Uptown Notes

On February 10th, I had the pleasure of joining an esteemed set of scholars for the 143rd Founder’s Day Symposium [...]

“History is not a procession of illustrious people. It’s about what happens to a people. Millions of anonymous people is [...]

And one of them is not the use of the word Negro which has BEEN appearing, including on the 2000 [...]

This is my reflection on Imani: Faith…
Faith is often thought of in a religious and spiritual way. Having grown up [...]

This is my reflection on Nia Purpose ”To make our collective vocation the building and developing of our community in order [...]

This is my reflection on the principle of Ujamaa – Cooperative Economics…
The title of the post is a variation on [...]

To me, the situation of urban education is much like the common cold, as technology advances, we find more and more options that tend to abate sickness, cover the symptoms, but still there is no cure. The biggest confusion that I see emerging around urban education is the highlight of a few successful schools in a city and mistaking that as the probable, that is what will likely happen, in the city as the whole.

I just watched Precious, Lee Daniel’s film based on the novel Push by Sapphire, and the only way I can find to describe it is extraordinary in the superlative and literal sense. Extraordinary, in the superlative sense, for its craftsmanship in visually and textually telling a narrative of the composite character Precious. It is extra-ordinary (beyond ordinary), in the literal sense, in that it concentrates on a particular set of lives ravished by sexual abuse, physical abuse, and poverty. This is not the tale of all in poverty, but it is a tale that exists.

For the past few weeks I’ve remained unsettled by the videotape of Derrion Albert’s death at the hands of Black youth in Chicago. Like many, I avoided the tape for days on end, only to finally watch it in horror, with pain, and without direct recourse. This feeling of paralysis that many of us have felt is not one that is new to our community, whether it was the viewing of Emmett Till’s body in Jet or the railroading of the Central Park Five, the loss and defilement of Black male life at the hands of those Black, White or other remains sickening.

We, the concerned, the tired, and the committed have a rare opportunity to join not just in frustration, but in production. This week, at the Think Tank for African American Progress' meeting in Memphis, Tennessee entitled: "What is the future of Black Boys?" While the media, and by admission in many of our community, suggest there is little being done to combat the conditions that black male youth face, there is work, there is opportunity, and there is the need for your voice and energy.

There are real dangers to Obama’s education speech for Sept 8th, but they’re not what the Right are talking about.