Boston Globe: School equality: a black responsibility?

School equality: a black responsibility?
By Cathy Young | May 31, 2004

A FEW DAYS after the 50th anniversary of Brown v. Board of Education, an
extraordinary panel met in New York City to discuss the urgent problem still
posed by the racial gap in educational achievement.

The panel was part of an event many would be quick to identify as a
"conservative" venue -- a conference of the National Organization of
Scholars, an 11-year-old group formed in opposition to "political
correctness" in academia. The same conference offered a workshop on new
legal strategies to combat race-based preferences in college admissions.
Many, perhaps most, of those in attendance would have probably described
themselves as right of center politically. Yet racial inequality in
education was clearly seen as a matter of grave concern.

Abigail Thernstrom, a member of the Massachusetts State Board of Education
and a commissioner on the US Commission on Civil Rights, presented the
alarming data. (She and her husband Stephan Thernstrom, a professor of
history at Harvard University and also a speaker on the panel, are
co-authors of the 2003 book, "No Excuses: Closing the Racial Gap in
Learning.") On the National Assessment for Educational Progress test, the
typical black or Hispanic student at age 17 scores below at least 80 percent
of white students. "On average, these non-Asian minority students are four
years behind those who are white and Asian," said Thernstrom. "They are
finishing high school with a junior high education."

What's more, Thernstrom added, differences in socioeconomic status account
for only about a third of this gap. The rest is due to a variety of cultural
factors -- some of which can be overcome by a concerted effort to provide
better schooling. Thernstrom cited exceptional inner-city charter schools
that seek not only to educate children in a safe, orderly environment but
also, unabashedly, to impart "middle-class" cultural values such as
discipline and responsibility.

Some say that to blame racial disparities in education on social and
cultural ills within the black community amounts to "victim-blaming." No one
denies these ills are rooted in a shameful legacy of oppression. But what
are the implications of this today? Another speaker, University of
Pennsylvania law professor Amy Wax, addressed this issue in a striking
parable. Suppose, she said, that a person is badly injured in a car accident
through no fault of his own, and has to undergo rehabilitative therapy in
order to walk again. The culprit can be forced to pay damages -- but without
arduous effort on the part of the victim, the therapy will not work.

White panelists talking to a mostly white audience about the need for the
black community to fix its problems risk coming across as offensively
patronizing. But the message of responsibility was most powerfully
articulated by a black speaker, Vanderbilt University law professor Carol
Swain.

Swain identified a number of cultural factors that may hold black students
back, including "dysfunctional abusive homes," "lack of parental involvement
in the schools," and "negative peer pressure about learning and about high
achievement as evidence of one's `acting white.' " Better schools may
provide some solutions, Swain said, but there must also be cultural change,
and "middle-class minorities must take a leadership role in this area." On
an even more controversial note, Swain identified affirmative action as
currently practiced by universities -- lower admissions standards for blacks
and Hispanics -- as part of the problem. These policies, she said, have
"created a negative incentive structure for African-Americans who have
either internalized societal messages about inferiority or have chosen an
easier path of not exerting themselves too vigorously" since they don't have
to meet higher standards.

Swain's message was made all the more powerful by her personal story as one
of 12 children in a poor rural home in Virginia. None of her siblings
finished high school. "I was by no means the smartest," said Swain. "By the
grace of God, I was the one who managed to escape."

In a later e-mail exchange, I asked Swain if she was concerned about being
used by conservatives who have their own agenda. "Do liberal blacks worry
about being tokens for the status quo?" she replied. "I doubt it. I call
things the way I see them."

Indeed, "conservative" may be a misnomer for the panel's agenda. Abigail
Thernstrom noted that she and her husband found themselves radicalized by
working on their book. Without a "radical overhaul of American education,"
she said, too many black and Hispanic young people will find the doors of
opportunity closed, and "ancient inequalities" will persist. "Is that
acceptable? No decent American will say yes."

Cathy Young is a contributing editor at Reason magazine. Her column appears
regularly in the Globe.

Copyright 2004 The New York Times Company