Black Education

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    Sidelines Activist: Charles S. Johnson and the Struggle for Civil Rights

    This is the first full-length biography of Charles S. Johnson (1893-1956). Although he called himself a "sidelines activist," his advocacy for racial equality was never watered-down or half-hearted. His strategy was to work indirectly, sometimes behind the scenes, to influence public policy and to mobilize groups with special concerns, especially black sharecroppers. Together with W. E. B. Du Bois and E. Franklin Frazier he has been named as a "founding father" among contemporary black sociologists. In a coalition with an embattled band of southern white liberals he pressed the federal government to end lynching, the poll tax, "separate but equal" schooling, and other racial inequalities of the Jim Crow era. Throughout his career Johnson played the vital role of building bridges between the races, specifically in gaining white philanthropic support in a stimulating activism in the black community. For a quarter of a century he conducted research on the South's twin system of economic and racial exploitation. Two of his books-Shadow of the Plantation and Growing up in the Black Belt (a study of black youth and its problems in the 1930s)-are recognized today as classics. In the last ten years of his life Johnson served as the first black president of Fisk University, one of the most important of the historically black colleges. [richard_robbins]_sidelines_activist_charles_s._j_bookzz.org_

    The Skin That We Speak: Thoughts on Language and Culture in the Classroom

    Now in paperback, The Skin That We Speak takes the discussion of language in the classroom beyond the highly charged war of idioms and presents today’s teachers with a thoughtful exploration of the varieties of English that we speak, in what Black Issues Book Review calls “an essential text.” Edited by bestselling author Lisa Delpit and education professor Joanne Kilgour Dowdy, the book includes an extended new piece by Delpit herself, as well as groundbreaking work by Herbert Kohl, Gloria Ladson-Billings, and Victoria Purcell-Gates, as well as classic texts by Geneva Smitherman and Asa Hilliard. At a time when children are written off in our schools because they do not speak formal English, and when the class- and race-biased language used to describe those children determines their fate, The Skin That We Speak offers a cutting-edge look at crucial educational issues. 1595583505

    Academically Gifted African American Male College Students

    At a time when so many studies of African American students focus on the factors of failure, Academically Gifted African American Male College Students fills a conspicuous void in the research literature on post-secondary education by focusing on success. Like no other work before it, this remarkable study goes deep inside the experiences of academically gifted African American men who successfully navigate their way through rigorous college-level programs. At the heart of the unique and long overdue work are two real-life stories of African American male students: one at a Historically Black College and University (HBCU) and the other at a Traditionally White Institution (TWI). In presenting, comparing, and contrasting these two cases, the book identifies a number of personal characteristics and institutional approaches driving their notable achievements. The result is a guidebook both for gifted African American male students and for the institutions looking to strengthen their support for them—particularly in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) disciplines. [Fred_A._Bonner_II]_Academically_Gifted_African_Am_bookos-z1.org_

    Integration Interrupted: Tracking, Black Students, and Acting White after Brown

    An all-too-popular explanation for why black students aren't doing better in school is their own use of the "acting white" slur to ridicule fellow blacks for taking advanced classes, doing schoolwork, and striving to earn high grades. Carefully reconsidering how and why black students have come to equate school success with whiteness, Integration Interrupted argues that when students understand race to be connected with achievement, it is a powerful lesson conveyed by schools, not their peers. Drawing on over ten years of ethnographic research, Karolyn Tyson shows how equating school success with "acting white" arose in the aftermath of Brown v. Board of Education through the practice of curriculum tracking, which separates students for instruction, ostensibly by ability and prior achievement. Only in very specific circumstances, when black students are drastically underrepresented in advanced and gifted classes, do anxieties about "the burden of acting white" emerge. Racialized tracking continues to define the typical American secondary school, but it goes unremarked, except by the young people who experience its costs and consequences daily. The rich narratives in Integration Interrupted throw light on the complex relationships underlying school behaviors and convincingly demonstrate that the problem lies not with students, but instead with how we organize our schools. [Karolyn_Tyson]_Integration_Interrupted_Tracking__bookos-z1.org_

    A Troubled Dream: The Promise and Failure of School Desegregation in Louisiana

    Fifty years after Brown v. Board of Education, the United States still has a long way to go to attain true integration of our educational system. Using extensive interviews and a wealth of statistical information, Bankston and Caldas examine the failed desegregation efforts in Louisiana as a case study to show how desegregation has followed the same unsuccessful pattern across the United States. Strong supporters of the dream of integration, Bankston and Caldas show that the practical difficulty with desegregation is that academic environments are created by all the students in a school from the backgrounds that all the students bring with them. Unfortunately, the disadvantages that minority children have to overcome affect schools more than schools can help remedy these disadvantages. [Carl_L._Bankston__Stephen_J._Caldas]_A_Troubled_D_bookos-z1.org_

    Reversing Underachievement Among Gifted Black Students

    This landmark book offers a new beginning on its often ignored subject: the effort to end underachievement among gifted black students and to increase the multicultural and multiracial representation of youth in gifted education. [donna_y._ford]_reversing_underachievement_among_g_bookos-z1.org_

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