Dr. K. P. Loftus

The statistics don't lie, at least not entirely. High school student achievement scores for African-American students remain consistently depressed when compared to all of their non-black counterparts, including students whose first language is not English. From a distance, philosophers from multiple disciplines formulate various instructional, economic, and biological theories to explain this disparity. Nevertheless, merely blaming the teachers, the school systems, or even the economy does not fully explain either why other populations overcome these obstacles more readily, or why African-American students attending predominantly non -black schools tend to excel equal to their classmates. Having spent much time on the "inside" of predominantly black high schools in the last decade I discovered three factors that may be contributing to some of the decline in the academic achievement of these students born near the tail end of the 20th century. Like the "Freakonomics" economists, Levitt and Dubner, I examined what is present in the lives of these students today, coupled with what factors have affected their lives thus far, that were not present for prior generations. A key Freakonomics catch phrase that now adorns every Starbucks coffee cup states: "Morality describes the way that any of us would like the world to work. Economics describes the way the world actually does work. You can't change the world you live in until you understand it." Using this premise, I will forego the usual political-correctness in the name of progress and face this problem head on.

To start, while welfare recipients are distributed fairly equally between whites (38.8%) and blacks (39.8%), this breakdown represents a far more staggering percentage of the general population, with American whites making up 81%, versus American blacks 13%.

Much has been written regarding the relative benefits and detriments of long-term welfare dependence on both families and individuals. In 2001, social researcher, Robert Rector of the Heritage Foundation wrote of his evidence that welfare actually harms rather than helps children, with prolonged welfare dependence being tied to lowered I.Q.'s, increased dropout rates, and significantly less earnings throughout adulthood. Yet, to some, these correlations are too farfetched to be believed. How can one's intelligence or motivation toward education be negatively impacted by the source of one's household income? Isn't the whole point of public assistance to ensure a more level playing field for children and families who might otherwise be relegated to the streets? Wouldn't a lack of this assistance only make matters worse and the children's futures even more bleak? As you ponder these questions, let me offer some specific observations of my own.

First, in many of America's poorest schools black and Hispanic minorities coexist side by side, equally as poor, residing in equally disparate homes and communities, yet often with far different levels of academic achievement, with Hispanics consistently outpacing their black peers, despite an added language handicap. One major difference in these students' lives is the source of their household incomes. Despite how you may feel about immigration reform, the fact remains that in the U.S. today 6 to 8 million Hispanic families are living here, sending their children to American schools. Yet, due to questionable citizenship status, many are not eligible for any public assistance programs afforded their non-Hispanic neighbors. Therefore, almost without exception, poor Hispanic kids come from households where everyone works, and works hard, usually at two or more jobs, with long hours, for little pay. Nothing comes easy, nothing is taken for granted. Like the children of many American immigrants of previous generations, these kids learn every day to appreciate the value of hard work and perseverance. Most are made to appreciate the sacrifices of their parents and to value their education as a privilege.

By contrast, students who have resided their whole lives in homes where no one is gainfully employed can't help but adopt a different set of values and understanding of what it means, and what it takes, to be an active participant in American society. Besides losing much perspective pertaining to economic cause and effect, these children's priorities and motivations are often permanently skewed, as well. In the absence of many of the external examples and motivators toward personal achievement, far too many black students are simply not striving to learn, to understand, or to analyze. Further, surprisingly, few have any awareness of black Americans of the last 100 years who became successful for anything other than sports or entertainment. Most have never heard of Colin Powell, Condoleezza Rice, Clarence Thomas, Harold Washington, or even Lester Holt. Many, in fact, are just as unfamiliar with the likes of Louis Armstrong, Sammy Davis, Jr. and Della Reese who, while entertainers, represented a standard of hard work and decency absent from many entertainers today. They do not watch the news; do not watch much mainstream television. Most of their knowledge of the world comes from urban radio stations and music videos that frequently portray the plight of blacks as bleak and downtrodden.

At one point in my adult life I worked as a Vocational Rehabilitation Counselor, meeting regularly with adults who had suffered debilitating, but not incapacitating injuries, mostly consisting of chronic back pain. While these conditions now permanently excluded them from returning to their roles as carpenters, truck drivers, firefighters, and so on, these were, for the most part, fairly young, knowledgeable, semi-skilled individuals who were still quite capable mentally, if not physically, of other types of gainful employment. Unfortunately, the benefits to remaining off work collecting "workers' compensation" benefits were far too lucrative to forego in lieu of starting over at entry-level salaries in fields for which they had no background or training. Nevertheless, being paid 66% of their former gross salaries to stay at home was not the "lottery windfall" many might imagine. Accepting this fate had relegated these individuals to a status of forced dependency, robbing them of all ambition and sense of accomplishment, while rendering most clinically depressed and hopeless. I saw my greatest results with my clients with whom I could identify other marketable strengths and talents not affected by their injuries, and then helping to facilitate their joyous reconnection with, and sense of belonging to, society.

More recently, I have spent a good deal of time observing urban high schools from the inside where I have often been able to draw clear parallels between the students and the injured workers. Of those having grown up with a sense of resignation toward non-self sufficiency few are able to successfully grasp the notion of working toward this seemingly farfetched and thereby intimidating goal. Utilizing only their current household governmental income sources, most have, somehow, still managed to acquire all of the latest fashions and gadgets, including name brand clothes and shoes, costly hairstyles, cd's, jewelry and cellphones. They see their non-welfare-eligible classmates wearing the same plain clothing (albeit always clean and neatly pressed) day after day, and cannot imagine working so hard for so little. Like the disabled workers, many view their idleness as their only certain destiny, having become too blinded by their present unearned "riches" to recognize their own self-worth.

Sadly, besides having to compete with this phenomenon, most urban high school teachers today have lost much of the leverage utilized by their predecessors to compel student achievement. First, many of their students do not perceive a high school diploma as a necessary component to prevent future homelessness. Some, in fact, actively pursue early parenthood, particularly females, as a means of guaranteeing their access to a free government-issued apartment, particularly if they aren't getting along with their families at home. Further, almost all urban black students today know and are related to many individuals who manage to live fairly comfortably, by teenager standards, without having to endure the pesky demands of a job.

Secondly, the sad truth is that most urban high schools are simply too under- funded to be able to hold their students to the high academic performance standards of their suburban counterparts, as this would lead to many students remaining for five or more years to successfully pass all of the classes required for graduation. Many, instead, offer curricula sufficiently watered-down or leniently graded (with parents and the general public none the wiser) to ensure that the majority of their students who attend regularly will be able to graduate within four years. Unfortunately, too many students in these schools manage to accomplish this feat without ever bringing home a book, making homework expectations difficult to enforce.

Finally, for those black students who do aspire to a college education, sometimes unrealistically, based on academic performance, the pressure of college acceptance has been largely omitted for them, as well. Although having made great strides toward leveling a once unfair and unequal playing field, the "Historically Black Colleges" now recruit heavily in predominantly black high schools and appear to accept most who seek admission, with ethnicity far outweighing academic record.

These factors are then coupled with a pervasive alternative usage of the English language that has all but obliterated any familiarity with the version of English utilized in standardized tests. While many recognize their own lack of familiarity with Standard English conventions, few are sufficiently motivated to learn them.

There is much debate regarding whether I.Q.'s are inherently- or environmentally- caused, as well as whether or not measuring someone's knowledge in an unfamiliar language produces a true representation of their intellect. Still, if one's I.Q. has been artificially depressed by outside factors inhibiting natural progression of learning and development, it is not beyond reason that, with appropriate motivators compelling achievement, one's I.Q. could be increased to its full potential. Unfortunately, as long as poor black students continue to predominantly reside in "motivation-free" zones, the world may never know many of their true gifts, while this trend of rewarding underachievement, should it continue, may significantly hamper the future progress of this group.

In his book, "Black Rednecks, White Liberals," Thomas Sowell points to the rapid progress blacks were making in America toward equal achievement in academics and other areas by the mid-1960's, only to now be much further behind than ever before. Using the "Freakonomics" approach to problem solving, one would have to consider what factors impacted this natural progression so significantly as to reverse this trend. Major reforms in public assistance seem at least one likely contributor. Perhaps a popular T-shirt I observed being worn by many black teens recently says it best, "Your just jealous." As educators, where do we begin?