Blog #3 African Americans in higher education

Last week Julian told us to write our short term and long term goals. I was not surprised that we all had similar goals. I enjoyed this activity because it reminds me of how far I have gotten and how closer I am to achieving a few of my goals. The last time I had to write down my goals and sealed them in an enveloped I was in the seventh grade. One of the goals I wrote down was to go to college and here I am now. We also did an activity that involved moving around the classroom. We had a couple of minutes to answer a couple of questions regarding the No Child Left act. I enjoyed this activity because I retained more information about No Child Left Behind than I did from the readings. We also got to see a short video about Common Core. I did not fully understand how this new system will be better for students but I think that it is worth a try to see what the outcomes will be. After all I believe it’s better to try something new than keep the old system that clearly isn’t working.
This week we had two articles to read. The first article was The Challenges of Educating Black Males Within American Society. The title sums up the article because it was about the challenges African American men face in their life in America. This article was upsetting because not only do African American men face challenges to get an education, but to live past the age of 20 is a challenge itself. When I read that African American male adolescences have a 50% chance of dying by the age of 20, I felt angry. I felt anger towards this country and society because it is absurd that a group of human beings have a 50% chance of dying by the age of 20 in a free, first world country, in the twenty first century just because they have a darker shade of skin. No wonder African Americans are more likely to get involved with drug abuse and drug trafficking. They abuse drugs to escape their reality and since they have little employment opportunities, drug trafficking is an alternative. The second article was a bit similar to the first article. It was about the history of African Americans in education. In 1954 the supreme court ruled that segregation in education is unconstitutional. It has been 60 years since segregation in education became unconstitutional but segregation is still happening today in an implicit manner. African Americans face many obstacles in the education system, all beginning at an early age. I think every high school, elementary school and college should have outreach programs for African Americans to help them stay in school and get a college degree. Education is the power to end the vicious cycle that African Americans live in and society needs to step in and help because it is the moral thing to do. This country has been in war with other countries many times to aid them from terrorists but lacks to support its own citizens (African Americans) from the disparity they face every day.