by Natasha S. Robinson | Nov 3, 2011 | Feature, Headline News |
I am the product of the American public school system. There was only one high school option in the city where I was raised; I assimilated to this school where approximately 96 percent of the student population was African American. Like so many others, I had big dreams, so I did the best that I could for the possibility of exploring opportunities outside my small town. Thanks to the love, support, education, and training that I received from teachers, guidance counselors, and administrators in that school, I was able to walk across the graduation stage and shake the hand of former Vice President Dick Cheney as I received my bachelor’s degree from the United States Naval Academy in 2002.
Less than ten years later, I find myself perplexed at the lack of preparation of so many students graduating from the public school system, if they graduate from high school at all. The 2010 Waiting for Superman documentary revealed that there are over 2,000 high school “dropout factories” in the United States. These are failing schools in failing neighborhoods where students do not have the caring guidance counselors, mentors, or teachers that I had while growing up. These kids do not have choices, so their dreams die, and as far as they are concerned, all of their life’s hope dies with them.
My brother attended schools where the cafeteria ran out of salad before his lunch hour, or maybe the leaves on the remaining salad were brown. I have seen first hand the old, worn textbooks with missing pages. I have tutored middle and high school students that were making As and Bs in the public school system, yet could not read, write, or walk you through the steps of a basic algebra problem.
What happens to all of these children? They sometimes end up in prison or on the streets. And many rich and middle-class (or what used to be middle-class) Americans sit idly by as we have victimized these children and forced them to fail for no other reason than being born into the wrong womb in the wrong neighborhood where they attend the worst schools. They are not prepared to embrace the opportunities that are now failing even some of the most educated and hardworking Americans.
It is comfortable to pretend as if this tragedy is not going on because it is not happening in your neighborhood, but I ask this question: “What about the least of those among us?” We are raising an illiterate generation; what does that mean for the church?
It means that young people are not being taught to know God intimately and grow in their relationship with Him. After all, mature Christians frequently point to the Bible for revelations of our faith. We point to the Bible for those who desire to know God. The Bible is a book that consists of various genres of literature: narratives, poetry, similes and metaphors, allegory, and other types of figurative language that are not all accurately interpreted in the same manner.
Instead of confronting this challenge, we set the standards lower. In the same manner that the public school system is passing students through school, American Christians are giving the silent nod in support with sound-bite theology for our young people — give them a devotional, show a video, invent a quick phone app, after all their attention span is not that long (so there are no expectations for them to sit and learn through the oral traditions of old). Our young people need to be educated and they need to know the Bible.
When addressing issues of abstinence, life’s purpose, failing expectations, homosexuality, developing Christian character and the like, Bible literacy is more important than ever for our young people. Here’s the bottom line: it is our responsibility to teach our youth, to come alongside them, and help them see the importance of getting a good education. It is also our responsibility to paint the big picture for them about how a solid academic foundation can lead to God’s greater good for their lives.
I believe that the failing educational system is one of the greatest domestic justice issues of today’s American church. God requires us to act justly, love mercy, and walk humbly with Him. We are to care about the same things that He cares about and the last time I checked, “Jesus loves the little children, all the children of the world.”
I wonder what would happen in this country if the church rose to lead the charge to provide educational options. What would happen if churches spent money to build and resource more schools to support free Christian education instead of building bigger sanctuaries for themselves? Or what would happen if those same churches with resources bought buses to bring students to their churches and financially support a tutoring ministry for the children who need it?
What would happen if the homeschool moms decided to also homeschool a child who lives across the tracks or across the bridge? If they had the same concern for their neighbor’s children as they do for their own?
What would happen if Christian men made this injustice a priority? Or if housewives, stay-at-home moms, singles and widows, unemployed and part-time workers, and retirees committed their time and resources to tutoring youth in the neighborhoods where the schools are failing? There is more than enough work for all of us to do.
I wonder if the church stood up, would we continue to see a lost generation of children whose lives of struggle are sure to end in poverty, prostitution, jail, unhealthy relationships, or homelessness? I wonder if any of this matters to the church.
by Andrew B. Williams, Ph.D. | Oct 28, 2011 | Feature, Headline News |
CORE VISION: Steve Jobs understood that a true, passionate commitment to a diverse and inclusive environment does not diminish innovation -- it enhances it. (Photo by Dai Sugano/Newscom.)
Steve Jobs has long been celebrated as a hero for middle-class, geeky white guys. But he was also deeply concerned about bringing more minorities into engineering, and into his own company. I know, because he told me. Even better, he hired me to help him do it.
Little did I know, God would allow my life path to intersect with that of Steve Jobs, the late cofounder and CEO of Apple. I met Steve four years ago and continued to interact with him until this past spring.
Since 2004, I’ve taught computer science at Spelman College, the historically black school for women in Atlanta. In December 2007, I took the SpelBots, Spelman College’s all-women robotics team, to Stanford University to give a presentation at Stanford’s Clayman Institute for Gender Research, which included an open showcase to the community. The SpelBots represent undergraduate female student trailblazers and role models who are paving the way for younger female and African American students by competing internationally against graduate-level engineering universities in RoboCup humanoid robot soccer competitions. RoboCup represents the closest we have to an international “Olympics” of robotics and artificial intelligence research.
After the SpelBots’ visit to Stanford, we did a tour of Silicon Valley, stopping off at Google for breakfast and Apple for lunch so that our students could see these world-class technology companies firsthand. During our lunch at Apple, my friend Scott, who was an employee there, told me not to look over my shoulder. “Steve Jobs just walked in with Jonathan Ive,” he whispered. I immediately recognized Steve, but I had no idea who Jonathan Ive was until Scott explained that he was the chief industrial designer for Apple, the man who had designed such gadgets as the iPhone and the iMac.
It didn’t take long for me to realize that Steve was both revered and feared at Apple, and that it was not a good idea to go up to Steve and try to talk to him. So, I went over to Jonathan Ive instead. I introduced myself and told him how much I liked his designs. We were having a nice chat when, suddenly, Steve Jobs came over to us.
I introduced myself, innocently including a little backstory as well: “Hi, I’m Andrew Williams, from Spelman College, a historically black college for women in Atlanta, and Apple supports our robotics team.”
Steve quickly asked, “Do you have an engineering program?”
“We have a dual engineering program with universities such as Georgia Tech and Michigan,” I told him.
“Can you help us hire black engineers?” he said. “Do you know how many black engineers we have?”
Before I could say anything he shared a shockingly low number and confessed how poorly Apple was doing in finding black candidates. I’ll skip the full exchange, but suffice it to say, I got an intimate peek into Steve’s passion and energy. He was seriously upset at Apple’s efforts in that area. His last words to me that day were, “If you have any ideas on how we can hire more black engineers, send me an email.”
King of Silicon Valley
Having grown up in a small Kansas Army town, living in a two-bedroom trailer with my African American dad, Korean mom, and five siblings, my path to overcoming poverty and earning my Ph.D. in electrical engineering was not always clear. But there I stood that day, amazed at how God had given me the opportunity to meet the greatest innovator of my lifetime.
I recalled reading in the Book of Proverbs, “Do you see a man skilled in his work? He shall stand before kings; He will not stand before obscure men.” I had taken those words of wisdom to heart while pursuing my education, and now I was realizing them.
While working at GE Medical Systems in the early ’90s, during the first dot-com boom, I grieved the fact that there weren’t more African Americans going to Silicon Valley and making a difference in the new technological era. I understood that many underrepresented minorities lacked the connections and education to become computing entrepreneurs. But now, there I was being asked by, in my view, the ultimate computing entrepreneur for help in getting more African Americans to work for his world-renowned Silicon Valley company.
Wow.
Challenging Steve Jobs
In 1995, I earned my master’s degree in electrical and computer engineering from Marquette University while I was at GE. I then left GE to work on my Ph.D. in electrical engineering at the University of Kansas. I received my doctorate in 1999. Ever since, my passion has been to help underrepresented students reach their full educational potential in computing, so that they can play a productive role in our world’s changing economy and perhaps aspire to become “the next Steve Jobs.”
After my encounter with Steve, I went home and thought and prayed about what ideas I would give him about recruiting more black engineers at Apple. Then I composed an email that would change my life.
I began by explaining why I did what I did, including how my wife, Anitra, and I decided after reading The Purpose-Driven Life that I would leave my tenure-track faculty position at the University of Iowa so that I could fulfill my purpose of helping underrepresented students. I even attached a picture of my wife Anitra and my children, John, Adrianna, and Rosa to the email.
I also told him about the positive things I observed Apple doing to encourage and expand diversity. Apple, at the time, was building relationships with Atlanta University Center schools. I told him about my wife’s experience with her retail position at the Apple Store in Atlanta and how I could see growing diversity there. I bragged about how my Apple friends Scott and Denise were doing great with improving Apple’s diversity in both its university relations and retail. Denise, by the way, is an African American woman who at the time was Apple’s director of human resources for global retail.
I told Steve how important it was for students to see other underrepresented and female role models at top positions at Apple including its board of directors. I suggested he needed to make efforts to recruit at non-traditional “Apple” elite schools, such as historically black colleges and universities (HBCUs) and women’s colleges. I told him that our current SpelBots captain would make a great intern at Apple. I mentioned that it’s important to consider the importance of family when dealing with African American students in making career and education decisions. I also let him know that I admired Apple and that it was one of the few companies for which I would consider leaving academia.
After I sent the email, I waited and didn’t hear anything for several days. I think my Apple friends were concerned because few people dared to confront Steve and tell him what he should do. Yet I saw him as a fellow human being who was concerned with helping underrepresented students make his company continue to be great. A week later, I received a phone call from Scott, and later a copy of an email Steve had sent internally about how he was “sooooooooooooo happy” about what I told him about Apple’s recent diversity efforts and that he wanted to hire me to help “hire black engineers.” He had read my email so thoroughly that he pointed out that I had hinted I would consider working at Apple.
I soon found myself taking a yearlong sabbatical from Spelman College to become a full-time Apple employee. I was named Apple’s first Senior Engineering Diversity Manager.
I won’t divulge all that I did and saw at Apple, but I did witness positive changes being made at levels that were way above me that could only have come from Steve. I was able to directly influence the hiring of more African Americans, women, and other minorities as interns and eventually full-time Apple engineers.
SPELBOTS COMETH: The 2011 SpelBots team (from left) Coach Andrew Williams, Christina Sparks, Amelia Henderson, Tyler Davis, Jonecia Keels, Jazmine Miller, Naquasia Jones, and program manager Angela Church. (Not pictured: Breoshshala Martin, Daria Jordan, Chanel Johnson.)
I was especially proud that I played a role in helping one of my students become the first Spelman grad to work as a full-time engineer at Apple, after she had obtained her initial internship through my contact with Steve. I’ve met African American engineers at Apple who helped design the iPad; one of my former female students from the University of Iowa works with Jon Ive’s group; there are African Americans intimately involved with the App store; and the list goes on. There are now literally dozens of engineers from underrepresented groups who are making a contribution to the development of Apple’s products.
Final Respects
I continued interacting with Steve in various ways after I ended my sabbatical at Apple. I gave him a copy of my autobiography, he received my family’s Christmas newsletter, and we periodically connected via email or indirect messages. One poignant note that I sent to him shared how with Apple’s new FaceTime feature I was able to “tuck in” my youngest daughter, Rosa, while I was away from home on business trips. Using FaceTime, I’d tell her a story and pray with her before she went to bed. Because of Apple’s technology, we didn’t have to sacrifice our bedtime routine — even when I was a thousand miles away.
My final interaction with Steve occurred this past spring. In a March 30th email, I told him I was praying for him and his family. I also let him know that one of our SpelBots students had won a national iPhone app competition and that she thought Apple should hire her as an intern. She had applied for summer internships at Apple over the last few years but could never break through. I didn’t hear back from Steve directly, but not long after that my student received a call from an Apple recruiter who said Steve had forwarded her résumé. Sure enough, this past summer our SpelBots student was hired as an Apple intern and soon will be offered a full-time position as an engineer.
A company such as Apple, which at the time of this writing has over $80 billion of cash on hand, can pick and choose whomever they want to hire. So, I’m always glad when they recognize the talent and potential of individuals from groups that are underrepresented in the engineering ranks.
My hope is that Steve’s vision for diversity at Apple will not die now that he’s gone. I also hope that other CEOs learn from him that a true, passionate commitment to a diverse and inclusive environment does not diminish but only enhances innovation.
Take it from Steve Jobs to understand diversity’s value and significance. He recognized that a diverse team of smart and creative people was essential to the success of his company, and to the future of our nation’s global competitiveness. Because of his sincere commitment to diversity, who knows? The next great American innovator could very well be an African American, a Latino, a woman. The iPad and the iPhone are wonderful, but for me that would be Steve’s most enduring legacy.
by Wil LaVeist | Sep 30, 2011 | Feature, Headline News |
It has been refreshing to watch the NBC News special series Education Nation inspire a national discussion on teaching American children. Especially impressive has been hearing from the diversity of excellent educators — whites, blacks, Hispanics, Asians, and so on — from across the country. But even as a wonderful national conversation unfolds, on some level everyone understand that any significant transformation for our children must happen at the state and local levels.
Recently, The Virginian-Pilot, the major newspaper in my area, ran a story about student-teacher racial imbalance in South Hampton Roads schools. The Sept. 17 headline, “Teacher-student racial imbalance widest in Va. Beach” honed in on that school district’s difficulty recruiting black teachers who could help increase black student achievement.
The article cited a 2004 study by Thomas Dee, a public policy professor at the University of Virginia, who found that white and black students in Tennessee tested better when they had teachers of their own race. Yes, diversity is very important but it’s not the main problem. The headline should’ve read, “Too many weak white teachers failing students.”
Whether white, black or other, excellent educators know how to teach ALL students regardless of their color. Overemphasizing diversity sends a message to weak white teachers that it’s okay to mis-educate students who don’t look like them. It lets these teachers — who are dishonoring the profession — off the hook.
Since the majority of teachers are white, this problem has, in part, been ruining generations of black and Hispanic students across the country. It almost claimed one of my children who attended high school in nearby Suffolk. During a parent-teacher’s conference, my wife and I endured a meeting with our daughter’s theater teacher that proved to be a turning point in our child’s education. She had approached the teacher for help to prepare to audition for the area’s Governor’s School for the Arts, which offers intense training to gifted students. Students attend their regular high school in the morning, then arts classes in the afternoon.
The weak teacher (who is white) gave my daughter (who is black) the cold shoulder. During the conference we asked the teacher about this. Displaying an air of annoyance, she told us that our daughter (who had been acting since age seven) had shown little to no talent. She said our daughter had no chance of getting in because the teacher’s “more talented” student (who was white) had auditioned previously and didn’t make it. In fact, no theater student from that high school had.
Recalling our own high school experiences with discouraging teachers and guidance counselors, my wife and I simply eyed each other instead of blowing gaskets. We knew who and what we were dealing with. We looked at our daughter, whose blank expression masked her fury and embarrassment. Our daughter knew it was time she stopped undermining herself and stepped up her game.
A few weeks later she successfully auditioned for the Governor’s School. Two years later she graduated (this past June) and is now away in college studying theater and psychology.
Strong teachers, whether they are white, black or other, inspire students. With hormones raging, middle and high-schoolers tend to respond negatively to teachers whom they sense don’t care. This happens too often with black and Hispanic students under white teachers who are weak or worse. Instead of saying, “I’ll prove you wrong,” like my daughter did, many of them act out (not doing homework, not studying, cutting classes, etc.), thinking that they are somehow getting back at the teacher. After it’s too late, these mis-educated students realize they’ve only hurt themselves.
Black, Hispanic, and low-income students of all races are being suffocated each year. It’s near hopeless if their parents are deadbeats or otherwise unable to actively engage. Unless the student has an internal drive to achieve and or has family support pushing him or her, one teacher, one authority figure, with one discouraging word, can strangle their will to succeed. Likewise, one teacher, one authority figure with an encouraging word can inspire a student toward greatness.
The article noted that Virginia Beach has had trouble finding black teachers — despite major HBCUs Hampton University and Norfolk State University being in its backyard. To provide some context, Virginia Beach has 440,000 residents with a 20 percent black population, but the city has never had a black mayor and just recently appointed its only African American on the city council. Sadly, the community can’t seem to shake a racist image linked to a clash between police and black college students at Greekfest in 1989. The incident drew unwanted national attention.
But Virginia Beach is not alone. Other districts are having trouble finding black teachers as well, as many black graduates are pursuing higher-paying careers. The promise of fatter paychecks is likely not the only reason for their disinterest. I suspect the bad experiences many of them had with teachers in middle and high school is also at the root. People often choose careers because someone inspired them. Why go into a field in which you had to overcome discouragement? Perhaps as black students have better experiences with strong teachers in middle and high school, more of them will aspire to teach after college.
Diversity can help, but it’s not the cure. There are also many black and Hispanic weak teachers who have low expectations of students who look like them. In the article, Professor Dee offered the solution: “We need teachers who are flat-out good and who we can train to be good for all students,” he said.
Amen.
by LaVonne Neff | Aug 18, 2011 | Feature, Headline News |
POINT/COUNTERPOINT: Protesters from either side of the political divide have descended on Washington this year to make their cases for the preservation or elimination of federal programs.
I have to ask myself: am I part of the American majority who wants to scale back government expenses — as long as none of my personal benefits are touched?
I confess: I turned 63 last week, and I don’t want Social Security or Medicare reduced or — heaven help us — privatized.
I have personal reasons.
My husband and I have been saving heavily for 20 years, have paid off the mortgage on our modest house, have nursing-home insurance policies, and have no debts whatsoever. Nevertheless, our retirement accounts have been significantly diminished by the recession of 2008-11, and the future of stocks and bonds does not look good. Without Social Security to supplement our savings, we’d have a rough retirement.
Both of us take good care of our health. We’ve never smoked, and we exercise daily. We eat no red meat, few desserts, and lots of whole grains, vegetables, and fruit. My weight has always been right where it’s supposed to be, and his isn’t far off. Nevertheless, I’m scheduled to have open heart surgery next week, and I will need to have costly check-ups and possibly medications for the rest of my life. Without Medicare, I’d probably have a very short retirement.
So yes, I’d much prefer that we strengthen Social Security, Medicare, and our entire health-care system and stop paying for 46.5 percent of global military spending, for example.
But my reasons are not entirely personal. Although my husband and I are the kind of people Republicans love (and Jesus worried about), we will be in trouble if the senior safety nets come down, right along with people who have had to face unemployment, divorce, foreclosure, addictions, natural disasters, accidents, disabilities, and catastrophic illness; right along with people who don’t know how to manage money, who abuse their health, and who long ago stopped thinking about tomorrow (see my personal blog for an earlier post, “The United States of Florida“).
Really, folks, this isn’t a question of deserving. As Jesus pointed out, God “makes his sun rise on the evil and on the good, and sends rain on the righteous and on the unrighteous” (Matthew 5:45). God may or may not be the sender, but I’ve noticed that crap falls on both the good and the bad as well. We all benefit from God’s grace, and we’re all just one step away from catastrophe.
Government programs can’t give us comfortable lifestyles if we have no job and no savings. They may not be able to give us good health if our bodies are faulty or abused. They can’t keep us from getting old and dying. What they can do is help us — all of us who need help — have food, shelter, and necessary medical care.
By the way, I’m not saying that Social Security and Medicare are our most important social programs. Nothing is more important than educating our young, and comparative test scores show that the U.S. is in trouble here (22nd place in math!). Still, many of our suburban schools are excellent. We say we believe in equality of opportunity: what are we doing to assure that all of our children, no matter where they live or how much their parents pay in property tax, have access to good schools?
Back to my main point. If all of this means additional funding — a payroll tax on all earned income, for example, and not just the first $106,800 — so be it. If it means ending President Obama’s extremely unwise payroll tax holiday, so be it. If it means I have to pay more taxes, so be it.
Our government is not only of the people and by the people, it is also for the people. May Lincoln’s vision of a nation dedicated to the common good not perish from the earth.
Photos: Newscom.
by Christine A. Scheller | Jul 22, 2011 | Feature, Headline News |
CLASHING PERSPECTIVES: Conservative activist and Tea Party member Jesse Lee Peterson (left) will protest the NAACP's convention; NAACP spokesman Hilary O. Shelton welcomes the debate.
On July 24, when the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) holds its annual convention in Los Angeles, the newly formed South Central L.A. Tea Party will be there to protest.
In a press release, the Brotherhood Organization of a New Destiny (BOND Action) said the NAACP has made “false allegations of ‘racism’ against the Tea Party movement,” has supported failing schools and teachers unions in opposition to black parents, especially in Harlem, where the organization filed suit along with the United Federation of Teachers to stop 22 school closings and the expansion of 20 charter schools, has “remained silent while black thugs attack white Americans and commit crimes in flash mobs across the country,” and “supports black genocide” as an ally of Planned Parenthood.
“The NAACP is set up as a non-profit organization with the pretense of helping black people get themselves together, but I can clearly see that the NAACP is a political pawn for the liberal elite white racist Democratic party and they are using black Americans for their own personal gain,” said Rev. Jesse Lee Peterson, founder and president of BOND Action.
“They’re continually being served by our tax dollars and black Americans continue to support them because they don’t really know and understand that the NAACP is out of touch with reality,” he said.
‘We Were Lied To’
Peterson used to believe in the NAACP and its goals, he said, but about 20 years ago he changed his mind.
“I stepped back and realized that we had been lied to and that they’re deliberately keeping the races divided. They’re deliberately keeping blacks dependent on governmental programs so that they can use black Americans for their own personal gain,” said Peterson.
In contrast, the Tea Party stands for freedom, the Constitution, God, country, and family, he said.
Peterson has spoken at Tea Party rallies around the country and has never seen “one glimpse” of racism, he said.
It’s not that clear-cut, says one NAACP representative.
“The NAACP did a very extensive analysis of the Tea Party, so it would be good to find out which Tea Party he spoke for,” said Hilary O. Shelton, director of the NAACP’s Washington Bureau and Vice President for Advocacy. “One of the things the Tea Party says all the time is that there is no one Tea Party.”
Shelton wondered if Peterson had spoken to the Tea Party Nationalist group out of St. Louis that Shelton said is the outgrowth of the Conservative Citizens Council and the White Citizens Council or the Tea Party construct in Kansas that he said was built by the Minutemen Association.
“There are some Tea Party constructs that we’ve been in contact with, quite frankly, that as much as we may not agree with them politically, they are advancing an agenda that is done in a civilized manner and they are, quite frankly, just fine, as far as we’re concerned,” said Shelton.
A resolution that was passed at the NAACP’s 2010 convention grew out of a number of racist incidents, he said. Among them were Tea Partiers using the N-word to describe the president of the United States, the painting of swastikas on the side of U.S. Congressman David Scott’s office in Georgia, an incident of spitting at U.S. Congressman John Lewis, and a racial slur directed at U.S. Congressman Emanuel Cleaver II.
“We’ve never denounced the entire Tea Party, but, as the resolution says, only those racist elements within the Tea Party. What [the NAACP] calls upon the Tea Party to do, and Rev. Peterson as well, is to simply denounce that kind of behavior,” said Shelton.
Defending the NAACP
BOND Action’s charges that the NAACP supports abortion and ignores black-on-white crime are “simply not true,” Shelton said, and the NAACP has never taken a position on “a woman’s right to choose,” but does support “a woman’s right to control her reproductive life” and Planned Parenthood’s other work in providing basic health services to women and children in underserved communities.
“If you look at the NAACP’s position on crime and violence, it is never limited to African Americans. We want to stop crime and violence for all Americans. The issue you hear most often is us talking about the disparities in how our criminal justice system treats African Americans,” said Shelton.
He suggested Peterson examine the NAACP’s new report, Smart on Crime, which compares spending on criminal justice with spending on education. The report advises redirecting resources away from incarceration and towards rehabilitation and education. Shelton also suggested Peterson look at a bill the NAACP supports that would create a federal blue ribbon commission on crime that would investigate the root causes of racial and ethnic minorities over-representation in the system.
In regard to the NAACP’s opposition to charter schools, Shelton said, “There’s a disagreement there.” The lawsuit filed by the NAACP was designed to “advance the concerns” of the 96 percent of New York students who attend traditional public schools, he said. (See the sidebar below for another perspective.)
In regard to this and the other issues outlined in BOND Action’s press release, Shelton suggested that Peterson read its position statements before making “ill-informed comments.”
UrbanFaith emailed Peterson’s office to ask if he had read any official documents about the issues he had publicly criticized.
“Rev. Peterson read news reports about the lawsuit before releasing his statement,” an email reply stated.
‘Good vs. Evil, Nothing to Do with Color’
This is the first time BOND Action will protest an NAACP convention, but it isn’t the first time its members have protested a civil rights organization. For five years, on Martin Luther King Jr.’s birthday, BOND Action held Repudiation of Jesse Jackson rallies outside Jackson’s Rainbow PUSH office in Los Angeles, Peterson said.
“Bad things were written and said about me, but it also educated those blacks that really didn’t know about Jackson and as a result, he doesn’t have that same influence prior to us exposing him. We showed the contrast between Dr. King’s dream and Jesse Jackson’s nightmare with those rallies,” said Peterson.
UrbanFaith spoke to a media relations representative in Rainbow PUSH’s Chicago office on July 14. She said she would ask Rev. Jackson for a response and get back to us, but never did, despite several follow-up phone calls.
As strong proponents of free speech, the NAACP has a policy of honoring protest picket lines wherever they are, said Shelton. “[Peterson] is welcome in a non-violent, non-disruptive way to express his position, regardless of how inaccurate it might be,” he added.
“We want black Americans to know that this is a spiritual battle that we’re dealing with. It’s a warfare between good and evil, right versus wrong. It has nothing to do with color at all. Once upon a time black Americans understood that, but when they turned their lives over to government and to other people to lead and think for them, that’s when they lost that reality of what the matter’s all about and then they fell away from God and that’s why they’re living the type of lifestyle that they’re living,” said Peterson.
At one time Shelton was Federal Policy Program Director for the United Methodist Church’s social justice advocacy agency. He said that as a fellow Christian, he finds some of Peterson’s critiques “inconsistent with Christian values” as he understands them.
“I don’t want to judge what’s in his heart. I believe our faith is something that we carry in our hearts. I do think he is factually inaccurate and when you have factual inaccuracy, what you deduce from those facts is also going to be inaccurate. My guess is if he was better informed, he’d probably come to very different conclusions,” he said.
“It’s appropriate for Christians to tell the truth and if the truth is harsh; there’s nothing I can do about that. But the truth is only harsh to the ear that loves lies,” Peterson replied in an email.
Listen to Jesse Lee Peterson’s over-the-top criticism of Barack Obama and his presidency.
What do you think? Is Rev. Peterson out of bounds? Or, is he just crudely stating what an increasing number of African Americans already believe?
NAACP president and CEO Benjamin Todd Jealous.
The NAACP’s opposition to charter schools has opened it to criticism from conservative activists like Jesse Lee Peterson, but there are also progressive voices that take issue with some of the group’s positions on education.
RiShawn Biddle is a columnist for The American Spectator, a former award-winning columnist for the Indianapolis Star who covered education and urban affairs, and publisher of DropOut Nation, a website dedicated to education reform. In a blog post, Biddle questioned NAACP president Benjamin Jealous’s insinuation that the U.S. spends more money on prisons than schools.
Biddle sent UrbanFaith statistics from the U.S. Department of Justice and the U.S. Department of Education comparing spending on criminal justice and education. In 2006-2007, the U.S. spent $228 billion on criminal justice and $562 billion on K-12 education; $1.5 billion of that spending went to building new prisons and $62 billion went to school construction.
“The reality isn’t so much that America doesn’t spend too much on prisons or that too much is spent on education. It’s that the country spends far too much on both inefficiently and ineffectively,” DropOut Nation concluded.
“When it comes to education, the NAACP has had a very proud legacy. What they did throughout much of the last century in terms of fighting for desegregation, trying to provide greater resources for schools that serve black children, to pushing for integration, those are wonderful legacies,” said Biddle.
But, Biddle added, there is definitely room for improvement in today’s NAACP. “The issue for the NAACP these days, at least from the perspective of those folks who are supportive of school reform, is more of where is the NAACP? They seem to be adrift in terms of having an education policy and in having some approach to improving education for black and Latino children that really matches what’s happening in the 21st century,” he said.
Biddle pointed to the NAACP’s longstanding relationship with teachers’ unions, particularly the American Federation of Teachers, and the fact that many older members are themselves teachers, as reasons for the organization’s opposition to charter schools.
“They’re opposed to anything that in their minds seems to lead to the denigration of public education, even though what is happening is basically charter schools are public schools, privately operated,” said Biddle.
It’s not just Tea Partiers who are disappointed in the NAACP’s stance on education, Biddle said. Notable black leaders who have criticized the organization include Kevin Chavous, chairman of Democrats for Education Reform; New York Daily News columnist Stanley Crouch; Capital Prepatory Magnet School founder Steve Perry; former New York City councilwoman Eva Moskowitz; and Harlem Children’s Zone president Geoffrey Canada.
“I am unhappy in many ways that the NAACP is not living up to its legacy, and not moving with the times, and basically is fighting against black children. But we have to get them on board because they are the grandaddy of the civil rights movement, and, in all honesty, we need everybody on board to reform American public education,” said Biddle.
