Why We Celebrate
African American History Month:
Reflections on Education
By Frank A. Bolden
February 4, 2001
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morning.
African American History Month is usually noted by churches
with the exchange of Pastors, choirs and sometimes even a joint dinner with
Black and White congregations and that's about it until the next year.
The intent to learn more about each other and to spend more
time together is present but there are so many other things to do and the
calendars are so full of events that getting together again is something that
doesn't happened until maybe the joint Thanksgiving service.
Then there is the rush to Christmas and
African American History Month all over again.
This year at Christ Church we will celebrate a new way. We
will celebrate African American History Month by reviewing why it is still
necessary to have African American History Month at all.
When the tradition began in 1926, Negroes' contribution to
the development of our nation was not taught in schools. Is that still the case today?
That's a good question and there are many other questions we
hope to generate during the rest of our celebration.
Each week this month the Bulletin will contain an insert
listing information showing the difference between the lives of Blacks and Whites
in our country today. We have selected
four different areas on which to focus our attention - education, employment,
healthcare and justice. At the service
each Sunday a speaker will briefly address the topic of the week.
We will ask a lot of questions but offer few answers. Providing the answers will be up to you.
At the end of the month a survey will be conducted to
determine the level of interest for further exploration of any of the
topics. If sufficient interest
surfices, follow up groups will be formed.
Let's start our celebration with education. The American dream of prosperity - health
and wealth - is so powerful that it motivates immigrants to brave extreme
hardship just to reach our shores. That
dream is fueled by education.
Most parents pray that their children will have bettter
lives than they do. In the United
States the key for turning that dream into reality is a good education. Our outstanding education institution in an
integral part of the solid foundation open which our nation was build.
When Negro history began in 1926, Negroes were not allowed
to fully participate in the education system. Since that time we have made tremendous progress in that area, but the
data in today's insert shows there is a difference between the education for
Blacks and the education for whites in our state.
On Friday the Star Ledgers published the report card for New
Jersey schools for last year. The
article clearly showed the gap between races with the biggest difference being
between blacks and whites. Why does
such a gap exist in 2001?
Problems don't just exist in urban areas. We have issues in our own communities. When our youngest child graduated from
middle school he was in the top 10th of his class with almost all
A's. At the commencement ceremony all
26 members of our family were waiting for his name to be called to receive the
United States Presidential Scholar Award. His name was never called. We
were very disappointed and could not understand what happened because we knew
he met the criteria. We discussed the
matter with the principal and the superintendent.
They knew us well from prior discussions most recently the
year before when we learned that our child had not been selected to pre-algebra
in the 8th grade even through he had an A average at the time. This was important because students who got
pre-algebra would then be eligible for advance courses in science at high
school. At that time our son was not
selected because they said he had to work too hard to earn his grades - that
"they" thought it would be better for him to be placed in the lower
math. Needless to say, that didn't
happen.
We learned that he had met the criteria for the Presidential
Scholar Award but the school system had a higher criteria than the White House
did for the award - an unpublished subjective criteria. After discussing the issues the school
system decided that our son did indeed meet the criteria and they presented his
award to him at the assembly during his first day of high school with me and my
wife in the audience but not the 24 other family members who had been at his
graduation. I can't begin to describe
the pain, the disappointment, the other frustrations this situation caused our
son and us. Some of our friends thought
this was an example of racism especially since the only two students who were
adversely effected by the unpublished, subjective criteria were our son and a
Jewish schoolmate.
How many other black students have experienced similar
treatment during the vulnerable time of their education?
As we look at education and African American History Month
there is a lot to celebrate from the dismantling of the separate but equal
doctrine by The Brown vs. Board Ed.
Supreme Court Case to the battles over integration of schools in Alabama, Georgia,
Little Rock and New Jersey. There have
also been famous black educators like Booke T. Washington, Benjamin Mays, Mary
McLeod Bethune and Jonetta Coles. But
our celebration is not about that or them. They represent achievement of the past. Our celebration is about the present and the future. Our celebration is about addressing the gaps
that exist today. If we don't who will?
We live in the greatest county in the world with
trillion dollar surpluses forecasted for the near future. We have the ability to insure that the key
to the American dream is available to all our children. The question is do we care enough to get the
job done?
We have the ability to make future celebrations of African
Americans History Month the Celebration of how fine our system really works for
everyone. We can do that, or we can
continue the celebration as a time to look at the gaps between black and white
Americans. If we choose the former,
education is the key.
