.

By Ameshia Cross
Word in  Black

No matter how much the right derides the word, the Black community needs to stay woke. In recent years, we’ve witnessed a disturbing trend that threatens the foundations of our democratic society: the rise of book bans, curriculum censorship and attacks on historical narratives in our educational institutions.

These actions not only threaten the principles of academic freedom and undermine the integrity of our education system, but they also position America as a democracy on the brink of collapse. 

Education is meant to be a journey of unlocking the unknown, expanding critical thinking, and advancing intellectual growth. Central to this journey is the freedom to engage with a diverse range of ideas, perspectives and honest history.

When politicians and officials censor books, sanitize curricula or suppress truths like the harsh effects of slavery, Jim Crow, Reconstruction and various civil rights movements, they are robbing students of the opportunity to grapple with complex issues of the past and design a future that embraces a more just society.

In a country growing more diverse by the day, we cannot let the right whitewash our history or dilute cultures that ignore the multicultural America and world our young people reside in. To do anything other than teach both historic and modern realities is erasure.  

Education should encourage dialogue, debate and the exploration of diverse viewpoints, not shield them from various ideas, uncomfortable truths or controversial topics. And yet, more than 4,200 books were targeted for censorship in 2023 — a 65 percent increase than the previous year,  according to the  American Library Association (ALA) — with 47 percent of them centering the lived experiences of the LGBTQ+ community and people of color.

This isn’t by mistake; it is a deliberate effort to propagate (cis-hetero) White supremacy. As a result, there has been a dangerous domino effect with the rollback of hard-earned civil rights progress. The so-called anti-CRT (critical race theory) and anti-DEI (diversity, equality and inclusion) culture wars have coincided with the downfall of affirmative action in college admissions, the decimation of voting rights, along with amplified White grievance politics and claims of reverse racism. Schools have always been battlegrounds for civil rights…today is no different. 

Black and Latino students are particularly impacted by the erasure of their history and culture. With the majority of students in the U.S. being students of color, they deserve a rich and rigorous education that is culturally relevant to them. Not only is it just, but it has positive effects: Research shows that children are more engaged and have better academic outcomes when they can see themselves in books, learning materials and teachers. In other words, representation matters. 

Similarly, curriculum censorship stifles academic inquiry and hampers educators’ ability to provide a comprehensive and well-rounded education. The right’s attacks on history are particularly insidious, as they seek to rewrite or erase the past to fit a memory of America that no longer represents who we are or where we are going.

History is not static; it is a dynamic and ongoing process of inquiry, interpretation and revision, and it should not be diluted or distorted. And Whiteness should no longer be the default perspective. 

Moreover, book bans, curriculum censorship and attacks on history disproportionately impact marginalized communities and perpetuate systemic inequalities. By silencing voices and perspectives that challenge the status quo or highlight the experiences of marginalized groups, we perpetuate a narrative of exclusion and erasure. Our histories, our heroes, and our experiences cannot be erased.  

That’s why EdTrust and renowned leaders in education and civil rights are hosting Can’t Be Erased: An Event to Rally Against Book Bans and Curriculum Censorship on April 17 at 6 p.m. E.T. Attendees of this free virtual event can learn how to push back against efforts to suppress the teaching of honest history and the diversity of identities and ideas in your community.  

The call to provide every student with a culturally relevant curriculum in a safe, inclusive environment has never been more pressing. Book bans and policies that restrict discussions of race, gender and identity not only stifle academic growth but also obscure students’ understanding of diverse cultures both in the U.S. and the world around them. 

This article was originally published on WordinBlack.com.

The post The whitewashing of education – and how to stop it appeared first on AFRO American Newspapers.

Just because one Black person at a fast food restaurant says nice things about Donald Trump, that doesn’t mean that the rest of Black people support him.

By Keith Boykin
Word in Black

Years ago, when I worked for President Clinton, activists would often call me to complain about the administration’s policies. But when the same activists were invited to meet the president at the White House, the tone of their objections inevitably changed when they spoke to him in person. 

There’s something about proximity to power and celebrity that makes people much more polite when they’re in the presence of powerful people than when they’re not. 

That’s the best possible explanation I can come up with for the reaction of Chick-fil-A workers and customers when Donald Trump stopped at one of the company’s restaurants in Atlanta on April 10. “I don’t care what the media tells you, Mr. Trump, we support you,” one Black woman told him.

It could be that the twice-impeached, quadruple-indicted presidential candidate just happened to meet the few Black people in Atlanta who support him all at the same place at the same time. Or it could be they were just being polite. Either way, it’s not representative of the Black community in Atlanta, in Georgia, or the rest of the country.

We need to stop grading Donald Trump on a curve. Just because one Black person at a fast food restaurant says nice things about him, that doesn’t mean that the rest of Black people support him. But expectations are so low for Trump and Republicans that just going to a fast food spot and speaking to a handful of Black people is considered remarkable African American outreach.

The truth is that Black people are the one demographic group most opposed to Trump’s presidential campaign. But in America, Black people carry an unfair burden of representation so that the actions of any one Black person, however unrepresentative, can and will be used against us.

The irony is that the comment at Chick-fil-A came from a Black woman, and Black women — notwithstanding Candace Owens — are the least supportive demographic group of Donald Trump. Ninety percent of Black women voted for Joe Biden in 2020, and 94 percent voted for Hillary Clinton in 2016. Only 4 percent of Black women supported Trump in his race against Clinton.

In the state of Georgia, 92 percent of Black women voted for Biden, and only 7 percent voted for Trump.

Black women’s opposition to Trump is understandable. Trump, after all, appointed the three right-wing Supreme Court justices who killed affirmative action in college admissions in 2023 and overturned Roe v. Wade in 2022. And when Black women created a private “Fearless Fund” to help other Black women start businesses, it was two Trump-appointed federal judges who struck it down.

After spending five-and-a-half years spreading unfounded rumors about the first Black president’s birth certificate, Trump came into office in 2017 and tried unsuccessfully to repeal Obamacare, a popular program that helped nearly 3 million Black Americans obtain health insurance coverage from 2011 to 2019.

When Democrats tried to expand Medicaid coverage, a state-run program that disproportionately helps Black people, Trump and the Republicans tried to block that as well, even though 15 million African Americans were enrolled in Medicaid.

Meanwhile, as President Biden has canceled $146 billion of student loan debt for more than 4 million borrowers, Trump’s Republican colleagues have gone to court to try to block this financial lifeline that disproportionately helps young Black people.

When Democrats tried to pass the George Floyd Justice in Policing Act, it was Trump and his Black Republican friend, Sen. Tim Scott, who killed the bill.

When Democrats tried to pass the much-needed John Lewis Voting Rights Act, it was Trump’s Senate Republican co-conspirators in Congress who blocked it.

Moreover, Trump has spent the past five years attacking the nation’s most prominent Black women, including former first lady Michelle Obama, Vice President Kamala Harris, Supreme Court Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson, New York Attorney General Letitia James, Reps. Maxine Waters and Ilhan Omar, and journalists Yamiche Alcindor and April Ryan. Not to mention, he’s been launching vicious personal attacks against Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis in Atlanta.

If nothing else, Trump is a relentless salesman. The guy who’s trying to hawk $400 gold sneakers and $60 Bibles is now using his celebrity to sell himself to White people by pretending to be a friend of Black people so White people won’t feel so guilty about supporting him after decades of racism.

But Black people can see right through his desperate strategy. Just because he said hello to some Black people at a chicken joint doesn’t make him Colonel Sanders. It makes him the panderer-in-chief.

“Black Vote, Black Power,” a collaboration between Keith Boykin and Word In Black, examines the issues, the candidates, and what’s at stake for Black America in the 2024 presidential election.

Keith Boykin is a New York Times–bestselling author, TV and film producer, and former CNN political commentator. A graduate of Dartmouth College and Harvard Law School, Keith served in the White House, cofounded the National Black Justice Coalition, cohosted the BET talk show “My Two Cents,” and taught at the Institute for Research in African-American Studies at Columbia University in New York. He’s a Lambda Literary Award–winning author and editor of seven books. He lives in Los Angeles.

This article was originally published by WordinBlack.com.

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By Aziah Siid,
Word in Black

Career days happen nationwide at schools, giving students a dose of “if you can see it you can be it” realness. Sure, some kids may see the day as an escape from the academic side of school, but it’s easier to be enthusiastic about career day when the people offering insights into their professions, the hurdles they’ve leaped over, and the milestones they’ve celebrated are actually relatable.

So picture this: Black folks from a range of professions packing a majority-Black school to tell students about their careers — and the skills and education they needed to get there. 

That’s what I witnessed when I participated as a speaker for career day at Brooklyn Laboratory Charter School, a sixth to 12th-grade school in Brooklyn. The school’s second annual “Success Looks Like Me” event saw over 70 professionals from a variety of backgrounds show up to campus with the hopes of inspiring students to pursue jobs they may never have heard of.

“I’ve never seen an event that has captivated the attention of scholars like Success Looks Like Me,” Chuck Jones, the principal for Brooklyn Lab’s high school told me. “We were able to host 70 Black and Brown professionals from across the country, some that come from big social nonprofits like The Black Man Can, handbag buyers from Chanel, marketing professionals, tailors, even a federal judge.” 

Exposure to various careers and the education needed to get there matters for students’ future ability to participate in the workforce or become an entrepreneur. As a recent report from Georgetown University’s Center for Education and the Workforce puts it, to ensure students have good jobs in the future, we need to “help young people pursue and attain their education and career goals simultaneously using career exposure and work-based learning.”

In addition, a 2021 report, “Preparing Students of Color for the Future Workforce” from the Center for American Progress recommended partnerships between local employers and schools to “help students build knowledge on various career options.” Ideally those would be long-term partnerships that create a pipeline for students from school to the workplace, but in the meantime, career day creates a vision of success in the minds of kids. 

Brooklyn Lab’s CEO, Garland Thomas-McDavid, who was born and raised in one of Brooklyn’s toughest neighborhoods in the 1980s, is all about vision.

“I really want it to expose children to success that looks like them, success that was tangible to them,” Thomas-McDavid previously told Word In Black. “I just like to think that I’m going back for my people. Like, it’s not just about my success, where I am, or me being a woman and arriving somewhere, but how am I widening the path and creating access, and showing even the adults around me how to get there and how to develop in order to be successful.”

Representation makes a difference

Brooklyn LAB is nearly 92 percent  Black, and according to data from New York City Public Schools economic need index, nearly 80 percent of Brooklyn Lab students come from families facing economic hardship, in turn many of them qualify for reduced or free lunch. 

In looking at Thomas-McDavid’s ideology about all students believing they can reach the highest level of success, Jones agrees their career day touched the LAB community, “in a way that was transformative.” He says that after talking to a marketing professional from George P. Johnson, one of the world’s leading experience marketing agencies, the student said that he “never realized that the experiences that I saw on TV were made by people that look like me.” 

Another high school student told Jones how enthusiastic she was about not only hearing about Historically Black Colleges and Universities, but also learning about themes from a person who attended and could explain how much the experience impacted their life.

Career days like this one signify the need for students to have first-hand exposure to opportunities — , like knowing they can attend an HBCU rather than settling for an in-state college or university.

“The thing that made it so transformational is because, at the end of the day, you want to be able to build bridges across lines of adversity, and oftentimes, adversity at an all-Black school can be just a thought, right?” Jones tells Word In Black. He says events like their annual career days help teachers distinguish between students who believe they can overcome adversities they face, and ones who need a bit of help achieving their goals

Although the number of participants doubled in just one year, Jones is looking forward to building partnerships with the companies who sent representatives and getting even more folks from a wide range of careers.  

“I would love for us to have a chef that comes on-site, and the portion of the mini-lesson is actually a mini cooking class,” Jones says. “I think the sky is really the limit, and the possibilities are endless.” 

This article was originally published by Word In Black.

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By Aziah Siid,
Word In Black

In education, it’s an uncomfortable fact: the teaching workforce is overwhelmingly White and female, particularly in grades K-12. Black men in an elementary school classroom, statistics show, are few and far between.

At the same time, studies show, Black boys make up a disproportionate number of children assigned to special-education classes – a component, experts say, in the schools-to-prison pipeline.

Now, a new study has found that Black male elementary school students matched to Black teachers are less likely to be identified for special education services. 

The study, conducted jointly by researchers from the University of North Carolina and the University of California-Davis, shed new light on the persistent problem of Black students misidentified as learning disabled or disciplinary problems. But it also underscores the need to increase recruitment of Black male teachers, who make up just 1.3 percent of the 3.8 million public school teachers in the U.S. 

“Our findings add to the growing body of evidence that having access to Black teachers matters to Black children’s educational journeys,” said Cassandra M.D. Hart, an education professor at UC-Davis and the study’s lead author. “We show that access to Black teachers most strongly affects precisely the types of special disability placements that are more subject to teacher discretion, and therefore where the need for services is more questionable.”

The researchers based their study on data drawn from North Carolina, a state with a relatively high number of Black teachers — roughly 15 percent, compared to 7 percent nationally.  

At the same time, the state’s Black students are overrepresented in special education programs: 17 percent of Black fifth graders in North Carolina are in special education services, compared to 13 percent of White fifth graders. 

The data comes from more than 540,000 observations of Black children in grades 1 to 4 and their assigned teachers from 2008 through 2013.

The analysis found that “Black students matched to Black teachers had a reduced likelihood of being newly identified with disabilities,” according to the study. The effect, the study found, was especially pronounced among Black boys —  particularly those who were economically disadvantaged.

Compared to their White peers, however, Black students are far less likely to be taught by teachers who look like them, according to the study.

That’s a problem because identifying students who need special educational help “generally (relies) on teacher or administrator discretion” rather than expert medical analysis, according to the study. “These disabilities may be most prone to subjectivity and ultimately, misclassification.” 

Importance of same-race teachers 

Historically, the lack of representation is problematic because Black teachers hold higher expectations for Black students, they are associated with better outcomes for Black students, higher scores on tests, increased attendance, and even high school graduation and college enrollment, according to the study.

With innovative programs like the Center for Black Educator Development, and the Black Mother’s Forum consistently recruiting teachers, and attempting to shift traditional classroom structure, the need for more Black teachers continues to be evident through research like this latest study. 

The need to look at how the matching of same-race teachers impact student placement is partially due to substantial research on the gaps that emerge between Black students and other races. That includes differences between enrollment into discretionary educational settings like gifted programs or for special education services. 

In looking at the special education-to-prison and foster care-to-prison pipeline – which both stem from fundamental structures in all school types – this research spotlights the need for  Black students being taught by teachers who understand their experiences.

This article was originally published by Word In Black.

The post Black teachers help keep Black boys out of special education appeared first on AFRO American Newspapers.

By Rev. Dorothy S. Boulware
Word In Black

Bishop Leah Daughtry was born in Brooklyn, N.Y., into a family where church was their life, which is the definition of a preacher’s kid. She began teaching Sunday school at 13 but carries none of the usual “PK” cynicism. “Usher, church administrator; being a preacher’s kid in a smaller church, you had to do all these things. We didn’t get to sit and wear pretty clothes,” she says. 

But a PK component emerged when asked if she’s ever cleaned the church bathroom.

“Yes, Ma’am, the bathroom, the kitchen, sweep the floor, make the bulletins in the old days with the mimeograph machines,” she says when I interject, having to clear mistakes on the bulletin master with a razor blade. She continues, laughing, “Buy the chicken, fry the chicken, serve the chicken, raise the money, count the money, take the money to the bank.”

Daughtry had no expectation of formal ministry until the call came in 2000. And she answered in a wholehearted way. 

She is now the presiding prelate of that church, a Pentecostal Assembly founded in 1929 by her grandfather, Bishop Alonzo Daughtry. It’s formally called The Church on the Mount, but the national fellowship of churches is called The House of the Lord.  

That fellowship describes its mandate as prophetic, political, pastoral, priestly, pedagogical and programmatic. 

A church full of registered voters

“We believe in the small church model, which is biblical,” she says. “It’s important that the shepherd be able to count the sheep. Know them by name. Know what their conditions are. There’s no need to go through lots of layers to get to the shepherd.” 

The members of The House of the Lord are educated in the necessity of voting and required to register; they are enlightened about the issues.

“We give them tools to make assessments for themselves. We don’t tell them who to vote for. They don’t have to vote, but they do have to register. When candidates come to speak, they know they’re addressing a church full of registered voters.”

So they immediately see the dichotomy in a platform that declares itself pro-life but has no care about the quality of the child’s life once it’s here.

“Abundant life in all its phases. Food. Shelter. Water. Good schools. Safe streets,” the Bishop says. 

“I want to be clear that I am not fighting for abortions. I’m pro-choice, but not pro-abortion. That’s between the women and their God. Everyone has a God-given right and a God-given ability to make personal decisions, including who you want involved in those decisions, but definitely not the government.”

She said we should have autonomy over our being and personhood. We are endowed with the right and freedom.

The bishop responds to the revisionist history being propagated. “The boldness of the lie is quite stunning,” she says. “That people learned skills, had housing. What housing? Our responsibility is to challenge the lie. It’s just a lie.”

And her tone softened as she recalled the family history that recorded her then fourth-grade-age grandmother having been raped, and chosen as the bed partner for the slave master. He legally claimed the son as his own, but who would deny the violence perpetrated upon a child?

Bishop Daughtry says the same force wants to make decisions for us — basic life decisions and choices: “It is the same force that made decisions over our grandparents. People outside myself make decisions. It’s the same demonic force.”

A Capitol Hill start

“My first vote was for Jesse Jackson for President in 1984. In my junior year of college, I interned for U.S. Rep., the Rev. Ed Townes of New York,” she says. 

She says working on Capitol Hill for those four years gave her an on-ramp into the Washington political establishment through his values lens, which reflected her own values and showed that faith and politics could be intertwined without losing their parameters. 

She also worked for Democratic National Committee Chair Ron Brown and had a hand in logistics for the 1992 convention. She was also an administrative assistant for Alexis Herman, the first African American to be Secretary of Labor

Trump surprise? Not. 

Bishop Daughtry says she’s not surprised that Trump is once again the Republican front-runner. 

“Because this country is what it is. We’ve never really repented for the sins of slavery, racism, sexism. When you dehumanize God’s creations, making them less than you…you commit a sin. Because our country refuses to deal with the sin of racism and sexism at its core, we’ll keep coming back to the consequences…Trump is one of the consequences,” she says. 

“My deeply held faith drives me to believe that every single human being is a person of worth, in whom God has invested His own time and His own breath to bring into being. I am compelled therefore to love and care for God’s handiwork — my sisters and brothers on this earth — and to see them as reflections of God’s love, grace and joy.”

For Bishop Daughtry, voting means choosing the person who represents her and her values. “Trump in no way represents my values. I don’t want my young nephews spending four years looking at him as a leader, as president or thinking his views are OK.”

What about the young people who are threatening to withhold their vote from the Biden administration because of Gaza?

“I’m really disappointed in the administration and the way it’s managed Gaza. There are 30,000 innocent dead people, people who had absolutely nothing to do with Hamas. They just happened to be living where Hamas is the political party in power,” she says. 

“And our country is funding the weapons Israel is using to kill Palestinians. They’re pushing them from Gaza to Rafa. Where are they going to end up?”

She prays every day and works every day to get the current administration to do the right thing, 

“I’m devastated at what’s going on in Gaza. But I’m also concerned about what’s happening on the South Side of Chicago, what’s happening in Bed Stuy. In Oakland. In Atlanta,” she says. 

“Trump ain’t going to help with none of them. If Trump was president now, Israel would have obliterated Palestine by now. That’s what he said.”

What have I done?

What have I done? That expression of regret is what Bishop Daughtry wants no voter to feel the morning after any election. Regret at having chosen the wrong candidate, or no candidate at all for the wrong reason. Everyone’s worst nightmare. 

There has been much conjecture as to the number of votes that will be lost because of the way the Biden administration has acted during the war in Gaza.

“The Democrats are my party, and I support them. I don’t support everything that they do.  And I definitely don’t support the way they’ve handled the situation in Gaza,” she says. 

“I was happy to hear President Biden say he was going to build a port city so the U.S. and other countries could provide food, clothing, medicine, and other essentials of which they are currently deprived.”

But what if Trump had been president when this happened? “Israel would have obliterated Palestine by now. He said out of his own mouth that Israel should just get it over with.”

And, says Daughtry, “President Biden said something no recent president has said, that there needs to be two states. The Palestinians should be able to govern themselves, without oversight of Netanyahu.”

A missed opportunity

Some people, especially Christians, say they’ll vote for the House and Senate, but not the top of the ticket.

“They should read Project 2025. It’s the Trump manifesto. It states what they plan to do if they get another go at the White House,” the Bishop says. “They’re going after everything they want with executive orders, all that don’t require congressional approval.”

She says they’re planning to deport Muslims, and half her family members are Muslims. 

“I’m concerned. They’re going to overturn laws — replace them with new laws. The top of the ticket matters,” she says.

Not voting is a missed opportunity.

“And you end up with, ‘Oh my God, what did I do?’”

This article was originally published by Word In Black.

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By Joseph Williams
Word in Black 

America’s anti-DEI crusaders — or, more accurately, the nation’s shameless racists and unabashed White supremacists who want to say the N-word publicly but don’t have the guts — are at it again. 

Hours after the Francis Scott Key Bridge disaster unfolded in his city, Baltimore Mayor Brandon Scott appeared with fire department and rescue squad commanders for a press conference. As rescue divers continued searching the frigid Patapsco River for possible survivors, Scott appeared shaken as he began his remarks, carried on live television nationwide. 

“This is an unthinkable tragedy,” Scott, only 39 years old and the youngest Black mayor in Baltimore history, told reporters. “We have to first and foremost pray for all of those who are impacted, those families, pray for our first responders and thank them. We have to be thinking about the families and people impacted. We have to try to find them safe.” 

Maybe it was the fact that Scott is a young Black man with a neatly trimmed beard and modest afro. Perhaps it was the fact that he was wearing a baseball jacket with the seal of Baltimore and his name embroidered on it. It could have been Scott’s unscripted, heart-on-his-sleeve concern for the road repair crew that vanished into dark, cold waters when a cargo ship veered into and knocked down the bridge.

Regardless of the reason, Scott’s television appearance triggered multiple bigots on X, formerly known as Twitter, who decided to drag the mayor for no clear reason. One of the most popular posts declared that the Black man leading Charm City through the crisis is, in their opinion, a “DEI Mayor,” whatever that means.

The nonsensical tweet by @iamyesyouareno incited many questions— what is a DEI mayor anyway? Why are things going to get worse? What’s up with that X handle? — immediately began trending, racking up nearly 10,000 likes and more than 7,000 shares at last count. 

Other like-minded people put on their tinfoil hats and quickly jumped in, drawing imaginary lines between DEI programs and the Key Bridge disaster, the company that owns the ship that hit the bridge, Baltimore’s crime rate, and even how well the Port of Baltimore is managed. 

It’s clear from the thousands of angry responses to those tweets that those on the left see DEI as the new “woke,” which became shorthand for efforts in schools or the workplace to eliminate racism and level the playing field for Black people. 

To their credit, dozens of respondents called out the writers of those tweets as racists, while dozens more suggested they get real with themselves and use the “N-word” next time. 

At this moment, authorities don’t know exactly why the massive cargo ship Dali lost control and slammed into the Key Bridge, sending six workers to all but certain death. But it’s safe to say that DEI didn’t build the bridge, didn’t load the ship, and wasn’t steering it when it veered into the Key Bridge support pillar at 1:30 EDT Tuesday morning. DEI didn’t even elect Scott, a native Baltimorean, in the 2020 mayoral race: more than 70% of Baltimore voters did. 

DEI tweets aside, Scott — who went to high school in Baltimore and returned after college to become one of the youngest members of the city council in history — has checked all the right boxes for a big-city mayor managing a catastrophe so far. In public and written statements, he has shown leadership, empathy, and concern for the victims as well as first responders. He has also kept the city informed through his social media accounts. 

And his love for the city has come through. 

“My heart is with those families tonight and in the days ahead,” he wrote on Twitter, referring to those who lost loved ones in the bridge collapse. “Let us wrap our arms around them and our entire community. Baltimore, we will get through this together.”  

This article was originally published by Word in Black. 

The post As Mayor Brandon M. Scott handles bridge tragedy, racists blow dog whistle appeared first on AFRO American Newspapers.

By Joseph Williams
Word in Black 

Working longer hours, typically in under-resourced schools, Black teachers often climb up the rougher side of the educational mountain compared with their White peers. And, like all teachers, they dealt with the COVID-19 disruptions in their profession: trying to engage and teach to camera-off students over Zoom.  

But while a new survey indicates that teachers, in general, are not OK — student behavior issues, chronic absenteeism, and learning loss are pushing morale underwater — Black teachers have a better attitude than White teachers about their work. 

“Black teachers report the strongest morale, while teachers who are White or of two or more races have more negative morale,” according to the first-ever Education Week 2024 Teacher Morale Index. On a scale of -100, which is a completely negative attitude, to +100, which is a completely positive outlook, overall teacher morale is -13, but Black teacher morale hovers at around +10, according to the survey. 

“The teaching profession — a workforce of three million — is at an inflection point that could shape the course of the profession for the next generation of educators and students,” according to the survey report. “For the last few years, teachers have reported high levels of burnout and disillusionment—borne initially from the hardships of teaching in a pandemic and exacerbated by the escalating academic, social, and mental health needs of students.”

The survey doesn’t pinpoint why Black teachers feel more positively about their work. But some experts believe that teaching — historically held in high esteem by the Black community, and one of few professions open to Black people during the Jim Crow era — may be seen as more of a calling than just a job. 

“In my opinion, Black teachers may be experiencing higher morale than their peers given the underlying purposes and motivations behind their work, but also community empowerment and racial uplift,” says Sonya Douglass, founding director of the Black Education Research Collective at Columbia University Teachers College. 

“The Black freedom struggle for equal education has always been just that — a struggle,” she says. “So one could argue that challenging circumstances or environment might not have the same impact on Black teachers as their non-Black colleagues.” 

Hiewet Senghor, founder of the nonprofit Black Teacher Collective, agrees, noting that Black teachers are just 7 percent of a workforce dominated by White women. But she also points out that the 10 percent positive morale of Black teachers isn’t all that high, and they likely experience the same frustrations and burnout rates as their White peers. 

“A more asset-based idea would be that Black teachers oftentimes have developed skills and capacity to make a way out of no way or make a dollar out of 15 cents,” Senghor says. “So they have better adaptability and problem-solving skills to work through the same challenges that teachers used to serving in less resource-starved schools do.”

The data illustrates the point. White teachers not only “sharply outnumber educators of other races and ethnicities, but they also tend to work in different school environments,” according to a 2021 study by the Pew Research Center. 

The highest percentage of Black teachers — 14 percent — work In Title I schools, where 75 percent or more students receive free or reduced lunches, according to the Pew study. By comparison, according to the study, schools where 25 percent or fewer students qualify for subsidized lunches have a Black teacher workforce of just 2 percent.

In schools where at least 90 percent of students were minorities, 20 percent of teachers were Black, according to the study. Yet in schools where at least 90 percent of students were White, “nearly all teachers (97 percent) also were White,” the survey said.

Meanwhile, the Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis looked at national school funding data and found that schools with a 10 percent higher share of Black students than the district average spend $140 less per student on instruction. 

Senghor said it’s been established that Black teachers work longer hours for less pay than their White counterparts, in part because their roles often include informally guiding and mentoring Black students — even if they work in majority White schools. Black women in the classroom, Senghor says, “have historically engaged in “other mothering,” while Black male teachers often take on role modeling for Black boys.

It tends to happen “outside formal teaching responsibilities, and the failure to recognize and compensate Black teachers for this is a significant barrier to Black teacher retention,” she says. “In my experience, Black teachers know this tax is a part of the experience, but their commitment and belief in the importance of Black teachers being there for Black students serves as a motivation to continue on.”

Ultimately, experts say, the best way to improve teacher morale, generally, is to improve working conditions, as well as offer more classroom and administrative support. But Douglass and Senghor agree that district and school administrators must recognize Black teachers’ special role in the profession. 

“Historically, Black teachers viewed education as a way to not only teach children and youth, but as central to community empowerment, racial uplift, and liberation,” Douglass says. “As Malcolm X said, ‘Education is the passport to the future, for tomorrow belongs to those who prepare for it today.’”

This article was originally published by Word in Black. 

The post Teachers’ “Black tax”: Longer hours, lower pay, better attitude appeared first on AFRO American Newspapers.

By Rev. Dorothy S. Boulware
Word In Black

I met Sister Mothyna James Brightful when she interned at the Baltimore AFRO during her senior year at Morgan State University, and it was evident she had a calling: ministering to women. Raised in a Christian family, her spirit responded to Islam in a profound and transformative way. For her it answered deep-seated questions and it fit her journey like a tailored cloth. 

She’s a wife, mother, sister, friend and entrepreneur who exudes the peace she’s found — especially when she’s doing the work of helping women find their sea legs in whatever calling beckons them. So we asked Sister Mothyna to share with Word in Black how she practices her faith through the season of Ramadan.

In 2024, both the Christian holiday of Easter and the Jewish holiday of Passover will take place during the Muslim season of Ramadan,  a time for praying, fasting and fellowship. 

Word In Black: As Christians, we fast during Lent in an attempt to better experience the sacrifice Jesus must have felt as he journeyed toward his crucifixion. How is Ramadan different?

Sister Mothyna: Our fast is distinct in that we aim to find greater peace, not only for ourselves but also to share it with everyone we encounter, including family, friends and co-workers. Sometimes people have habits they want to break, so this is a great time to do that — and not just with food. It could mean spending less time watching TV or cutting back on sweets. Some are working to spend more time with loved ones. It’s really about becoming the best version of ourselves. Ramadan isn’t a health fast. There are health benefits, but it’s a spiritual fast. People compare it to intermittent fasting, but intermittent fasting is designed for health. Ramadan is obligatory for all Muslims although there are provisions for those who are unable. We submit to the instruction in the Holy Quran in our desire to get closer to God.

WIB: What else should we know?

SM: During Ramadan we aim to read what’s called a 30th of the Quran every day. You can pick up a Quran and many of them are now separated into 30 parts. So, you have a section that you read, called the Juz, every single day and that should become the dominant part of your discussion throughout the course of your day. By the end of Ramadan, you would have read the entire Quran.

WIB: I love this. I need to get one. 

SM: It’s beautiful. I have in my home three different Bibles, plus a biblical annex, plus a metaphysical dictionary, and a Bible dictionary. And then I have about four or five Qurans. I believe that when we seek to align our minds and our beings with God, it does require us to study, because if you think about it, every prophet that I can think of had to study and align themselves with God.

So for example, Prophet Muhammad, peace of blessings of Allah be upon him, was considered an ignorant man because he didn’t know how to read. When he received a revelation from Allah, he recited it to people. So at first it was our recitation. And then it was written down. And guess who was entrusted to hold the written works? Women. 

WIB: Do people eat before sunrise?

SM: Some people do that meal which is called suhoor. Most make sure they have water before the fast begins each morning. People who are diabetic can’t go as long without food. People who have to take their meds, it is permissible. Some people want to have their coffee.

WIB: I forget how much Ramadan is affected by the calendar as well as the season. 

SM: Yes. It begins in the evening of March 10 and ends on April 10. The times will be exact according to the new moon, as the Islamic calendar is Lunar.

WIB: So tell us about that evening meal. 

SM: Culturally a lot of Muslims will break their fast with a date because they’re highly nutritious. It’s a good way to reactivate the body. I also like to drink something warm, like tea or room temperature water. You break your fast. Then you go pray because just like you break your fast at the prayer time, you start your fast, in theory, at prayer time. You break your fast as a family — as friends. And you pray the same way as a group.

WIB: Give me a typical meal.

SM: That is really very culturally driven, I try to have a balanced meal, meaning we have some soup, some vegetables, maybe some couscous. But later in Ramadan, your stomach shrinks so you can’t eat as much.

WIB: How does observing Ramadan affect your work day?

SM: I get up and work out in the morning before the sun comes up. I also kickbox two days a week, and that’s like 5:00 a.m. I know a sister who says the first three days are always the most difficult for her, so she reduces her work day.

WIB: And this is something everyone can do?

SM: There are provisions for women who still receive their menses. You don’t fast during that period. Breastfeeding mothers shouldn’t fast. If you’re sick, you shouldn’t fast. You can make up those days another time or you can do an act of kindness like feeding someone. And that will absolve you of that particular day. 

This article was originally published by Word In Black.

The post Ramadan: A catalyst for growth and change appeared first on AFRO American Newspapers.

By Reginald Williams,
Special to the AFRO

Principal Baruti Kafele recently stood before the sold-out crowd in Lima, Ohio, speaking with students, educators, parents, business owners and community advocates on the importance of sowing seeds of promise– not doubt– into today’s youth. 

The 35-year education veteran, credited with being a master teacher and transformational school leader, keynoted the “I’m At Promise –Not at Risk” signature event that focused on helping students go from the cradle to prosperous careers– not from the cradle to prison. 

The weekend of Feb. 24 was filled with educational activities and presenters, like Chike Akua, Ph.D., who also spoke to attendees. 

“Our objective was to be intentional about addressing barriers youth and families face in school–in the space that could lead them to feeling left out and left alone,” explained Emmanuel Curtis, the host and brain trust behind the events.  “The information and efforts given by every one of our presenters, authors and edu-tainers, Chike Akua and Principal Baruti Kafele, were beyond anything that I could’ve imagined. Their workshops were career altering.” 

Sponsored by Jenga Lima, of My Brothers Keeper (MBK), Kafele and Akua were also tasked with facilitating professional development workshops with educators and school counselors. The mission for the weekend, which concluded with the “Music is Medicine” concert, aspired to bring awareness, information and advocacy for a population– specifically Black and Brown people, who are systematically underserved. 

Black children, especially adolescent males, are commonly branded at risk. But what– Kafele asked–are they at risk of? He addressed the conference’s theme, while also encouraging change. 

“The theme of the conference is ‘I’m at promise —not at risk,” explained Kafele. “If there’s anybody in this room who uses at-risk language, I’m going to strongly encourage you this afternoon to stop using that language. It stigmatizes the young people to whom it is being applied. When you say ‘at risk,’ then there’s another question you must ask. At risk of what? The implication is ‘at risk of going to jail; At risk of committing a crime; At risk of underachieving; At risk of failing; At risk of an early death–what are we talking about?” 

Rather speaking negativity over the lives of Black children, Kafele promotes language that breathes promise.

“I would rather not look at a young person—Black children–with a mindset that I see them ‘at risk’ of something if it isn’t ‘at risk of greatness.’ Instead, I’ll use ‘at promise,’ ‘at possibility,’ ‘at probable’– ‘at most likely,’” explained Kafele.

While the language stigmatizes, the actions of school leaders nationwide too often criminalize Black students, especially Black adolescent males, subsequently placing them “at risk,” if for nothing other than being separated from educational opportunities. 

One academic study reports that Black boys represent more than 50 percent of the 17,000 preschool students, ages three to five, expelled or suspended. Research conducted by Yale Child Study Center provides insight into some dynamics that drive the preschool-to-prison pipeline. 

The Yale study revealed the results of eye-tracking software worn by teachers that gauged their eye movement whenever responding to classroom disturbances. Teachers were prone to first turn their attention toward Black boys whenever classroom disruptions occurred. Research reveals the cradle-to-prison pipeline is impacted by teachers swayed by their implicit biases.

“One of the reasons that preschool-to-prison pipelines even exist is because our children have not been taught the truth about their history,” explained Akua, an award-winning educator, “Many of our children have been gangsterized, criminalized, and hypersexualized. Unaddressed trauma in a people over time can look like culture. ” 

Akua provided data, presented images society frequently uses to paint Black boys as less than, and offered impact statements that evoked several Asé moments.   

“Some people see academic underachievement in our community and say, ‘It’s just a part of the culture.’ No, it’s not! It’s unaddressed trauma in our people over time looking like culture,” Akua explained. However, the professor of Educational Leadership at Clark Atlanta University, maintains that culture is the key to educational engagement and achievement. 

“When you show them the greatness of their culture, their achievement skyrockets. But in the absence of that, they will continue to struggle,” said Akua.

Kafele, recognized as an “urban educator” and “turnaround school leader,” has grown a reputation for transforming failing schools and cultivating students’ excellence rooted in impoverished conditions. Noted for transforming Newark Tech from one of the lowest-performing schools to one of the nation’s best, Kafele said:

“As long as we fail to properly educate Black children as to who that is in their mirror historically, culturally, socially, economically, but particularly culturally and historically—we will be coming to these kinds of gatherings forever, asking the same questions. How do you close the achievement gap for Black children? How do you inspire our children to excel in the classroom,” explained Kafele. 

In his commanding voice, Kafele questioned if Lima was committed to properly educating Black youth.  

“When I say properly educated: are they being exposed to a curriculum, an instruction that tells them who they are?” quipped the coveted Milken Educator Award winner. “When they are in mathematics—is there something culturally relevant about this instruction that they can take the math and apply it to their Black lives? Is there something about the science that they are exposed to, that they can apply it to their Black life? Is there something about language arts, reading and writing that they can apply to their Black life?” 

“In other words,” asked Kafele, “Is this curriculum and this instruction relevant to who they are, or is it something distant from them that when the bell rings at three o’clock for them to go home, they don’t see how those lessons are applicable to their lives?”  

Public school curriculums often attempt to “White-out” the genius of Black thought. Curriculum teaches that Pythagoras, an ancient Greek mathematician, is credited as the founder of the Pythagorean theorem, considered a cornerstone of math, but fails to teach that Pythagoras was educated in ancient Egypt by Egyptian scholars who were Black.

“Education and literacy has always been sacred to African people,” explained Akua. “Going back thousands and thousands of years, there’s never been a time when education was not sacred to African people. We were the ones that gave the world reading and writing—language and literature. We gave them architecture, engineering, agricultural and astronomy, mathematics, science and technology,” Akua asked. 

“How do you take a group of people that gave the world all that and then convince them that they are nothing but a race of pimps and players—criminals, thugs, ‘n-word,’ and ‘b-word?’ I call that cultural identity theft,” said Akua. “ [It] happens every day in schools with curriculums that continue to miseducate our children– with school districts that literally spend millions of dollars every year on materials that continue to miseducate our children and miseducate all children.”

The post Principal Baruti Kafele: Encouraging Black youth, one promise at a time appeared first on AFRO American Newspapers.

By Joseph Williams,
Word In Black

For years, as test scores fell and teachers fretted, educators and analysts rang the alarm: the U.S. is facing a grade-school reading crisis. If left unaddressed, they say, Black children could fall even further behind. 

Now, college professors are sounding an alarm of their own. They say college students are entering college unprepared to read anything more than a few pages, and struggle to understand and interpret what they’ve read. 

“Professors are also discussing the issue in academic trade publications, from a variety of perspectives,” Adam Kotsko, a humanities and theology professor, wrote in an essay in Slate, an online magazine. “What we almost all seem to agree on is that we are facing new obstacles in structuring and delivering our courses, requiring us to ratchet down expectations in the face of a ratcheting down of preparation.”

But along with COVID-19 learning loss, social media addiction, and attention-draining cell phone scrolling, researchers and educators have identified a new culprit: state and school officials who are stripping diverse books from library shelves and curbing the teaching of Black history.

“This is actually a very preventable problem,” says Allison Rose Socol, vice president for P-12 policy, research and practice at Education Trust. Studies show that “if (students) are given access to texts in which they see themselves reflected, that they will not only want to read, but they will develop a love of reading.” 

But “the access and availability of culturally relevant, rich texts are not happening in a lot of schools,” Socol says. “And that is disproportionately affecting the fundamental reading skills of many students of color.”

Data tells part of the story. 

According to the National Assessment of Educational Progress, in 2022, average scores decreased for both literary and informational texts at both the fourth- and eighth grade level, compared to 2019. 

Eighteen states or jurisdictions scored lower on literary reading in 2022 than in 2019, according to NAEP, while 29 states scored lower on informational reading at grade 4. In eighth grade, 22 states scored lower in 2022 on literary reading, and 30 states scored lower for informational reading.

“And when you look at the data for certain groups of students — particularly marginalized students — the numbers are so much more concerning,” Socol says. 

The data shows “just 17 percent of Black students, 21 percent of Latino students, 11 percent of students with disabilities, and 10 percent of multilingual learners in fourth grade are found to be proficient” in reading, she says. “Those numbers are just unacceptable.”

And yet, despite research that should encourage reading diverse texts, “there are states and districts that are putting in place legislation and regulation and policy that removes or penalizes teachers, for teaching honest, accurate history, for using books that represent the diversity of our country and for doing things that we know are important for opening up students,” Socol says. 

Those books are key to “engaging hearts and minds and creating critical thinkers and engaged citizens,” Socol says. 

Kotsco, the humanities professor, agrees the book bans are doing damage to the students he’ll eventually have to teach, depriving them of the ability to read long texts and think for themselves. 

“Motivated by bigotry, it has already done demonstrable harm and promises to do more,” he wrote. “But at the same time, the appropriate response is, in principle, simple. Named individuals have advanced explicit policies with clear goals and outcomes, and we can replace those individuals with people who want to reverse those policies.”

“That is already beginning to happen in many places,” he wrote, “and I hope those successes will continue until every banned book is restored.”

This article was originally published by Word In Black.

The post Another downside of book bans: They stunt reading ability appeared first on AFRO American Newspapers.

By Helen Bezuneh,
Special to the AFRO

Black deaf and hard of hearing individuals have utilized TikTok to amplify their unique experiences, not only enlightening viewers about the distinct challenges and perspectives that set them apart from their non-Black counterparts in the deaf and hard-of-hearing community, but also forging meaningful connections. These TikTokers have fostered a sense of unity among Black individuals who are deaf or hard of hearing, demonstrating to others that they are not alone. 

“I want other people who are deaf and Black and also have been mainstreamed to be able to see that we’re out here,” 30-year-old deaf TikToker, singer, freelance artist and model Anjuli Symone told the AFRO. “We’re not all a monolith in our experience. We can do anything that we want to do. Just because there may be expectations, whether that’s put on us by us or society or family, doesn’t mean that we can’t or can do everything.”

Symone makes TikTok videos showcasing her singing, which she has been able to do since she was young by feeling sound vibrations. Her content has caught the attention of viewers, who are stunned by her voice.

Though Symone was born with about 75 percent hearing loss, it took doctors a while to determine that she had hearing issues. With Symone’s mother worried that she was not responding to much noise, she took her to get checked for hearing loss. However, the doctors said that Symone’s lack of responsiveness was more likely due to her not liking her mother, not due to deafness.

Symone was indeed deaf, despite doctors’ assumptions –– assumptions that, Symone said, could have been racially informed.

“Would they have told a White parent that?” said Symone, who is from Little Rock, Ark. “I don’t know that they would have.”

It’s well known that Black individuals face disparate medical treatment compared to their White counterparts, and this inequity persists within the Black deaf and hard-of- hearing community.

“Racial biases can influence the diagnosis and treatment of Black deaf, deaf-blind, deaf-disabled, hard-of- hearing and late-deafened folks resulting in delayed or inappropriate diagnosis,” Howard A. Rosenblum, CEO of the National Association of the Deaf (NAD), told the AFRO.

Similar to many organizations, the NAD has a history marked by racism. Historically, the association did not permit Black folks to become members, and it was not until 1965 that African Americans were allowed entry. 

“It is documented in the 1904 minutes that the NAD delegates stated Black deaf students should have their own school,” said Rosenblum. “Fast forward to 2012, NAD delegates passed a resolution acknowledging the NAD’s discriminatory actions towards the Black deaf communities. The NAD gave a formal apology at the Black Deaf Advocates (NBDA) Conference in 2013 and the National Black Deaf Senior Citizens of America Conference in 2022.

“It was wrong then and it is still wrong today,” Rosenblum continued. “It was wrong to ban Black deaf people from being able to join as members and vote during the NAD’s business meetings. This is our history and we acknowledge our past racial injustices. We also recognize that the NAD’s support at that time for segregation was wrong and apologize for this harmful act. The NAD remains committed to changing racist practices, including important perspectives on the board and team and working with all communities.”

The historical segregation of the NAD speaks to the historically persistent, distinct struggles confronted by Black individuals who are deaf or hard-of-hearing. This can contribute to a sense of isolation from both Black and deaf communities. Symone, in particular, grapples with these intersectional struggles–– as a child, she felt extremely isolated due to her reality living as a Black deaf person in a predominantly White area. 

“When youre the one who has to wear a scarf at the slumber party, or when you’re the one who also has to wear hearing aids, it’s a very isolating existence,” said Symone. “Because these are things that your parents are constantly screaming at you – ‘I need you to wear your bonnet, I need you to wear your hearing aids’ – and you’re just sitting there like, ‘But Karen isn’t. I don’t want to be different.’”

As an adult, Symone faces unrealistic expectations from those who may not understand her unique circumstances as a Black deaf person.

“People expect me to know sign,” said Symone, who never had the chance to learn American Sign Language. “They expect me to have a certain cadence in the way that I speak because I’m also Black on top of that. But I speak ‘properly’. Me being deaf and me being Black together played a lot into the reason why I don’t know sign.

“We were in an all-White area and we were the only Black family,” she continued. “Because we weren’t wealthy, we didn’t have the resources to put me in a special school. I just want people to understand that all of these identities intertwine and play a part into this.”

ASL is not the only sign language that some deaf and hard-of-hearing Americans use. Many Black deaf and hard-of-hearing folks on TikTok have worked to educate their viewers about Black American Sign Language, a dialect of ASL used most commonly by deaf African Americans in the U.S.

“BASL is a very treasured language,” Nakia Smith, a fifth generation deaf TikToker from Dallas, Texas, told the AFRO. “I think it’s unbelievable for [people], when it comes to any Black that creates something amazing. It’s nice to have our own things. So when I teach viewers about BASL, I know there will be a lot of questions, and it’s normal.”

Smith has made various TikTok videos that teach viewers how to sign BASL, including phrases such as  “don’t give me attitude,” “that’s tight,” “attitude for what?” and more. 

BASL historically emerged due to segregated deaf schools throughout the 1800s. With the first Black deaf school opening in 1869, some 52 years after the opening of the first school for the deaf in the U.S., Black deaf schools developed a sign language rooted in early ASL, while White deaf schools moved towards a focus on lip-reading and speaking.

Today, BASL typically involves two-handed gestures, while modern ASL predominantly relies on one hand. BASL is recognized for its emphasis on facial expressions and extensive use of physical space when signing.

However, not every Black deaf person knows BASL, and it’s important to not assume that they do.

“Sign languages are valued in our deaf communities,” said Rosenblum. “For years, people have referred to American Sign Language as the only sign language in the U.S. but this is not true and is quite misleading. There are other sign languages that deaf, deaf-blind, deaf-disabled, hard-of-hearing and late-deafened people use such as BASL, ProTactile and more. This is why the NAD celebrates International Day of Sign Languages hosted by the World Federation of the Deaf (WFD).”

With common whitewashed perceptions of deaf communities, Symone frequently faces assumptions that she is not deaf.

“Now that I’m older I actually get dismissed a lot as a deaf person,” she said. “You can’t deny that I’m Black, but I think it’s easy for people to forget that I’m deaf. So when I go into a medical office or something and I am speaking, I constantly have to remind them, ‘Excuse me, I’m deaf.’”

“A lot of times it gets dismissed because I speak so well, but I also think when you’re the only Black family, you’re told you have to be better than everyone, you have to speak well,” she continued. “I also think that ultimately if it’s easy for people to dismiss it, if it’s easier for them to get you to assimilate to them, then they’re going to keep pushing for that.”

Social media has heightened the visibility of the distinct experiences of Black deaf and hard-of-hearing individuals, playing a crucial role in fostering connections within the Black deaf community.

“The default I think is to just accept loneliness, at least it was for me because that was all I knew,” said Symone. “But I think if you want to find community, it’s out there. You just have to be willing to put yourself out there. Social media is a double edged sword. It can be a really negative and scary place, but it can also be a positive space. I can’t say I made a whole community, but I have found some community in that and I’ve been able to create some really good connections.”

Demographics of deaf youth and young adults in America, ages 16 to 24

The post TikTok provides forum for Black deaf to be heard appeared first on AFRO American Newspapers.

By Joseph Williams
Word In Black

For years, as test scores fell and teachers fretted, educators and analysts rang the alarm: the U.S. is facing a grade-school reading crisis. If left unaddressed, they say, Black children could fall even further behind. 

Now, college professors are sounding an alarm of their own. They say college students are entering college unprepared to read anything more than a few pages, and struggle to understand and interpret what they’ve read. 

“Professors are also discussing the issue in academic trade publications, from a variety of perspectives,” Adam Kotsko, a humanities and theology professor, wrote in an essay in Slate, an online magazine. “What we almost all seem to agree on is that we are facing new obstacles in structuring and delivering our courses, requiring us to ratchet down expectations in the face of a ratcheting down of preparation.”

But along with COVID-19 learning loss, social media addiction, and attention-draining cell phone scrolling, researchers and educators have identified a new culprit: state and school officials who are stripping diverse books from library shelves and curbing the teaching of Black history.

“This is actually a very preventable problem,” says Allison Rose Socol, vice president for P-12 policy, research and practice at Education Trust. Studies show that “if (students) are given access to texts in which they see themselves reflected, that they will not only want to read, but they will develop a love of reading.” 

But “the access and availability of culturally relevant, rich texts are not happening in a lot of schools,” Socol says. “And that is disproportionately affecting the fundamental reading skills of many students of color.”

Data tells part of the story. 

According to the National Assessment of Educational Progress, in 2022, average scores decreased for both literary and informational texts at both the fourth- and eighth grade level, compared to 2019. 

Eighteen states or jurisdictions scored lower on literary reading in 2022 than in 2019, according to NAEP, while 29 states scored lower on informational reading at grade 4. In eighth grade, 22 states scored lower in 2022 on literary reading, and 30 states scored lower for informational reading.

“And when you look at the data for certain groups of students — particularly marginalized students — the numbers are so much more concerning,” Socol says. 

The data shows “just 17 percent of Black students, 21 percent of Latino students, 11 percent of students with disabilities, and 10 percent of multilingual learners in fourth grade are found to be proficient” in reading, she says. “Those numbers are just unacceptable.”

And yet, despite research that should encourage reading diverse texts, “there are states and districts that are putting in place legislation and regulation and policy that removes or penalizes teachers, for teaching honest, accurate history, for using books that represent the diversity of our country and for doing things that we know are important for opening up students,” Socol says. 

Those books are key to “engaging hearts and minds and creating critical thinkers and engaged citizens,” Socol says. 

Kotsco, the humanities professor, agrees the book bans are doing damage to the students he’ll eventually have to teach, depriving them of the ability to read long texts and think for themselves. 

“Motivated by bigotry, it has already done demonstrable harm and promises to do more,” he wrote. “But at the same time, the appropriate response is, in principle, simple. Named individuals have advanced explicit policies with clear goals and outcomes, and we can replace those individuals with people who want to reverse those policies.”

“That is already beginning to happen in many places,” he wrote, “and I hope those successes will continue until every banned book is restored.”

This article was originally published by Word In Black.

The post Another downside of book bans: They stunt reading ability appeared first on AFRO American Newspapers.

By Joseph Williams 
Word In Black

Less than a year after the Supreme Court voided race-based admissions policies in top colleges, diversity advocates breathed a sigh of relief when the high court passed on hearing a challenge to an initiative to bring more Black students to an elite Virginia magnet school. 

But experts warn that the court’s decision not to hear a challenge to an admissions policy at Thomas Jefferson High School in suburban Washington, D.C., is more likely the justices deciding to hit the pause button on a politically charged issue — not a clear win for diversity in secondary education.

The court apparently “is not ready to opine on such a question” so soon after its landmark 2023 ruling, says Deborah Hellman, a constitutional law professor at the University of Virginia School of Law.  While it’s hard to read the court’s motives, she says, “I think will be for some time.”

On Tuesday, the justices declined to add to their upcoming docket a case arguing that the admissions policies for the prestigious Thomas Jefferson High School for Science and Technology in Fairfax, Va., discriminate against Asian American applicants.

The highly-anticipated case, “Coalition for T.J. v Fairfax County School Board,” was brought by a group of Asian-American parents who argued that the strategies the school implemented to increase the number of Black and Latino students left their children out in the cold. 

Although the conservative-majority court agreed to punt the case, Justice Samuel Alito wrote a 10-page dissent slamming the “indefensible” decision. He said a lower court ruling that now stands is “based on a patently incorrect and dangerous understanding of what a plaintiff must show to prove intentional race discrimination.”

The reasoning behind that ruling, Alito wrote, is “a virus that may spread if not promptly eliminated.”

At issue is a series of changes the high school made in the wake of the 2020 murder of George Floyd, when the country underwent a racial reckoning. The school board made what it called “holistic” changes to Thomas Jefferson High’s admissions requirements — including priority admission for the top 1.5 percent of eighth-grade students in the county’s public middle schools, elimination of the entrance exam, and waiver of a $100 fee. 

The changes triggered an increase of nearly 1,000 more applicants, including substantial upticks in the acceptance of Black and Hispanic students. But Coalition for T.J. sued in federal court, and a federal district judge sided with them in 2022. 

But in a 2-1 decision, an appellate court overturned that decision last year. In its ruling, the court noted that, even after the changes, Asian American students made up more than half of those who received offers of admission. White students made up 22 percent of the admission pool, with Latino students at 11 percent and Black students at less than 8 percent. 

Hellman, the University of Virginia professor, says that although the Supreme Court’s dismantling of affirmative action in college admissions was a backdrop, the facts and issues raised in the Thomas Jefferson High School case are different, and that may have given pause to the justices. 

In the college admissions case, race was an explicit factor in deciding who won admission to Harvard University and the University of North Carolina, Hellman says. But Thomas Jefferson, she says, adopted “a facially race-neutral policy. The new policy was one that didn’t use race-based classification.”

Though they lost at the Supreme Court, lawyers for Coalition for T.J. say they haven’t given up on trying to change the admissions policy at the high school.  

“If anything, this multiplies our efforts,” Glenn Roper, a senior attorney for the Pacific Legal Foundation, which represented the plaintiffs, told Inside Higher Ed. “There are multiple unanswered questions from the Students for Fair Admissions ruling that the court is going to have to address eventually.”

This article was originally published by Word In Black.

The post SCOTUS punts on race and schools case appeared first on AFRO American Newspapers.

By Roger House
Word in Black

James Pierson Beckwourth is a pioneer of the American West largely erased from history lessons. Recovering his story, however, can help us to better understand current debates over historical revision versus woke education — which is to say that, if he had been White, people likely would have learned about him in school.

Beckwourth was an American original, at times a slave, miner, fur trapper, leader of the Crow Indians, Army scout and guide to the California gold mines in the 1800s. He opened a vital trading post and hotel in the Sierra Nevada mountains that became Beckwourth, Calif.

Historians have enshrined White “mountain men” like Kit Carson, Thomas Fitzpatrick and William Sublette in American folklore, but not so with Beckwourth. Because of racism, writers disparaged his feats and ridiculed his name. However, his keen observations of frontier life could spark discussions on colonial ideologies of ethnic displacement like manifest destiny, slavery and miscegenation, White settler violence against Indigenous people, and commercial exploitation of the land.

His controversial exploits were investigated by historian Elinor Wilson in 1976 in “Jim Beckwourth: Mountain Man and War Chief of the Crows.” She argued that he “was a figure suited to the making of Western legend” had it not been for his race. She found that “racial prejudice inspired much of what early writers said about his life,” and that he was branded a “gaudy liar” — even in a culture that valued the tall tale — an unfair indictment that has been recycled in contemporary times.

His accomplishments were preserved in a memoir, as well as physical landmarks, on websites, and in documentary treatments. Central is his colorful autobiography, but unlike the frontiersman Davy Crockett, students don’t learn about the “Black King of the Wild Frontier.”

Yet, his story would seem appropriate for educators today. For example, it fits with several of the topic sections in the revamped AP African American history framework issued by the College Board. The “Unit 2” sections on Black identity, freedom, autonomy and living in Indigenous territory would seem particularly relevant.

And the Beckwourth story could be a vehicle for an action movie or television treatment. In fact, his name is used teasingly for a character in the 2021 Netflix Western, “The Harder They Fall.” And there is a documentary, “Jim Beckwourth: War Chief of the Crow,” in the 2022 Apple TV series, “Into the Wild Frontier.” Surely, his story could be relevant to controversies over racial representation in Hollywood.

Beckwourth’s wild frontier  

Born into slavery in about 1798 in Fredericks County, Va., Beckwourth was a product of rape and the legal property of a tobacco plantation owner. The violence shaped his racial identity in conflicting and accommodating ways. His pioneer outlook was fueled by the opportunities of the Louisiana Purchase. About 1805, his master took him to work at a St. Louis fur trading post; he was later hired out for a lead-mining expedition to Illinois on the Mississippi River.

With money earned from the mines, he returned to St. Louis to buy his freedom. His story from that point sheds light on the incorporation of the wild frontier into Western capitalism. His work as a trapper in the dangerous but lucrative fur trade is a window into the diverse people, places and cultures of the old west, and the systems of colonization and slavery that made America an economic power.

For instance, he was hired by the Rocky Mountain Fur Company to supply animal pelts for fashionable wear. At the same time, as he trekked about the frontier, his freedom was subject to challenge under the fugitive slave laws of 1793 and 1850. Like other free Black people, he lived at risk of kidnapping and enslavement; his former master testified to his legal emancipation in courts several times.

Over the years, Beckwourth gained a reputation as a skilled hunter, fur trapper and courageous mountaineer. His assignments took him to Iowa, Colorado, Utah and New Mexico. He witnessed — and participated in — skirmishes among indigenous nations and with White settlers. About 1828, he was captured by warriors of the Crow Nation in Montana.

Tribal leaders evidently saw value in his understanding of White culture, fluency in English, and bravery in combat. In the tribe, he rose to the position of a war chief. Today, his observations of their way of life before displacement by White settlers are valued as precious anthropology.

Witness to continental expansion

Beckwourth was a rare Black witness to the Seminole Nation and runaway slaves in Florida. He participated in the second of three wars from 1835 to 1842. During the conflicts, he served as a messenger delivering instructions between army forts. He observed the deadly Battle of Okeechobee on Christmas Day 1837, involving about 800 troops under the command of Col. Zachary Taylor.

Though Taylor, who later became president, proclaimed the battle a victory, many historians tend to agree with Beckwourth’s assessment that the Seminoles got the better of the fight. He recounted: “I could not see that Ok-ke-cho-be was much of a victory; indeed, I shrewdly suspected that the enemy had the advantage; but it was called a victory by the soldier, and they were the best qualified to decide.”

Beckwourth also provided insights into the opening of California during the gold rush. In 1850, he located a passage through the Sierra Nevada mountains known as Beckwourth Pass. Then, he organized a team to prepare a road for wagon trains between Reno and northern California, known as the Beckwourth Trail, which enabled thousands of settlers to reach the fertile central valley in safety — and allowed Beckwourth to achieve a measure of commercial success.  

This fascinating pioneer lived to see the end of slavery; he died around 1866, shortly after the Civil War. But he never enjoyed the rights of citizenship, even though he was an authentic product of the American experience. As such, the rediscovery of his story can provide an engaging springboard for re-envisioning the wild frontier.

This article was originally published by Word In Black.

The post James P. Beckwourth: Rediscovering a Black pioneer’s overlooked legacy appeared first on AFRO American Newspapers.

By Rev. Dorothy S. Boulware,
Word in Black

Imagine working 64 hours a week and being unable to cover basic needs like food, shelter and utilities. Imagine working that many hours at more than one job and still not having adequate health coverage for yourself or your family.

Millions of people in the United States live like this. In 2022, 17.1 percent of Black folks lived in poverty, twice the rate of White people, according to U.S. Census Bureau data — and elected officials often ignore their voices. But the Poor People’s Campaign has a master plan — a 40-week blitz to mobilize the political might of 15 million low-income voters in 30 states in time for the Nov. 5 presidential election.

“For far too long, extremists have blamed poor people and low-wage people for their plight, while moderates too often have ignored poor people, appealing instead to the so-called ‘middle class,’” said campaign co-founder, activist and pastor Bishop William Barber II, while announcing the effort on Feb. 4 at the Press Club in Washington, D.C. 

“Meanwhile, poor and low-income, low-wage people have become nearly half of this country. And we are here today to make one thing clear: Poor and low-wage brothers and sisters have the power to determine and decide the 2024 elections and elections beyond,” he said.

Barber made the announcement with his fellow campaign leaders and several folks who will be putting boots on the ground — self-characterized poor people.

Together, they’re kicking off the campaign with a bold statement on March 2, orchestrating major actions at 30 statehouses across the United States. And they’re inviting hundreds of thousands of “poor” people, people of faith and activists to show up at their respective statehouses to raise hell and demand to be seen.  

And they’re not stopping there. On June 15, these same people– and probably many more– plan to show up at the U.S. Capitol Building in Washington, D.C., to sound the same alarm at Congress’s door. The message? Working folks in the United States shouldn’t be living worse than folks in countries we call “underdeveloped.”

And they have the goods: votes. This campaign could deliver millions of votes from poor people and low-wage workers who haven’t previously voted, although they’re eligible to do so. 

According to the Pew Research Center, in the 2020 election, about 158.4 million people headed to the polls, but that was only 62.8 percent  of people of voting age. Get those 87 million eligible voters to cast a ballot, and that’s an election game changer.

“It is time for a resurrection and not an insurrection,” Barber said.

During the event, Shailly Gupta Brown, national policy director for the campaign, said there are 39,000 eligible non-voters in Georgia alone, nearly four times greater than the 10,000-vote margin of victory in the last election.

This is another move in what Barber has coined the “Third Reconstruction: Fully Addressing Poverty and Low Wages From the Bottom Up.” 

“Poverty is claiming 800 lives a day in this country. It’s time to build a 3rd Reconstruction and abolish poverty as the 4th leading cause of death,” according to the Poor People’s Campaign website. 

Barber and his team met with Reps. Pramila Jayapal (D-Washington) and Barbara Lee (D-Cali.) to secure a resolution of the same name and intention: to ensure a livable wage, expanded Medicaid, fully funded public education, and an expanded childcare tax.

Indeed, the campaign’s website details that they’re seeking “a revival of our constitutional commitment to establish justice, provide for the general welfare, end decades of austerity, and recognize that policies that center the 140 million poor and low-income people in the country are also good economic policies that can heal and transform the nation.”

Barber’s faith team, determined to restore that hope, includes leaders of all faiths, ordained and lay leaders committed to organizing and mobilizing.

It also includes workers with stories of homelessness, sickness, trying, and rarely succeeding because the system works against them. Beth Shafer said, “I’m exhausted,” and she should be– working 64 hours every week.

Liz Theoharis, director of the campaign partner, the Kairos Center — a national anti-poverty organization housed at Union Theological Seminary — spoke against a political system that could end poverty tomorrow if it chose to. Instead, decisions to end pandemic relief policies will ensure 700,000 people will have lost Medicaid by March. 

“But we’re mobilizing, organizing, educating and motivating. More than a thousand voter suppression bills have been passed since the last election, and poverty is on the rise since the pandemic policies have lifted,” Theoharis said.

Poverty is the fourth leading cause of death in this country, according to Rev. A. Kazimir Brown, executive director of Repairers of the Breach, who added the fact that “46 million people still don’t have safe drinking water.”

Barber said, “We won’t be silent anymore. If we have to make Election Day a labor strike day, we will.”

This article was originally published by Word in Black.

The post Rev. Barber’s bold vision: A revolutionary election year, powered by low-income voters appeared first on AFRO American Newspapers.

By Rev. Dorothy S. Boulware,
Word in Black

I can’t use her name, even if I could remember it after all these years. What I do remember is the visceral pain I felt as I listened to my seminary classmate confess that her husband assaulted her physically, emotionally, and sexually on a regular basis. Most days. But always on Sundays. Just before she was scheduled to assume her role as pastor, just before she had to preach the good news of Jesus Christ. 

I felt foolish telling her what I thought was obvious. You are in no way obligated to stay in an abusive relationship. She seemed relieved. It was as if she’d never heard it before.

And she was not alone then. She is not alone now. Many Christian women stay in abusive relationships because they feel it would be unchristian to leave, or because they don’t find the kind of support they need in their church. Or any other church.

Brittney Guary’s story is different, although it’s all one horror story. She could see the warning signs before her relationship was consummated in marriage, but she forged ahead with her plans. In fact, the church offering premarital counseling encouraged her to get married and not worry about the signs that should have dissuaded her.

“I should have known when I saw so much porn around him. It seemed to be an obsession, but he always pushed aside the suggestion that it was a problem. Just like he pushed aside my questions regarding the often naked women in his phone who were starred as favorites,” she tells Word In Black.

She didn’t even fight so much when the physical and emotional abuse was limited to her instead of their children.

“I couldn’t make plans for myself. I couldn’t withdraw money from the bank, but he could without explanation. I finally realized I was losing my voice.”

It wasn’t even when he began to purchase and store large guns with night vision scopes and silencers.

“More than $10,000 would disappear from the same account I couldn’t touch, and he would always minimize his behavior as if I were imagining what was going on,” Guary says.

And when she went to their church for guidance, she was advised to hang in there and maintain her household.

But she did find what she needed.

She found a church that helped her gather strength to get away.

At that point, she wasn’t staying anyway. He’d finally made a move she wouldn’t tolerate.

“He picked up our son by the arm and threw him against the wall. I wasn’t going to allow him to abuse our children. It was bad enough what he’d done to me.”

When she confronted her husband about his abuse of her, he’d always apologize. When she confronted him on his abuse of their son, he’d say he hadn’t been exposed to children and didn’t know how to handle them. There was always an excuse. 

“I just knew I had to get away. I couldn’t take a chance on what he might do next.”

Her new church helped her do everything she needed to get away. “They counseled me and assured me while God does hate divorce, he certainly doesn’t hate the people involved, and he definitely didn’t want me to stay in that situation,” Guary says.

She did get away, and, when she’s telling her story that she captured in her book “Breaking Free: Healing from Abuse and Trauma,” the number one question she’s asked is, “How did you get away?”

She’s happy to respond because she’d love to be the reason another woman breaks free. And there are so many that need that help.

The Black Women’s Health Project determined that domestic violence is the number one health issue facing Black women: “The data tells a painful truth: 40 percent of Black women will experience domestic violence across their lifetimes, compared to 30.2 percent of White women.”

One has to wonder, if 1 in 3 women will report being abused in their lifetime, how many cases are going unreported? That’s a question asked on the website of Shine a Light on Domestic Violence, a faith-centered ministry that provides domestic violence education, as well as support and resources for victims. Shine a Light calls itself a safe place and also offers training to churches and other entities that would want to be safe places, too. 

The Black church gets passing and failing grades in its treatment of domestic violence or intimate partner violence (IPV). In her article “Domestic Violence: In Praise and Rebuke of the Black Church,”  Carolyn Morgan, chairperson of the Women of Color Task Force for the Delaware Coalition Against Domestic Violence, explains how while the church has proven to be the supportive, healing place as promised, it has the tendency to commit some unforgivable sins when it comes to IPV.

“Women in the Black church are most often the victims of DV and abuse, and women comprise the majority count of Black church membership,” Morgan wrote. “Men in the Black church are most often the perpetrators of DV and abuse, and men comprise the majority count of Black church leadership. In part, this dynamic contributes to what commonly follows for Black women seeking help from the Black church.”

Morgan ultimately suggested to Black church helpers:

• Do not advise her to stay and pray and allow God to work it out
• Do not meet with her and her spouse or partner together
• Do not tell her to keep the abuse a secret
• Do not suggest to her what has worked for you

And ultimately, do not blame the victim because she hasn’t changed her abuser’s behavior. 

This article was originally published by Word In Black.

The post Confronting domestic violence in the Black church appeared first on AFRO American Newspapers.

By Anissa Durham
Word In Black

If you’re feeling suicidal or concerned that someone you know may be in danger of hurting themselves, call or text the National Suicide Prevention Lifeline at 988. The lifeline is available 24 hours a day, seven days a week and is staffed by trained counselors

“Within the Black community, we’ve had a narrative that we don’t die by suicide, that we’re resilient people who survived slavery. And that suicide was really a white problem.” 

That’s what Vic Armstrong, vice president for health equity at the American Foundation for Suicide Prevention, says. With more than 35 years of experience working towards equitable access to mental health care, Armstrong knows the importance of starting those tough conversations. 

According to the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration, suicide was the third leading cause of death in 2020 for Black Americans ages 15 to 24. The suicide rates for Black youth increased nearly 37 percent between 2018 and 2021. 

On Feb. 5, AFSP launched a new initiative to support mental health equity for Black communities. Listening, Empathy, Trust and Support or L.E.T.S Save Lives: An Introduction to Suicide Prevention for Black and African American Communities is a free presentation aimed at fostering dialogue around mental health and providing suicide prevention resources.

The presentation will be shared through the chapters the organization has in each state, its media partners, and HBCUs. It is also available virtually. Word In Black sat down with Armstrong, who shared more about this program and its importance for the mental health of Black people.  

Word In Black: Tell me about the L.E.T.S Save Lives program. Why did AFSP decide to create this initiative? What’s the goal? 

Vic Armstrong: It’s part of an ongoing initiative by AFSP on how we can reach historically marginalized communities. Our goal was to create a resource by Black people for Black people — that could address the issues around suicide.  

We wanted something that would help educate the community about the prevalence of suicide in the Black community. And something that would create avenues to open conversation. We engaged a marketing team, The House of Joy, a Black female-led organization to create Black imagery. Everything speaks to the Black experience. 

Ultimately, the goal is always to reduce suicide rates. Specifically, we want to think about how we can get upstream in suicide prevention. Suicide itself is not a disease, it is the worst possible outcome of a combination of a lot of complex things that often include mental health challenges.  

That means we need to create culturally relevant resources. And raise awareness that suicide is relevant to the Black community and is happening in our community. So that we don’t ignore people around us that are hurting.  

WIB: Why was it important to create this program by Black people and for Black people? 

VA: Historically, when we look at suicide prevention, it’s not a conversation that we typically have. In the last few years, we’ve been more open to trying to have that conversation. But, when you look around, there were very few resources for Black people, that speak to the Black experience. 

For AFSP, when the mission is to save lives and bring hope — that’s for everybody. But traditionally, we’ve created resources that were not specific to any community, like painting with broad strokes.  

Suicide doesn’t discriminate. Suicide is not exclusive to any one race or ethnicity. Neither is hope. 

WIB: You’ve been working in the mental health space for more than three decades. What has kept you going in a space that can be dark and heavy? 

VA: I grew up in rural North Carolina— my world was really small. I didn’t know a lot about what happened outside of my community. Once I got into the field of social work, my perspective broadened over time. 

I started my career as a therapist. At one point, I was the only clinician in three counties. I saw adults. I saw kids. I saw men reported for domestic violence. I saw the women that they abused. I really saw some of the generational challenges — and that made me really fall in love with community mental health. 

I think the suicide piece that really hit home for me was when I was the vice president of behavioral health for a large hospital system. In looking at all these resources as a hospital system, your primary goal is to avoid preventable deaths — we weren’t focusing enough on efforts around suicide prevention, especially in historically marginalized communities.  

Now, I really focus on health equity in the suicide prevention and awareness space. 

WIB: Thinking about the narrative that as Black people we don’t die by suicide or have depression. How does that then change the way we experience suicidality?  

VA: Black people are more likely to go to a faith leader than a psychiatrist or psychologist. One of the things that happens is we look inwardly, into our community. The other thing that makes it difficult is when we tell ourselves a narrative that we should not be experiencing depression or anxiety. 

We tell ourselves we don’t have the right to have those feelings, and that we should be able to manage it on our own. What ends up happening is that we don’t seek help.  

So, part of what we want to do is be able to change that conversation. We are changing the message to our community. Letting them know that it’s OK to not be OK, it’s OK to feel vulnerable, and it’s OK to ask for help. 

There are nuances in the way that communities internalize things that have happened to them. In the Black community, where we’ve seen racial discrimination and segregation — we have internalized that as just being part of the Black experience. What we’ve also done is not allow ourselves to talk about those things and how they impact us.  

Some of these things are unique to the Black experience. We now want to create avenues for people to talk about it — and come into a space to acknowledge those challenges and talk about resources to provide healing. 

This article was originally published by Word in Black.

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By John Celestand
Word In Black

It’s not breaking news that there was a time when the greatest Black athletes were steered away from playing the quarterback position in the NFL. With quick feet, the ability to cut back on a dime, solid hands, and blistering speed to blow past defenders, you would undoubtedly be led to the running back and wide receiver position as soon as you step foot on an NFL field.

It didn’t matter if you played QB at the Blackest high school or college in your state or could throw the ball 75 yards on target. It was mistakenly assumed that Black players didn’t possess the “leadership qualities,” quick decision-making skills, ability to read and digest a playbook, or discipline to throw from the pocket to lead a group of men at the NFL level. 

The thinking has changed over the years as Black quarterbacks such as Doug Williams, Warren Moon, Rodney Peete, Michael Vick, Donovan McNabb, and Randall Cunningham, just to name a few, have shown how asinine, foolish, and downright racist those thoughts were. Now, mobile, quick, and innovative QBs are coveted for their ability to put pressure on the defense with both their arms and legs. 

Last year’s Super Bowl was the first time the game featured two Black starting quarterbacks, with the Kansas City Chiefs’ Patrick Mahomes and the Philadelphia Eagles’ Jalen Hurts going head-to-head. On the heels of that matchup, I was just as excited last Sunday to watch two Black quarterbacks — Mahomes and the Baltimore Ravens’s Lamar Jackson — go head-to-head with a berth in Super Bowl LVIII on the line. 

As I surfed social media and spoke to my Black friends, it dawned on me that most of them were rooting for Lamar Jackson to take down Patrick Mahomes. My first thought was that it was their instinct to root for the underdog, but Mahomes and the Chiefs were the underdogs in this matchup, with the Baltimore Ravens being the most dominant team in the league during the regular season.

Maybe folks were just tired of Patrick Mahomes winning, as he had already hoisted the Lombardy Trophy twice in his career. Maybe folks just felt that it was Lamar’s time and that he deserved his shot. But in talking to folks a little more, I realized it went much deeper than that. 

Many Black folks looked at Lamar Jackson as more anti-establishment. Lamar was the exact opposite of everything “the establishment” always tried to say a quarterback should be. The establishment said Black people were too athletic to play the position and always used their “legs” to scramble instead of the “discipline” to stay in the pocket and make the designed throws. 

Lamar Jackson is also a dark-skinned dude from South Florida with braids in his hair who doesn’t quite speak with the same intonation, cadence, and diction as successful white quarterbacks from yesteryear. Jackson is a man who plays the QB position in one of the blackest cities in the nation (Baltimore is 64 percent Black at the last U.S. census count). Jackson is a man who, instead of hiring an agent in an industry dominated by white men, retained the services of his mother, Felicia Jones, as his manager and represented himself, leading to a five-year $260 million contract with $185 million guaranteed. 

To many Black folks, Jackson represents a slap in the face to the establishment, someone who doesn’t have to code switch or dial back his “blackness” to be accepted as a leader at the quarterback position in the NFL. Jackson is a man, to many, who has received unfair criticism for not being able to get it done in the playoffs. Many felt that some of the criticism was racially motivated and that if Jackson were White, he wouldn’t have received the same amount of backlash. 

And then I thought about Patrick Mahomes and how, in this country, Mahomes is considered Black. Although Mahomes’s mother is White and his father is Black, Mahomes is widely considered the most successful Black quarterback of all time. Mahomes has repeatedly expressed pride in his Black heritage.  

“I’ve always just had confidence and believed in who I am,” Mahomes told GQ in 2020. “And I’ve known that I’m Black. And I’m proud to be Black. And I’m proud to have a White mom too. I’m just proud of who I am. And I’ve always had that confidence in myself.”  

Although not the dynamic scrambler Jackson is, Mahomes uses his mobility to avoid sacks and make plays that almost no other quarterback in history could make. He is the ultimate definition of the mobile Black quarterback — hated by the old-school bigots of yesteryear who felt that any quarterback with too much melanin wouldn’t have the discipline to play the most important position in football. 

Because of this, you would think that some Black folks were rooting for Mahomes, while others were siding with Lamar Jackson, two great quarterbacks who decades earlier would have been whisked away to another skill position because of their athleticism. But overwhelmingly, in my informal research, it seemed one-sided. Almost every Black person I talked to wanted to see Lamar move on to the Super Bowl. 

My hypothesis? For Black folks, it’s not enough just to be Black. Many times, it’s about culture. Although many Black folks voted for President Obama, it was not just because he was Black, as so many believed. It was because he was down with the culture. He moved like us, spoke like us, and walked like us. Let’s be honest: Ben Carson is Black, and so is Herschel Walker, but they just ain’t down. 

I also wonder if White America’s acceptance of Mahomes’ greatness is a subliminal catalyst for some Black folks’ support of Jackson. Do we, as Black folks, unconsciously wonder that if Mahomes spoke a little differently, wore his hair in cornrows, and grew up on the Southside of Chicago vs. Tyler, Texas, he’d be viewed differently? 

I hope this doesn’t come off as a slight to Patrick Mahomes, a guy the great sports analyst Shannon Sharpe calls Patrick “Mahome-Boy,” an ode to Mahomes’ greatness as well as his blackness. It’s nothing that Mahomes did or didn’t do. I think Mahomes is already the greatest quarterback of all time.

But in the end, Black folks rooting for Jackson over Mahomes isn’t just about football. It’s about the ongoing dialogue within the community over what it is to be Black in America, and seeing our collective and individual experiences in a QB. There’s just something about Lamar Jackson that Black folks connect with a little more. I can’t explain it. You’ve got to grow up around it. It can’t be taught. You just have to be immersed in it to understand.  

It’s the culture. 

This article was originally published by Word in Black. 

The post Mahomes or Jackson? Black America rooted for a Black QB appeared first on AFRO American Newspapers.

By Aziah Siid
Word In Black

In the spring of 2018, Los Angeles two mothers, Kawanna Brown and Lisa Johnson, sparked a transformative movement. Frustrated by the racial isolation their children faced in private schools, they dreamed of a community where Black private school kids could connect and families could support each other. 

Johnson, having experienced being one of the few Black students in her Atlanta independent school, was dismayed to find little progress decades for her own children. 

“As a parent of two children, who are also in an independent school here in California, they were living the same experience that I lived as a student, many decades ago,” Johnson tells Word In Black. “It is this experience of isolation. It is an experience of being the only one or one of a few. It’s an experience of a lot of ‘othering.’”

Determined to break this cycle, Johnson and Brown organized a casual park playdate, inviting Black families from various schools across L.A. What started off as a simple electronic invite to Black and Brown families as a way to connect, turned into a movement.

“We booked this park that had a capacity of only 50 people. I asked four other friends of mine who are in other private schools if I put their name on an Evite, and we sent this thing around, and it went around to 75 people,” Johnson says. “By the time the event rolled around, the RSVP was at 500.”

The overwhelming response marked the birth of Private School Village.

This grassroots effort, formalized as a nonprofit in September 2018, goes beyond mere social gatherings. PSV aims to transform the private school experience for Black families into one of inclusivity and empowerment. Recognizing the unique challenges Black students face, including heightened anxiety, depression, and feelings of alienation, PSV works towards creating a supportive and racially literate community.

PSV’s mission is broad and profound: to foster parental engagement, advocate for equitable policies, and build a network where Black students see themselves reflected and supported. The organization underscores the necessity of a communal approach to counter the often-isolating private school environment for Black families, emphasizing the power of unity in shaping a more inclusive future.

Private school truths

“What I’ve found in the past five years is people make a lot of assumptions about private school families and kids,” Johnson says.

Like most establishments in the United States, private schools — often called independent schools — were not initially designed for Black students. In the South, private schools were “established, expanded and supported to preserve the Southern tradition of racial segregation despite federal courts’ dismantling of “separate but equal,” according to the Southern Education Foundation. White students left public schools in droves to both traditional and newly formed private schools, and from 1950 to 1965, private school enrollment grew at unprecedented rates all over the nation. 

As recent as 2018, an elite school in New York City, Little Red Schoolhouse, came under fire after students were segregated by race as a means of self-exploration and self-affirmation. 

Federal data shows that in Fall 2019, the most recent year available, about 49.2 million kindergarten through grade 12 (K–12) students were enrolled in public schools. Significantly fewer students — 4.7 million — were enrolled in private schools, with Black students representing 6 percent of the enrollment. 

According to the National Association of Independent Schools, during the 2019-2020 school year, the median private school tuition was $26,866, and the average financial aid award was $11,500. 

Part of the ongoing discussion between private and public school supporters are controversial school vouchers and educational savings account programs that allow families to use public taxpayer money to send their kids to private schools. 

With vouchers, this money goes directly from the government to a school. Federal data shows 15 states and the District of Columbia  have adopted school voucher programs.

Educational savings accounts are a newer phenomenon, where taxpayer funds go directly to parents, who can use them to pay for tuition to private schools, homeschooling supplies, curriculum materials, educational therapy services, and more. In Arizona, for example, the universal ESA program puts $7,000 per student into a family’s bank account.

“In the short term, mostly it’s just going to be a funding giveaway to families that were already sending their kids to private schools,” Douglas Harris, an economist at Tulane University who studies education policy, told Vox. 

Changing the system

The realization Johnson came to was that instead of trying to change the entire system, she’d work with what she and the parents around them could control, which was the quality of education, getting students proper mental health resources and increasing parent engagement. 

“I was raising my children saying, well, you’re there for the education, and I keep you rooted and grounded in the Black community outside of school,” Johnson says. “But what I realized as a parent, which was different from my parents, was that we spend so much time in school. These are the most important developmental years of your life, when your identity development is most impressionable.” 

Johnson says the first step in shifting the private school experience for Black kids is getting parents together to figure out what their students and environments need. One way Johnson is doing so at her organization is “primarily focusing on racial socialization, increasing racial socialization, racial literacy, representation and research.” 

“I think the American education system is hugely flawed, and in my dream world, we would start over from scratch tomorrow,” Johnson says. “So to me, there’s really no one fit or solution. I believe that the strongest indicators for a child’s success have nothing to do with whether or not they’re in public charter or private. It is parent engagement.”

This article was originally published by Word In Black.

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by Aziah Siid February 2, 2024

They’ve shaped generations of Black professionals. Now HBCUs are working to educate students K-12, particularly in STEM fields.

What do Martin Luther King Jr., Supreme Court Justice Thurgood Marshall, and Vice President Kamala Harris have in common? They’re all graduates of Historically Black Colleges and Universities. 

The schools saw a surge in applications from high school seniors after the murder of George Floyd. And along with increasingly being seen by Black high school students and families as havens of safety — both physically and culturally — HBCUs produce nearly 13% of all Black graduates, according to the National Center for Educational Statistics. 

RELATED: HBCU or PWI: What Should High School Seniors Consider?  

I’m a Morgan State graduate, so I know first-hand these schools aren’t just academic institutions. They’re a testament to the determination of Black Americans to create spaces of excellence, empowerment, and cultural affirmation in the face of racism. And in the nearly 187 years since the first HBCU — the African Institute, later renamed Cheyney University of Pennsylvania — opened its doors, they’ve become incubators of Black intellectuals, activists, and professionals.

 2022 proclamation from President Biden for National Historically Black Colleges and Universities Week pointed out their incredible contributions to society: “HBCUs have produced 40 percent of all Black engineers and 50 percent of all Black lawyers in America. Seventy percent of Black doctors in our country attended an HBCU, and 80 percent of Black judges are alumni of these schools.” 

The institutions also play a prominent role in maintaining the Black teacher pipeline. They produce 50% of Black teachers, thus boosting the number of Black men entering classrooms and introducing students to the love of learning.

So, this Black History Month, let’s look at the contributions five HBCUs have made, and how their current impact on K-12 education makes a difference. 

1. Howard University

Listen, when the school is the alma mater of Carter G. Woodson, the creator of Black History Month, you know it has to be No. 1 on the list. Founded 150 years ago by Army General Oliver Otis Howard, Howard University has also long been a pioneer in educating Black women at both the undergraduate and graduate levels. Our first black vice president, Kamala Harris, graduated in 1986. Charlotte Ray, the nation’s first Black woman lawyer — and the first woman admitted to the Washington D.C. bar —  graduated from Howard’s law school in 1872. 

HU continues to make modern-day strides as it competes directly with schools in underserved communities through its dual enrollment courses. 

2. Spelman College  

Voted as the #1 HBCU in the country for 17 consecutive years by U.S News & World Report, Spelman College has earned its distinction for more reasons than one. Founded in 1881 as Atlanta Baptist Female Seminary, the all-women’s campus has been a beacon of education and hope for Black women nationwide. Spelman College was home to visionaries like Martin Luther King Jr’s daughter, peace advocate and CEO of the King Center, Dr Bernice King, politician and activist Stacey Abrams, and the legendary novelist Alice Walker. Walker’s Pulitzer Prize novel, “The Color Purple,” is one of the most frequently banned books in the United States and continues to serve as a staple in Black history and culture. 

Spelman continues to serve the greater Black education community through partnerships like their initiative with the National Education Equity Lab, a nonprofit that works to boost economic and social mobility for high school students. The program provides free college-level courses to low-income high school students to make them confident they can succeed in college and prepare them for higher education. In addition, alumnae of the college are working to make attending the institution more affordable for incoming freshmen and current students. 

3. Florida A&M University

Through rhythm and song, FAMU alumni, like musical artist Common, have spoken life into the Black community.  In 2018, Common helped launch  Art in Motion Charter School in his hometown as a way to, as he told Ebony magazine last year, “bring academics but also artistic expression and holistic living to children that are from Chicago.”

As for Common’s alma mater, the 140-year-old university — which began with only 15 students and two instructors — is currently ranked as the No. 1 HBCU for research and development by the National Science Foundation. The university continues to make immense strides in law, pharmaceutical sciences, and more. 

To encourage more young people to pursue STEM, FAMU hosts an annual STEM Day for students in grades 6-12. The event features academic speakers, hands-on activities, and science demonstrations to give participants a realistic look at what the future holds.

Additionally, the university holds a “Women and Girls in STEM Mentoring Event” each year, introducing nearly 200 K-12 girls to female engineers, scientists, and academics. In 2022, FAMU expanded its STEM Day to include third, fourth, and fifth graders, broadening the event traditionally aimed at girls in grades 6-12.

4. Morgan State University 

Morgan State University President David K. Wilson recently became the first HBCU president to win the national Harold W. McGraw Jr. Prize in Education, presented by the McGraw Family Foundation and the University of Pennsylvania’s Graduate School of Education. His efforts to improve retention, graduation rates, and support for degree completion for Black students underscore MSU’s commitment to advancing Black leadership and success.

The university is committed to increasing representation in fields such as STEM and communications by recruiting students as early as their junior year of high school. Since 2021, Morgan has had a partnership with NASA designed to foster interest and retention in STEM among K-12 students. They also have a summer program for rising high school seniors and incoming freshmen interested in actuarial and mathematical sciences. The free, six-week program allows students to take pre-calculus, go on field trips, and participate in professional development seminars. 

5. Prairie View A&M University

One thing Prairie View A&M University has said is her name. Sandra Bland. As a 2009 graduate, member of the Sigma Gamma Rho sorority, civil rights activist, and summer school counselor, Bland’s name echoed throughout the university and the Black Lives Matter movement after her death in 2015. 

Founded in 1876 as the Alta Vista Agricultural and Mechanical College of Texas, the second public institution of higher learning in the state initially admitted only men. Recognizing the need for all Black people to be educated, it soon welcomed women.

PVAMU carries the legacy of inclusivity into its STEM Mobile Road Show. On-board technology allows Prairie View to bring hands-on demonstrations to high schools across the state and enable students to engage in activities. 

Leaders of the program hope the mobile show will “play a role in exciting and engaging young minds, in particular under-represented minorities, in STEM education.” 

The university also has a shadowing program where secondary students can sign up to follow a College of Engineering student around for a day to get a feel for what the school’s STEM programs are like.

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By Holly Edgell 
The Midwest Newsroom

Antonio Lewis was surprised to see an email from Antoinette “Bonnie” Candia-Bailey in his inbox on the morning of Jan. 8. Lewis, president of the Atlanta chapter of the Lincoln University Alumni Association, had never met Candia-Bailey, but knew she was the university’s vice president for student affairs and an alumna.

After scanning the first few lines of the email, his surprise turned to alarm.

“The first paragraph says, ‘Lincoln, where it all started and where it all ends.’ That paragraph made me alert to what could happen,” said Lewis, who said he immediately sent Candia-Bailey a message via Facebook.

“I said, ‘Whatever you’re doing, please don’t do it. Give me a call.’”

The email came in the form of a letter addressed to Lincoln University President John B. Moseley. Candia-Bailey sent the message from her personal account to family, friends and Lincoln alumni, hours before she died by suicide.

Running more than 10 pages and nearly 6,000 words, the email called out Moseley for a litany of actions that Candia-Bailey said exacerbated her existing mental health condition, which she did not explicitly describe.

“It was a manifesto,” Lewis said. “She was very direct with what she wanted to happen and what had happened to her. She didn’t mince any words.”

In the email, which the Midwest Newsroom has reviewed, Candia-Bailey gives Moseley 18 recommendations for how to improve his job performance as university president. She includes accusations of micromanagement, failure to provide clear directions, inconsistency and arrogance.

She also pointed to jail time, DWI offenses and criminal charges by a key leader on Moseley’s staff–citing case numbers and other details from public records. She said the leader was disruptive and created a toxic work environment.

She outlined several occasions when she talked about her mental health struggles with Moseley and asked for help, only to be rebuffed.

“I think the entire email shows the culture of bullying and go-along-to-get-along, and it is sickening,” Lewis said. 

As word of Candia-Bailey’s death and her email spread, blame and criticism grew among alumni and students–most of it directed at Moseley, who fired Candia-Bailey the week before she died. Her termination letter read, in part, that she “was being fired ‘due to your continued failure to appropriately supervise your staff and continued failure to properly supervise the area of student affairs at Lincoln University.’”

Candia-Bailey’s email addresses her firing, admits to mistakes and details the times she tried to work within the university’s processes and seek ways to improve.

Moseley took voluntary paid leave within days of Candia-Bailey’s death, and on Jan. 12, Lincoln University’s Board of Curators announced it would “engage a third-party expert to fully review potential personnel issues and concerns recently raised regarding compliance with the university’s established policies and procedures.”

In response to requests to interview Moseley as well as a representative of the Lincoln University Board of Curators, the Midwest Newsroom received two statements from the university’s marketing and communications department. One is the same statement released on Jan. 12. The second, dated Jan. 18, provided more details about the review. It said the university has hired attorneys led by Ronald Norwood and Jerina Phillips in the Higher Education Practice Group of Lewis Rice in St. Louis to conduct the independent review “of recent issues raised regarding compliance with the University’s established policies and procedures.”

Lewis, a 2011 graduate of Lincoln, is eager to learn what the review reveals. Regardless of the findings, however, he thinks Moseley’s voluntary leave is not sufficient and that he should resign immediately.

He referred to Claudine Gay, who stepped away from the Harvard University presidency in early January amid criticism about her remarks about anti-Semitism and accusations of plagiarism.

“I saw the grace that Dr. Gay showed. She showed a different level of maturity,” Lewis said. “And to see the way that our president is acting shows me the privilege that he thinks he has. I hope he steps down for the betterment of the university.”

Sherman Bonds, national president of the Lincoln University Alumni Association, asked for even more definitive action in a letter he wrote to the Board of Curators president.

“The university’s institutional care has been breached,” he wrote to Victor Pasley. “The present administration has become a liability to the mission and health of the institution. I have become compelled to demand a change to the Office of the Presidency of the university effective immediately.”

Bonds, who earned a bachelor’s degree from Lincoln in 1980 and a master’s degree from the school a year later, told the Midwest Newsroom neither Pasley nor anyone else from the Board of Curators has responded to his letter.

Pasley did not respond to Midwest Newsroom requests for an interview.

On Moseley’s watch

Lincoln University, one of two Historically Black Colleges and Universities (HBCUs) in Missouri, has struggled with funding shortfalls and declining enrollment. In late 2023, federal officials estimated Missouri had underfunded the college, located in Jefferson City, by almost $361.6 million for three decades.

The Missouri Independent reported that Lincoln University’s funding woes grew “over years of the state not meeting its obligation to match federal funds and school administrators dipping into the university’s other revenue streams.”

Lewis said he was dismayed by the way Moseley responded to his questions about securing money for Lincoln University shortly after he took office.

“I immediately gave him a call,” Lewis said. “I said, ‘Congratulations, President Moseley. Now can we work on getting that Lincoln University funding?’”

Lewis said Moseley made a remark that caught him off guard.

“He told me asking for that funding is like asking for reparations.”

Moseley’s university biography touts the securing of the much-needed funding: “For the first time since it was federally mandated in 2000, the University received nearly $10 million, the full state match for its federal land grant funding, in May 2022 and maintained the full funding following the 2023 legislative session.”

Bonds said it’s no accident that Moseley, who is white, was able to do what Black Lincoln University presidents over decades could not.

“African American presidents came through this era where we did not receive this funding,” he said. “The entitlement to the funding was always there. The state just decided to release it on Moseley’s watch.”

Moseley’s biography says he has more than 20 years of higher education experience, “including 14 years on HBCU campuses.” His LinkedIn profile shows few examples of university administration experience, however. It lists an assistant head basketball coach position at North Carolina Central University, followed by the head basketball coach role at Lincoln. From there, Moseley was the school’s athletic director for nearly six years. After nine months as interim president, Moseley officially got the job in 2022.

“He just walked out of the gym and into the president’s office,” Bonds said.

Lewis did not discount Moseley’s experience as a basketball coach or athletic director, but he did question why the Board of Curators selected him for the position in the absence of academic and administrative leadership roles.

“Dr. James Franks was our basketball coach, became our athletic director, became our president,” Lewis said. “He went on to become the first Black man to be the president of the NCAA. And so I’ve seen a basketball coach become a president, and I understand and respect it.”

Lewis said that Moseley’s race was not a key factor in his concerns, pointing out that Lincoln University’s founding president, Richard Baxter Foster, was white. Lewis called Moseley a novice, based on his resume.

Bonds also called Moseley a novice and said the Board of Curators tapped him to lead Lincoln University because he had strong relationships with lawmakers and officials in Jefferson City.

“There was always concern about his ability to mentor faculty and students, to provide direction to others,” Bonds said. “His ability to provide scholarly leadership is limited.”

In her email, Candia-Bailey urged Moseley to get to know the alumni and partner with them for the good of the university. Bonds said that, unlike previous presidents, Moseley seemed uninterested in connecting with alumni, who number thousands around the country and actively fundraise and recruit on behalf of their alma mater.

“Our feedback was not received with any value,” said Bonds, who’s been active in the alumni association for decades. “So we’ve always, from the time that Moseley’s been in the position, been at a position of, you know, feeling that indifference toward what we believe and our input.”

Bonds said the indifference has continued in the wake of Candia-Bailey’s death.

“It would be interesting if the Board of Curators would want to have a listening session with us,” he said. “They said they want a listening session with the faculty and a listening session with the students, but they didn’t say they want a listening session with the alumni.”

A student speaks

On Jan. 12, the day Lincoln University announced the independent review, a group of students gathered outside a Board of Curators meeting, hoping to question leaders about the university’s response and plans.

“We were just trying to have a conversation just to get some type of answers or just to be heard,” Kenlyn Washington, Lincoln’s Student Government Association president, told local television station KRCG. “When they said, ‘OK, we’re having a closed meeting now,’ it was very frustrating.”

Washington, a political science major from St. Louis, told the Midwest Newsroom she became acquainted with Candia-Bailey through her work in student government.

“She was a great woman,” she said. “She was about her business. She made a significant impact on campus, and she impacted many lives.”

As for Moseley, Washington said he maintained close relationships with student-athletes and athletic department staff but was perceived as “distant,” by the wider student body.

She said a reckoning at Lincoln University is the last thing she expected going into her senior year.

“For everything to happen in such a short period of time and to have this much attention and the spotlight, it’s really been an eye-opener,” Washington said. “But we students continue with the things that we need to get done.”

Among those things, Washington said, is pressing the Board of Curators for information about how Candia-Bailey was treated and her firing.

The Jan. 18 statement from the Board of Curators said, “…we want to prioritize the mental health of everyone here and make sure each employee and student is treated with dignity and respect.”

Like Bonds and Lewis, Washington is ready to see Moseley gone–whether by termination or resignation.

“We should hold everyone accountable on behalf of the student body,” she said.

‘Our university is suffering’

Stevie Lawrence II, Lincoln University’s provost and vice president of academic affairs, is now acting as interim president of Lincoln University. DeNeia Thomas, dean of professional studies, now serves as acting vice president for student affairs, the position Candia-Bailey held until her firing.

The next Board of Curators meeting is scheduled for Feb. 8. Students will be there, Washington said, to take a stand for the university they love.

“For me, coming to Lincoln made me who I am,” she said.

Lewis, who has not visited the Lincoln campus for two years, said he will also be at the meeting in Jefferson City. He’s eager to resume the fundraising and recruiting efforts he suspended during Moseley’s tenure.

“The person I became at Lincoln University is the person I am now,” he said. “I was taught how to speak up in times like this. Our university is suffering.”

Bonds, a special education teacher in Georgia, said he will not attend the Feb. 8 meeting, but he and other alumni will gather in Jefferson City for their annual meeting later in the month. He said the occasion could be an opportunity for university leaders to engage with alumni.

Bonds, born and raised in Sikeston, in Missouri’s rural “Bootheel,” said Lincoln University has long served as a beacon for Black students, and he worries that the school’s current troubles are detracting from its brand and reputation.

“What the whole underpinning of the institution is about is bringing individual students and faculty to a platform that engages them and uplifts them,” Bonds said.

If you’re having thoughts of suicide or self-harm or know someone who is, the 988 Lifeline provides free and confidential support all hours, seven days a week.

This story comes from the Midwest Newsroom, an investigative journalism collaboration including IPR, KCUR 89.3, Nebraska Public Media News, St. Louis Public Radio and NPR.

This article was originally published by Word In Black. 

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January 26, 2024 — Word In Black, a groundbreaking collaboration of 10 legendary Black news publishers and a program managed by Local Media Foundation, has received a $300,000 grant from the Henry Luce Foundation to establish a religion and social justice desk.

This funding will allow Word In Black to delve into the intersection of race, religion and social justice within the Black community, as well as the Black youth perspective. These stories will humanize what audiences are experiencing and offer religious-based solutions.

Word In Black has hired an award-winning journalist and editor, the Rev. Dorothy Scott Boulware, for this new position. She has worked at the AFRO American News Co. for more than 20 years, beginning as a reporter and progressing to managing editor of the 131-year-old publication. She also served as editor of the Mustard Seed Magazine, a lifestyle magazine for young adults with Christian values. 

Alongside her journalism career, she served as an urban pastor for 17 years, and as a charter professor for the Determined Biblical and Theological Institute of New Shiloh Baptist Church of Baltimore. She’s a graduate of Wesley Theological Seminary (M.Div.), Coppin State University (B.S.-English/ journalism), and Leadership Baltimore County, 2021.

“We are grateful to the Luce Foundation for funding Word in Black’s religion and social justice reporter. The AFRO is especially pleased that our special projects editor and former managing editor, the Rev. Dorothy Boulware, has been tapped for this important position. Dorothy is a talented writer who is a perfect fit for this position,” said Dr. Frances “Toni” Draper, CEO and publisher of The AFRO in Baltimore and Washington, D.C., and chair of the Word In Black board of directors. 

“Developed in response to the Luce Foundation’s recent request for proposals for projects seeking to advance public knowledge on democracy, race, and religion in America, Word in Black’s new initiative will support journalism that examines the role of religion in African American life and explores how Black faith communities put their spiritual understandings of justice and democracy into practice in a diverse range of social, cultural, and institutional contexts,” said Jonathan VanAntwerpen, program director for religion and theology, Henry Luce Foundation. “We are delighted to have the opportunity to support this effort, which will build upon an innovative media collaboration that seeks to amplify the voices of Black Americans by sharing stories about African American communities across the country.” 

About Luce Foundation 

For more than 80 years, the Henry Luce Foundation has invested in knowledge makers and ensured that their work informs public discussion. This commitment to public knowledge derives from its founder. Henry R. Luce created Time magazine to disseminate the most important news, ideas, analysis, and criticism to a mass audience.

About Word In Black

Word In Black is a groundbreaking collaborative representing 10 legendary Black news publishers. Word In Black promises to confront inequities, elevate solutions and amplify the Black experience by reporting, collecting, and sharing stories about real people in communities across our country. We believe that by joining forces and providing a platform to examine these experiences in one place, we can shape how the nation understands and addresses systemic issues of race, justice, and equity.

About Local Media Association and Local Media Foundation 

Local Media Association brings all media together to share, network, collaborate and more. More than 3,000 newspapers, TV stations, radio stations, digital pure-plays, and research and development partners engage with LMA as members or constituents of our programs. As a 501(c)(6) trade association, LMA is focused on the business side of local media. Its programs and labs focus on revenue growth and new business models. LMA helps local media companies develop their strategies via cutting-edge programs, conferences, webinars, research and training.

Local Media Foundation, a 501(c)(3) charitable trust, serves as the innovation and transformation affiliate of LMA. Incorporating our four strategic pillars — business transformation, journalism funded by philanthropy, industry collaboration, and sustainability for publishers of color — LMF helps provide local media companies the strategies and resources for meaningful innovation and impactful journalism projects.

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By Rev. Dorothy S. Boulware
Word In Black

A student who misbehaves in Houston, Texas, might find himself in the library — or what used to be the library.  Nowadays, students looking for reading resources from a library would find no librarian, only a few books, and the space occupied by students who are in trouble. They might find what used to be the library is now an in-school detention center.  

This is the situation that has captured the attention of the social justice ministry of Wheeler Avenue Baptist Church in Houston.

“With all of the challenges that face Brown and Black children, their education should not be subjected to these sorts of roadblocks,” the Rev. Dr. Angela Ravin-Anderson, head of the ministry, tells Word In Black.  

She says their first instinct was to put a stop to the detention libraries as soon as possible.

“So we began a writing campaign to make our voices heard, to let the powers-that-be know they don’t know what they’re doing. We went to the school board meeting and presented close to two thousand letters we’d collected at church.”

Ravin-Anderson says there was such an outpouring of support at the church that they’ve now started a second campaign.

“We know how critical it is for children to be on point with reading by third grade, so we were very concerned.”

Rev. Ravin-Anderson says books would be in the library, although the librarians would not be there.

“How do you associate something fun with someplace you go when you’re in trouble? The libraries were reconfigured into detention centers.”

Houston neighbor Sandra Thomas initially thought it might be a good idea when she heard about it, but that soon changed.

“It was presented to me as a way to keep children in school, where they’d be safe, rather than send them home because they misbehaved,” Thomas says. “But when I realized it meant the librarians were losing their jobs and the children would be left to their own devices for help with their reading, that was an entirely different story.”

She says it was a real shock to the entire community.

Wheeler Avenue’s outrage is equally shared by the Houston branch of the NAACP.

“Nelson Mandela stated that the clearest depiction of a nation’s character is seen in how it treats its children. That needs to sink in deeply because what we are witnessing presently in HISD are actions towards our children that are beyond egregious,” said NAACP Houston President Dr. James Dixon, according to the Houston Defender.

“The thought of closing and repurposing libraries in schools is not only insulting, but it’s also repulsive,” Dixon said. “It reveals a measure of disrespect and disregard for our children’s need to have access to the best and most functional libraries and schools available. And that includes professional staff.”

This article was originally published by Word In Black. 

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The co-anchor of CNN News Central announced her stage 3 diagnosis on-air, emphasizing how the disease impacts Black women.

By Alexa Spencer
Word In Black

CNN anchor Sara Sidner announced on Jan. 8 that she is undergoing treatment for stage 3 breast cancer. During an emotional segment on CNN News Central, she told viewers she is in her second month of chemotherapy and will receive radiation and a double mastectomy. 

“I have never been sick a day of my life. I don’t smoke. I rarely drink. Breast cancer does not run in my family. And yet, here I am with stage three breast cancer,”  Sidner, 51, said on air.

FACT: Black women get breast cancer less, but die more often

As Sidner explained, “stage 3 is not a death sentence anymore for the vast majority of women.” But as she researched the condition, she learned about a harrowing disparity.

“If you happen to be a Black woman, you are 41 percent more likely to die from breast cancer than your white counterparts,” she said. 

An estimated 13 percent of women in the United States develop breast cancer in their lifetime, and about 2.5 percent die from it, according to the American Cancer Society. Further, the organization reports that Black women have a 4 percent lower incidence rate compared to White women but a 40 percent higher death rate.

Black women are also more likely to develop breast cancer before age 40, but when diagnosed at any age, it’s often more advanced and aggressive forms of the disease, such as triple-negative and inflammatory breast cancers. 

FACT: Breast cancer is a mental battle too. Community can help

Living with breast cancer impacts the mind, just as it does the body. Sidner told viewers that every single day that she “breathes another breath,” she celebrates because she’s still here with others. 

“I am here with my co-anchors, my colleagues, my family. And I can love and cry, and laugh, and hope. And that, my dear friends, is enough,” she said.

One-in-four women with breast cancer experience depression and are more likely to experience one or more of the following conditions: addiction, anxiety, fatigue, insomnia, memory loss, mood swings or post-traumatic stress disorder. 

The mental illnesses can be more severe if a person was diagnosed at a younger age, had prior traumatic experiences of mental illness diagnoses, lacked access to higher education, or had a lower income. 

Lacking social support from family, friends, or community could also contribute to mental challenges among women living with breast cancer. On the contrary, those who complete treatment and survive breast cancer could have a better quality of life if they’re supported socially. 

RESOURCES: Where to get a free exam 

Sidner urged women to get examined annually to prevent advanced diagnoses. “To all my sisters — Black and White and Brown — out there, please, for the love of God, get your mammograms every single year. Do your self-exams. Try to catch it before I did,” she said.

Whether performed at home or a clinic, breast examinations are accessible. Here are two free resources for preventative care: 

• The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) sponsors free breast cancer screenings and diagnostic services for low-income, uninsured, or underinsured women. To find out if you’re eligible for care at a location near you, visit the program’s website.
• According to the National Breast Cancer Foundation, Inc., adult women of all ages should perform self-exams at least once a month. Visit their website to learn three techniques for self-examination.

This article was originally published by Word in Black.

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Contact: Julia Campbell, Local Media Foundation, julia.campbell@localmedia.org

Move comes three years after site launch, accelerated growth expected

(January 9, 2024) — The long-anticipated day has finally arrived for 10 of the nation’s most trusted and innovative Black publishers, who have worked hard over the past three years to grow Word In Black into a national news site focused on solutions to racial inequities in America. As of Jan. 1, Word In Black has officially incorporated as a public benefit company. 

Word In Black is the only media startup of its kind and serves as a future model for the industry. It was incubated inside Local Media Foundation, a 501(c)(3) organization affiliated with Local Media Association. The incubation period allowed for significant testing and experimentation which in turn led to rapid growth. The 10 publishers and the LMF team worked hand-in-hand throughout the last three years to drive this growth. As part of this transition envisioned in the original 2020 business plan, LMF sold the assets to Word In Black, PBC, and will continue to provide support as a shareholder in the new company.

What makes it so successful is combining the large and loyal audience of the 10 publishers with the new national brand, along with third-party management services that don’t drain local resources. Almost all of the support, both commercial and philanthropic, includes all 10 publishers and the national brand, reaching a combined audience of more than 1 million. All 10 publishers have been able to add mini-beats to their newsrooms focused on health and education, along with access to content developed by the national reporting team. It’s a winning formula that has not been tested anywhere else. 

The public benefit corporation will be supported by the Word In Black Racial Equity Fund, a component fund of LMF. This support will ensure the great journalism funded by philanthropy continues to grow. Word In Black employs a newsroom of 10 FTEs along with contracted freelancers. The staff includes reporters and data journalists focused on health, education, finance, climate justice, religion and more. Read the 2023 Impact Report to learn more. 

The new corporation’s shareholders include the 10 publishers, their companies, LMF and LMA/LMF CEO Nancy Lane. All shareholders contributed to a capital raise to strengthen the infrastructure on the business side. The company will continue to be managed by LMA and LMF for at least the next three years to ensure a smooth transition and manage the growth.

The shareholders elected the first board of directors, as follows: Dr. Frances Toni Draper, CEO, The AFRO American, board chair; Elinor Tatum, CEO, New York Amsterdam News, first vice chair; Patrick Washington, publisher, Dallas Weekly, second vice chair; Denise Rolark Barnes, CEO, The Washington Informer, treasurer; and Nancy Lane, secretary.

“This is a day to celebrate an important step in the evolution of Word In Black,” said Draper. “Launching a digital news site focused on racial inequities in America, in collaboration with nine other leading Black publishers, has been game changing for all of us. The transition to a public benefit corporation allows us to take Word In Black out of the pilot phase and develop it into a much larger national brand that is unapologetically Black.”

In the future, the group believes there will be opportunities to include more of the nation’s leading Black publishers. “We are already working with other like-minded local Black publishers on content campaigns involving large brands,” said Draper. “We look forward to casting a wider net as opportunities arise. Publishers that want to be involved are encouraged to contact us.”

“As chair of the board for Local Media Foundation, I could not be more proud of the work that has been done over the past three years,” said Larry Lee, publisher of The Sacramento Observer, and a shareholder in Word In Black. “We have been sharing our learnings with many others in the industry which has led to the formation of several new collaborations including News Is Out, a queer media collaborative. We believe this model is scalable and important to the long term sustainability of local media.”

As part of the transition, Word In Black is hiring a director of business development to cultivate sponsorships, events, reader revenue and branded content opportunities. 

Without the support of corporations, foundations and individuals, Word In Black would not exist. The board of directors would especially like to thank Google News Initiative, Conrad Hilton Foundation, Chan Zuckerberg Initiative, Comcast Foundation, Commonwealth Fund, Deloitte, Robert Wood Johnson Foundation, W.K. Kellogg Foundation, McKinsey, Henry Luce Foundation, Walton Family Foundation, Wells Fargo, AARP, Biogen, Meta Journalism Project and many others.

For more information about Word In Black and the WIB Racial Equity Fund, visit: www.wordinblack.com/aboutus and www.wordinblack.com/racial-equity-fund.

About Word In Black

Amsterdam News Publisher Elinor R. Tatum conceived what is today known as Word in Black, the acclaimed and historic collaboration of Black newspaper publishers to collectively address racial inequity in partnership with the Local Media Association, after the murder of George Floyd.

Since its launch in late 2020, Word In Black’s reporting team has relentlessly confronted inequities, elevated solutions, and amplified the Black experience by collecting and sharing stories that inform, inspire and center truth.

Through this collaboration, Word In Black aims to accurately frame how the nation understands and addresses systemic issues of race, justice and equity. Collective understanding leads to collective impact.

The 10 publishers that make up Word In Black are: AFRO News, The Atlanta Voice, Dallas Weekly, Houston Defender, Michigan Chronicle, New York Amsterdam News, The Sacramento Observer, The Seattle Medium, The St. Louis American and The Washington Informer. Cumulatively, these publishers have operated for more than 800 years.

About Word in Black Racial Equity Fund

The Word In Black Racial Equity Fund, a component fund of Local Media Foundation, supports the work of Black-owned and operated local news media by providing critical journalism resources for Word In Black, a collaborative effort of 10 of the leading Black publishers. 

The Fund supports journalism projects focused on solutions to racial inequities. Funding generally supports journalists who work for Word In Black, as well as journalists working for the 10 publishers. The Fund currently covers costs of 10 Word In Black journalists: an education reporter, education data journalist, health reporter, health data journalist, newsletter editor, climate justice reporter, community and audience engagement manager, finance reporter, religion reporter and the managing editor. The 10 publishers work with the WIB team to localize the stories in their markets, as well as producing their own original reporting.

About Local Media Foundation

Local Media Foundation is a 501(c)(3) charitable organization affiliated with Local Media Association. The LMF mission is to ensure a healthy future for local journalism, which is essential to a strong democracy, by reinventing business models for news.

In line with this mission, LMF worked with 10 of the nation’s legendary Black publishers to incubate Word In Black, a digital startup unlike any other in the industry. Over a three year period the national site, as well as the 10 local publishers, experienced significant growth. The organization believes this is a model that can be duplicated in other ways and in other markets. LMF manages other national collaborations including: Oklahoma Media Center, News Is Out – Queer Media Collaborative, Solving Sacramento, LMA Covering Climate, and New York/Michigan Solutions Journalism. LMF also manages the Local News Fund, which has helped hundreds of local and national news outlets fundraise for journalism projects, along with the Knight x LMA BloomLab, Lab for Journalism funding, Family and Independent Media Sustainability Lab and much more. More information at: www.localmedia.org.

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From the time I could talk, I was loud and opinionated, especially about the rights of those disenfranchised and pushed to the margins of society.  Though not calling it democracy back then, I believed being heard by the powers-that-be would make a difference. My adamant pitch and passion was always met by opponents bent on silencing and shutting me down. 

Mary-Pat Hector, CEO of the student and youth
activist organization, RISE, says we must “raise our
voices for ownership of our civic life.”

One hurdle after another, this Black girl-child coming of age in the deep South eventually realized going it alone to get results was an impossible feat. 

I found my tribe — a chorus of like-minded voices — all screaming synchronously at the top of our lungs. Together, we unharnessed the secret to being heard, fighting back, and making an impact.  

In the “off-year” election year of 2023, the primal scream of voters reverberated. The message was simple. They’ve had enough of being dismissed, denied and deceived. 

The stunning wins for the abortion rights movement in ruby-red Ohio, deep-purple Virginia, and light-blue Pennsylvania were not about party or candidate victories. It was a full-throttle response to disinformation maneuvers by extremists who are clueless about how democracy works or that it can work. 

Last year’s victory can’t be claimed by one state or coalition alone. It is part of a still roaring scream, pushing to the tipping point a changing landscape to exact a people’s victory that proclaims democracy is us. Grassroots organizers, nonprofit advocacy groups, and institutions committed to public interest are the small “d” democrats who are saving the day. 

From Vermont to Virginia, Kansas to Kentucky, Montana to Maine, the call is loud and crystallizing. Politicians should read the edict from voters, not the latest polling data. 

Just as abortion rights in the post-Dobbs era triggered unstoppable pushback and movements in ballot campaigns, constitutional amendments, and legislatures across the country, groundswells of voices for change are surging and coming to their feet around gun safety and climate change; saying “no” to book banning and assaults on LGBTQ rights; demanding clean water in Jackson and Flint; and justice for workers on picket lines at work sites nationwide. 

There is a well-paved path of civic engagement animated by people devoted to action and advocacy. Together, we are the connective tissue of democracy. You don’t need an advanced degree to read the message plainly spelled out last year. 

Without abstractions or caveats, the voters are collectively embracing authentic solutions. Across generational, demographic, and geographic divides, we are responding to issues that hit hard where we live, impacting real-life choices and everyday circumstances. 

What’s motivating us with each new ballot initiative is our demand to raise our voices for ownership of our civic life. We can secure common sense solutions that speak to an elevated form of basic brilliance.

We know the role of government is to help, not hinder, obstruct or enter the corridors of our personal lives. Rights denied, reversed, or taken away will ultimately spur movements.  

My call to action to anyone unsure they hold power in their voice: join a group that shares your values in 2024. Get involved. Speak, meet, organize and act. Become the movement to plow the ground and plant the fertile seeds of change.

This article was originally published by Word in Black. 

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By AFRO Staff

Baltimore City Public Schools (City Schools) made significant strides in 2023, with 39 of its institutions improving the ratings earned on the annual Maryland School Report Card.

Every year, the Maryland State Department of Education (MSDE) gauges schools’ performance based on state tests results and other critical academic, college readiness, and attendance measures. Each school is then awarded a star rating – from one to five stars – based on the results of its assessment.

Of Baltimore’s 164 schools and centers, only 148 were included in the report card since some lacked sufficient data in certain categories. Of those assessed, 27 percent improved in star rating, outpacing the statewide rate of 8 percent. Only nine schools – 6 percent – recorded a decrease in the number of stars earned. 

Additionally, the proportion of 3-, 4-, and 5-star schools  increased from a quarter of City Schools to more than one-third. And the number of 1-star schools was cut in half from 29 to 15. Two campuses – Baltimore School for the Arts and Baltimore Polytechnic Institute – earned the maximum of five stars. 

City Schools officials say the gains – which mirror similar growth shown on other state reports, such as the Maryland Comprehensive Assessment Program (MCAP) results in math and literacy – reflect their efforts to address key performance areas.

“Our positive results are more than numbers on a spreadsheet; they indicate a rapid growth trajectory that outpaces our state,” said Dr. Sonja Brookins Santelises, chief executive officer of City Schools, in a statement. “They are proof of the collective effort and investment of our community to accelerate the improvement of our student outcomes and schools.” 

In the past few years, some of the remedies implemented by City Schools  to improve student performance included, tutoring efforts to improve literacy and math proficiency, implementing individualized student learning plans, increasing summer learning offerings, and organizing a redesigned Office of Student Success to support college and career readiness.  

City Schools also made investments in addressing chronic absenteeism, which MSDE defines as the proportion of students absent 10 percent or more of school days while enrolled at a school.  And those investments paid off.

More than 85 percent of the schools measured – 128 of 148 schools – reduced chronic absenteeism in at least one grade band.

Those gains resulted from investments such as ensuring each school has an attendance plan, establishing cross-functional attendance teams at 64 schools, and embarking on a citywide effort to encourage regular attendance. Outreach to the community has included phone-a-thons, neighborhood visits by the “City Schools On The Go” bus, home visits and summer outreach. 

“The quality of our schools – as indicated by increased stars – is improving, which equals better options for our students and families,” Santelises added. “We still have more progress ahead, but these results, paired with other positive indicators in attendance, literacy, and math, verify that we are on the right track.” 

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Nationwide, about 90 percent of four-day school weeks are used by rural, White populations. Here’s what Black families should know about the model.

By Maya Pottiger
Word in Black

Coming out of the COVID-19 pandemic, teachers, educators and parents have been playing catch up. 

The recent National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP) report showed devastating declines in math and reading achievement levels. On top of that, schools nationwide continue to struggle with chronic absenteeism and staffing shortages.

So Paul Thompson, an associate professor of economics at Oregon State University, finds it odd that schools have started shifting to a four-day model as an effort to recruit and retain key personnel. It also goes against the other lesson we learned from the pandemic: numerous families rely on schools for valuable resources.

“There’s these big equity concerns about shifting the burden of what schools have traditionally done for students and parents and communities — providing child care, food provision, physical activity, all of those things — and are shifting away from the school district onto families and communities on that additional day,” Thompson says. “What the implications of that are is extremely important, as well.”

Currently, it’s a small sample of schools concentrated in a handful of states — or about 7 percent of districts, mostly in Oregon, Missouri, Colorado, Texas, and New Mexico – that are utilizing the four-day school week.

As researchers study the impacts of these shortened school weeks, they’re asking key questions: Who is mostly being impacted by this? And what are the impacts? 

Mostly White, Rural Students — For Now

Four-day school weeks currently exist in mostly rural, White communities. But as the concept gains popularity, states with large indigenous student bodies are also adopting the practice.

Across the country, 90 percent of districts using a four-day model are rural, and they have an average of 454 total students enrolled in the district, according to an MIT study. Looking at districts with the five-day model, only half are rural, and the average enrollment is 3,735 students. 

“But, as this continues to grow, and as teacher shortages affect schools from across the spectrum of different types of districts, we may see this model continue to expand into urban areas,” Thompson says.

Colorado’s 27J School District, with nearly 23,000 students, is now the largest district using a four-day model — and preliminary results aren’t good, with a study reporting home prices and student achievement both declined. And Independence School District in Missouri, which also adopted it, serves more than 14,000 students. 

However, RAND study participants cautioned that while the four-day model worked in their rural communities, it wouldn’t be as accepted in places like “big cities,” where key factors would be different, like higher numbers of working parents and higher childcare costs.

And these homogenous districts have made it difficult to study the impacts on a range of racially or socioeconomically diverse students. Instead, the research has mostly focused on the average impact.

The MIT study offers a window into this, finding districts with the four-day model have “significantly smaller portions” of Black and Asian students and a significantly higher portion of free or reduced-price lunch-eligible student population than five-day districts.

“We’re still a little off from really understanding what the true equity concerns are here,” Thompson says. “That’s a big thing that’s currently missing. We know how it affects the average student, but what about these more at-risk students, either academically or financially?”

As more districts around the country consider switching, William Rodick, Ph.D., the P-12 practice lead at the Education Trust, says he hopes they’re thinking about lessons learned in the pandemic. 

NAEP results continue to show concern in general student progress in math and reading, but especially for Black and Latino students, English learners, and students from low-income backgrounds. These students, in particular, rely on schools to provide food, devices, and high-speed internet. 

If they need those supports on those other four days, Rodick says, they’re also going to need them on the fifth.

“These are students who rely on school supports and additional educational services, students that really need to build strong relationships with teachers,” Rodick says. “So taking an additional day of contact, we can imagine that’s going to have negative consequences on certain student groups.”

Not Promising for Student Achievement

Generally, research — and experience — shows that when students spend less time in front of teachers, it has a negative impact on achievement. 

When Oregon schools made the switch, students lost three to four hours of classroom time, and that “translated almost directly to the negative effects that we saw on student achievement” to students in third through eighth grade, Thompson says. And, he added, “If you look nationally, you see these similar impacts.” 

In districts with four-day school weeks, those with low levels in classroom time are the places where researchers see big negative impacts on achievement. But, in schools that are maintaining instructional time close to a five-day school week model, there isn’t much difference on achievement levels.

This outlines two potential policy recommendations, Thompson says. When switching to a four-day week, schools should focus on maintaining instructional time, either through lengthening the school day, or offering remedial or experiential learning opportunities on the off-day.

And, beyond educational impacts, there are other negative effects on students. A four-day school week impacts nutrition for students who rely on school for breakfast and lunch. And, after Colorado districts switched, juvenile crime increased.

“Our research has shown differences in how much students are eating breakfast, sugary beverages, drug use, things like that,” Thompson says. “So there’s implications that go beyond the traditional academic impacts that most educational interventions have.”

Fewer Days Mean Longer Days

Despite changes to the weekly schedule, the amount of months students are in the classroom is generally the same, Thompson says. Instead of attending for 170 or 180 days, students are now in class for about 150 days.

Days in a four-day school week are often extended to make up time missed from skipping the fifth day of instruction. The 30-60 added minutes are “generally insufficient,” Thompson says, but teachers seem to appreciate it. 

In the surveys he’s done, Thompson reports teachers say the added time allows them to go more in-depth than they otherwise would have been able to in a single class period. It’s not known yet if these cuts are leading to any changes in lesson plans, like omitting topics or cutting projects. But, overall, the curriculum is staying the same, and “the goal is that teachers just become more efficient in their teaching,” Thompson says. 

However, even though four-day school week students, on average, had 49 more minutes per day of instructional time, they lost 58 hours of instructional time per school year compared to a traditional five-day week, according to a 2021 RAND report.

And in high school, especially in the rural areas where these switches are taking place, students were missing a lot of class time on Fridays for extracurriculars, like a long bus ride to a sporting event. So time was tacked on to the first four days of the week to recapture some of the otherwise lost time.

“That seems to be pretty effective at mitigating any decline in achievement,” Thompson says, “but when you make this a district-wide switch, it’s those elementary and middle school students that suffer in terms of their achievement.”

Parents Need to Stay Informed — and Involved

When a district is considering a switch to a four-day school week, Rodick says his biggest concern is community involvement. 

“So many of the consequences of this decision are going to be felt by community members,” Rodick says. 

Especially after the pandemic, Rodick says family engagement is an “incredible tool” to bring students back to schools. But, of course, it matters how much that information is spreading in the community, and which community members it is and isn’t reaching.

So, Thompson says, as four-day school weeks are “more on the national conscience,” especially if parents are in states where it’s growing, it’s important to get informed. Whether through reading the research, looking at the infographics, or even attending a virtual conference on the subject, “be aware of what it means for your school to switch to a four-day school week.”

Parents should raise the issue with their school boards, asking about the implications for student learning, how to get services to at-risk students during the off-day, and what the child care options are.

“School officials may not have thought about all these things,” Thompson says. “They may be thinking, ‘We need to make this change so we can hire teachers,’ and you want to at least have them thinking about all these other things that could be impacted by this change.”

This article was originally published by Word in Black.

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Some of the biggest stories for Black people in the past year include issues much closer to home and our daily lives

Hiram Jackson

Retrospectives of the preceding year are not simply a recap. They are, in many ways, a forecast for what’s to come. If we don’t take the time to reflect on what’s gone before, we’re more likely to make the same mistakes and less able to apply what we’ve learned going forward — case in point, the strange case(s) of Donald Trump.

Trump is the story that keeps giving. The former president – the only president in the nation’s history to be indicted on federal charges – faces a litany of criminal charges after being impeached twice. The fact that he remains a frontrunner in the 2024 election and is still a Republican party favorite is a national tragedy.

But the upside: three Black women law officials — New York Attorney General Letitia James, Atlanta-based District Attorney Fani Willis, and U.S. District Judge Tanya Chutkan — continue to hold his feet to the fire for crimes ranging from fraud and sexual harassment to election tampering and inciting a riot. 

That these three Black women are in a position to hold and preside over such high-profile cases underscores this nation’s progress on the judicial front and moves the jurisprudence system closer to the promise: “No one is above the law.”

Some of the biggest stories for Black people in the past year include issues much closer to home and our daily lives. Battles for racial justice and equity continue with greater and greater zeal. 

Two Black quarterbacks, Patrick Mahomes and Jalen Hurts, faced off against each other in the Super Bowl, while 14 Black quarterbacks started for NFL teams during the 2023 season. Brittney Griner returned to the U.S. after 10 months of imprisonment in Russia, and Damar Hamlin returned from a near-death experience on the gridiron.

Black entrepreneurs are emerging in spaces once considered the domain of the ethnically privileged, and initiatives to increase access to quality education for underserved communities are working. Arian Simone, co-founder and CEO of Atlanta-based Fearless Fund, made major waves in the venture capital space where only 3 percent of investors are Black. Morgan DeBaun, the founder, chairman and CEO of Blavity, continues to expand the media company’s reach, popularity, and size.

The Bruce family’s descendants sold oceanfront property that was stolen through a Jim Crow application of eminent domain in 1912. They won the property back in 2002, and in 2023, they sold it back to Los Angeles County for $20 million.

And although local and national calls for reparations have yet to produce a national policy to compensate for slavery, a Black woman in Denver, Colorado, who worked seven days a week, 24 hours a day, 365 days a year for $30,000, sued her employer for underpayment and was awarded a judgment of $830,737.68, plus attorney’s fees that are estimated to be about $250,000.

Hakeem Jeffries became the U.S. House of Representatives minority leader and made history as the first Black lawmaker to lead a party in Congress. And two Black lawmakers, Justin Jones and Justin Pearson of Tennessee, were reinstated to the state legislature after expulsion when they called for gun reform in the wake of the Nashville school shooting.

Cherelle Parker became the first woman mayor of Philadelphia, and artificial intelligence caused a Hollywood shutdown.

A lot happened this year, and many of the key actors in the events that made history in the past 12 months will bring much of what they started in 2023 into 2024. But the best way to close out this year and every year is to take what we learned over the preceding months, including the impact that the year’s events have had on our individual lives and communities, and be vigilant but hopeful about our futures.

Although we don’t expect the 2024 presidential election to be as fraught with false claims of fraud, we know that at least one candidate for the office will continue to disrupt the political process with lies and insidious inventions. But since past behavior is a predictor of future behavior, expect an eventful ride in 2024.

Hiram Jackson is the CEO and publisher of Real Times Media, which includes The Michigan Chronicle, a partner in the Word In Black collaborative.

This article was originally published by Word in Black.

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Black homeowners and prospective buyers faced serious headwinds in 2023, but 2024 and beyond could provide hope.

By Bria Overs
Word in Black

“Challenging.” That is how Courtney Johnson Rose describes the state of housing in Black America in 2023. Rose is the president of the National Association of Real Estate Brokers (NAREB), a minority professional trade organization serving real estate workers. 

The rate of Black homeownership in America has never reached 50 percent, a level other racial and ethnic groups hit in years past. The closest the Black community has ever come to it was in early 2004 when it hit 49.7 percent. It has been rapidly declining in the nearly 20 years since, hitting its lowest point in early 2019 at 40.6 percent.

“It’s a challenge to sell real estate and to inspire people to buy real estate in this type of market,” Rose says. “Rates are high, prices are high. We’ve had buyers in my office that we’ve been looking for six months to find the right house.”

According to NAREB’s annual “State of Housing in Black America,” blaming a lack of desire for homeownership would be unfair. The current process for purchasing has created systemic barriers and obstacles that, for some, are nearly impossible to jump over.

“We need to figure out new ways for Black Americans to build wealth because, in many markets, it’s very difficult to become a homeowner because of the wealth profile of Black Americans,” Andre M. Perry, senior fellow at Brookings Metro, says. “We certainly need homeownership as a vehicle to build wealth, but we need other as well.”

All is not lost, though. Rose says educating, preparing, and reforming systems to be more inclusive for potential and existing Black homeowners can help the community get there.

What Black homeowners and homebuyers face

The list of obstacles is  long, including several that remain out of the control of Black people. The list includes low wages and wealth, housing unaffordability, lack of housing supply, discriminatory property tax systems, and even vulnerability to the effects of climate change.

Black net worth has increased by 61 percent since 2019, from a median of $28,000 to $45,000. However, more money is needed to purchase a home. Providers of conventional home loans denied Black applicants three times more than White applicants. The report found that “unfavorable debt-to-income ratio, poor credit history, and inadequate collateral were the top three reasons for loan denial among Black and white prospective borrowers.”

Then there’s the housing affordability problem. According to the National Association of Home Builders (NAHB)/Wells Fargo Housing Opportunity Index (HOI), 37.4 percent of homes sold this summer were affordable to families earning the U.S. median income of $96,300. Most Black families do not make half of that. 

Contributing to this problem are interest rates, which were raised by the Federal Reserve 11 times since March 2020 in an attempt to recover from the shock of the COVID-19 pandemic. Fortunately for borrowers, as inflation holds steady at 3.1 percent, the year will end with no new increases, and some reports claim the Fed may cut interest rates three or more times in the coming year. Rose hopes this news will encourage more Black Americans to enter the housing market.

In addition to housing unaffordability, property tax systems have made it harder for Black folks to keep their homes. A report from the Brookings Institute found that Black-owned home values were “over-assessed” by tax collectors at 10 percent to 13 percent higher than White-owned homes. At the same time, Black homes are undervalued by 21 percent to 23 percent by appraisers, lowering their homes’ selling price.

Recommendations for addressing these concerns include finding new ways to tax people based on levels of wealth to account for the profiles of different racial and ethnic groups. But more importantly, guards are needed to stop racial bias, Perry says.

“We need data to examine the differences across neighborhoods, and we need systems to hold tax assessors and cities accountable,” he adds.

What’s Next?

Black millennials are the future of homeownership. The NAREB reported the group accounting for the most significant generational share of mortgage loans in 2022. Yet, their homeownership rate is only half that of white millennials, and is at risk of declining because of systemic obstacles and the economy.

“Student loan debt is one of the biggest impediments they have for being able to purchase real estate,” Rose says. “A lot of them went to college, which was the right thing to do, but for the first 15 years out of college, they’re paying off the debt they spent to get their education.”

To provide opportunities for education and advancement, NAREB kicked off its multi-city Black Wealth Tour, making stops in Houston and Birmingham earlier this year. The tour will visit Atlanta, Little Rock, Los Angeles, and other cities in 2024.

“If you have a community that’s active, and that wants it, we can get to the finish line,” Rose says. “I don’t think we have an apathetic community. I think the Black community wants to build wealth, they want to understand, they want to learn and grow. If that desire is there, the NAREB is here to keep on pushing to try to open the door for them.”

This article was originally published by WordinBlack.

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Since the 1800s, Black folks have used Christmas to resist racial violence and oppression. Here are some social justice organizations to support this holiday season.

By Nadira Jamerson
Word in  Black

For many of us, Christmas is a time to exchange gifts, indulge in slices of sweet potato pie, and binge-watch movies like “This Christmas” and “Best Man Holiday” with family. But for Black Americans, spreading holiday cheer has also meant reflecting on the injustices in our society and actively working to do something about them.

Historically, Christmas was one of the only times when some enslaved Black folks were given time off from the grueling work of plantation life. In the 1830s, the large slaveholding states of Alabama, Louisiana and Arkansas became the first in the United States to declare Christmas a state holiday.

As Solomon Northup wrote in his memoir “Twelve Years a Slave,” Christmas was “the time of feasting, and frolicking, and fiddling — the carnival season with the children of bondage. They are the only days when they are allowed a little restricted liberty, and heartily indeed do they enjoy it.” 

During the holiday season, some enslaved Black folks used their “little restricted liberty” to resist the atrocities of slavery by enjoying rest that was otherwise seldom afforded to them, while some traveled to nearby relatives to strengthen family bonds that slaveholders worked tirelessly to break.

For others, Christmas was an ideal time to plan their escapes to freedom. In fact, icon and leader of the Underground Railroad, Harriet Tubman, used Christmas Eve, 1854, to lead her three brothers to freedom in Philadelphia. And Ellen Craft disguised herself as a White man to help her and her husband escape enslavement on Christmas day, 1848. 

Today, resistance may look a little different — but it’s still a strong Black tradition. According to a joint study from the W.K. Kellogg Foundation and Rockefeller Philanthropy Advisors, nearly two-thirds of Black households donate to community-based organizations and causes, totaling roughly $11 billion each year.

Despite having a lower net worth, Black households, on average, give away 25 percent more of their income per year than their White counterparts. Outside of financial contributions, Black Americans have taken charge of facilitating some of the most influential protests in the United States, from the 1963 March on Washington to the Summer of George Floyd in 2020. 

If you want to make a meaningful change in your community this Christmas, support these Black-led organizations to help you get in the holiday spirit.

Five social justice organizations to support this holiday season: 

1. Black Women For Wellness: This Black-women-led organization promotes health and well-being among Black women and girls through health education, empowerment and advocacy. You can support their mission by making a donation. 

2. Black Male Voter Project: BMVP directly engages Black male voters in their 17 priority states to increase civic engagement and voter participation and ensure the needs of Black male voters are heard. You can support their mission by making a donation. 

3. H.O.P.E.: Through counseling, success coaching and financial assistance for housing and childcare, H.O.P.E empowers Black single parents in Atlanta. Learn more about this organization in our interview with founder Kenita Smith, and support their work by volunteering at their next event.

4. Black and Pink National: A prison abolitionist organization dedicated to abolishing the criminal punishment system and liberating Black LGBTQ+ people and people living with HIV/AIDS. You can volunteer to support one of their programs or make a donation. 

5. The National Coalition for the Homeless: Building a movement to end homelessness. This organization uses an advocacy-based approach to prevent homelessness for those at risk, provide resources for the immediate needs of those experiencing homelessness, and ensure their civil rights are respected and protected. Get involved by volunteering or making a donation.

This article was originally published by WordinBlack.

The post Why Black Christmas means resistance appeared first on AFRO American Newspapers.

By Tonya Calhoun

The power of a “people-first” approach drives authentic community engagement while citing statistical data as a key pillar in addressing climate.

Milwaukee is witnessing a transformation — a journey fueled by data, collaboration, and a fervent commitment to justice. 

Playing a crucial role in this endeavor is Data You Can Use, a diverse coalition of local professionals committed to providing accessible data for addressing community concerns. For instance, Walnut Way, a local community-based organization, serves as an exemplary community organization harnessing data for empowerment and showcasing the tangible impact of leveraging information for positive change.

Milwaukee’s recent 9th Annual Data Day, themed ‘Journey to Justice,’ resonated with the collective desire to dismantle silos, democratize data, and catalyze systemic change. This convergence of minds, comprising residents, professionals, government officials and academics, marked a pivotal moment in the pursuit of equitable solutions.

As the director of the Office of Community Collaboration and Engagement at Environmental Defense Fund (EDF), I was delighted to be at the core of this journey, igniting discussions on climate injustice. My goal for the event was to illuminate the power of a people-first approach in driving authentic community engagement while citing statistical data as a key pillar in addressing climate inequity.

Walnut Way’s community work is a testament to the marriage of data-driven strategies and grassroots climate action. Their work aims to reduce disparities among African Americans, increase community wealth, enhance residents’ well-being, and create a resilient, self-sustaining neighborhood. Their collaboration with institutions like the Northwestern Mutual Data Science Institute underscores the potency of data in shaping environmental justice initiatives.

Their approach to community-led, comprehensive development allows residents to lead important initiatives that support the unique needs of their community, fostering economic mobility, supporting small businesses and advocating for issues like energy burden, the portion of your total household income that goes specifically toward paying for energy-related expenses like electricity, heating, and other similar costs, broadband access, and water rights. 

Broad-based collaboration is core to Walnut Way’s efforts to create healthier community environments. To help residents, policymakers, and businesses make informed decisions related to protecting the health and well-being of communities, Walnut Way collaborates with MKE FreshAir Collection, a local non-profit air quality monitoring and advocacy organization. 

With support from Walnut Way, MKE FreshAir Collective relies on the Air Visual App by IQAir as a primary platform for helping residents receive real-time, neighborhood-level air quality notifications, empowering them to make informed decisions about their well-being. Their meticulous deployment of air quality sensors, guided by health data, not only educates nearly 10,000 Milwaukeeans, but also serves as a blaring call for policy reforms. 

The tapestry of these initiatives spotlights the critical role of the historic Inflation Reduction Act in fostering sustainable infrastructure and incentivizing climate projects, like Walnut Way’s community bioswales and healthy home projects, which leverage tax incentives on construction and sustainable supplies for affordable homeownership projects. It’s a testament to how informed funding propels impactful community-driven solutions.

The real marvel lies in the potential—a potential propelled by tools like EDF’s Climate Vulnerability Index (CVI). This instrument isn’t just a map; it’s a compass guiding investments and empowering Black communities to confront climate risks head-on.

The CVI presents the opportunity for local governments to leverage the tool as a resource to not only show where the risks lie, but to help steer new investment in solutions. Supporting groups like Walnut Way — and ensuring the right investments flow to the right places for the biggest impact — is critical to the advancement of climate progress. 

Walnut Way’s unwavering commitment to fostering economic and climate equity within Milwaukee’s historically marginalized communities stands as a testament to their dedication in redefining the parameters of success. Their efforts serve as an exceptional model for other communities seeking to address similar challenges by using data to inspire action. And utilizing tools like the CVI that doesn’t just showcase climate risks — but offers a roadmap for equitable investments, leveraging the IRA’s transformative funding — can add to this momentum.

Milwaukee stands at the cusp of a transformative era, armed with data as a catalyst for justice. Let their journey, while ongoing, exemplify the potency of collaborative efforts, data-driven strategies and equitable funding in sculpting a future where justice isn’t a distant dream but a tangible reality.

Together, we champion a call to leverage data for community empowerment, a journey where justice isn’t a destination but a path we pave together.

This article was originally published by Word In Black.

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By Roger House,
Word in Black

The campaign of Maryland’s Angela Alsobrooks for the U.S. Senate may be the most consequential election facing Black Democrats in 2024. That’s because her candidacy can serve as a springboard to a more inclusive Senate chamber and to the consolidation of Black political power in a Southern state.

Alsobrooks is the county executive of Prince George’s County, a suburban powerbase for affluent Black families in Maryland. She is a former state’s attorney for “PG County” as well. A lifelong resident of Maryland, she announced her candidacy to fill the seat of Democratic Sen. Ben Cardin, who will retire in 2024. If elected, she promises to focus on legislation aimed at bolstering the economy and reducing crime, among other priorities.

There are six candidates in the state’s Democratic primary, including Rep. David Trone (D-Md.), a three-term member of the House of Representatives. Also trending is Will Jawando, a progressive member of the Montgomery County Council. Alsobrooks and Trone are considered the leading candidates, but Trone holds a financial advantage as the founder of alcohol retailer Total Wine & More. He has put nearly $10 million of his own money into the campaign.

Alsobrooks has raised about $1.7 million in recent months. It is an overall strong fundraising performance, but her campaign is at a stark financial disadvantage. This should raise alarm bells with supporters on a number of levels.

The Senate Glass Ceiling

Black women have decried their lack of representation in the Senate since the departure of Kamala Harris, who made history as the first Afro-Asian woman elected from California but opted to leave for the historically symbolic — but relatively unimportant — vice presidency. Since then, advocates like Rep. Barbara Lee (D-Calif.) have called on party leaders to help a Black woman get elected to the Senate. That’s because across history, only two Black women have made it to the chamber: Harris (2017-2021) and Carol Moseley Braun of Illinois (1993-1999).

Advocates urged action after the death of Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.). California Gov. Gavin Newsom attempted to quell the stir with the one-year appointment of Laphonza Butler, a former president of the political action group Emily’s List. The appointment did little to placate the hopes of Black women for a full-term senator.

Some have looked to the Senate campaign of Rep. Lee, who announced her candidacy after Feinstein’s death. Lee has been a dedicated representative of the Oakland community since 1998. However, the voting power of Black people in California has been in decline for years with the loss of population. To date, Lee polls far behind the better-funded campaigns of Reps. Katie Porter (D-Calif.) and Adam Schiff (D-Calif.), who earned a national profile as the leader of the Donald Trump impeachment hearings.

Then there is the senate campaign of Rep. Lisa Blunt Rochester, the sole House member of the small blue state of Delaware. She is the handpicked replacement of the retiring Sen. Thomas R. Carper. Rochester may very well cruise into the Senate as an overall favorite of Black voters and White liberal Democrats. While she may benefit, however, one can question whether the role of the statewide Black community will be enhanced as well.

Delaware, like Maryland, can fly under the radar as a state with a sizable Black population of about 23 percent. Yet, the community lacks the organization and talent pool of professionals that fuel the larger Maryland. Her campaign could further the cause of a more inclusive Senate chamber but little more. 

It means that the national Black leadership must be conscious of putting its limited resources into a campaign with both good odds and the chance to forge a strong statewide organization. That’s where the Senate candidacy of Angela Alsobrooks is worth a look.

The New Capital of Black America

The politics of Maryland is a game-changer in the American political experience. Black people comprise about 30 percent of the 6 million population and more than half of the Democratic base. They are organized in a suburban-urban coalition that can exercise influence in the state, unlike in other Southern states.

The drivers of the coalition are the affluent suburban counties that border Washington, foremost Prince George’s County with a population of 900,000, of which about 60 percent is Black. The engine of the coalition is the rough-and-tumble city of Baltimore, which can bring to bear about 600,000 voters for candidates seeking statewide office.

As such, Maryland stands out as a symbol of the rise of a Black-led democracy with a fair chance of sustainability. Voters made history in 2022 with the elections of Wes Moore as governor and Anthony Brown as attorney general. Their confidence in a strong Black voter base provides leeway for shaping an agenda of equity in state policy. 

Maryland has the favorable condition of a large pool of educated, middle-class Blacks drawn to the Washington job market. Gov. Moore, an example of this class, has the background to mobilize a large Black voting bloc and build alliances across race and ethnic lines.

As such, the Free State offers an opportunity for Black professionals to forge a statewide power base — and, by extension, to gain experience in how the state can be an instrument for negotiations with other states and the federal government, and how it can provide a pathway for relations with African countries under initiatives such as President Biden’s summit on trade.

The Angela Alsobrooks campaign will build on the Moore and Brown elections; her victory would be a “triple crown” for the Black community. And it may encourage young people to consider work in the unglamorous but critical field of state governance.

Under Moore, for example, Maryland is one of the few states to prioritize the inclusion of historically under-represented Black labor in civil construction. It is promoting the equity provisions in President Biden’s $1.2 trillion infrastructure law for the Frederick Douglass Tunnel project to rebuild the 150-year-old Baltimore and Potomac Tunnel.

The project is expected to generate 30,000 skilled jobs, most of which do not require a college degree. The state has identified nine associated projects, which encompass $9 billion in investment and 11,000 jobs, for “pre-hire collective bargaining agreements (PLAs) between labor unions and employers.” In addition, Baltimore pledged to require PLAs on six projects, valued at $30 million, that will create more than 100 skilled jobs.  

A Model for Moderate Southern States

Maryland can serve as a model for the emerging Black political class in other moderate southern states with strong economies — Virginia, North Carolina and Georgia. As I have suggested, Democratic and community strategists should consider a “Four State Project” to accelerate racial democracy in the South. It would entail the recruitment of middle-class voters from the politically repugnant states of Texas, Florida and the Mississippi Delta region.

Just like recruiters are doing in border states and “sanctuary cities” for immigrants both legal and undocumented, Black political recruitment should include assistance with relocation expenses and information on jobs and housing.

Roger House is associate professor of American Studies at Emerson College and the author of “Blue Smoke: The Recorded Journey of Big Bill Broonzy” and “South End Shout: Boston’s Forgotten Music Scene in the Jazz Age.” His forthcoming book is “Five Hundred Years of Black Self Governance” by Louisiana State University Press. A version of the commentary appeared in The Messenger.

This article was originally published by WordinBlack.

The post Opinion: Angela Alsobrooks – A Senate bid and Black Power springboard appeared first on AFRO American Newspapers.

By Bria Overs,
Word in Black

Black people have always had an entrepreneurial spirit. There’s no lack of desire or motivation that stops them from pursuing the path.

According to the most recent official numbers from the U.S. Census Bureau, there are nearly 3.6 million Black-owned businesses. An estimated 1.3 million people are employed by 4 percent of those companies.

Despite having millions of businesses, there are still long-standing hurdles to entrepreneurship. Lack of access to capital, education, networking and mentoring opportunities keeps potential founders from taking the steps needed to build something great.

A partnership between the Black Economic Alliance Foundation and two distinguished Historically Black Colleges and Universities seeks to solve this for the next generation of Black entrepreneurs. 

Their solution: the Center for Black Entrepreneurship.

Launched in 2021 with a $10 million grant from Bank of America, the CBE builds on Atlanta’s Morehouse College and Spelman College’s respective entrepreneurship programs and initiatives. Since its start, the program has received $5 million from Mastercard’s Impact Fund, $5 million from the Visa Foundation and $4 million from Cisco.

“Aspirationally, the Center is not just standing up academic programs,” Grant Warner, director of the CBE, tells Word In Black, adding that it’s also about creating historically Black colleges and universities (HBCUs) that can stand as an “economic development engine for their surrounding communities” wherever they are located. Werner said that part is critical, as Black communities need institutions to help “create economic transformation without gentrification.” 

Warner said the HBCUs operating as economic development engines in their respective communities increases the “impact across the board, in terms of quality of life and length of life.”

With a background in mechanical engineering and entrepreneurship, Werner has led business ventures, including Black Star Technologies, ConnectYard and XediaLabs. 

He spent nearly two decades on the HBCU campus of Howard University, where he was the director of innovation, a professor and initiator of HowU Innovate programming, “an interdisciplinary initiative that provides campus-wide innovation programming in which students are guided through the process of founding technology startups.”

Warner has his finger on the pulse of small businesses and startups. Word In Black spoke with him about the future of the CBE, how to prepare future Black business owners and leaders, and his outlook on the future of Black entrepreneurship.

Bria Overs: This sounds like a large effort to fill a gap that exists around Black entrepreneurship. Both that there aren’t enough Black entrepreneurs, but also the gap in access to pursue entrepreneurship.

Grant Warner: I think that’s absolutely accurate. We completed a study on entrepreneurs who are looking at federal opportunities, but I think the results of it speak largely to the Black experience in entrepreneurship. What you find is things like a lack of access to funding. 

You look at things like the SBIR program, which is called America’s Seed Fund, and you look at who’s funded. Oftentimes, it doesn’t look like America. The statistics around Black startups that are funded by venture capital is around 1 percent. It’s not representative of our slice of the population. These are all dynamics that need to change.

BO: We haven’t seen an investment or this kind of widespread care in Black businesses before. I feel like I’m seeing it for the first time. What makes now so special? Why invest in young Black entrepreneurs and talent at this time?

GW: The “now” part of it was because of George Floyd and the racial reckoning that had everybody step back and look at what they were doing or not doing. It provided a unique opportunity for investments to come into HBCUs, some of which landed in entrepreneurship like we have here.

Most jobs are created by small businesses and startups. That’s just the reality of it. So, if you want to have a thriving U.S. economy, then we have to figure out how we engage larger parts of the society in those activities. That’s just for the health of the country, period. 

Given the demographic changes, I think it becomes a national imperative to make sure that we invest in institutions that have been underinvested, in communities that have been underinvested — and create pathways so that people get an education that is tied to opportunities, and those opportunities are tied to dollars so that we can have people who launch ventures who employ people who transform communities.

BO: I would love to talk about the minor in entrepreneurship, as well as the certificate programs going on at Morehouse and Spelman. Can you tell me more about the thinking behind creating those?

GW: The creation of the center really instigated the formation and introduction of the minor. I think the big part of it was really providing an on-ramp for people to participate in entrepreneurship. 

It’s really about providing a 21st-century skill set — active partnering, opportunity assessment, risk reduction, experimentation — to our students that they can then leverage however they want. Some will choose to go to a company, some will choose to go and be an entrepreneur, and some will choose to go into academia. But in all of those cases, being able to really understand user needs — do the opportunity identification, experiment with solutions, take feedback, and iterate — all of those are critical skills that you would want to have in those jobs.

Equipping a 21st-century skilled Black workforce and then connecting them with opportunities that allow them to explore entrepreneurship and wealth creation.

BO: One of the issues entrepreneurs have expressed is that they don’t feel supported enough by society as a whole and sometimes by their own community. So what can we all be doing to support entrepreneurs and even the talent coming out of the minor, out of colleges, and the certificate program?

GW: There are a number of different things. When we talk about access to capital, that means a couple of things.

One, it does mean investment. We have institutions that are the leading producers of Black doctors, Black investors, people in finance, etc. Activating them to support and invest in burgeoning Black businesses is important. We need us invested in that asset class to help change the investment targets so that more money goes to Black startups. And I think that will be a virtuous cycle. We’ll have more Black startups that are successful; we’ll have more Black people who have investments that turn a profit.

But the other part is customers. The other way you get capital is through customers. To the extent that there are ventures that are B2C, I think we need to be open as a community. And I think that happens, right? There’s a whole Buy Black initiative, and sites have popped up that really try to aggregate Black vendors. Being conscious about how we spend our dollars will be helpful.

Then, look at the companies we’re working for. What do their supply chains look like right now? Are you making sure your company has a diverse set of suppliers because that’s another access to capital?

There are multiple things to do. But we have to be advocates for ourselves across the board.

BO: You touched on some of the challenges that Black business owners face when they start their own companies. Some of these hurdles come as a surprise to owners. How does the center help prepare students for facing these challenges? 

GW: What we try to do is evidence-based action. The reality of it is that as recently as the first half of 2021, 1 percent of venture funding went to Black people — that’s just the reality. You should be armed with that knowledge. But then, looking under the hood, what drives some of that differentiation? It really is the behavior that investors have when they look at Black companies.

We look at the behavior of venture investors. What you’ll notice is that they tend to scrutinize teams from underrepresented groups, including Black, more heavily, indicating that they don’t believe the facts or statements they’re making.

So when we think about how we go about building curriculum and preparation, we have to take that into account and then arm our students with the knowledge that strengthens them.

BO: As the CBE is going into its second year and the end of your first year as Director, you’ve had some time to see the potential of the Center for Black Entrepreneurship. What does the future look like?

GW: It’s something that we’re actively thinking about now. For example, how we can take some of the curricula, whether it’s the whole thing or modularized, and share it with the HBCU network or the PWI network. Tell them how they might better access students on their campuses and better support Black students. 

We’re thinking about bringing additional Black leaders into the ecosystem and then creating digital assets around that interaction. Something that can be shared across HBCUs.

There are also some discussions about how you might instantiate the CBE and other places, but those are all still conversations happening. We’re continuing to build out the program.

BO: My last question is similar to the previous one. What does the future of Black entrepreneurship look like?

GW: It has to be bright because we’re producing new entrants into that market equipped with new skills and relationships that we think will help them be successful. But they’re also entering a landscape that’s very different. A lot of new funds with Black fund managers, and data shows that Black fund managers do invest their money differently.

Again, now the economic landscape has changed a little bit — interest rates, inflation — but I’m hopeful that we reach a state where some of the gains we’ve seen in the past will continue.

At one point, you could count the number of Black people who raised $1 million. If we go back even five years, the number was somewhere around a couple of hundred — ever. Then in 2021 to 2022 and 2023, Black people raised over $1 million, and the average raised was much higher. That number has grown tremendously, so I think the trajectory is there.

We have a bunch of enthusiastic and skilled participants that we’re going to release into the ecosystem. I’m hopeful. And we need it. This is the next civil rights issue. How do we close the wealth gap? This is not something where we can be dejected or something that we can stop. We need to actually attack this and win.

This article was originally published by Word in Black.

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#education

By Cedric Jones,
Word In Black

I remember sitting in a small classroom in Barrows Hall at U.C. Berkeley when I learned of my acceptance into Teach For America, a national education nonprofit that supports public school systems by sourcing talent to lead as anti-racist educators within the classroom.

Then — as is the case today — only about 2 percent of teachers nationally are Black men. I was both charged to make an impact and also curious if there was infrastructure to nurture my presence as I entered TFA as one of 22 Black educators in the 2014 Bay Area cohort — about 11 of the entire Bay Area class of new TFA teachers that year. 

I remember sitting in a small classroom in Barrows Hall at U.C. Berkeley when I learned of my acceptance into Teach For America, a national education nonprofit that supports public school systems by sourcing talent to lead as anti-racist educators within the classroom.

Then — as is the case today — only about 2 percent of teachers nationally are Black men. I was both charged to make an impact and also curious if there was infrastructure to nurture my presence as I entered TFA as one of 22 Black educators in the 2014 Bay Area cohort — about 11 of the entire Bay Area class of new TFA teachers that year. 

Nearly a decade later, it’s clear that my time in the classroom was one of the most profound professional experiences I could have chosen. Now, as the Director of Southern California Recruitment and Retention at TFA Los Angeles, I often reflect on what drew me to the classroom and what about the recruitment process engaged me — and I use those learnings to help me recruit more teachers that reflect the students we serve in L.A. and across the country. 

Building relationships

I met my recruiter, Raquel Lucente, for the first time at a Black Community event on campus. Seeing folks I looked up to engaging with her authentically and seeing her meet with folks for coffee on my way to classes, it was clear her focus was on creating relationships and going into the spaces where Black students felt most comfortable. While career fairs, resume workshops, and club meetings can be a fine way to meet prospective teachers, I’ve observed that recruiting Black folks into the field requires a more genuine connection, transparency, and support that feels equitable. 

Following in Raquel’s footsteps, so much of my time in my current role is dedicated to hosting both one-on-one sessions with Black folks who are interested in joining TFA, as well as those who have already applied. I also hold space for weekly office hours, where folks can pop in to receive specific support or simply process what an offer from TFA might look like for them uniquely. 

Addressing financial barriers

When candidates are offered admission to the corps, I always like to address the challenges and barriers to joining TFA head-on. Finances, an area of concern for many, including myself, come up often. Many Black applicants are financially supporting family members or are burdened by student loan debt. In fact, the average student loan debt is more than $37,000, almost the same as the average starting teacher salary. Given the racial wealth gap, Black applicants, as a whole, want to make sure they can sustain themselves and avoid entering — or reentering — a cycle of poverty.  

Though, as an organization, we’ve been able to provide more than $12 million annually in transitional support grants, as well as emergency and need-based financial aid, the average entry-level salary of teachers can still leave recent college graduates anxious about their future. 

In many states, credentialing exams for subject matter and basic skills competency exacerbate the financial barriers to entering the profession. I’m proud of the efforts TFA has made to address these concerns in the short term through grants, as well as our work to advocate for legislation that improves teacher pay, reduces educator student loan debt, and investigates innovative ways to make teacher housing more affordable. 

Listening and integrating the community

Nationwide, actively listening to the needs of our Black applicants has resulted in salary negotiations with our school districts and charter management organizations, clustering corps members at sites with strong retention of Black teachers, and placing folks where pro-Black programming is on-site.

In 2022, I launched our School Partner Pipeline initiative, which supports instructional aides and paraprofessionals who already have a bachelor’s degree and work in one of our partner schools to earn their teaching credentials. These folks, who often come from the community, are then able to continue as classroom teachers in a setting where they already have deep relationships with students and their families.

Black perspectives must inform the evolution of the teaching profession to make it a more inclusive and sustainable career path for us.

By taking an individualized approach to recruiting Black educators, I’m positioned to invest in those ready to inspire — and educate — our youth.  I’ve seen firsthand how crucial it is for those closest to the communities we serve to be at the forefront of educational change and accountability. 

The country’s schools, classrooms, and students need more Black educators. To make that possible, Black perspectives must inform the evolution of the teaching profession to make it a more inclusive and sustainable career path for us. I’m proud to have not only followed in my grandfather’s footsteps, but also built upon his legacy by working with TFA and our school partners to create a pathway for more Black educators to thrive.

This article was originally published by Word In Black.

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#education

By Aziah Siid,
Word in Black

Here’s what you probably know about school segregation in the United States: On May 17, 1954, the United States Supreme Court ruled unanimously that racially segregated public schools were unconstitutional in the Brown v. Board of Education case.

Many cities across the Jim Crow South refused to comply with the ruling, and so six years later, on Nov. 14, 1960, a brave 6-year-old girl named Ruby Bridges needed U.S. marshals to escort her to her first day of class at all-white William Frantz Elementary School in New Orleans. At the same time, 6-year-olds Gail Etienne, Tessie Prevost, and Leona Tate integrated nearby McDonogh 19 Elementary School.  

Norman Rockwell immortalized Bridges being escorted into the school in his famous 1964 painting, “The Problem We All Live With.” In the decades since, de jure segregation mandated by law has disappeared, but de facto segregation — what actually happens in practice — persists, and it continues to impact Black students today. How? Well, here’s what you may not know about modern-day school segregation. 

1. Not much has happened since the 1970s

Experts at The Civil Rights Project at UCLA say school desegregation “peaked in 1988,” and there have been no major legal or policy advances since that time. It’s been almost 70 years since the high court struck down the“separate but equal” doctrine, but as researchers Gary Orfield and Danielle Jarvie wrote in a recent report, the legal effort to integrate schools has been abandoned and led to increased “isolation of Black students in all sectors of American education.” They go on to note that “New policies are needed, and legislation recently passed by the House of Representatives, the Strength in Diversity Act, could be a positive beginning.”

2. School segregation is getting worse

White-Black segregation increased by 35 percent from 1991 to 2020 in the 100 largest school districts. Black students have the least amount of contact with White students in Chicago, followed by Dallas, Miami, and Prince George’s County, Maryland,” according to the UCLA Civil Rights Project.

3. Other racial or ethnic groups are now counted

Black students are far more segregated from White students now than in the civil rights era, but schools are also more racially and ethnically diverse. Black kids, particularly in the western states and in the South, attend school with many more Latinos. 

4. Schools in blue states are segregated, too.

New York is the most segregated state in the country for Black students, followed by Illinois, California, and Maryland. In the seven-episode Serial podcast series, “Nice White Parents,” Chana Joffe-Walt takes listeners through the influence White parents wield in private and public education and their direct contribution to keeping schools segregated in New York City schools. In-depth reporting on funding allocation, the power of parent-teacher associations, and the ways Black voices are kept out of decision-making in the nation’s largest school district are explored as well.

5. Nearly a quarter of Black students attend predominantly Black schools 

A recent analysis by the U.S. Government Accountability Office found that although Black students are 15 percent of the U.S. public school population, 23 percent of them attend schools that are more than three-quarters Black.

6. Charter schools also struggle with segregation 

School segregation is not just prevalent in traditional public schools. It’s spread across all school types, including charter schools, private, and magnet schools. The Government Accountability Office found more than 41 percent of charter schools and about 26 percent of magnet schools were predominantly same race/ethnicity, And although “magnet schools were established to assist in the desegregation, about one in four magnet schools are predominantly same-race/ethnicity schools.”

7. A lack of Black teachers is tied to desegregation

Research compiled by the National Institutes of Health shows after the Brown v. Board decision, “38,000 black teachers and administrators in twenty-one Southern and Southern-bordering states lost their jobs.” In addition, “Official language concerning black-teacher retention was included in neither the Civil Rights Act of 1964 nor the subsequent federal desegregation guidelines of 1966.” 

Fast forward to today, and Black teachers make up only 6 percent of the profession in public schools, yet Black people comprise 14 percent of the U.S. population and 15 percent of the K-12 public school student population, according to the 2022 data from the National Center for Education Statistics. Black male educators, in particular, openly speak on how the lack of representation in the classroom from as early as elementary school through the collegiate level impacted their journey through schooling, but also how the disproportionately low numbers of Black teachers have an effect on today’s students. 

This article was originally published by Word In Black.

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By Stacy M. Brown,
NNPA Newswire

TikTok, the Chinese-owned social media giant, is bidding farewell to its $2 billion Creator Fund, an initiative launched in 2020 to support eligible users creating content on the platform financially. A TikTok spokesperson confirmed the announcement, which represents a significant change in the environment for influencers and content creators who have long relied on this fund to support their livelihoods.

The Creator Fund, as per a July 2020 news release from TikTok, was designed to “help support ambitious creators who are seeking opportunities to foster a livelihood through their innovative content.” Over the past three years, the fund has distributed money to creators based on their share of overall views on the platform. However, after the fund’s launch, many creators voiced their concerns, asserting that it had made monetization on TikTok an uphill battle.

Notable internet personality Hank Green, a former YouTube star, was among the outspoken critics of the fund. Green argued that the monetization tool primarily served TikTok’s interests rather than those of its creators. He pointed out that, despite amassing substantial viewership numbers, creators only made meager incomes from the platform. For instance, Green, who boasts 8 million followers on TikTok, revealed that he earned just about 2.5 cents per 1,000 views.

The Creator Fund will cease operations on Dec. 16 in the United States, the United Kingdom, France and Germany, according to reports from The Verge and Fortune. Although TikTok confirmed the fund’s termination to NBC News, the platform’s spokesperson gave no further information or a specific end date.

TikTok has already introduced a replacement for the Creator Fund, known as the Creativity Program, aiming to address the initial grievances of creators. In a blog post in February, TikTok announced that creators could “earn up to 20 times the amount previously offered by the Creator Fund.” To qualify for the Creativity Program, videos must be longer than a minute, garner at least 1,000 views and adhere to the platform’s community guidelines, among other criteria.
The program remains in beta testing and, at present, is available exclusively to U.S.-based creators over 18 with more than 10,000 followers and a minimum of 100,000 video views in the last 30 days. It remains to be seen whether TikTok intends to introduce a different monetization program that includes creators worldwide.

“The Creativity Program was developed based on the learnings and feedback we’ve gained from the previous Creator Fund,” the Tik Tok spokesman stated. “As we continue developing new ways to reward creators and enrich the TikTok experience, we value the feedback and direct insights from our community to help inform our decisions.”

This article was originally published by NNPA Newswire.

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By Joseph Williams,
Word In Black

From disproportionately high rates of chronic diseases like hypertension and diabetes to women being three times more likely to die during childbirth than Whites, the data confirms a simple, indisputable, alarming fact: Being Black in America is hazardous to your health. 

Multiple studies have shown that structural racism — from Jim Crow laws that institutionalized second-class citizenship to microaggressions from coworkers at the office — is a key contributor to poor health outcomes among Black people. It’s why some 300 jurisdictions, along with the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, have declared racism a public health threat.

That’s why Dr. Gail Christopher, a researcher and public health specialist, believes that the path towards improving the health of Black people begins by ending the story the U.S. tells itself about race.

“After decades of working on this idea of ending health inequities and moving toward healing (from) racism, I realized that we had to have a comprehensive approach,” says Christopher, executive director of the National Collaborative for Health Equity (NCHE), which focuses on the grassroots factors that contribute to health inequities.

She concluded that a common factor — America’s White supremacist racial hierarchy — is the root cause. 

“The mission is to eliminate health inequities, but we know that we can’t do that without ultimately eliminating racism in this country. So there’s a beautiful intersection there,” Christopher says.

That theory, she says, led her to work with the W.K. Kellogg Foundation to create the Truth, Racial Healing and Transformation (TRHT) framework, a program aimed at helping communities achieve lasting change through dialogue and workshops. 

“The first pillar of the truth, racial healing, and transformation framework is narrative change,” Christopher says. “We’re wired as human beings to believe stories,”  she says, citing a famous quote from 17th-century philosopher René Descartes, “I think, therefore, I am.”

And “in America,” says Christopher, “we really believe in racial hierarchy.”

Change that paradigm by embracing the TRHT framework, she says, and Black health outcomes will improve.

Racial healing, and improving health outcomes for Black people, “begins with creating a new narrative of who we are, how we became who we are,” Christopher says. “And that has to be done at the individual level and at the collective level.” 

Both take place at the NCHE, which trains community leaders and clinicians to tackle on-the-ground issues linked to health problems, such as the relocation of an industrial waste facility to a Black community or reframing data to identify and address inequities. The organization also sponsors 18-month fellowships for select professionals.

NCHE has partnered with the American Public Health Association and produced a series of briefs called “Healing through Policy,” which identifies policies and practices that align with the TRHT framework, Christopher says. “And you can download that from our website, you can download it from the (American Public Health Association) website, or the de Beaumont Foundation website. But it lists all kinds of practical policies that relate to all of those (TRHT) pillars.”

Eliminating structural racism to improve Black health outcomes seems like an ambitious goal, particularly in an era when politicians in states from Texas to Idaho have banned the teaching of subjects and books that relate to race. But Christopher believes her mission is a marathon, not a sprint. And she’s seen times change before. 

“I say to people all the time: there are some advantages to growing older and living a long time.  Very few of them are physical, but it allows you to live through cycles,” she says. There are decades of progress followed by decades of backlash, Christopher says, but when the dust settles, more progress than regression has been made. 

“And, eventually, it dies down, and it dissipates,” Christopher says. “People stay the course.”

This story was originally published by Word In Black.

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By Joseph Williams,
Word in Black

As George Mason University’s “chief wellbeing officer,” Dr. Nance Lucas wanted to create a positive, healthy environment for stressed-out students. Along with classes on mental and physical health, Lucas’ Center for the Advancement of Wellbeing offered students specialized learning dorms and cultural enrichment programs on art and music. 

But she was puzzled to notice Black students — who make up 11 percent of the student body at George Mason, a liberal arts school in the Northern Virginia suburbs — didn’t seem interested.

“One of the comments from some of our students of color — this was probably around 2015 — was, ‘This wellbeing stuff at Mason is for White, rich people who can afford yoga studios and gym memberships,’” Lucas says. “And so my first response — and again, this is showing my White woman naivete — was, ‘Ok, we need to do a better job of educating our students about what we mean around wellbeing.’” 

But the education campaign flopped, too: “It didn’t work. Same thing,” she says. 

So, Nance “got together a couple of my colleagues, two vice presidents who were over overseeing those strategic goals at that level, and said, ‘You know, let’s start working at the intersections of diversity, inclusion, and well-being. On the well-being side, I think we can learn quite a bit there.”

That conversation led to a university-wide summit in 2018, focused on diversity, equity, and inclusion; participants for the highly-anticipated meeting ranged from students and faculty to the school’s leadership, Nance says. Out of that meeting came a number of recommendations — including adopting the Truth, Racial Healing and Reconciliation framework created by the W.K. Kellogg Foundation. They also invited Dr. Gail Christopher, author of the TRHT curriculum, on campus to train staff. 

With that foundation, “We started to create special programs that were designed and targeted at BIPOC student audiences,” Lucas says.

Since then, George Mason has held racial healing circles, convened specialized workshops aimed at empowering Black students, and set aside an entire week for the wellbeing of students of color. That included a “Black author talking about the stigma of mental health among Black individuals and people of color in general,” she says. 

The center even promoted proper rest: in a post on the Center’s web page, an article promotes the book, “Rest is Resistance: A Manifesto,” by Tricia Hersey. 

“Hersey posits, as racialized people, we often feel we’re running against the current, trying to travel upstream while being met with resistance on all sides,” according to the post by Shekila Melchior, director of strategic initiatives and partnerships at George Mason’s Office for Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion. 

“For hundreds of years, racialized people in the United States have labored in body, mind, and soul. We can find racial justice healing in our collective spaces — the laughter from the belly, the celebration of our community, the successes of the generation to come, and the rejuvenating power of rest.”

While George Mason’s campus writ large has adopted a theme of kindness, Black, Asian, and Latino students “are suffering alone — whether it’s from a microaggression in the classroom or they don’t feel like they belong,” Nance says. The mission to advance racial healing, she says, starts with “connecting them to a larger community and making them aware of resources” and educational opportunities. 

The key to reversing Black students’ sense that they didn’t belong was to be intentional about helping them see themselves as part of George Mason and the Wellbeing Center, Nance says. “Part of that was due to this perception of who it was for, and they didn’t see themselves in it.” 

Although the THRT healing circles have been paused for now, the campus still considers itself a participant in the mission of racial reconciliation and recovery. Too often on college campuses, she says, stories told around campus as well as in the classroom don’t center people of color. 

To avoid repeating that paradigm, she says, the Center for the Advancement of Wellbeing had to be intentional to avoid making the same mistake. 

Healing is “having them see the power of stories — connecting their stories to common humanity,” she says. “Things like love and kindness and wholeness are part of the racial healing process. That’s what the circles really are designed to do — debunk the myth that there is a hierarchy of human value. And that’s the very beginning part of the journey to racial healing.”

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By Maya Pottiger,
Word In Black

Breana Calloway stood in front of the Illinois State Senate in March to testify in favor of the Racism Free Schools Act. 

It passed the Senate unanimously, passed through the House, and was signed into law in August. 

Calloway, a principal-in-training in Chicago and a former Teach Plus Fellow, worked with her cohort to pass the act, which she said “puts something on the books to protect staff and students from racial harassment.”

The goal was to distinguish racial harassment from bullying, because bullying is something that persists, whereas racial harassment can happen once and still cause the same amount of harm. And it aims to provide training for teachers, because so many “are not prepared to deal with it,” Calloway said.

Growing up in predominantly White spaces, this was personal to Calloway. She wanted to make sure that not only was her story being told, but so were the stories of thousands of students who experience this daily.

Now they’re figuring out how to implement it, hold people accountable, and even take it national.

“This is something we want to expand upon,” Calloway said. “This is something that is super monumental for us here in Illinois, and we’re definitely looking forward to expanding.”

Racist bullying isn’t going anywhere

Bullying isn’t going away. If anything, it’s evolving and becoming more targeted, said Tyler Cook, a second-year eighth-grade math teacher in Philadelphia.

“Bullying has become much more intersecting,” he said. “As we’ve adopted more inclusive language and different ways of recognizing the intersections in the world, that also has created more room for violence and harm.”

Cook, a Black and queer educator, is open with his students about how he identifies. Fed up with the offensive vernacular he’s heard students use, Cook leads Safe Zone workshops, teaching his students how to address different identities, and be open and mindful of others’ identities.

But it only sticks situationally. Even though Cook knows his students respect him, he’s found they are no longer thinking about his identity when they leave his classroom. He’s overheard students say, “This person is a , but I’m not talking about Mr. Cook.”

Cook wants students to understand that there aren’t exceptions to derogatory terms.

“You’re talking about a community that I am accepted into, a community that I feel a part of,” Cook said. “When you say that to one person, you’re saying that to all.”

Despite making up only 15 percent of the public school population, Black students were 35 percent of those who reported being bullied because of their race, according to a 2018 report by the U.S. Department of Education’s Civil Rights Data Collection. Race-based bullying accounted for nearly a quarter of all bullying reported in the analysis, and it was the top reason Black students were bullied.

Cyberbullying is also a huge problem among teens, with 46 percent of teens ages 13-17 reporting any type of cyberbullying, according to a 2022 Pew Research Center report. Black students, at 40 percent, were the least likely to report cyberbullying, and 29 percent said they experienced offensive name-calling.

However, data from Boston University’s Wheelock College of Education and Human Development shows that searches for both school bullying and cyberbullying dropped between 30 percent to 40 percent during virtual learning in spring 2020. The drop continued through the fall and winter of the 2020-2021 school year, but increased back to pre-pandemic levels, and students returned to in-person schooling.

Part of the problem, Cook said, is that the education system “is not quite all the way there” to support educators, students and families as they navigate these new spaces.

“I don’t see bullying going away anytime soon,” Cook said. “The moral code is played out. We need to update it just like we need to update our laws, our policies.”

The burden falls on Black teachers

Neither Cook nor Calloway, who spent seven years as a teacher in Chicago, recall any specific training on handling racial harassment or racist bullying. 

And yet the responsibility of navigating racial harassment and racist bullying incidents are often assigned to Black teachers. 

“It’s given to you to figure it out,” Calloway said. 

But it’s not just the students. It also comes from the teachers, Calloway said. As a Black teacher, Calloway explains, the environment can become hostile when you try to speak up.

“The burnout, for me, I experienced because I’m constantly speaking out for Black children, their experiences, trying to make it better. And I’m not shielded from that,” Calloway said. “So I’m shielding myself from these experiences, from an administration and other teachers, but also trying to shield the students from that, as well.”

Progressive movements don’t help the cause

While the Black Lives Matter Movement dominated the news cycle and Gen Z is talked about as being a progressive generation, neither have done much to help eliminate racial harassment or racist bullying. 

Instead, Cook thinks the movement unintentionally contributed to racism in the classroom. He said focusing attention on any specific identity, social group, or type of oppression definitely brings in allies and advocates, but it also amplifies the voices of the opposition, who say, “I don’t believe in this thing, and I don’t accept it.”

“How do you level out ‘we are trying to open these young minds, and we’re trying to adopt this new transformative way of thinking,’” Cook said, “but we still have generations of people who are in these positions of power, who haven’t adopted their mindset?”

Racist bullying or racial harassment are an everyday thing for many students.

If anything, the bullying gets more discreet and becomes more of a microaggression, Calloway said. Racism doesn’t go away because we say it doesn’t exist, she said.

“A lot of times, when people say that, you’re minimizing the everyday experiences of Black and brown children, specifically in schools that are already harmful to them because they have different ways of teaching,” Calloway said. “If racism was going away, we wouldn’t need something like the Racism Free Schools Act to protect students from racial harassment and racial bullying.”

This article was originally published by Word In Black.

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By Joseph Williams,
Word in Black

Growing up, riding a bicycle was one of Monica Garrison’s favorite summertime activities. The sense of excitement and freedom she felt on two wheels stayed with her into young adulthood when she commuted to and from work on her bike. 

Then, life happened — her career, a family — and Garrison had less and less time for cycling. Eventually, she put down the kickstand and parked her bike.

During a particularly rough stretch of 2013, however, Garrison found herself feeling low, badly in need of some joy and a weight-loss routine. Her bicycle beckoned, she hopped back on and hasn’t stopped since then. 

“I got what I was looking for, and I wanted to share that with other women who looked like me and perhaps shared similar struggles,” says Garrison, who lives and rides in Pittsburgh. “I was surprised that I rarely saw women of color on bikes while riding through my town.”

So she decided to be the change she wanted to see and started a Facebook page, looking for other women like her. She didn’t know it then, but Garrison’s page would lead to Black Girls Do Bike, a nonprofit dedicated to recruiting and celebrating Black women cyclists with more than 100 chapters worldwide — and counting. 

The mission is “to introduce the joy of cycling to all women, but especially, women and girls of color,” according to BGDB’s website. But it’s as much a safety organization and a support group as it is a cycling club.  

“We are establishing a comfortable place where lady cyclists can support and advise one another, organize rides, and promote skill-sharing,” according to the website. 

By “demystifying” a largely White, predominantly male sport, according to the website, BGDB hopes to “be a liaison to help usher new riders past barriers to entry and into the larger cycling community. We rejoice when women choose cycling as a tool for function, fitness, freedom, and fun!”

That fits the definition of Garrison’s relationship to cycling, who considers the sport “a positive recurring theme” in her life.

“I have always loved the feeling cycling gives me,” she says. “In my twenties, I used commuting by bike as a stress reliever. Later in life, cycling became a way to find mental peace and connect with my body. I’d say cycling brings me back to my center and has been very good to me.”

The rapid growth of BGDB shows other Black women crave those feelings, too, Garrison says. The liberation and joy of riding a bike, she says, can be a powerful antidote to racism by reducing stress and providing an environment in which healing can take place. 

“Our mission resonates with women who are eager to be a part of a movement that fosters positive change, both in cycling and in society as a whole,” Garrison says. Women of color, she says, hunger for a space “where we can come together to embrace cycling and empower one another. Women riding with us enter a space free of the microaggressions we encounter interacting daily with a society that was not built for us to succeed as our authentic selves.”

But the explosive growth of BGDB is also looking to change the complexion of the sport. 

“Historically, Black women have been underrepresented in the world of cycling,” Garrison says. “One of my primary goals was to create a platform where Black women and girls could be seen and celebrated as cyclists. By being visible on the roads, trails, and in the cycling community, we shatter stereotypes and demonstrate that cycling is not limited by race, gender, body size, or background.” 

When others see Black women on two wheels, “they can envision themselves doing the same, nurturing a sense of possibility,” Garrison says. “It may sound cliche, but we are actively being the change we want to see.”

“Hopefully,” she says, “we are moving the needle — one ride at a time.”

This article was originally published by Word In Black. 

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By Gwen McKinney,
Word in Black

Meet our silent killers. They lurk. They creep. Like assailants in the dark, they can quickly swoop down and consume us in a deadly clutch. They are sinister and sometimes strike without warning. For Black women, they exact incalculable harm to our bodies, our families, and our life chances.

The most far-reaching silent killer across generations, geography, and economic status is racism and inequality that denies us access, opportunity, and a fair chance. Their first cousin is bias — sometimes intentional but often implicit — reflected in cues and missteps of health care providers, baked into the very medical system that should save us. 

For Tara Robinson, that outright bias doomed her to one hellish week in which she suffered three heart attacks over three days. Sent home twice and repeatedly dismissed, she said the third coronary crisis sent her to heaven and back. 

“I had actually gone into sudden death,” remembers Robinson, then a 40-year-old Houston school counselor. 

Ten years later, Robinson, the founder of the Black Heart Association, insists Black women’s safety net is being seen and heard.  The BHA mission: to eliminate heart-health disparity in the Black community through advocacy, education, and empowerment. 

Heart disease and stroke are the leading killers of Black people. According to the American Heart Association, black women have almost twice the risk of stroke than their White counterparts and are more likely to die at an earlier age than women of other ethnic groups.  

Alarming data estimates that half of Black women aged 20 and older will have heart disease, but more than one-third of them are unaware of the signs or risk factors. 

Silence is a killer, especially when held within. So says Tanja Thompson, a two-time breast cancer survivor and the founder of Breast Cancer Move Foundation. The Air Force veteran and motivational speaker says her second stint with breast cancer five years after her initial diagnosis convinced her that activism was her lifeline. 

“There are other women who look like me who are going through this kind of ordeal,” Thompson recalls. “I realized I could no longer hide in silence. I could no longer hide in fear.”

Breast cancer is the leading cause of cancer fatalities for Black women, with colorectal and cervical cancer vying for second and third place, respectively. Black women are struck younger, diagnosed later, die quicker, and suffer the most virulent forms. Black women under 35 experience twice the rate of White women, with 39 percent  higher recurrence and 71 percent higher risk of death.

Endometriosis, another deadly affliction for Black women, is deemed a “silent epidemic globally” by the World Health Organization (WHO). Affecting an estimated 10 percent of reproductive-age women worldwide, African American women, notably affected with disproportionate death rates, often have a late diagnosis or the condition is misdiagnosed as fibroid tumors. According to WHO, a staggering 90 percent of women with endometriosis report being dismissed or disbelieved by healthcare professionals. 

Maternal mortality is another fatal but preventable condition at crisis proportions for Black women who are not seen, heard, or cared for. The astronomical rate of maternal mortality affecting African Americans contributes to this country’s status as the worst place to give birth among high-income nations. 

In Maryland, the Johns Hopkins Center for Communication Programs reports Black women are four times more likely to experience a pregnancy-related death than White women. This disparity persists even when controlling for education, body mass index, and socio-economic status.

Diabetes and kidney disease are also pernicious silent killers that disproportionately strike Black people. In fact, diabetes-triggered end-stage renal disease is nearly three times more prevalent in African Americans.   

Bernadine Watson, author of a newly-released book Transplant: A Memoir, shares her nearly 40-year journey with kidney disease that included two transplants and two lingering encounters with dialysis. Hers is a story of blood, tears, and triumph. But during most of her illness, Watson suffered in silence, keeping her kidney disease a secret even from her family. 

Like most survivors in this story, Watson is a striver who forged a transformational path to life and living by confronting her illness free of shame, silence, or submission. Always wanting to write a book, at 70, she did it, sharing her story with the world.

“Don’t wait until you’re on dialysis or your kidneys are failing,” Watson advises. She urges that during your annual physical, insist that your kidney functions be checked.

Her parting shot: “Develop a spiritual practice and talk to yourself about how you want to live — sick or healthy.” 

Tara Robinson, of the Black Heart Association, is a thriver who transformed adversity into activism and illness into empowerment. She issued a clarion call to action. “Dear Black women, find balance in your lives. Know your stressor. Know your triggers. And take time to breathe.” 

Gwen McKinney is creator of Unerased | Black Women Speak. This article was originally published by Word in Black.

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By Joseph Williams,
Word In Black

It happens for Darrell Wade when he goes hiking in green spaces in and around Portland, Oregon, remembering to breathe. For Dr. Joy DeGruy, an internationally renowned researcher and educator and the founder of the Be The Healing movement, it can be spontaneous, like when other Black people “see” her and interact — especially if both of them are navigating mostly-White spaces. 

And for Rahkii “Hyp” Holman, racial healing occurs when he gets to take off his mask in culturally Black spaces: the beauty shop, talking with people from the African diaspora in Ghana, or joining the circles he convenes with other Black men. Even if removing that mask can take a minute sometimes. 

After all, “I’m still a Black dude who has to maneuver through the streets,” Holman said, recalling how a Black stylist chided him to say “hi” when he sees her in the salon. “I’m coming in from the world with my ‘ice grill’ on. And I have to remember to snap out of it.”

Those were some of the answers to the question about racial healing in real time during “Wellness Wednesday,” a livestream hosted by Dr. DeGruy and Dr. Bahia (Cross) Overton, executive director of Black Parent Initiative The organization’s mission is to “educate and mobilize” parents of Black children to become better caregivers and push back against systemic racism affecting their children. 

Joining the conversation with DeGruy, Overton,and Holman, was Ashanti Branch, founder and executive director of the Ever Forward Club, an organization uplifting troubled Black boys in public school; Patrick Shaw, founder and CEO of For Fathers, a support group for Black men; and Malachi Scott, who with Holman founded the Atunse Justice League, a group that supports Black men returning from incarceration. Wade, meanwhile, is the founder of Black Men’s Wellness, a grassroots organization that helps members address chronic health issues. 

Also on the livestream was Liz Courquet-Lesaulnier, managing director for Word In Black. Courquet-Lesaulnier explained that the news collaborative founded by 10 leading Black publishers is completing a months-long series examining how artists, educators, activists, physicians, musicians, and others are helping themselves and their communities repair racial trauma.

The methods range from the ancient — Zee Clarke’s adaptation of venerable breathing techniques taught in India for thousands of years — to the futuristic, such as Dr. Fallon Wilson’s vision of a Black technology utopia. Many of the subjects featured in the series have adopted The W.K. Kellogg Foundation’s Truth, Racial Healing and Transformation curriculum. 

While racial healing involves reconciling past injustices, Courquet-Lesaulnier said the vignettes appearing in Word In Black are focused on amplifying solutions as well as transforming the pain of racism to hope and joy. And It places Black people as the subject of the experience.

“When we think about racial healing, so often it is not framed through the lens of the healing of Black folk,” she said. “Obviously, White folks need to heal, but centering the experience of Black folks is not always what happens.” 

Furthermore, “We need these models to encourage us to show us what is possible, and that things are happening,” Courquet-Lesalnier said. “Because this society will have you out here thinking, as you all know, it’s all doom and gloom, there is nothing good happening for us.”

On the Wellness Wednesday podcast, participants shared examples of what real-time racial healing looks like. 

Branch, of the Ever Forward Club, shared that his Million Mask project — in which participants write the image they want to project to society on the outside of a paper mask but write their real feelings on the inside — can help young people express their feelings. Shaw, of For Fathers, said it happens when he gives Black men a safe space to explore their feelings and get to the root of their challenges dealing with their family. And Scott, who works with Holman at the Atunse Justice League, said the healing circles with other Black men — out in the open, in a public park — has the power to heal an entire community. 

“That visibility was promoting healing of itself,” he said. “Black men and women used to walk by our circle and get interested in joining. We had circles where somebody just lost a loved one, and they wanted revenge. We were able to hold that and talk them down.”

Ultimately, the group agreed that racial healing programs and concepts have several commonalities. They usually involve individuals or groups changing racist narratives around Black people; engaging in self-care practices or routines; building or joining a community; and creating safe spaces for Black people to relax, decompress, and be themselves. But the practice has to be intentional, and it will take time. 

Still, a growing number of people are thinking about racial healing, said Wade, the Black Men’s Wellness founder. And it’s coming from grassroots organizations. 

“Whether it’s yoga retreats, or Black Men Heal on the East Coast, or Black Girls Ride, I think you’re seeing a ton of things like that,” he said. “It’s like the Harlem Renaissance. I think in that way, what we’re seeing is a renaissance in the space of Black wellness.”

This article was originally published by Word In Black.

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By Joseph Williams,
Word in Black

It’s easy to imagine that, for a Black teenager navigating a turbulent life — in juvenile detention, say, or attending a school for students with discipline, learning or behavior issues — racial healing might be the next to last thing on their mind. 

It’s easier still to think that the very last thing on their mind would be sitting in a circle with other students inside a library, sharing thoughts and feelings about a book they just read. 

Yet the Great Stories Club, a long-running program sponsored by the American Library Association, has met both goals, and then some. For nearly two decades, the GSC, as it’s known, has enticed troubled young people to put their noses in books that can help them see themselves in the pages, make sense of their lives, and tell their own stories. 

“The goal here is to reach populations that are not typically reached by the library — or, if they are already being reached– to be able to engage them in a deeper way that’s beyond a classroom,” says Brian Russell, project director for the ALA’s public programs office. The group discussions, he says, can “really give them a sense of community.” 

Launched in 2006, the program “gives underserved youth the opportunity to read, reflect, and share ideas on topics that resonate with them,” according to the ALA’s website. Funded by public and private grants, the site says, the ALA “has made 1,400 Great Stories Club grants to libraries, reaching more than 42,000 young adults in 49 states and 2 U.S. territories.”

Under the program, libraries at juvenile detention centers or alternative schools that win GSC grants receive young-adult books and literature as well as promotional material linked to a broader theme, such as “finding your voice,” or delving “deeper than our skins,” Russell says. Librarians hand out the books to interested readers, he says, then facilitate group discussions on the theme.

“All of the themes have always been about the kind of issues pertinent to teens’ realities,” including racism, poverty, suicide, parental conflicts, peer pressure, or unstable households, Russell says. The books, he says, “have to be gifted to the teen readers — they can’t remain in the collection. Sometimes, this is the first book that a lot of these teens have ever owned on their own.”

Besides encouraging teens to read and build relationships with a library, the discussions can be powerful, centered on ideas and themes like universal humanity, according to the ALA website. The prompts can also provide important steps towards racial healing: suggested discussion points can help young people reflect on past actions and present circumstances, reduce feelings of isolation and depression, and inspire changes in behavior. 

In-depth discussions on works like “Between the World and Me,” by Ta-Nehisi Coates, and “Mother of the Sea,” by Zetta Elliott encourage young readers to “consider ‘big questions’ about the world around them and their place in it, according to the website. Besides “affecting how they view themselves as thinkers and creators,” according to the website, the group discussions can “facilitate reflection and discussion of past actions and future opportunities for positive change” inspired by the literature.

Russell says it’s not a coincidence that the list of authors includes Black, Asian, Latino and Native American writers.

“Teens can see themselves reflected in these stories — someone who lives a life that looks like their life, and who looks like them,” Russell says. “You read a story about someone whose life is similar to yours, and then you’re in this space where you feel safe and comfortable with the other people there. And then you can tell your story.”

That experience can be transformative, Russell says, and not just for the Great Stories Club participants. 

“I think there is healing. A lot of learning comes from that too, especially in groups,” Russell says. “It’s powerful for me on a personal level. You know, teenagers are a really tricky demographic. But some of the librarians have already been posting that their titles have been so relevant, they can’t believe how engaged the teens have been.”

This article was originally published by Word in Black.

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By Willy Blackmore,
Word in Black

Last fall, the Environmental Protection Agency said something that many have long suspected to be true: an investigation of the Louisiana Department of Environmental Quality found “significant evidence suggesting that the Departments’ actions or inactions” have harmed the majority-Black communities in Cancer Alley, as the refinery- and petrochemical factory-laden stretch of the Mississippi River between New Orleans and Baton Rouge is widely known.

The investigation was dropped in June, however, after the state filed a lawsuit against the EPA. And now a draft copy of the agreement that EPA was negotiating with Louisiana, published by the Associated Press on Nov. 1, shows what might have been: an updated system for reviewing industrial emissions and approving new permits that would have required analysis of how pollution would impact people from different socioeconomic backgrounds who live nearby.

The EPA investigation was a rare application of Title VI of the Civil Rights Act, which is most often used to address discrimination in housing and transportation, but not environmental issues.

But the Biden administration had planned to expand the use of such Title XI investigations and “prioritize states where there are decades of civil rights complaints by Black and other communities of color against permitted pollution in their communities, such as Louisiana’s Cancer Alley and the Houston Ship Channel,” according to the recommendations from the White House Environmental Justice Advisory Council.

Now, the future of that strategy is unclear after Louisiana argued in its lawsuit that the new approach will “effectively transform the agency from one purely or largely concerned with environmental protection into a free-ranging, social-justice-warrior,” and that Title XI only applies to deliberate discrimination, not decisions that (as the state argued) inadvertently affect Black residents more than White residents.

But the reason why both the factories and the Black communities that live and suffer alongside them are there shows that none of this is by chance: the land that some of the facilities sit on, like the neoprene factory in Revere, Louisiana, were formerly plantations.

And, many of the communities in Cancer Alley were established by formerly enslaved people who were forced to work on those plantations. Today, Black residents in Cancer Alley are all but shut out from jobs at the refineries and other factories that pollute the air they breathe, but cancer rates are 12 to 16 percent higher in Black communities along that stretch of the river compared to White ones.

The draft document published by AP was just that — a working draft that would need to be agreed upon by both parties. And, the state had struck a number of provisions, such as appointing a new “scientific integrity official,” and the state agreeing to use “the best available science” to inform decisions around pollution permitting.

So while it likely wouldn’t shut down the neoprene factory in Revere — which is the last remaining one in the country after a similar plant in Kentucky was shuttered in 2008 due to concerns that it was polluting the nearby communities — any agreement would have been better than the current status quo.

An Oct. 16 letter to the EPA and the U.S. Department of Justice signed by dozens of individuals and organizations urged “the EPA and DOJ to follow through on the Biden-Harris Administration’s stated commitment to advance racial equity throughout the federal government.”

The letter points out the “Biden-Harris Administration has committed to advancing civil rights for communities long bearing the brunt of the cumulative impacts of racial segregation and extractive polluting,” and the EPA and DOJ have made similar commitments.

In practice, however, the letter’s authors wrote, EPA and DOJ are sending “a message to state and local agencies and other recipients of federal funds that they can continue to ignore their obligations under Title VI and avoid accountability for their discriminatory actions.” Indeed, since the EPA backed off of the Cancer Alley investigation, there was a gubernatorial election in Louisiana: the incumbent Democrat John Bel Edwards was defeated by Republican Jeff Landry, who was the state attorney general when Louisiana sued the EPA.

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By Bria Overs,
Word In Black

HBCU students win again. Over 2,700 former students of Morehouse College had their debts canceled by the Debt Collective recently, totaling nearly $10 million in student debt. 

Thousands of accounts from the fall 2022 semester and years prior owed $9.7 million to the historically Black college. Morehouse College transferred the entire balance in collections to the Collective and its sister organization, the Rolling Jubilee Fund, after which they canceled the debts as a “no-strings-attached gift.”

“Now, thousands of Black men can receive their diplomas, access their transcript, pursue further education, and move on with their lives,” reads a statement from Morehouse.

The Debt Collective is “the nation’s first debtors’ union,” they proclaim on their website. They are organizing to have debts canceled and abolished. 

“Our nation is defaulting on the promise of education when we burden communities, especially Black HBCU graduates, with crushing amounts of student debt,” said Braxton Brewington, spokesperson for the Debt Collective, in a statement. “This nearly $10M of student debt cancellation will put thousands of Black folks in a better position to be able to save for retirement, purchase a home or start a small business.”

According to the Legal Defense Fund, in 2019, 86 percent of Black students used student loans to pay for their education, with an average of $39,500 taken out. And in 2022, 57 percent of Black student loan borrowers had at least $25,000 of debt from their education, the Federal Reserve found. 

This is not the Collective’s first time aiding Black students and graduates. In May 2022, the group purchased $1.7 million of unpaid student debt for 462 women who attended Bennett College, a women’s HBCU. Some of the bills went as far back as 1996, Insider reported. 

While some have reason to rejoice, the debts forgiven were not federal loans, the group noted in a post, it was money owed directly to Morehouse. The Collective said they were “doing their part” because President Joe Biden had not held up his end of the deal.

During his 2020 campaign, Biden proposed he would forgive “all undergraduate tuition-related federal student debt from two- and four-year public colleges and universities for debt-holders earning up to $125,000.” This benefit would also apply to federal loans for private HBCUs and Minority-Serving Institutions.

In June, the Supreme Court struck down Biden’s broad forgiveness plan that would have fulfilled this campaign promise and removed over $400 billion in federal student loans. Since the decision, interest and loan payments have restarted, and the administration rolled out the Saving on an Affordable Education (SAVE) plan, formerly known as the Revised Pay as You Earn income-driven repayment plan.

On Oct. 4, the administration announced they had forgiven over $127 billion for an estimated 3.6 million borrowers enrolled in Income-Driven Repayment (IDR) plans, the Public Service Loan Forgiveness (PSLF) program, who have disabilities, or were misled by their school.

President Biden is not giving up on achieving forgiveness. The administration and Department of Education are moving forward with a new path to debt relief for student loan borrowers, including policy considerations, through the Higher Education Act of 1965.

In its statement, Morehouse College hinted at these recent moves and Biden’s promises.

“The fact that a small group of activists can eliminate $10 million in a split second is a reminder of the amazing power the executive branch has to eliminate the crushing weight of student loans for the public writ large.”

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By Maya Pottiger,
Word In Black

Back in the 1990s, everyone was jealous of their classmate who had a phone in their room — doubly so if it was a private line. Otherwise, your parents could pick up in another room and listen in to your conversations, or at least know who you were talking to and when. 

But with the dominance of cell phones, teens can live entire lives their parents don’t know about.

Adolescence is also a time when people are struggling with low self-esteem and body image issues, says Dr. Carletta S. Hurt, a certified school counselor in Washington, D.C. It’s a good breeding ground for manipulation.

“We have this person who says they love you, they care about you, they just want nice things for you,” Hurt says. “And then it turns into abuse.”

In her work as a school counselor, as well as with the American School Counselor Association, Hurt advocates for giving students vocabulary and knowledge, helping raise their awareness of abuse and manipulation.

Teens, of course, deal with cyberbullying. Particularly on Snapchat, where messages and photos delete almost instantly, cyberbullying is “dangerous because those images all disappear,” Murray says.

And teens are particularly susceptible to digital violence. They can be pressured to share passwords or targeted with mountains of texts. Everybody has a threshold, says Brian O’Connor, the vice president of public education at Futures Without Violence. And, due to their comfort with technology and the prevalence of it in their lives compared to trusted adults, they might not be able to recognize alarming behavior.

“Somebody texted you 12 or 13 times to ask you what you’re doing, where you’re going, who you’re with — it’s just not even a big deal. That can be alarming behavior,” O’Connor says. “Context really matters. It comes down to when you start to feel uncomfortable, or you feel threatened, you feel pressured, then something’s not okay.”

Another factor unique to teens is mutual violence. More than 40 percent of teens experience reciprocal violence, Murray says. While there isn’t concrete evidence to explain this, there are some hypotheses, Murray says, and it comes down to culture and media.

“Teenagers don’t quite grasp or understand all the aspects of violence yet at this age, so there is much more vulnerability toward it, much more acceptance of it,” Murray says. “Teens don’t quite know what is violence or what is acceptable, and they need us to teach them that.”

What the official numbers show — and what they don’t

Officially, about 1 in 3 teens in the United States experiences teen dating violence, according to the Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia. And about 14 percent of students who dated in 2021 experienced some sort of teen dating violence — physical, sexual or both.

The CDC found that teen dating violence — physical, sexual or both — decreased from 2013 to 2021 and few differences were seen during COVID-19.

Female students experienced all types of teen dating violence at higher rates than male students, according to a 2021 CDC study.

“It’s unfortunate, being both Black and identifying as female increases the risk of teen dating violence,” says Angela Lee, director of love is respect, part of the National Domestic Violence Hotline.

And teen dating violence is particularly high among LGBTQ+ youth.

Between October 2022 and September 2023, love is respect logged 424,400 interactions. About half of those interactions provided demographic information and a quarter of them were Black.

Rates varied across racial and ethnic groups. No matter the type of teen dating violence, Black students reported among the lowest levels.

But those are only the reported numbers.

“The statistics are really based on the disclosure rates, so youth may not feel as comfortable disclosing,” Murray says. “We anticipate those rates are way higher. And we do think that there is a disparity in Black youth that are impacted.”

Survivors of color, particularly in the Black community, face increased barriers to accessing support services, Lee says.

“Black youth are less likely to seek support, such as school counselors, due to concerns about confidentiality or a preference for seeking a more trusted support,” Lee says. “Even though Title IX is in place, have so many students and only one representative. We’ve heard their needs haven’t been met.”

The roles of pop culture and social media

We’ve actually been fed examples of unhealthy relationships since childhood. 

Take “Beauty and the Beast” — we’re taught that, if you keep someone locked away in your home, they will eventually fall in love with you. Or “The Little Mermaid” — Ariel had to literally give up her voice for the prince to fall in love with her. More recently, Netflix’s “13 Reasons Why” received widespread backlash about the ways it depicted and romanticized suicide.

Gender violence is also glorified in the United States, Murray says, specifically citing the stereotype of the strong Black woman. What does that mean for a Black woman who is in a dating violence relationship? She might be looked down on for seeking help and going against what’s expected.

These media stereotypes lead audiences “to believe that unhealthy power dynamics are okay,” Lee says. And it gives them “a false sense of reality” that healthy relationships don’t exist in real life.

Murray referenced a study of movies and TV shows, which found two-thirds of all youth-based materials have violence of some sort.

As children’s brains develop, it’s hard for them to know what is and isn’t OK. 

“What they see in front of them is what they accept as normal,” Murray says. “If you’re growing up watching TV shows without a conversation about it, you think being possessive of a partner and keeping them captive is romanticized and beautiful and normal.”

The role of school officials — and trusted adults

Schools have mandatory reporting laws, which require certain employees to report known or suspected cases of child abuse or neglect. But the laws vary by state and most states don’t mandate healthy relationship training for public schools.

But, as children spend most of their lives in schools, adults and counselors should have “some foundational knowledge” about how to recognize, intervene, and refer students to appropriate sources, Murray says.

This comes in many forms, like knowing the current dating language and developing comfortable relationships with students. This allows trusted adults to ask questions without limiting it to one conversation. 

“Forcing adolescents to disclose” in one conversation “is actually causing more harm,” Murray says. “We encourage having these ongoing conversations and partnering with a trusted adult.”

And, when a student does come to you, it’s important to be culturally responsive, take them seriously and not dismiss the complaint, Lee says. Make them feel safe and comfortable.

From middle school through high school, there are “training wheels,” O’Connor says. It’s the responsibility of trusted adults to be guiding students to what safe and healthy relationships look like so they can go forward confidently. 

Although no one situation is the same, teenagers look up to the adults in their lives, Lee says. Hurt echoed this, saying that families play a critical role in teen dating violence. It’s important to have honest conversations with teens about violence and where to draw the line.

“Some people suffer in silence. It’s not okay,” Hurt says. “Find someone you can trust, if nothing else, just to talk about it.”

If you or someone you know is being affected by intimate partner violence, please consider making an anonymous, confidential call to the National Domestic Violence Hotline at 1-800-799-SAFE (7233). Chat at http://thehotline.org | Text “START” to 88788. There are people waiting to help you heal 24/7/365.

This article was originally published by Word In Black.

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By Joseph Williams,
Word In Black

If you’re Black, chances are you’ve experienced it. 

You’re in a mostly White space, maybe your workplace, a school classroom or perhaps a social event. A White person with whom you’re interacting will do or say something seemingly innocuous — a joke about your hair, a compliment on how articulate you are, or asking if you really wrote that report the boss loved — that can trigger a stress response. Some describe it as a block of ice in their stomach; others experience sweaty palms, a racing heartbeat, or a mouth drier than paper.

The feeling prompts an inevitable question: Was that racist? But when confronted, that person is offended, becomes defensive, or dismisses the allegation outright. They might accuse you of being overly sensitive or even racist, transforming your insecurity or anger into self-doubt.

If this scenario is familiar, then you’ve encountered what Dr. J. Luke Wood, a sociologist and the new president of California State University, Sacramento, calls “racelighting” — an insidious form of racism that can trigger not only psychological but physical issues in its victims. 

The term comes from the word “gaslighting,” defined as a form of emotional abuse in which the abuser intentionally manipulates the physical environment or mental state of the abused. The abuser then deflects responsibility, and insists that the changes are products of the abused’s imagination, weakening their perception of reality. 

Wood said the racism-based manipulation is intended to cause Black people to second-guess their own experiences, their judgment, their memories and, ultimately, their humanity. 

While it parallels other racist behaviors, like implicit bias or microaggression, Wood said racelighting identifies a specific pattern of behavior that leads the target to question reality. Putting a name to that behavior, he said, is similar to a doctor making a medical diagnosis: When the condition is identified, the healing can begin. 

“What we’ve tried to do with racelighting is to create a set of concepts and terms that help people to explain the nature and condition of their oppression,” he said. “It’s important because it allows you to have a better understanding of what’s going on — to examine it almost like an artifact so that you can see what’s taking place: ‘This is what I’m experiencing.’”

As with other aspects of racism, there is evidence that the internal conflicts triggered by racelighting do physical and emotional damage “very similar to how Combat Stress Syndrome impacts those who are in war zones,” Wood said.

“It impacts you cognitively — an inability to process information, retain information, manage attention control,” he said. “Then, constant anxiety and worrying: anger, resentment, emotional and social withdrawal. And then it impacts you physiologically: tension headaches, backaches, elevated heartbeat, upset stomach, extreme fatigue due to elevated cortisol levels within your body that are directly related to racialized stress.”

And it can take different forms, ranging from advancing stereotypes about Black people (“Criminality, being overly emotional,” Wood said) to false allyship (“People say and pretend like they’re doing something to support you or protect you, but really aren’t”) to misrepresenting the past by discounting Black history or pretending systemic racism doesn’t exist. 

Exhibit A, Wood said: Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis’ attacks on “woke culture,” including revising school history standards to include positive outcomes from slavery and eliminating diversity, equity and inclusion programs for state employees. Wood said DeSantis’s December 2021 statement supporting his state’s Stop W.O.K.E. Act is textbook racelighting:  

“In Florida we’re taking a stand against state-sanctioned racism that is critical race theory… We will not allow for your tax dollars to be spent teaching kids to hate our country or to hate each other… We must protect Florida workers against a hostile work environment” that forces them to acknowledge racism.

While it identifies harmful behavior, racelighting also presents an opportunity to begin racial healing, Wood said. 

“Being able to name something gives you more power over it. I don’t think we can downplay how important that is,” Wood said. When presenting his findings before Black audiences, “the number one thing I hear someone say afterwards is, ‘I’m so glad you gave me language to explain what I’ve always felt but didn’t know how to describe.’”

“It is humbling, because we recognize that this work is about trying to help people who come from our community who oftentimes are in a (hostile) environment,” he said.

The most effective antidote to racelighting is for Black people to immerse themselves in Black spaces that are welcoming, validating, or supportive — “a club or organization, maybe a historically black fraternity, maybe a cultural club,” Wood said. “You’ve got to be in a place where you can see yourself through distress, disdain, and disregard. Where someone is instead going to extol your brilliance, your dignity.”

Otherwise, he said, “If you continue to sit in this, it may kill you slowly, but it’s going to kill you.”

This story was originally published by Word In Black and produced in partnership with the W.K. Kellogg Foundation.

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By Aziah Siid,
Word in Black

At least once a year, students come to school with money they saved up, or a sealed envelope sent by their parents or guardian, for the annual Scholastic Book Fair. It’s an integral part of students’ yearly calendar festivities, giving them an opportunity to pick whatever their heart desires.

The nationwide book fairs allow students to discover books of their interest and pick what reads they want. It can be the latest book from a popular comic series like “Captain Underpants,” or the newest shiny pencil on display, but for over 40 years, Scholastic has tried to “empower” kids to choose their own books and school supplies, which it calls a “milestone opportunity” for students “to identify and express their own voice.”

But earlier this month, the organization announced a plan to segregate books on race, gender, and sexuality, leaving authors, education professionals, and parents criticizing the decision, especially when censorship and book bans through education facilities are at a high. That decision has now been reversed.

The decision to create the “Share Every Story, Celebrate Every Voice” collection, which included 64 controversial titles that elementary schools could choose to include or exclude from their book fairs, was made earlier this year. In the official statement, Scholastic said the decision to segregate the books was made to reduce the risk of “teachers, librarians, and volunteers vulnerable to being fired, sued, or prosecuted” for hosting these books in a district that has banned them.

In creating the sentiment that including this collection of books in an elementary school book fair was optional, Scholastic caused an uproar across social media and within those very librarians’ walls they were trying to keep out of harm’s way.

Scholastic clarified in the original statement that the separate collection was intended to ensure kids can access books that are targeted by book bans across the country.

“We don’t pretend this solution is perfect — but the other option would be to not offer these books at all — which is not something we’d consider,” the organization said.

In the latest update, Scholastic apologized for the harm caused by its separate catalog and said it would be discontinued beginning in January when their next book fair season begins. Scholastic also pledged to “redouble our efforts to combat the laws restricting children’s access to books.”

Youth poet laureate Amanda Gorman, who read one of her poems at President Joe Biden’s inauguration, was one of the authors whose book “Change Sings” was listed for schools to opt in or opt out of including in their book fair. A book fair, she said, would never “censor her words.”

“It honestly feels like a betrayal,” Gorman wrote on Twitter  about Scholastic’s initial decision to create a separate catalog of diverse books. “As an elementary student, for weeks, I’d save every single penny I had for the Scholastic Book Fair, because it felt like a safe place to explore and choose for myself what books I wanted to read, what stories I wanted to find representations of myself in.”

“The Scholastic book fair and catalogue opened the world to me and made me excited to read and own books,” author Nikole Hannah-Jones wrote on Instagram. “Imagine children now made to feel that stories of children like them are optional or shameful.”

The nonprofit organization We Need Diverse Books condemned Scholastic for the decision, stating that “Diversity is not a choice,” and demanded Scholastic desegregate its books fairs, which it described as an “institution that fostered a love of reading for generations of American children.”

“Scholastic must not treat history and the lived experiences of readers’ and authors’ diverse identities as something that may be ignored or opted out of,” WNDB wrote in a statement. “Scholastic may choose to either support diverse books completely or submit to bigotry and fascism…Scholastic’s recent misguided decision prioritizes profit over diversity and the welfare of students everywhere.”

This article was originally published by Word in Black.

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By Joseph Williams,
Word In Black

The way Jourdan Sorrell sees it, between microaggressions at the office, the threat of getting stopped or shot by police, and societal definitions of masculinity, Black men in America are in a constant existential struggle. With the stress of moving through a world that often sees them as a threat, there isn’t much time to decompress, let alone heal. 

Coincidentally, the same thoughts were on the mind of his friend Darrious Hillman, when the two met for lunch in Chicago in April. As they dined, Sorrell, a Comcast senior manager, and Hillman, executive director for CAN TV, a local public access channel, found themselves talking about the lack of a safe space for Black men to truthfully answer the question, “How’s it going?” 

That conversation led the two to create “Brothers Talking,” a monthly, hour-long program on CAN TV, the Chicago-based public access TV channel Hillman leads. Hosted by Dr. Obari Cartman, a professional psychologist, the show features a multigenerational group of Black men tackling topics from Black sexuality to toxic masculinity and the schools-to-prison pipeline.

“We’re all just trying to eat, live, and do what we need to do daily,” says Sorrell, talking with Hillman in a YouTube video about the show’s origin, and how difficult it can be for Black men to breathe. “Vulnerability is not necessarily on the top of the list of things we need to do when we get up and when you go to sleep every night.”

The simplicity of its format — six Black of different generations, men sitting in a circle, talking to one another — belies the significance of its mission: centering “the lived experiences of 

Black men — the pain, joy, success, failure, and the resulting opportunities for growth and self-discovery,” according to the show’s website.

In an interview with Word In Black, Cartman says the program’s goal is to create a safe space for honesty and vulnerability, which in turn can lead to healing from racial trauma.

Men talking to one another in male spaces, like barber shops and locker rooms, is nothing new, “but sometimes we do it in ways that can be superficial and miss the point,” Cartman says. “In my experience, men are good at ‘barbershop talk’ — trading opinions, theories, talking about celebrities, talking about women. Sometimes we posture a little bit,” all the while avoiding conversations about what’s going on in their lives. 

The point of Black Men Talking is to “redirect the theoretical talk into their own personal experiences,” he says. “Not ‘This is what I think about it,’ but ‘This is what I feel. This is what I learned from my trials and tribulations.’” 

Besides representing Black men of different generations, each of the regular panelists comes from different socioeconomic backgrounds, political perspectives, and sexual orientations. At the top of every show, they take a few minutes to discuss their progress on a life goal they’ve set for themselves before digging into the main topic of conversation. 

Even the manner in which they sit contributes to the goal of honesty and healing, Cartman says.  

“It’s a roundtable, but there is no table — it’s like a peace circle,” he says. “The goal is to connect to ancient Indigenous formats of problem-solving and connections, looking eye-to-eye. The circle itself represents a sort of sacred space.” 

Although his job is to keep the conversation going, “I support them to the extent that I can, as another Black man that ‘s trying to figure it out myself,” says Cartman, whose expertise includes Black masculinity, restorative justice, and trauma-informed care. “The mission is to help Black men and boys be our best selves, be aware of the strengths we have.”

Cartman says racial healing is at the center of the program, and not just for the men on camera. 

“When I think about the diagnosis, the analysis of the harm, a lot of it has to do with long harm — racial trauma, generations of a system in place that brought our ancestors to this country,” Cartman says. Black people in America, he says, are subject to “a lot of spiritual, emotional, psychological warfare. I think we are still unpacking and undoing some of the damage.” 

The repair, “includes bringing (people) back into a community space to remember who we are,” Cartman says. “Restoration includes community. ‘I believe there is healing in just gathering. We’re doing that on the air. We’re creating space to gather and demonstrate it for other men.” 

“The power,” he says, “is in the simplicity of the conversation.”

This article was originally published by Word In Black and produced in partnership with the W.K. Kellogg Foundation.

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By Joseph Williams,
Word In Black

Jenn Roberts had done everything right. But it all felt wrong.

“I was one of the first in my family to go off to college,” she said. “I found a good guy in college, got married really early — did all the things I was supposed to do. And then I woke up one day: ‘This doesn’t feel good. I’m not happy, my (soon to be former) husband is not happy, now we have kids. Everything just started crumbling, everything that I had worked so hard for.”

So she started dancing — something she’d done throughout school but gave up when she became an adult. That reinvigorated a feeling, she said, “When I used to not care what people thought, when I used to just do the things that feel good. And then, my friends were watching, and they were like, ‘We want to do it, too! You look peaceful, You look happy, you look free.’”

That feeling of freedom inspired Roberts to start holding gatherings for friends and friends of friends, creating a space where they could talk, share and be themselves. Those gatherings soon evolved into the Colored Girls Liberation Lab, a creativity, education and self-care community designed to allow Black women to shake off the twin shackles of racism and patriarchy, in a supportive environment. 

“Black women can come in and say, ‘Hey, I just need a space to fall apart a little bit with people who are going to care and hold me and help me and pick me back up,’” she said. “‘And once I get to that space, I need some people who are going to tell me that whatever I dream up for my life is possible and be there to cheer me on.’ And so that’s really what the lab is about: helping women be OK and free in life.”

While space to breathe and heal is its primary mission, Roberts emphasizes the “lab” element of her organization’s title. Along with self-care lessons, she encourages members to “play” with their lives — be imaginative, think big, envision a limitless future and dream of what they can do with nothing holding them back.

“This lab became a space for me to combine all of those things: art, creativity, sisterhood, Afrofuturism and design,” she said. In the laboratory, she said, she encourages participants to “really play around with the idea of what it looks like to have my own toolkit of liberation.”

For example, “every Monday at noon, we meet — it’s called ‘Dreams and Schemes,” Roberts said. “It’s a place that’s patterned after bell hooks’ ‘Sisters of the Yam’ space, where it really is a time to tell the truth of your life, to share your story: ‘OK, this thing is not working like I thought I wanted it to,’ and no one’s going to shame you for it.”

Rather than a set curriculum, Roberts said, the lessons and gatherings vary; so does leadership of the group discussions.  

“Right now we’re doing one around [hooks’] ‘All About Love’: New Visions,’” Roberts said. “We’ve done ones on pleasure, we’ve done ones around plant medicine. And we come in for three to four weeks, every week. And whether it’s me or another woman from our community that has that knowledge to give, they’re able to bring us together and have us explore that topic in a way that doesn’t feel like they’re trying to tell us what to do, but in a way that we get to discover how we want to incorporate it ourselves.”

Living at the intersection of two major “-isms” — racism and sexism — is a unique, traumatizing burden Black women must carry, whether they want to or not, Roberts said. The Colored Girls Liberation Lab, she said, can help heal that trauma. 

“One of my beliefs is that sometimes we don’t know what freedom looks like until we feel it,” she said. “I like to create spaces that feel good and that make Black women feel like, ‘Oh — this is what freedom feels like, this is what joy feels like. Let me recreate that at home.”

She goes on: “I really do think our liberation lies in our imagination and our ability to reimagine what systems look like, what our communities look like, what our personal care and love looks like. I think sometimes we don’t realize that just stopping and pausing and thinking is also doing. And I think that what we’re learning in this space is that the pause and the reflection in the healing part of it is action.”

This story was produced in partnership with the W.K. Kellogg Foundation. This article was originally published by Word In Black.

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By Joseph Williams,
Word In Black

It’s something we do from our first moments of life until the moment we die. We do it some 17,000 times a day, without having to think about it. In fact, you’re doing it — breathing — right now, while reading this very sentence. 

Yet wellness expert Zee Clarke believes that this simple act, when done intentionally using specific rhythms and techniques, holds the key to relieving stress, lowering anxiety and promoting healing from racial trauma — especially the invisible, day-to-day strain of being Black in America.  

Clarke is such a believer in the power of breathing techniques that, years ago, after returning from an eye-opening vacation in India, she quit her fast-paced, stress-filled job in the corporate world to immerse herself in ancient practices and rituals that slow life down. Now, she is encouraging Black people to adopt those methods, borrowed from yoga and meditation, to improve their own physical and mental health. 

“It’s so important for Black people to use these tools in our daily lives,” said Clarke, a Harvard University-educated MBA who has worked in the high-pressure world of Silicon Valley alongside tech CEOs. She preaches the gospel of “mindfulness and breathwork for BIPOC communities to reclaim our flow at work and in life,” according to her website.

Indeed, science backs up her faith in mindfulness and breathing as a health-giving superpower that can counter the insidious effects of systemic racism.  

“Researchers at leading institutions like Harvard and Columbia University found that racism causes chronic stress, resulting in higher rates of both heart disease and high blood pressure in African-Americans,” Clarke said. “It also causes mental health issues like anxiety and depression. Every time we face a moment of racial trauma, whether it’s a big or small event, our fight or flight response kicks in. Stress hormones run through the body, affecting both our mental and physical well-being.”

Studies show that taking a few moments for deep breathing “can lower your blood pressure, reduce stress, lower anxiety levels, and improve mental health,” she said. “When we breathe, it stimulates our parasympathetic nervous system, which counters that fight or flight response.” 

And there’s an additional benefit: unlike prescription drugs or doctor copays, the health benefits of what Clarke calls “slow living” cost just a few minutes of time. 

“These practices, which are free, and can be done anytime, anywhere, can be so powerful in helping our community,” she said. They provide the tools to “not just cope with [racist harm] in the moment when they happen, but also heal from them afterwards,” Clarke said. “Yet, most folks in our community have never heard of it.” 

She aims to change it through her new book, “Black People Breathe: A Mindfulness Guide to Racial Healing,” which focuses on breathwork and mindfulness for people of color. This spring, Clarke launched an online course called Breathing Through Microaggressions and Racism.

For Clarke, adopting a lifestyle centered on mindfulness and breathing was a matter of survival.

The persistent sexism and racism in the mostly-white corporate world put “my mental and physical health in the gutter,” Clarke said, to the degree that her doctor all but ordered a vacation. Research on the health effects of chronic stress led her to consider meditation, which in turn led her to India and the mindfulness community. 

Not long after returning to the U.S., Clarke quit her job and began studying mindfulness full-time. During her studies, she said, “I couldn’t help but notice the connections with the health conditions in the Black community,” including studies linking institutional racism to chronic ailments like hypertension, heart disease, depression and obesity. 

“The way Black people are treated in this country is killing us slowly — death by a thousand cuts,” she said. “Dr. Martin Luther King was 39 when he passed, but the autopsy said he had the heart of a 60-year-old. And recent studies show that Black women are aging at a much faster rate than white women.”

​​While mindfulness can conjure up images of mostly-white spaces — tie-dyed hippies in a commune, or white women in a yoga studio, sitting cross-legged on a mat — Clarke said the practice is for everyone, and doesn’t take more than a few minutes a day. Deep breathing for just a few minutes, or taking a stroll outside in pleasant weather, is enough to make a measurable difference in one’s frame of mind and, in turn, their health.

“These micro-self-care moments can be super powerful, and can change your whole day,” Clarke said. “You’ll be more productive, and you’ll be in a better mood.” 

Ultimately, “racism is a public health issue,” Clarke said, noting that healing from racism begins with defining the problem. “Rather than wait for the world to change, we need to take our health into our own hands. I believe the breath can help us do just that!”

This story was produced in partnership with the W.K. Kellogg Foundation. This article was originally published by Word In Black.

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By Anissa Durham,
Word In Black

This story is part of “Love Don’t Live Here” Word In Black’s series about how domestic violence impacts our community and what we can do about it. Trigger Warning: These stories contain mention of domestic violence and abuse.

Christy White worked as an immigration attorney because she wanted to save everyone. But, she quit when she realized she could only save herself. 

“I became a lawyer because of my trauma, because of my domestic abuse and I wanted to save all the people who were going through the same things that I went through,” White says. “Once I recognized that I didn’t have to fight that anymore, I decided to get to know myself.” 

She grew up with a father with alcoholism who was violent and verbally abusive toward the family and a mother who was physically violent as well. 

While in college and law school, White was in a 12-year on-and-off relationship with her ex-fiancé. Over the years, she says he manipulated, threatened, and verbally abused her. After getting engaged, she started going to therapy. 

“I was able to discern that it was a repeating relationship that I had been in several times,” she says. “It was just familiarity instead of something healthy.” 

But her ex-fiancé wasn’t the only person abusing her at that time. In 2019, when she was trying to leave him, White realized her best friend was also manipulative. They worked together when she learned that “unethical things” were going on. As a result, White had to get the police involved. 

“It didn’t really end well,” she says. “It also ended with nothing being harmed to my body, so I felt like that was a plus.”  

Safely leaving abusive partners 

Kiva Harper, a psychotherapist in Arlington, Texas, says safety is a huge concern for those in abusive relationships. It’s not enough to tell a woman to leave — it’s about helping them to leave with a safety plan. 

“Domestic violence is about power and control,” she says. “When they lose their power and control, they become very desperate.” 

According to research, “75 percent of women who are killed by their batterers are murdered when they attempt to leave or after they have left an abusive relationship.” One of the reasons domestic violence emergency shelters exist is to keep women safe during this dangerous time. 

Women are 70 times more likely to be killed in the two weeks after leaving. And on average, a woman will leave an abusive relationship seven times before leaving for good.  

Every minute, about 20 people are physically abused by an intimate partner in the U.S., according to the National Coalition Against Domestic Violence. In one day, that’s nearly 30,000 people. In one week, it’s a little more than 200,000 people. 

Whether you are family, friends, or acquaintances with someone in an abusive relationship, Harper says it’s imperative to help them find professional help. “We see so many cases of murder suicide in the news because of people just leaving.” Harper recommends domestic violence victims develop a comprehensive safety plan when they leave.  

That plan could look like a woman or man in an abusive relationship forming a plan to remain safe if they decide to stay, another plan if they decide to leave, and a plan to stay safe after leaving. Harper says each plan varies by person and circumstance — and some may need to seek refuge at an emergency shelter or an anonymous location.

It can also include getting a protective order, which typically offers more protection than a restraining order. Depending on the state, if an abuser violates a protective order they can be immediately arrested.

“We also have to respect that women and men who are in these abusive relationships know their partner better than we do,” Harper says. “If they say, ‘he’ll kill me’ and they choose to stay to protect themselves and their kids … we have to know that helping someone is not about getting them to leave. It’s about keeping them safe.” 

A safety plan is self-care 

If and when someone leaves an abusive relationship, Harper says there are things survivors can do to take care of their mental health. A big part of a safety plan includes self-care. Oftentimes, selfcare is touted as long baths, nature walks, and drinking water — but there’s more to it for domestic violence survivors.  

Self-care involves empowerment, validation, and support. With nearly 20 years of experience treating Black women in abusive relationships, Harper offers four pieces of advice. 

1. Boundaries 

Set boundaries and limits with people who are not supportive in that moment. Prioritize protecting your mental and emotional health. Learn to eliminate toxic relationships.  

2. Social media safety 

Look at your digital footprint. Deactivate your social media accounts periodically. When using the internet, use an incognito browser.  

3. Spiritual health 

Many clergy members still advise women to stay in a relationship with an abusive partner. Take care of your spiritual needs by keeping yourself safe — even if your church is not supportive of it.  

4. Intentionality  

Be intentional about what you are consuming and putting into your body. Take some time to move your body. And prioritize rest. Part of being intentional means knowing where to get professional help. 

Healing is possible 

Chloe Panta, a mindset expert in Los Angeles, knows what it’s like to heal from a domestic violence relationship. Initially, she didn’t tell anyone around her what was going on with her relationship. This deprived her of a support network. 

“I know what it’s like to hit rock bottom,” Panta says. “I know what it’s like to be in a rut where you feel as if there is no way out. Or you don’t know how to get out.”

Her self-worth was low at the time, and she says she was ashamed and embarrassed to disclose her struggle to people who loved her. But she knew she needed to get out. One day, she reached out to a friend who told Panta not only can she leave but she can take control of her life. Now, as a transformational coach she helps others to heal from the same traumas she experienced.  

For Panta self-care was at the bottom of the list; it was nonexistent. Her abusive ex-partner convinced her that she was not deserving or worthy of caring for herself, so she had to unlearn the cycle of putting other people first.  

“We are not deserving of abuse, or hate, or punishment,” she says. 

Once she realized how important self-care was to her mental health, she made that a priority. Panta says many women don’t understand the price paid when you don’t take care of yourself and uplift yourself.  

“We are worthy of having love, and abundance and joy. We have to accept that ourselves and allow that in,” she says. “Now I romanticize my life by wearing perfume, getting dressed up every single day … getting a massage once a week. That’s making myself feel loved and beautiful and know that I am worthy of that.” 

Supporting survivors of domestic violence 

After surviving years of abuse, White has learned to prioritize her mental health. In doing so, she leaned on close friends who supported her and didn’t bombard her with questions. Part of what helped her heal was having people around her who didn’t blame her for experiencing abuse.

“I couldn’t really talk much,” White says about the time when she left her abusive fiancé. “It was really just love and silence.” 

To reclaim her power and control, the 35-year-old moved from Dallas to Barcelona. Before moving, she worked on breathing techniques to reconnect with her body. And now she actively prioritizes her mental health and wellbeing.  

“I did get the opportunity to heal there,” she says. “Now I’m getting the opportunity to grow, just from a different place. It feels like a second start. It feels really good.” 

If you or someone you know is being affected by intimate partner violence, please consider making an anonymous, confidential call to the National Domestic Violence Hotline at 1-800-799-SAFE (7233). Chat at http://thehotline.org | Text “START” to 88788. There are people waiting to help you heal 24/7/365.

This article was originally published by Word In Black.

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By Alexa Spencer,
Word in Black

The U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) proposed a ban on hair-straightening and smoothing products that contain cancer-causing chemicals. Black women, who are historic consumers of the hair “relaxers,” may benefit most from the new rule if it’s adopted.

The ban forbids the use of formaldehyde and other formaldehyde-releasing chemicals in the products. Formaldehyde is a colorless, flammable gas used in a variety of household products, including detergents and cosmetics, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

The gas is highly toxic and irritable to the eyes, skin, lungs, and throat — even in small amounts. Repeated exposure has been linked to long-term adverse health effects, including myeloid leukemia, a rare blood cancer.

Before the proposed rule can become official, the FDA listens to public comments and then decides to “end the rulemaking process, to issue a new proposed rule, or to issue a final rule,” the agency wrote on its website.

Black Women and Cancer

Recent research has linked relaxers to various cancers in women.

A study published in October 2022 by the National Institutes of Health examined usage among 33,947 women. Researchers found that women who applied the products to their hair were two times more likely to have uterine cancer than women who didn’t. For women who used chemical hair straighteners more than four times a year, the risk was even greater.

Nearly 60 percent of the women who reported using relaxers in the past year were Black.

Black women also are more likely than White women to receive a breast, ovarian, or uterine cancer diagnosis at an advanced stage and are less likely to receive treatment or survive.

“Hair products may contain hazardous chemicals with endocrine-disrupting and carcinogenic properties,” the authors wrote. “Previous studies have found hair product use to be associated with a higher risk of hormone-sensitive cancers including breast and ovarian cancer.”

Black women have long raised concerns about possible links between chemical hair straighteners and cancer rates among them. Only now is science confirming their theories. With data backing their claims, many are pursuing lawsuits against companies who make the products.

Congress Calls for an Investigation

The FDA’s proposed ban comes months after Reps. Ayanna Pressley (D-Mass.) and Shontel Brown, (D-Ohio) penned an open letter in March to the agency requesting an investigation into chemical hair straighteners. Pressley and Brown noted that Black women are pressured to opt-in to the products due to an anti-Black beauty standard in America.

“As a result of anti-Black hair sentiment, Black women have been unfairly subjected to scrutiny and forced to navigate the extreme politicization of hair. Hence, generations of Black women have adapted by straightening hair in an attempt to achieve social and economic advancement,” they wrote. “Manufacturers of chemical straighteners have gained enormous profits, but recent findings unveil potentially significant negative health consequences associated with these products.”

Pressley, who previously combatted hair discrimination through the CROWN Act, says the FDA’s proposal is a win for Black women’s health.  “Regardless of how we wear our hair, we should be allowed to show up in the world without putting our health at risk,” she said in a statement.

Brown is committed to helping the proposal become an official rule. “We must ensure the products American consumers buy and use are safe, and I look forward to working with my colleagues and the Administration to implement this proposed rule,” she said.

This article was originally published  by Word in Black.

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By Hiram Jackson,
Word in Black

America’s love affair with incarceration unnecessarily deprives people of their freedom. It also comes with enormous social and economic costs for formerly incarcerated individuals, their families and their communities.

More than 10.2 million people are held in penal institutions throughout the world, mostly as pre-trial detainees, remand prisoners or sentenced prisoners. Although the United States is home to just 5 percent of the world’s population, the nation has 25 percent of the world’s imprisoned population.

Data compiled by the Prison Policy Initiative shows roughly 1.9 million people are incarcerated in the U.S. in 2023 — in state prisons, federal prisons or local jails — the highest rate in the Western world. Another 803,000 Americans are on parole, and 2.9 million are on probation.

The prison and jail incarceration rate in the United States remains between five and eight times that of France, Canada and Germany, and imprisonment rates in Arkansas, Louisiana, Mississippi and Oklahomaare nearly 50 percent above the national average.

But before delving into the racial disparities that run rampant in the penal system — like how one in fiveBlack men born in 2001 is likely to experience imprisonment within their lifetime, which is a decline from one in three for those born in 1981 — we must address what is an even larger issue.

Why does the justice system, like a game of Monopoly, dole out the “go straight to jail, do not pass go” card so readily?

Most incarcerated people, approximately 96 percent in 2021 and 2022, had sentences of over a year. The demographic distribution of incarcerated people remained consistent over the two years, with 32 percent being Black, 31 percent White, 23 percent Hispanic, 10 percent multiracial or of another race, 2 percent American Indian or Alaska Native, and 1 percent Asian, Native Hawaiian or other Pacific Islander.

According to the experts, the main drivers are: (1) changes in laws leading to longer, often mandatory sentences; (2) “truth-in-sentencing” legislation requiring individuals convicted of violent crimes to serve at least 80 percent of their sentences; (3) increased use of incarceration for non-violent crimes; (4) prison privatization.

Behind that legal lingo lies a deep-rooted and much more intrinsic reason, layered in unnecessary and discretionary punishment and a system’s unwavering resolve to make the least capable pay. Cash Rules Everything Around Incarceration“It is said that no one truly knows a nation until one has been inside its jails. A nation should not be judged by how it treats its highest citizens, but its lowest ones,” Nelson Mandela said.

But many people who are arrested are trapped in dismal local jail conditions waiting, no, hoping for deliverance.

Local jails have become modern-day quasi-debtors’ prisons because many of those being held are there simply because they cannot afford cash bail. So they languish and wait for a day in court, which, depending on where you live, might be a months- or years-long process. The wheels of justice grind to a near halt for those without the funds to make them turn more quickly.

Consider the profitability side of the prison equation, and things get clearer. Thousands of private corporations rake in $80 billion a year in profits from America’s carceral system. Bail bond businesses alone make $1.4 billion a year from folks who can pony up the cash to get their loved ones out of jail.

Some of the biggest winners in the mass incarceration scheme are the for-profit prison companies whose business models essentially depend on the number of inmates held in these private institutions.

Currently, the government sends $3.8 billion in federal grants to states and cities for criminal justice purposes. Unfortunately, these grants largely go out on autopilot, pressuring states to increase the number of arrests, prosecutions, and people in prison without requiring a public safety reason.

The reluctance evident in correcting sentencing excesses, particularly for violent crimes as supported by criminological evidence, prolongs the harm and futility of mass incarceration.

The Jobs Opportunity Task Force, a nonprofit advocating for improved skills, jobs and incomes, recently drew attention to the wide-reaching effects of incarceration. They revealed that approximately 113 million adults in the U.S., or roughly 45 percent, have a family member with a history of imprisonment, and 79 million individuals possess a criminal record — greatly impacting opportunities for meaningful employment for the formerly incarcerated, regardless of guilt or innocence.

An even sadder reality, though, is that one year of housing a prisoner is comparable to the cost of a year of college.

Black and Behind Bars, Possibly for Life

But back to the racial disparities, another scourge of mass incarceration. In 2021, Black adults were five times as likely to be incarcerated as White adults, and Black youth were just over four times as likely to be locked up in the juvenile justice system as their White peers. In seven states — California, Iowa, Connecticut, Minnesota, New Jersey, Maine and Wisconsin — Black adults are incarcerated nine times more often than their White peers. Twenty-eight states exercise some form of a “three strikes” law, which automatically sentences individuals convicted of a third offense to harsher penalties and, in some cases, life sentences.

Yes, life in prison for offenses ranging from an indiscretion as marginal as failed custody cases, low-level drug possession, and non-violent misdemeanors.

In California, which has had a three-strikes law since 1994, more than half of the people incarcerated by the law are doing time for nonviolent crimes. Due to the work of activists, in 2012 Californians voted to amend the law, eliminating life sentences for nonviolent crimes. It’s estimated the change will save the Golden State $1 billion over the next decade.

The three strikes you’re out rule should be for baseball, not life-long deprivation of freedom. The bottom line is that the American penal system doesn’t value human life. Instead, our courts prefer to address individual transgressions and crimes by imposing bigger and more brutal infringements on hapless citizens who encounter the criminal justice system’s peculiarly punitive measures. These measures operate as intended: to cause long-term suffering and pain.

In this country, the punishment rarely really fits the crime. Meanwhile, Black people keep suffering whileprison profiteers laugh all the way to the bank.

Hiram Jackson is the CEO and publisher of Real Times Media, which includes The Michigan Chronicle, a partner in the Word In Black collaborative.

This article was originally published in Word in Black.

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By Sarah Kwon,
Word In Black

When Selam Solomon Caldwell and her husband learned she was pregnant last year, the stakes for finding the right OB-GYN felt high. Caldwell, a Black woman, had heard stories from family and friends of maternity care providers who ignored their requests or pressured them into cesarean sections without clear medical justification.

As a relative newcomer to Los Angeles, the recruiter, now 31, knew few Black people who could recommend doctors who had treated them with respect. She combed review sites, including Google reviews and Healthgrades, but couldn’t find how nearby physicians and hospitals might treat a Black woman like her.

“It’s hard to tell if it’s a fellow Black person who’s giving the review,” Caldwell said.

Consumer ratings sites rarely identify patient experiences by race or ethnicity and hospitals are under no obligation to reveal the racial and ethnic breakdowns of their patient satisfaction scores. Yet that information could be instrumental in holding maternity care providers and hospitals accountable for treating patients inequitably and could empower expectant mothers like Caldwell in finding quality obstetric care.

“You can’t change what you don’t see,” said Kimberly Seals Allers, founder of Irth, an app allowing Black and brown women to find and leave reviews of maternity care providers. She’s one of a few entrepreneurs developing new tools for collecting feedback from mothers of color.

A steady drip of new research over the past several years has spotlighted racial discrimination by maternity care providers and the role it may play in one of the country’s most vexing health disparities: Black women experience the worst birthing outcomes, a gap not explained by income or education, according to a KFF analysis. In 2021, they were nearly three times as likely to die of pregnancy-related causes as White women.

Mothers of color, especially Black women, report that they do in fact experience discrimination. They are more likely than White women to say that their care providers ignored them, scolded them, or pressured them into treatments they didn’t want. The extent to which discrimination is reported varies widely by survey, but one recently published report by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention found roughly 30 percent of Black, Hispanic and multiracial women reported mistreatment during maternity care, compared with 20 percent of women overall.

It’s unclear how many hospitals track survey responses by race, and, even if they do, they rarely reveal that information. And the federal government requires generic reporting on how patients say they were treated, making it difficult to pin down and address incidents of bias in maternity care.

Funding and regulations lag

Currently, the results of the industry’s standard patient experience survey, known as the Hospital Consumer Assessment of Healthcare Providers and Systems, are made publicly available by the federal government to help patients compare hospitals. They incentivize hospitals to improve care and are included in the rankings of many hospital ratings sites, such as U.S. News & World Report’s Best Hospitals. But it doesn’t ask about maternity care or discrimination and has low response rates, particularly among people of color.

These flaws can also make the survey inadequate for improving birth equity. “We know it’s insufficient,” said Amanda P. Williams, an OB-GYN and clinical innovation adviser to the nonprofit California Maternal Quality Care Collaborative. Hospitals, she said, could fill in the gaps by collecting feedback from maternity care surveys and breaking the results out by race and other demographic information; they could also talk to patients through forums such as town halls or focus groups.

Joy Lewis, senior vice president for health equity strategies at the American Hospital Association, said many hospitals do this work, both generally and in obstetrics.

However, Williams believes it isn’t happening enough in maternity care.

She said there are some pockets where people are doing these activities but that they are not yet widespread. At a national conference of 200 hospital executives this year, Williams said, only a few raised their hands when asked if they break out their maternity outcomes data. “If your overall C-section rate is fine, you might think everything’s hunky-dory,” she said. “But if you see that your Black people are having 50 percent higher C-section rates than your white and Asian patients, there’s very important work to be done.”

Then there are barriers to participation. Studies have found many in the Black community distrust the health care system.

Fearing retaliation and being seen as an “angry Black woman,” Ta-She-Ra Manning, a maternal health program coordinator in Fresno, California, said she didn’t provide any critical feedback when her OB-GYN dismissed her concerns about unusual symptoms during her 2021 pregnancy.

Meanwhile, new funding to measure disparities has been slow in coming. President Biden’s 2023 budget proposed $7.4 million to develop a supplemental survey aimed at reducing maternal health disparities, among other steps. But Congress did not fund the item. Instead, an agency in the Department of Health and Human Services is developing it with its own funding and estimates the work will take less than five years, according to a statement from Caren Ginsberg, who directs the agency’s surveys.

Still, the public likely won’t see changes anytime soon. After a survey’s measures are created, it can take several years for the results to be publicly reported or tied to payment, said Carol Sakala, senior director for maternal health at the National Partnership for Women & Families, an advocacy organization.

“This molasses level of movement contrasts acutely with all the things hitting the news about people not getting the right care and attention and respect,” Sakala said.

Amid growing interest in health equity, traditional ratings sites are grappling with how much to share with the public. For its birthing hospital ratings, U.S. News & World Report recently started assessing whether hospitals tracked racial disparities in maternity outcomes measures, but it withholds actual results. Healthgrades is taking time to think through how to collect and display sensitive information publicly, said spokesperson Sarah Javors in a statement.

Black innovators fight for better data

Some Black women are trying to fill the void by creating new feedback mechanisms that could be more trusted by the community. Allers said she created Irth after a traumatic birth experience as a Black mother at a highly rated hospital left her feeling failed by mainstream ratings. On the app, verified users answer questions, from whether they felt respected by their doctor to if they experienced certain types of mistreatment such as dismissal of pain. Irth currently has 10,000 reviews of hospitals, OB-GYNs and pediatricians nationally, according to Allers.

“Our data is for the community,” said Allers. “They know their feedback has value to another mom or family.”

Irth also offers analysis of the reviews to hospitals and leads campaigns to collect more reviews for them. But Allers said many hospitals have expressed little interest.

Karen Scott, an OB-GYN who created PREM-OB, a scientifically validated survey that measures racism in Black birthing experiences, said she has met hospital leaders who don’t think their providers could mistreat patients or who worry that documenting responses could carry legal risk.

The American Hospital Association’s Lewis declined to comment specifically on Irth and PREM-OB but acknowledged the Black community’s long-standing mistrust of health care providers. She said hospitals want to hear more from patients in historically marginalized groups.

Early signs of progress are emerging in parts of the country.

California hospitals will likely report disparities in birth outcomes and patient satisfaction measures. Hospitals are expected to start posting data broken out by race and other demographics on their websites in 2026, though the state hasn’t finalized the measures that will be required, said Andrew DiLuccia, a spokesperson for the state’s health data agency. At least two states, Washington and New Jersey, have disclosed rates of C-sections among low-risk patients by race for individual hospitals.

Scott founded Birthing Cultural Rigor to increase uptake of her survey. The firm has partnered with birth equity groups to recruit respondents in select counties in Georgia, Michigan, Ohio, and Tennessee. Scott said results will be used to train local health professionals on how to reduce racism in maternity care.

Separately, Irth will collect and analyze reviews for three hospitals or health systems in California, said Allers. One of them, MemorialCare Miller Children’s and Women’s Hospital Long Beach, will work with Irth to better understand the impact of birth equity efforts such as implicit bias training.

“We’ll get to see if what we’re doing is actually working,” said Sharilyn Kelly, executive director of the hospital’s perinatal services.

Caldwell, the recruiter, eventually found a doctor she trusted and went on to have a smooth pregnancy and delivery. Her son is now 8 months old. But with so little information available on how she might be treated, she said, she felt anxious until she met her doctor, when “a lot of that stress and anxiety melted away.”

Digital strategy and audience engagement editor Chaseedaw Giles contributed to this report.

[Editor’s note: California Healthline is an editorially independent service of the California Health Care Foundation, which has contributed funding to PREM-OB and the birth equity nonprofit Narrative Nation, which developed Irth.]

This article was produced by KFF Health News, which publishes California Healthline, an editorially independent service of the California Health Care Foundation. This article was published from Word In Black.

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By Alexa Spencer,
Word In Black

When Pflugerville, Texas, resident Melissa Bensouda gave birth to her third child in 2002 at age 27, she dreamed of dressing her baby in cute outfits and documenting all the usual first-year milestones. Instead, she soon found herself worrying about staying alive. 

“I definitely did not expect to see my children graduate from high school,” she says.

Six months after giving birth, a lab test revealed that Bensouda’s kidneys were functioning at half-strength. She was diagnosed with Stage 5 kidney disease. 

Twenty-one years later, Bensouda, now 48, has one kid in high school but has seen her other two children graduate.

“I wanted to see them in their life journey, and they’re reaching milestones,” Bensouda says. “Some that I never met.”

The tech that sustained her physically and emotionally? Home dialysis.

Black Americans are most at risk 

An estimated 37 million Americans live with kidney disease, according to the National Institute of Diabetes and Digestive and Kidney Diseases. But Black Americans are four times more likely than White Americans to develop the disease due to high rates of diabetes and high blood pressure, the most common causes of kidney failure.

Chronic kidney disease occurs when the kidneys — two fist-sized organs located below the rib cage — fail to clean the blood and filter out extra water. This can cause waste and fluid to build up in the blood, and may lead to heart disease or stroke. 

There is no known cure for chronic kidney disease, though the symptoms are often managed with medication.

If the condition progresses to end-stage kidney disease (also called end-stage renal disease or kidney failure), a kidney transplant or dialysis — when an artificial kidney machine cleans the blood — is required to stay alive.

The average life expectancy with dialysis is five to 10 years — although some people live 30 years longer. 

The dialysis clinic experience

Bensouda began dialysis at clinics after her diagnosis. She went in multiple times a week — like most patients. After a while, she noticed a decline in her mental health. Research shows depression is common among people being treated for kidney disease due to isolation, fatigue, and an overall major life change. 

“It was depressing and scary because I was pretty much the youngest person that was going into the clinic to do treatment,” Bensouda recalls.

She says she regularly saw older patients “hurting,” “lashing out,” and “incoherent” as they suffered from low blood pressure during treatment, a common side effect of dialysis due to a drop in fluid levels.

“It was very difficult for me to reconcile that when I would go into the clinic, so I would basically just go to sleep until my treatment was over,” Bensouda says.

She found relief when a nurse recommended she join a home dialysis program. After accepting, she completed six weeks of training, where she learned to insert needles, set up and clean the machine, and diagnose any warnings or alarms.

The switch helped her mentally because she could do it from the comfort of her house, on her own time, while also being present for her children.

The realities of at-home dialysis

Home dialysis offers a range of advantages: More time for family, work, and travel. Patients can also dialyze on their own schedule instead of traveling to a clinic three times a week for four-hour sessions. 

Jenny Shen, an associate professor of medicine at the University of California in Los Angeles, says her patients who dialyze at home appreciate its flexibility.

“They seem to be a lot more independent, a lot more free, and a lot less burdened by it,” she says.

Despite the perks, home dialysis is less popular than clinic- or hospital-based care, but that’s changing. Between 2010 and 2020, home dialysis use among newly-diagnosed patients with kidney failure grew from 9.1 percent to 13.7 percent, according to the National Institutes of Health. 

Black patients, however, remain less likely to use home dialysis at 7.3 percent, compared to 9.3 percent of White patients. 

Previous research by Shen and Katherine Rizzolo, a nephrologist at Boston University, found that certain socioeconomic conditions, such as unstable housing, cause less access among Black people. 

Despite the perks, home dialysis is less popular than clinic- or hospital-based care, but that’s changing. Between 2010 and 2020, home dialysis use among newly-diagnosed patients with kidney failure grew from 9.1 percent to 13.7 percent, according to the National Institutes of Health. 

Black patients, however, remain less likely to use home dialysis at 7.3 percent, compared to 9.3 percent of White patients. 

Previous research by Shen and Katherine Rizzolo, a nephrologist at Boston University, found that certain socioeconomic conditions, such as unstable housing, cause less access among Black people. 

“[Home dialysis requires] a lot of boxes. You have to get a certain amount of backup materials. You have to have a space for the machine,” Rozzolo says. “So, if you don’t have a space for that because you have unstable housing, a lot of places won’t feel safe putting you on this machine because you’re prone to get infections.”

Shen adds that more research needs to be done around potential bias among practitioners, considering that dialysis facilities that serve high rates of Black patients have lower rates of home dialysis referral and initiation.

“Another issue is just fewer home dialysis programs are available in communities where Black patients tend to dialyze,” she says. 

While insurance covers much of the expenses for home dialysis, there can be hidden costs. Unpaid time off from work for training can make it unaffordable, as well as money for a caregiver when additional help is required.  

“In addition, the amount of time it takes for a patient to set up the machine, to be on the machine, all of that is time that they can’t work,” Rozzolo says. 

Dialysis, in general, is costly. Depending on a patient’s insurance status and type of dialysis, expenses can range from $10,000 to $90,000 annually.

Bensouda says it’s a lifelong debt that she’ll never be able to pay fully. 

“There’s never a year that I don’t have expenses related to either dialysis or hospitalization or medication or taking time off because I’m not feeling that great…that’s just my reality,” she says. 

At home, Bensouda dialyzes three times a week for eight hours each, with the option to perform an additional treatment, if needed. The process requires inserting large needles into her body, a task she believes keeps some patients from giving home dialysis a try.

“There is responsibility here. It’s not like it’s just the easiest thing in the world. It takes time. It takes commitment,” she says. 

Hope and a kidney transplant

Bensouda remained on home-based dialysis for a decade while on a kidney transplant list. She was matched with a donor but encountered complications five years after the surgery.

“I got really sick one holiday season and went into the emergency room and found out that my kidney had been fully rejected,” she says.

With no choice but to return to dialysis, she once again chose the type that brought her the most comfort. 

“I knew that if I was going to survive emotionally this experience and continue with my life goals for my family, I would have to go back to home dialysis,” Bensouda says. 

A 100-pound portable hemodialysis machine allowed her to reclaim her love for traveling. She’s comfortably visited Kansas City, Missouri, and Cabo, Mexico. 

“I needed that machine in order to continue living my life the way that I need to,” Bensouda says.

Part of living her life is pursuing a master’s degree in public health and advocating for home dialysis accessibility in her community. 

“We need to push to make these types of therapies available to more people,” she says. “It really was a lifesaver and a game changer for me.”

This article was originally published by Word In Black.

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By Alexa Spencer,
Word In Black

When Quavo headed to the White House on Sept. 22, there’s no doubt the Migos rapper wished he was there for a happier reason.

But in Nov. 2022, Takeoff — his nephew and fellow group member — was shot and killed during an altercation at a Houston bowling alley. Now Quavo, who witnessed the shooting, is putting his efforts into supporting the first-ever White House Office of Gun Violence Prevention to address the nation’s gun violence epidemic.

Accompanied by his mom and his sister Titania Davenport, Takeoff’s mother, Quavo talked about dealing with the pain of losing his nephew, and the pressure on young Black men to buy into gun culture.

“I feel like it’s just so hard for us to say we hurting, or to say I want change, or to say I am coming to the White House and trying to get a gun law act,” he told Vice President Kamala Harris.

There’s no freedom without safety

The new federal office, announced on Sept. 22 by President Joe Biden, will be overseen by Harris, a former prosecutor and state attorney general who’s been vocal about banning assault weapons and implementing universal background checks.

“We know true freedom is not possible if people are not safe,” Harris said in a statement. “This epidemic of gun violence requires urgent leadership to end the fear and trauma that Americans experience every day.”

Harris’ vision where “every community” has the “freedom to live and to thrive” is not yet a reality for Americans — especially Black Americans, who are disproportionately impacted by gun violence.

Compared to White Americans, Black Americans experience 12 times the gun homicides, 18 times the gun assault injuries, and nearly three times the fatal shootings by police, according to Everytown for Gun Safety Action Fund.
Targeted by White Supremacist Terrorism

The community has also been a target for racially-motivated mass shootings in recent years: leaving nine dead at a church in Charleston, South Carolina in 2015, 10 at a supermarket in Buffalo, New York, in 2022, and three at a Dollar General in Jacksonville, Florida in August.

“Gun violence has no boundaries,” Lucy McBath, a congresswoman for Georgia’s 7th congressional district, said at the White House on Sept. 22.

McBath’s son, 17-year-old Jordan Davis, was fatally shot by a White man at a Jacksonville gas station in 2012 after an argument about loud music.

“The historic creation of the office of gun violence prevention marks a new era in the fight to keep us all safe,” McBath said. “The office will increase coordination between states and ensure proper implementation of the gun safety legislation that we have already passed in Congress.”

Guns are killing American children

Firearms have risen to a leading cause of death for children, a reality that Justin Jones, a Tennessee House representative, knows all too well.

Jones was expelled by the state legislature in March for protesting gun violence on the House floor after a Nashville school shooting took the lives of three elementary students and three adults.

He calls the Office of Gun Violence Prevention a “great victory.”

“We know that in our nation, gun violence is the leading cause of death for children,” Jones said in a video on X. “Just like FEMA responds to natural emergencies like hurricanes and tornadoes, this office is an emergency response to a crisis of gun violence that we are facing as a nation where we’ve had more mass shootings than days this year.”

The Office comes on the heels of the Bipartisan Safer Communities Act, a federal bill passed in June 2022 that enhanced gun control and access to school-based mental health care.

Biden said he’ll continue to urge Congress to take “commonsense actions that the majority of Americans support,” such as banning assault weapons.

“But in the absence of that sorely-needed action,” he said, “the Office of Gun Violence Prevention along with the rest of my Administration will continue to do everything it can to combat the epidemic of gun violence that is tearing our families, our communities, and our country apart,” he said.

As for Quavo, he’s fully committed to solutions.

“We need to do better with the control of guns,” he told the Congressional Black Caucus. “We need to figure out how do we keep these types of incidents from happening to people going anywhere and thinking they can hurt somebody where it shouldn’t happen.”

This article was originally published by Word In Black.

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By Ariama C. Long,
Word In Black

With the average graduate grappling with high inflation and housing costs, it turns out the real boogeyman haunting October is student loan repayments (with interest) — which are due to restart next month because of legislation passed by Congress.

According to the U.S. Department of Education (DOE), borrowers will receive a billing statement from a loan service provider containing a monthly payment amount in September or October, at least 21 days before the payment’s due date.

Onyekachi Okeke, 24, graduated from City University of New York (CUNY) Hunter College this Spring with over $25,000 in student loan debt. She studied human biology and sociology with hopes of enrolling in nursing school in New York City. Currently, she lives at home with her Nigerian family in the Bronx. For now, she is looking for a job to save up money for nursing school and for scholarships to help with costs. She thinks that realistically higher education and the cost of living is much more expensive than for previous generations, so just “working harder” isn’t going to cut it.

“College is seen as the time in our lives where we’re supposed to prepare ourselves to be able to enter the working field,” said Okeke. “I don’t understand why there’s not an emphasis on trying to help students so they can successfully [do that]. Many students when they graduate college, it’s very difficult to find jobs. Jobs now they want you to get a master’s or even higher to employ you [and] you have to deal with paying back your student loans. I think that’s insane.”

Okeke, who has been involved in political groups on campus, believes it’s doable to make at least CUNY college and universities tuition free and reinvest higher education funding into schools. “It just takes political will,” said Okeke. “When it comes to funding the military and wars and foreign affairs, they will find money for that.”

Unfortunately, President Joe Biden’s hail mary plan to cancel student debt was categorically blocked in courts and with legislation fueled by conservatives. 

As a cursory backup, Biden announced the Saving on a Valuable Education (SAVE) Plan, which is the newest income-driven repayment (IDR) plan that is supposed to dramatically decrease monthly payments by increasing the income exemption from 150 percent to 225 percent of the poverty line. The SAVE Plan replaced the Revised Pay As You Earn (REPAYE) Plan. Other plan options include the default Standard Repayment Plan, if you don’t pick a plan, the Extended Repayment Plan, Graduated Repayment Plan, and Income-Sensitive Repayment Plan.

A borrower can enroll in auto pay on a loan servicer’s website to save 0.25 percent on their interest rate. And the DOE advises borrowers to check if you qualify for loan forgiveness for public service employment, disability, or college wrongdoing.

“Every American deserves the opportunity to pursue a college education without the burden of unmanageable student loan debt. President Joe Biden and I are committed to delivering relief to student loan borrowers,” said Vice President Kamala Harris in a statement put out in August.

Harris said the SAVE plan upholds the “promise” the administration made to voters and they are “continuing to pursue an alternative path to deliver student debt relief to as many Americans as possible [and] as quickly as possible.”

Satra D. Taylor, 28, director of higher education and workforce policy & advocacy at Young Invincibles, said that she’s heard first-hand accounts about people panicking over budgeting for upcoming repayments from friends, family, and their 50 Borrowers 50 States project. Some people are considering forbearance or just not making payments altogether, she said.

“Many expected to have their student debt relieved so I’m concerned about what this means for the housing market, for young borrowers in general who may have already been struggling to meet their basic needs,” said Taylor. “I’m really thinking about all these compounded factors and what it will mean for our economy.”

It’s especially concerning considering the racial wealth gap among Black and Brown borrowers, said Taylor. Black college graduates more often have higher student loan debt than primarily White counterparts, an average of $52,726 compared to $28,006 for the typical White bachelor’s graduate, reported the White House Initiative on Educational Excellence for African Americans. 

Additionally, in the Young Invincibles Reimagining Federal Pell Grants report, Taylor said that more than 20 percent of Black young adult women occupy low-skill jobs—meaning positions like customer service representatives, cashiers, or retail salespersons. The report indicates that young adult workers from historically marginalized communities, especially women, hold these kinds of jobs at higher percentages than White men, necessitating a need for affordable higher education and accessible workforce development for students as a pathway to higher lifelong earnings.

Many borrowers are pessimistic at best about the repayments. 

A Queens native, Jessica K., 29, works as a program and evaluation coordinator at a nonprofit in the city. She has about $40,000 in student loan debt and currently makes $70,000 for her salary. Her debt is a combination of undergraduate and graduate school loans. At the moment, she has no dependents and rents in Astoria. 

“It’s doable but I’m weary about planning for my future. Retirement-wise,” said K. She feels that her future is more “unclear” and hasn’t really been planning for the upcoming payments.

Romy Enriquez, 39, was born and raised in Bushwick, Brooklyn. Enriquez, a local social studies teacher for the last ten years, has two kids and owns his own home. He’s been paying down his loans since his graduation, has received about $10,000 from the public service forgiveness program, and has at least $20,000 in student loan debt left. He said he feels “absolutely” no relief about the amount left he has to pay with other expenses like groceries, after school care, and his mortgage. 

“I wish that Biden’s plan had gone through,” said Enriquez. “[I feel] unexcited. Again, disappointed. All the negative emotions you can think of.”

Taylor, who’s from Cincinnati but resides in D.C., is also a third year doctoral student at the University of Maryland herself with over $100,000 of student loan debt. Since she’s currently in school she doesn’t have to pay at the moment but she is not excited about repayments after 2026. She said her debt-to-income ratio is not sustainable with two more years of schooling left.

“I have a Ph.D.,” said Taylor. “I’m still a Black woman. And so there’s still barriers within the workplace that will impact my salary unfortunately and it’s just what it is, which is why I also went back to school because I realized that not having a Ph.D. stopped me from certain promotions.”

Check out StudentAid.gov/restart for more info about repayments.

Ariama C. Long is a Report for America corps member and writes about politics for the Amsterdam News. 

This story was published by Word In Black.

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By Willy Blackmore
Word in Black

It’s no exaggeration to say that nearly all of LaPlace, Louisiana, flooded when Hurricane Ida hit the small town just upriver from New Orleans as a category 4 storm two years ago. Almost 60 percent of the 7,000 homes in the greater Saint John the Baptist Parish that are covered by the National Flood Insurance Program had to file a claim after the storm, which also left millions in southeastern Louisiana without power for upward of two weeks. It’s the kind of disaster that’s expected to happen again and again there in the future, according to an exhaustive new report from the Environmental Defense Fund and Texas A&M University. 

Saint John the Baptist Parish faces the greatest climate-change risk of any county in the entire country. The parish also happens to be nearly 60 percent Black.

The Climate Vulnerability Index, as the new report and mapping tool is called, shows just how disproportionally at-risk such communities are to climate change. In the 10 most-threatened communities, the population is about one-third Black, although Blacks make up only 13.6 percent of the nation’s population. Half of those communities are in Louisiana, with locales in Texas, South Carolina and Kentucky rounding out the list. It’s just the latest stark reminder that the history of racism in the United States has concentrated Black people in places that will be hit early and hard by the climate crisis. 

The Index draws from 184 different data sets to determine the climate risk of 70,000 census tracts across the country. It considers environmental risks (like flooding), socioeconomic matters (such as income and car ownership) and the availability of public resources, all of which affect how residents are able to respond to disasters. The Index also takes into account environmental pollution, a contributing factor in St. John the Baptist’s claim to the top spot: the parish is in Louisiana’s Cancer Alley, where practically every community ranks in the top 5 percent of the whole country for cancer risk from such pollution. 

Sitting on a wedge of low-lying land between Lake Pontchartrain and the Mississippi River, LaPlace tends to be flooded from the lake side. During hurricanes and other severe weather patterns, storm-surge buildup on Lake Pontchartrain and high winds push water over the western bank and into the town. 

After decades of delays, construction has begun on a levee that will protect the backside of the town, slated to be completed next year. But mitigating flood risk is only one piece of the overall puzzle in a community like St. John the Baptist Parish.

That’s where the Climate Vulnerability Index may be able to help. The tool is designed not only to show where the risks lie, but to help steer new investment in solutions. The Biden administration’s Inflation Reduction Act has made available “a historic level of funding” to build toward climate justice and equity, 

Dr. Grace Tee Lewis, a senior health scientist at the Environmental Defense Fund said in a news release. 

But the “right investments need to flow to the right places for the biggest impact.”

This article was originally published by Word in Black.

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By Alexa Spencer,
Word in Black

Black patients are more likely than other racial groups to be restrained during emergency department (ED) visits, according to a new study by Baylor University College of Medicine. The findings  — released in JAMA Internal Medicine on Sept. 25 — are based on a systematic review of 10 studies published through February 2022. 

Physical restraint in EDs is used to protect patients and staff from harm, but may have negative consequences, such as aspiration, physical trauma and psychological harm for those being treated. 

The team of researchers found that physical restraint was a rare occurrence during ED visits. However, of the 24,030 events of physical restraint represented in the review, Black adults were disproportionately impacted.

“The absolute event rate for restraint use was relatively low, less than 1 percent, but our results suggest that Black patients have a higher risk of restraint than patients of other racial groups,” said Dr. Vidya Eswaran, corresponding author of the paper and assistant professor of emergency medicine at Baylor. 

Physical restraint includes belts, vests, jackets, mitts, and other devices that confine the body and prevent movement. 

Abrasions and bruises are the most common complications. Asphyxia, in which a person loses consciousness due to lack of oxygen, can also occur. And physical restraints can lead to death if patients are not continually monitored by staff.

The American College of Emergency Physicians says using restraints can be dangerous to patients and staff and may raise civil rights and liberty issues, “including the right to refuse care, freedom from imprisonment, and freedom of association.” 

“However, there are circumstances when the use of restraints is in the best interest of the patient, staff, or the public,” the organization said in a policy statement.

Similarly, the American Medical Association says individuals have a fundamental right to be free from unreasonable bodily restraint, however, restraint may be justified if patients are at risk of harming themselves. 

“Except in emergencies, patients should be restrained only on a physician’s explicit order. Patients should never be restrained punitively, for convenience, or as an alternate to reasonable staffing,” the association stated.

The researchers at Baylor note that their analysis had limitations, though, past studies reveal the same disparity among Black patients.

Research by Yale University found that Black children were more likely than White children to be physically restrained during ED visits. Further research by the university discovered that Black uninsured males bore the brunt of restraints among adults.

“The small number of studies included in this review are of mixed quality and reveal that the assessment of race-based disparities in physical restraint use in the ED is understudied,” Eswaran said. 

Overall, she said more research needs to be conducted on this topic. 

“Showing that differences in restraint use exist is not enough,” she said.  “We must now further assess the mechanism for why these differences occur and what can be done to prevent them from persisting.”
This article was originally published by WordinBlack.

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By Joseph Williams,
Word in Black

Not long after starting work as a practicing physician, Dr. Paula Braveman reached an important diagnosis: many of the Black patients she treated for things like hypertension or diabetes had something in common. She later confirmed the observation as a public health researcher in San Francisco. 

Being Black in America, she concluded, is hazardous to your health. 

“Once you are sick, you definitely want medical care, but it is the conditions of your life that largely determine whether you get sick in the first place,” said Braveman, founding director of the Center for Health Equity and professor of family and community medicine at the University of California-San Francisco. 

“Structural racism systematically exposes Black people to health-harming conditions and obstructs their progress to health-promoting conditions,” Braveman said. “These factors did not just suddenly emerge. They have always been there, from slavery on.” 

There is, however, an interim prescription, Braveman says: Black people connecting to talk about their experiences in an atmosphere designed to heal, not hurt. 

“I think that seeking opportunities for Black people to come together and discuss with each other their experiences of racism, and how they deal with it, could have healing effects, but only if sustained over time,” Braveman said. “Racial healing is absolutely part of the equation.”

Until recently, the notion that things as disparate as housing or education can influence a person’s health outcomes was a radical idea with little scientific support. But researchers like Braverman and others found solid evidence that social determinants — the conditions and circumstances in which people are born, grow, live, work, and age — can shape their well-being. 

Factors driving health inequity are “disparities in the conditions that people experience, including racism in its many forms,” such as economic insecurity, unsafe or insecure housing, and poor nutrition, to name a few, Braveman said. “It’s important to understand that for Black people, racism, particularly structural and systemic racism, is actually the cause of almost all the other causes on this list and longer lists.”

Those conditions, she says, confirmed what she’d seen when she was a young doctor. 

“So many of my patients needed changes in the circumstances of their lives that could only be accomplished” through broad societal changes and public policy, Braveman said. “I see it all the time in my and others’ research findings.” 

For example, a study Braveman did with colleagues, she says, found that “among Black women, those who often or very often worried about being treated unfairly because of their race, were far more likely to give birth prematurely than Black women who were comparable in many other ways but who did not often worry about being treated unfairly because of their race.”

While it wasn’t until the last decade that social determinants of health became a field of study, “a light is at last being shone on them, with an understanding that they are direct products of racism,” Braveman said. “They operate whether or not any particular individual is identified who intends to discriminate; they operate because they are built into structures and systems, e.g., policies, laws, entrenched practices.”

For solutions, however, Braveman believes there must be racial healing on a broad scale. 

“I think that seeking opportunities for Black people to come together and discuss with each other their experiences of racism (and how they deal with it) could have healing effects, but only if sustained over time,” she said. “At least in the beginning, a skilled facilitator is probably needed, so this is not a super-cheap intervention.”

Braveman also points to the California Department of Public Health’s Black Infant Health Program, a series of classes specifically designed to address racial trauma among pregnant and parenting Black women. 

Along with providing long-term planning and a support network of other Black birthing people, the BIH program addresses internalized racism “by including a discussion of a ‘Black icon’—a Black individual who has made significant contributions to society,” according to a program description.  

While support for new parents and racial healing can help, reversing social determinants of health and creating health equity has to happen at a higher level, Braveman said. 

“The primary focus needs to be on changing the laws and policies (e.g. on voter suppression; on funding for schools; on environmental injustice) that are the fundamental instruments for racism’s effects,” she said. 

This story was produced in partnership with the W.K. Kellogg Foundation and originally published by Word in Black. 

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By John Celestand,
Word in Black

Being a lover of sports since I was a toddler and later becoming a professional basketball player in the NBA, it is safe to say I’ve had my share of disappointing moments in sports over the years. I remember missing the final shot at the buzzer of the Edison Boys Basketball League in New Jersey when I was in sixth grade. I must’ve cried into the wee hours of the morning, replaying how the ball rimmed out right as time expired.  

I remember when the Fab Five’s Chris Webber called the timeout in the waning seconds of the 1993 NCAA Championship game vs. North Carolina.  I still remember the look on his face, the sheer embarrassment and disappointment.  I can still see the cameras focusing in on him as he sat there, head down, dejected. I still can’t watch the replay of that game. 

I remember losing to Shawnee High School by 50 points in the New Jersey Group IV state semifinals in 1995, a game that would prove to be the final high school basketball game of my career.  A game in which my team didn’t score a basket in the entire third quarter. 

As I sat in the stands with my 10-year-old son at his first NFL football game on a rainy Sunday afternoon at FedEx Field in Landover, Maryland, I just could not have predicted what I was going to see two days later. On Tuesday, I came across this headline:  “J. Cole shared Colin Kaepernick’s letter to the Jets.  He’s looking to join the Jets practice squad.” 

“Letter to the Jets?” I thought to myself, “But Kap hasn’t played in years! Practice squad?” 

Add this to the list of my most disappointing moments in sports.  For Kaepernick to sacrifice his career; to not stand for the National Anthem but yet stand up for disenfranchised folks of color who have been violated, mauled, and sometimes murdered in America’s streets by those selected to serve and protect them; to be a martyr and stand shoulder-to-shoulder with great legendary athletes turned activists such as Muhammad Ali, John Carlos, Tommie Smith, Jim Brown, Bill Russell and others; and to then be begging for a “practice spot” with the New York Jets would make even the great Allen Iverson relive his famous quote: “We talking about practice? Not a game.”

How could he do this to us? After all, we had all been through this pain with him, right?  We had all stood behind him and taken this journey with him, right? Some of us refused to watch NFL games until we saw Kap back on the sideline where he belonged.  Many of us engaged in conversations or, better yet, flat-out arguments in barbershops, on street corners, in alleys and at backyard barbecues on how the NFL had now proven to us that it was the greatest plantation in sports. It was a league that would always try to beat you into submission, forcing you to show your respect for the shield, especially if you were a descendant of the Motherland.  

But this had to be a publicity stunt, right?  By no means would Colin Kaepernick, after being shunned, blackballed, forced out of America’s most popular sports league, now beg, resort to groveling and crawl back for a “chance” to run a damn practice squad after being out of the league for seven years. Not after having a Netflix series about his life.  Not after refusing to buckle, kneel and cave in to the demands of the NFL, White America, and true “American patriots.” 

Publicity stunt or not, it will go down as one of the most embarrassing moments╾not just for Kaepernick, but for those of us who walked a little taller because he never succumbed; for those of us who finally saw an athlete of this generation stand up and lay it all on the line while mirroring the purpose and gumption of athletes from past generations.  What the hell would Tupac say now?   

Maybe this is deeper than the surface thinkers among us can fathom.  Maybe J. Cole, being the intelligent wordsmith that he is, has already strategized with Kaepernick about how this will all play out.  Maybe one of the greatest rappers of this generation and Kaepernick, one of the most polarizing NFL players of our time, can see the forest for the trees.  

Or maybe, just maybe, we should stop questioning Kaepernick’s dedication to the cause.  Maybe we should stop questioning if he’s lost all his dignity and start looking at ourselves in the mirror.  As I reflected on my own actions, I realized that I read Kaepernick’s letter on my cell phone after spending a rainy NFL Sunday in an NFL stadium draped in Washington Commanders gear — after already dropping my hard-earned money on overpriced tickets, hot dogs and parking. All things I swore I’d boycott because of what they did to Kap back in 2016. But I just couldn’t stop watching my NFL, could I? My boycott lasted about three weeks.

How long did yours last?

This article was originally published by WordinBlack.

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By Joseph Williams,
Word in Black

Dr. Fallon Wilson has seen the future, and it is Black.  

A technology maven and self-described prophet, her visions are of Black Americans thriving in a society that’s equal parts Black Wall Street, Silicon Valley, and Wakanda. Every Black school and household will have broadband internet access. Well-funded historically Black colleges and universities will be at the vanguard of the nation’s technological innovation and research. 

In this world, Black girls code, artificial intelligence doesn’t discriminate, and Black people are driving change in America — just like our enslaved ancestors envisioned. 

“I believe Black people are future. We have always thought of ourselves as future,” says Wilson, a renowned social scientist, tech equity advocate and vice president of tech policy at the Multicultural Media, Telecom and Internet Council.

“We have always dreamed. ‘Freedom Dreams’ is one of my favorite books, because (author) Robin D.G. Kelly chronicles how Black people have always imagined freedom,” even if that future didn’t seem attainable. 

“We have always had to think of ourselves beyond the current moment,” she says, “because if we stood only in the moment, it would look devastating and demoralizing.”

Described as the Fannie Lou Hamer of tech, Wilson has spent her career working to bring sorely-needed equity to the fast-moving digital world, working with colleges, tech companies, nonprofits, and the White House to make it happen. At the same time, however, she’s an outspoken evangelist for a grassroots Black tech movement “aligned in a vision of freedom.”

That vision emerges in Wilson’s 2019 TEDx-Nashville talk, titled, “Stop Ignoring Black Women and Hear of Our Tech Prophecies.”

In the 15-minute talk, she references civil rights pioneers, scriptures, and Black Joy to upend misconceptions about Black people in the digital landscape — and Black people’s misconceptions about technology. 

But she also reminds listeners that the tech divide is real, and that the Black tech future she sees is more realistic than it seems. After all, she says, enslaved Black people had to first imagine freedom before it could even become a realistic possibility. 

“I dream of a national unified Black tech ecosystem reminiscent of Black Wall Street before White supremacy annihilated it,” she told the TEDx audience, referring to the Greenwood section of Tulsa, Oklahoma, a flourishing Black community that an angry White mob burned to the ground in 1921. “I dream of a flesh and blood Wakanda-like ecosystem.”

That ecosystem, she says, is centered in bringing broadband internet access to churches and public schools — encouraging legacy organizations like the NAACP to adopt a tech agenda, and standing up organizations like the Algorithmic Justice League and Data for Black Lives. 

It sweeps in racial healing, including an acknowledgment of trauma. It speaks truth to powerful tech companies, particularly how lack of diversity results in discriminatory algorithms and biased A.I. And it includes Black Joy as a fundamental principle.  

“We have to build a future and have to get black people ready for the world that is currently being built,” she says. “And so the model that we developed for the #BlackTechFutures Research Institute is that it takes an ecosystem to address the main structural challenges that keep Black people from living and thriving in a world where machines are everywhere.”

That future has arrived, Wilson says, with the advent of A.I. and self-driving cars, among other things. But the moment, she says, is also “an opportunity to (destroy) the structural constraints of racial equity for tech futures in this country.”

Smashing those barriers, and realizing the Black community can write its own future, is essential to racial healing, she says. 

But the challenge is real: According to the Joint Center for Political and Economic Studies, 34 percent of Black adults do not have home broadband, and 30.6 percent of Black households with one or more children aged 17 or younger lack high-speed home internet. Wilson, however, is bullish on Black future, driven by self-empowerment and overcoming present-day obstacles.  

“This is the thing about White supremacy: It keeps you always looking down so that you can never look up and look around and see how everything you need is right there,” Wilson says. “My money’s on us — that’s it.” 

“I tell people all the time: We are who we have been waiting for,” she says.

This story was produced in partnership with the W.K. Kellogg Foundation and originally published by Word in Black.

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