National
After more than a decade in decline, the United States teen pregnancy has been rising in recent years.
According to momlogic.com, the estimated public cost for teen pregnancy in the United States is between $6 and $9 billion a year. Eighty percent of teen moms are on some form of public assistance. Seven out of 10 teen mothers are unlikely to receive prenatal care, which of course has great negative health impacts for their children. Aside from the health risks, kids born to teen mothers are at greater risk for emotional and physical abuse, especially if there is no family support.
"It really is a public health issue," said Bill Albert, chief program officer at the National Campaign to Prevent Teen and Unplanned Pregnancy. "This administration and this Congress have made a historic investment in preventing teen pregnancy. In our view, this investment could not be more timely... given the fact that the teen pregnancy rate in the United States is on the rise. I think one might say, without hyperbole...that one of the nation's great success stories of the past two decades may be in danger of unraveling. So, this investment is right on for content and right on for timeliness."
Teenage mothers are also at higher risk of having emotional and academic problems later in life. Another startling statistic: baby boys of teen mothers are at an increased risk for incarceration later in their lives, while girls born to teens are more likely to become teen moms themselves.
In the beginning of 2009, President Barack Obama signed an appropriations bill that ended federal funding for existing abstinence-only-until-marriage programs and put a new teenage pregnancy prevention initiative in the newly funded Office of Adolescent Health within the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services that was supported with more than $114 million in federal funds.
While the nation's teen pregnancy rate declined about 40 percent between 1990 and 2005, data released by the Guttmacher Institute in January 2010 showed that the rate rose three percent in 2006. According to the institute, the new data is "especially noteworthy because they provide the first documentation of what experts have suspected for several years, based on trends in teens' contraceptive use — that the overall teen pregnancy rate would increase in the mid-2000s following steep declines in the 1990s and a subsequent plateau in the early 2000s."
And like many other health issues, the U.S. teen pregnancy rate is checkered with disparities. In 2006, among Black and Hispanic teens ages 15 to 19, there were about 126 pregnancies per 1,000 women, while among white teens, it was 44 per 1,000. Such statistics mean the United States has the highest teen birth rate among Western, industrialized nations.
Mississippi, for example, has the nation's highest rate of poverty and the third highest rate of teen pregnancies. New Mexico is third in poverty and second in teen pregnancies. Texas leads in teen pregnancies and comes in ninth in the poverty rankings. Other "risk factors" for teenage pregnancy – being a person of color, being disinterested in school, etc. – similarly dovetail with living in poverty. Pennsylvania is ranked 39th in teenage pregnancies.
According to the National Campaign to Prevent Teen Pregnancy, a child born to an unmarried teen mother has a 27 percent chance of growing up in poverty. If the mother has not earned a high school diploma or equivalency degree, the child will grow up in poverty 64 percent of the time. If those numbers are correct, the steep decline in teen pregnancy rates between 1991 and 2002 kept an additional 460,000 children from being born into poverty.
"As a society, we have to continually redouble our efforts to sustain these kinds of (downward) trends over time," said Heather Boonstra, a senior public policy associate at the Guttmacher Institute, which conducts research on a range of sexual and reproductive health issues. "We can't just sit back, because new teens are constantly coming into the field and we have to remain vigilant."
Factors shaping the recent rise in teen pregnancy are varied and complex, prevention advocates say, ranging from years of federal support for rigid abstinence-only programs to tempered fears of contracting HIV, to less teen contraceptive use. According to the 2007 National Youth Risk Behavior Survey, conducted by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, rates of teens who were sexually active and those who used a condom during their last sexual encounter remained statistically stalled from 2005 to 2007, following years of positive behavior change.
The CDC reported that of the teens who were sexually active, only about 61 percent used a condom the last time they had sex. And according to Lorrie Gavin, PhD, MPH, a health scientist with the CDC's Division of Reproductive Health, current trends point to more than just a teen pregnancy problem — "there's something else going on ... improvements in sexual risk behavior have leveled off in recent years, and rates of some sexually transmitted diseases have increased."
Buying a bagful of multi-colored vegetables at designer grocery stores can easily eat up a significant amount of one's shopping budget. Cost-conscious buyers might be able to make the splurge, but it is not as easy for the millions of people who receive Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program benefits, formerly known as Food Stamps.
To help ease the transition to healthier eating for millions of SNAP beneficiaries who live in food deserts, the United States Department of Agriculture announced last month that it is awarding $4 million in grants to state agencies to allow farmers' markets throughout the country to purchase pricey point-of-sale machines. The wireless machines can process SNAP benefits, but can cost as much as $500.
The measure will help reconnect low-income residents with the often more affordable farmers' markets, which have unfairly earned a reputation as being trendy and inaccessible, said Michael Segal, executive director of the Ward 8 Farmers Market in Washington, D.C.
"When there were food stamps and coupons, there was a lot of business at farmers' markets with food stamps. Individual farmers didn't have to make any investments with the old-fashioned system," he said. "When they made the shift to the debit card system, that pattern dropped almost down to nothing the next year. There was no way you could use a debit card outdoors in the middle of a parking lot."
Technically, the EBT cards are not debit cards. And electronic terminals set up to process debit cards, Visa and MasterCards are not wired to process EBT cards. And that's a problem for farmers selling their fresh fruit and vegetables and EBT cardholders who want to buy fresh produce.
"It was really frustrating for us," Segal explained. "There was a moment in history, about 15 or 20 years ago, when you have two things simultaneously going on: there were more markets and more fresh fruit available, and the doors were slamming shut on people who had these cards that we couldn't process," he said. "Farmers' markets had gotten this reputation as these tremendously elite and expensive places, and it's not fair."
Farmers markets, which are largely staffed by volunteers, also run into challenges accessing the market share of people who use SNAP benefits. Problems staffing EBT terminals, letting people with SNAP benefits know that they do accept them, and lack of uniformity in executing the program are some of the issues detailed in "Real Food, Real Choice: Connecting SNAP Recipients with Farmers Markets."
Two of the report's co-authors, Stacy Miller of the Farmers Market Coalition and Andy Fisher of the Community Security Coalition, introduced the report in 2010.
Of the 7,100 farmers markets in the United States, the Ward 8 Farmers' Market is one of more than 1,500 markets that are already able to accept and process EBT cards. With a customer base that's at least 80 percent Black, the market opened for the season on June 2. With many of its food producers residents of Ward 8, it saw a 5 percent increase in purchases made with EBT cards last year, which is in addition to other public assistance options such as WIC and senior vouchers.
"That means a lot for the farmers and turns into 10 percent for them because of a grant from Wholesome Wave Foundation, which doubles the amount purchased, so that's exciting," Segal said.
The grant is only available to farmers markets that don't already have an EBT machine.
Some farmers' markets are in rural areas and don't have access to electricity or phone lines. But advances in wireless technology will open up a new world for them – up to a point.
"One of the things that's really frustrating is that the technology is very, very close to the point where the card use could get much less expensive if Square and other [smartphone] devices started processing EBT cards," said Segal. "There's a lot of security issues involved. Personally, I think it's going to happen. The technology is there."
Bruce Alexander, director of communications for the USDA's Food and Nutrition Service, said, "The program is entirely opt in, it's not mandatory. The funding covers the purchase of the equipment for each farmers market, not for each farmer."
More than 46 million people in the country receive SNAP benefits. Caseload growth year-to-year largely mirror unemployment and underemployment trends, according to the Food Research & Action Center, a national anti-hunger organization.
"Increases in SNAP caseloads between February 2011 and February 2012 occurred in 46 states and the District of Columbia," reported the nonprofit. "The four states that registered double digit over-the-year percentage caseload increases were: Delaware (11.7 percent), Iowa (10.8 percent), Colorado (10.1 percent) and Hawaii (10.8 percent.)"
WASHINGTON - A House committee looking into a flawed gun-smuggling probe in Arizona announced Monday that it will consider holding Attorney General Eric Holder in contempt of Congress next week for failing to produce some documents the panel is seeking.
The committee has scheduled a contempt vote for June 20. To date, the Justice Department has produced 7,600 pages of documents to the committee.
Darrell Issa, chairman of the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee, says Congress needs to examine records regarding the Justice Department's conduct following public disclosures in early 2011 that hundreds of guns illicitly purchased at gun shops on the U.S. side of the border wound up in Mexico, many of them at crime scenes.
The Justice Department says many of the documents deal with open criminal investigations and prosecutions - matters relating to sensitive law enforcement activities that cannot be disclosed.
"The Justice Department is out of excuses," House Speaker John Boehner said Monday. "Congress has given Attorney General Holder more than enough time to fully cooperate with its investigation into Fast and Furious," the name of the flawed law enforcement operation.
Issa said Congress has an obligation "to investigate unanswered questions about attempts to smear whistleblowers, failures by Justice Department officials to be truthful and candid with the congressional investigation and the reasons for the significant delay in acknowledging reckless conduct in Operation Fast and Furious."
Sen. Chuck Grassley, whose investigation first turned up problems in Operation Fast and Furious, said the action by the House committee "is straightforward and necessary. Contempt is the only tool Congress has to enforce a subpoena."
ORLANDO, FL — A new bond hearing is set for George Zimmerman, the Florida neighborhood watch volunteer charged in the fatal shooting of an unarmed teenager.
The hearing is set for the morning of June 29.
Zimmerman returned to jail Sunday because his $150,000 bond was revoked after prosecutors claimed he and his wife, Shellie, deceived the court during an April bond hearing.
At the hearing, Shellie Zimmerman testified that the couple had limited funds for bail because she was a full-time student and her husband wasn't working. Prosecutors say Zimmerman actually had raised $135,000 in donations from a website he created.
Zimmerman is charged with second-degree murder for fatally shooting Trayvon Martin during a confrontation in a Sanford, Fla., gated community where Zimmerman lived. He's pleaded not guilty, claiming self-defense.
Men Interested in joining the exclusive sorority, Alpha Kappa Alpha, Incorporated — are threatening to file a lawsuit claiming discrimination and homophobia.
The men, all homosexual, have imitated everything AKA, from their signature calls and attire, to their probate shows, but have been refused admittance because they are not women.
Alpha Kappa Alpha Sorority was founded at Howard University on Jan. 15, 1908. The group of men, whom all are homosexual, are alleging homophobia and gender discrimination by the sorority.
News of MIAKAs first surfaced a couple years ago when men founded an unofficial chapter of AKA at Texas Southern University and Prairie view A&M.
Members of the Greek community were shocked when the Tri Alpha Chapter of MIAKA presented photos of men adorned in pink and green and pearls, while throwing up their "pinkies." People were even more shocked to learn the chapter had even filmed a probate show with sounds of the sorority's famous call "skee wee" being heard in the background.
In 2011, the New York City Police Department stopped more people than the total population of the state of Vermont – that's about 626,431. After Rep. Yvette Clarke (D-NY) reached out several times to the Department of Justice on the issue of stop and frisks, state lawmakers from New York secured a meeting with Assistant Attorney General for Civil Rights Tom Perez regarding their concerns over the city's policies. The meeting will take place at the Department of Justice on Thursday morning. The elected officials will also participate in a racial profiling/stop-and-frisk conference hosted by Clarke.
The lawmakers believe the New York City Police Department stop-and-frisk policy focuses on minorities and is a violation of civil liberties. The number of stops by the New York City Police Department has skyrocketed over the last ten years.
In 2002, 97,296 New Yorkers were stopped by the police. In 2011, 685,724 New Yorkers were stopped by the police. Eighty-eight percent of those stopped in 2011 were innocent. The racial breakdowns of the stops in 2011: 53% of those stopped were Black, 34% were Hispanic and only 9% were White. The City of New York is 15% Black and 17% Hispanic according to the CENSUS.
The New York elected officials will be in Washington to take part in a conference hosted by Brooklyn Congresswoman Clarke that will focus on the issue of stop-and-frisk policies.
Mayor Michael Bloomberg and Police Chief Ray Kelly have defended the practice. When asked what he wants to hear from Perez at the meeting, Rep. Greg Meeks (D-NY), who represents the Queens borough of New York City, said, "the policies that have been instituted by New York City have to be rebuked. They have to go in a completely different direction. All you have to be is Black and they're stopping you."
"If anything there should be an articulate reason to stop and frisk someone. And if you don't have a reason then I think it's going to cost the city of New York a lot of money as people begin to sue the City of New York," Meeks added. "We need the Attorney General and others to come in."
"This is a civil rights issue in 2012," Meeks said.
Rep. Clarke's conference on the issue will take place in the U.S. Capitol Visitor's Center at 1 p.m. on Thursday. Attendees will include NY Assemblyman Jeffrion Aubry, NY Assemblyman William Boyland Jr., NY Assemblywoman Barbara Clark, NY Assemblyman Nick Perry, NYC Councilmember Daniel Dromm, NYC Councilmember Brad Lander, NYC Councilmember Melissa Mark-Viverito, NYC Councilmember Ydanis Rodriguez and NYC Councilmember Deborah Rose.
LAUREN VICTORIA BURKE, Politic365 Chief Congressional Correspondent, publishes the blog Crewof42 on the Congressional Black Caucus. She is heard every Tuesday at 4 p.m. ET on WMCS 1290 in Milwaukee on Earl Ingram's show The Evening Rush as well as on WPFW every Friday at 6:30 p.m. in Washington DC. You can e-mail her at This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it follow her on twitter at @crewof42.
The following is a list of the CBCF's 2012 summer interns, their legislative sponsors and colleges and universities the interns attend:
Ashley Bobo, Rep. Laura Richardson, Long Beach CA, Harvard College
Jeremy Broadus, Rep. Emanuel Cleaver, II Rahway NJ, Rutgers University
Tierra Burns, Rep. Melvin Watt Cameron, NC North Carolina Central University
Melissa Chin, TBD Mount Vernon NY, Brown university
Saliha Cifci, Rep. Al Green, Houston TX, Rutgers University
Devon Cox, Rep. Hansen Clarke, Southfield MI, University of Michigan
Nairobi Cratic, Rep. Gwen Moore, Milwaukee WI, Temple University
Devon Crawford, Rep. Terri Sewell, Birmingham AL, Morehouse College
Elizabeth Davis Rep. Bobby Scott Newport News VA George Mason University
Courtnie Drigo, Rep. Eddie Bernice Johnson, Missouri City TX, Rice University
Camylle Fleming, TBD Beltsville MD, Wellesley College
Chazmon Flood, Rep. Maxine Waters, Washington DC, Howard University
Ariana Gibbs, Rep. Bennie Thompson, Jackson MS, Spelman College
Brianna Gibson, Rep. Donna Edwards, Landover MD, Columbia University
Keitherra Graham, Rep. Cedric Richmond Kenner, LA, Howard University
John Grigg, Jr. Rep. Donna Christensen, St. Croix VI, University of Tampa
Brittany Harvey, Rep. André Carson, Indianapolis IN, Clark Atlanta University
Brandon Hill, TBD Eden Prairie MN, Morehouse College and Stanford
Tyler Hill, Rep. Barbara Lee, Los Angeles CA, University of California, Berkeley
Brooke Hutchins, Rep. Chaka Fattah Bala, Cynwyd, PA, Georgetown University
Duane Jackson, Rep. Yvette Clarke, Brooklyn NY, Bates College
Ocoszio Jackson, Rep. Sanford Bishop Jr., Dublin GA, Morehouse College
Tatehona Kelly, Rep. Marcia Fudge, Cincinnati OH, American University
Jordan Lindsay, Rep. William Lacy Clay, Silver Spring MD, Morehouse College
Malaiya McGee, Rep. Gregory Meeks, Laurelton NY, Howard University
Kaylan Meaza, Rep. G.K. Butterfield, Fayetteville NC ,North Carolina State University
Origen Monsanto, Rep. David Scott, Marietta GA, Southern Polytechnic State University
Khristopher Nicholas, Rep. Alcee Hastings, Pompano Beach FL, Columbia University
Matthew Norwood, Rep. John Lewis, Atlanta GA, Dartmouth College
Jasmine Omeke, Rep. Jesse Jackson Jr., Chicago IL, Harvard University
Aarrayn Perez, Rep. Eleanor Holmes Norton, Washington DC, Winston-Salem State University
Brittany Porter Rep., Frederica Wilson, Miami Shores FL, Hampton University
Jeremy Ratcliff, Rep. Emanuel Cleaver, II Raleigh NC, Livingstone College
Davante Rowe, Rep. Charles Rangel Bronx NY, St. John's University
Program Builds a Cohort to Lead and to Serve
WASHINGTON, DC - The Congressional Black Caucus Foundation (CBCF) recently welcomed 44 undergraduate students and recent graduates from across the country to its Summer Congressional Internship Program. The students will spend the next two months working in a congressional office where they will observe first-hand how the Hill works and legislation is developed. Interns will also create and participate in a summer-long "Model Mock Congress," and create a community action plan that outlines how to bring positive change to their home communities. The group will leave the program as a solid cohort, prepared to lead and to serve.
CBCF created the Congressional Internship Program in 1986 to address the underrepresentation of black professional staff on Capitol Hill. Today, in addition to the Congressional Internship Program, the Foundation has two other internship programs for college students and recent college graduates who are interested in civic engagement, building a career in government and public service. These programs run during the fall and spring semesters. CBCF internship programs are described as one of the top public policy training experience in Washington, D.C.
"CBCF's mission and much of our reputation for success are built on our strong internship program," said Elsie L. Scott, president and chief executive officer of CBCF. "We are known throughout the nation for our competitive, intensive nine-week program that provides a behind-the-scenes look into the democratic process."
Since its inception, more than 1,500 students have participated in Foundation internships. "Our program gives young adults the chance to experience what it is like to be involved in public service," said Dr. Scott. "From working on the Hill to developing and implementing community service projects, to life coaching sessions – all of these opportunities prepare our interns to become civically involved in their communities."
The program is sponsored by Altria, Comcast, Delta Research and Educational Foundation, Hyundai Motor America, New York Life Foundation, Prudential Financial, UPS and Washington Intern Student Housing c/o LM Associates.
There's just no way you can put a positive spin on it: the monthly jos report for May delivered some devastating news for President Obama. Last month, employers added only 69,000 jobs, which is the fewest added in the last year.
As late as the day before, economists were expecting at least 150,000 jobs added to the economy, which was still considered lackluster. And the economy needs to gain at least 250,000 jobs per month as a way to maintain any sort of recovery momentum.
Unemployment is now up to 8.2 percent – from 8.1 percent the previous month. Things with the economy clearly aren't progressing, and for the Latino and African American communities, the unemployment rates rose .7 percent and .6 percent respectively.
These are two key groups the President is counting on to support him in November. The news clearly puts the Obama campaign on the defensive and suddenly transforms the 2012 election from a discussion on GOP competitor Mitt Romney's as private equity capitalist vulture to a full scale referendum on Obama's economic policies.
"The economy is growing again, but not as fast as we want it to grow," was the President before an audience of manufacture workers in Minneapolis. He added that a debt crisis in Europe and the threat of high gas prices from problems in the Middle East were "cast[ing] a shadow" over the recovery.
"We have lot work to do to get where we need to be," Obama added. "All these factors make it all the more challenging not just to recover but to lay the foundation for an economy built to last over the long term. But that's our job."
Jennifer Korn, the Executive Director of the Hispanic Leadership Network wasn't buying it. "It is clear that President Obama still hasn't delivered to the American people, especially the Hispanic community on the most important issue facing the country," argued Korn in a statement to the press. "Hispanics are still experiencing an all-time high unemployment rate of 11.0 percent. Mr. President: where are the jobs?"
Through its Twitter feed, the Congressional Black Caucus blasted out messages encouraging the passage of the American Jobs Act as a way to get folks back to the work. Congressman Charlie Rangel (D-NY) even sent out a tweet taunting Republicans "to give up their political games" and to move forward on passing a jobs bill.
And so the blame game continues on both sides with conservative groups insisting that the President hasn't done enough and Democrats charging that GOP hasn't moved swiftly to create jobs. Ultimately, it will come down to which group has the most credibility with communities of color.
Black support for the President is still the highest out of any subgroup polled by Gallup at 88 percent. For Hispanics, it is currently at 59 percent. Still, that's distressingly lower than where African American support was in 2008: at 96% of all Black voters. Latino support was at an all time high of 67%. Obama will need to either repeat or surpass his 2008 performance.
These constituencies aren't going to move too far away from President Obama in the general election. But there may be some gains for Republicans if they can eat away at the margins in key districts and states.
The other factor to keep in mind is that no president since FDR has won re-election when employment was over 7.2%. This means that the road to the White House will be a battle of epic proportions because Romney can continue to hit Obama on the economy and jobs. Yet, footage of Governor Romney talking about how he likes to fire people plus the GOP attacks on his record at Bain Capital will still give plenty of ammunition for Obama campaign ads and Democrats up for re-election. But, how much will that hold up if the economy goes back into a slump?
Managing Editor Charles D. Ellison contributed to this report.
George Zimmerman, who was charged with second-degree murder in the shooting death of Florida teenager Trayvon Martin, was booked into jail Sunday, two days after a judge revoked his bail after evidence surfaced that Zimmerman and his wife may have misled the court about their finances.
Zimmerman, 28, arrived in the state Saturday night from an undisclosed "secure location," where he has been staying because of "significant threats against his life," his lawyer, Mark O'Mara, said Sunday. He arrived at the jail before 2 p.m. on Sunday.
Zimmerman met police at a business park and was driven to the jail. He was handcuffed and wore a blue checkered button-up shirt. He is being held without bail and is listed as having $500 in his jail account, according to the jail website.
Advertise | AdChoicesZimmerman, a neighborhood watch captain in Sanford, Fla., was released after posting $15,000 in cash on April 20 after he was charged with killing Martin, 17, who was unarmed, in February. The case triggered a nationwide debate about whether race was involved in the shooting; Martin was black, while Zimmerman is the son of a white man and a Peruvian woman.
Zimmerman was quiet and his return to jail went smoothly, Seminole County Sheriff Donald Eslinger said at a news conference Sunday. He said Zimmerman will stay in a single cell as he did before he was released in late April. The cell is 67-square-feet and is equipped with a toilet, two beds, a mattress, pillow, blanket and sheets, according to The Associated Press.
Gee praised the positive attitude of the students and all involved in this orb.
COLUMBUS – The Ohio State University is a sprawling institution of nearly 50,000 students. And it is a "place" for a lot of people and a lot of things.
But "hate" is not one of them.
That was the message sent loud and clear by the university involving its recent effort to address the problem of hate and intolerance on campus. The effort was implemented under the theme "No Place for Hate."
While efforts against 'hate' is not novel for the university, it picked up intensity after the Feb. 26 killing of an unarmed Black teenager Trayvon Martin in Sanford, Florida by a 28-year old neighborhood watchman George Zimmerman who is claiming that he acted in self-defense under that state's "Stand Your Ground" law.
Apparently, for that reason, Zimmerman was not immediately arrested and charged with murder. The decision not to arrest Zimmerman stoked an outrage that sparked marches and rallies across the country that eventually led to his arrest and being charged with second degree murder.
Racial incidents, especially the kind involving violence, would ordinarily stoke spirited debate among students whose opinions often run the entire gamut. But the debate over Trayvon shooting on OSU campus was particularly fuelled by the April 5 incident involving someone spray-painting "Long Live Zimmerman" on the walls of the Frank W. Hale Jr. Black Cultural Center at The Ohio State University.
While that incident simmered, a rash of racially-charged incidents, including swastikas and racial slurs were found on a mural of President Barack Obama located at Weinland Park. Also, religious and racial slurs were discovered in a dormitory room and on a trash can near the Ohio Union student center.
That was when OSU President E. Gordon Gee decided it was time to take action.
With help from U.S. District Judge Algenon Marbley, who is also a university trustee, he formed the "No Place for Hate" task force to address the rising tide of 'hateful' indulgencies on campus. The panel of 31 students, faculties and others was chaired by Javaune Adams-Gaston, vice president of Student Life and Valerie Lee, vice provost for Diversity and Inclusion.
"We want to be a leader, not a follower," said Gee, who last week received the panel's report containing 24 recommendations for how to promote racial tolerance and inclusion on campus.
The panel's recommendations, which fall into three main categories – diversity awareness, identity-based harassment, and diversity and inclusion – called for addressing short and long terms goals, to be accomplished within one year and two to five years, respectively, starting with establishing a student helpline to handle the eruption of racial incidents on campus.
A director at the Hale Center Larry Williamson applauded the idea.
"A lot of times when things happen, you don't have a place that you feel that you can go, and the helpline and hate crime alerts were put in place to make sure the students, faculty and staff have something tangible that they can actually dialogue with and try to get some action," said Williamson.
Also on the panel's list of recommendation is the need to create five committees to address parts of the overall goal of this endeavor, which according to Adams-Gaston, "is to ensure that the university continues to expand in its engagement and its breadth of inclusion, and the sense of welcoming, and the sense of voice for all individuals in the community."
That need for achieving a "sense of voice" was precisely the moxie that galvanized students into action which was instrumental in the panel's work, including marches and protests that initially helped veer the university into action.
Gee praised the positive attitude of the students and all involved in this orb.
"Having served as a university president for more than three decades, I will say that never before have I seen a more constructive, positive and forward-thinking response to something that could all-too easily divide a campus community," he said.
Mgbatogu is a freelance writer and editor of Onumba.com based in Columbus. He can be reached by email at This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it .
Some Worry Student Loan Mismanagement Mimics Predatory Housing Market
While college completion rates among African Americans continues to increase exponentially – a growth of more than 45 percent for bachelor's degrees between 1990 and 2000 – that growth brings an equally pressing concern over the funding and support for Black college students at both historically black colleges and universities (HBCUs) and predominantly black institutions (PBIs).
Organizations and think tanks, including the National Association for Equal Opportunity in Higher Education, insist that the nation's recent economic downturn not only raises the ire over federal funding for Black college students, who disproportionately rely on federal education assistance, but also brings to the foreground the growing number of black students who are unable to find gainful employment after graduation and subsequently default on their student loans.
Lynn Huntley, policy expert and immediate past president of the Southern Education Foundation, said that financial difficulties facing many Black college students is likely to escalate as the nation attempts to overhaul Pell Grant and Federal Student Loan programs. Huntley believes creative restructuring and guidelines may strategically offset decreases in funding.
"Instead of just saying it is important to balance money and even to make some cuts, we have to determine more effective ways to achieve that balance. For instance, we cannot have a full-time undergraduate student on Pell Grants for nine years. Six years may even be determined to be too many years, and it does not mean that we necessarily cut these students off, but there have to be ways to use the money we do have more effectively," Huntley said.
Huntley said that there are some clear racial biases that impact financing and repayment indirectly, including the fact that black students with college degrees earn less than white college students with the same college degrees. The result, Huntley said is that many students coming from low-income households, as black college graduates, actually "remain low-income after earning their college degrees; consequently, there is little pay-off to going into debt to earn the degree."
In the face of inequity, some recent graduates, like Jaunice Washington, suggest after graduation, there should be a limit on how much students have to pay monthly. A 2010 graduate of Southern University in Baton Rouge, La., Washington said she has been unable to find employment in her field – criminal justice – with a bachelor's degree. Returning to school for additional training is not an option with student loans and other bills mounting.
"It's a Catch-22. I need the education and the experience in order to get the job I want in my field, but I need more money to pay for school and more school to enhance my marketability," Washington said.
For now, the 22-year-old is working as an assistant manager for a fast food chain and praying the years and money spent on her criminal justice degree will lead to a career beyond burgers and milkshakes.
Washington's anxiety over career opportunities is only one portion of the competitive equation. Competition for financial resources in education is further complicated by the popularity of short-term certificates from for-profit schools among African Americans, like Everett, Kaplan, and Capella. Programs generally range from six months to two years, and are appealing to minorities because of the flexibility, the promised direct link to employment after graduation and the flexibility of classes.
However, the promise of employment rarely materializes and lends itself to buyer's remorse and loan defaults. Industry insiders note that the for-profit college industry makes its money by recruiting students – overwhelmingly poor and minority students – who must depend on federal monies to pay tuition. As much as 90 percent of the revenue of a for-profit college company, in some instances, comes from the federal government, in the form of Pell Grants and student loans.
"Short-term certificates-for-profit schools are more expensive than traditional institutions of higher learning and have an enrollment of roughly 17 percent Black. In fact, undergraduate enrollment of black students at public institutions is 13 percent, while enrollment of this same group of students at for-profit institutions is 22 percent. As a result, there is a higher default rate and it is harder for them to navigate the job market," Huntley said.
Julius L. Cartwright, president / CEO of the National Association of Real Estate Brokers, contends that the answer to financial sustainability among African Americans rests in acknowledging a long-overlooked parallel between education [be it traditional, HBCUs or PBIs] and the currency homeownership affords in being able to finance higher education.
Cartwright said that during the American housing crisis, African Americans lost more than a million dollars of wealth through housing foreclosures.
"The media said we, African Americans, were the cause of the crisis and failure. When sending children to school, the average wealth is a $5,600 difference in the gap between white and African-American families. The difference in the gap is a piece of property – real estate," Cartwright said.
Cartwright and others insist that one of the quickest means of re-establishing that wealth is to promote homeownership among black college students so that within two years of graduation, the students are property owners.
"For African Americans the loss was multi-generational. We must transplant these messages into our young people between the ages of 16 and 25, and they will regain the loss caused by the housing foreclosure disaster because there is a tremendous amount of wealth if one buys a property today," Cartwright said.
"Many lenders require that a buyer put an average of 20 percent down on the property in order to secure the loan. With the housing markets in some areas so exorbitant, the average black person would need 20 years simply to earn the down payment, effectively taking black people back to sharecropping days," Cartwright said.
And while President Barack Obama is an ardent supporter of black colleges, according to Dr. William Harvey, chairman of the President's Board of Advisors on Historically Black Colleges and Universities, the money to support HBCUs did not materialize under his administration. Harvey said that although Obama signed Executive Order 13532, titled "Promoting Excellence, Innovation, and Sustainability at Historically Black Colleges and Universities," the federal funding culture promotes narcissism and familiarity over parity and may impede the order.
Harvey points to a former National Institutes of Health (NIH) executive who upon leaving and joining the research faculty of a university, was able to acquire more than 32 grants from NIH for that school.
"One of the biggest problems that I see is you've got the federal agencies populated with people [who] look out for each other. So whether or not you have Democrats or Republicans in the White House, you've got people in federal agencies, career civil servants [who] are program managers, and some of them come from the University of Chicago and Michigan and Stanford. They look to get proposals, support advisory councils and other kinds of advice from people that they know, and, as a result, a lot of those people get the federal grants," Harvey said.
Morehouse alumnus Malcolm McLemore, 44, believes that without reorganization and prioritizing, the financial collapse of the federal financial aid program is as imminent as the housing crisis.
"We have to return to the things of our past as African Americans and allow our churches and extended families to finance our kids' educations," he said.
"We should nest egg for our children's educations when they are babies without relying on federal aid, even it if means foregoing a larger house or new vehicle. We must sacrifice for our own futures because cuts are coming and if we are caught short, it is our own failure, not the president's and not the federal government," McLemore said.
Former Republican National Committee Chairman Michael Steele weighed in on the dialogue in an exclusive interview with the Washington Informer, saying, when it comes to budgeting, HBCUs are no different than majority institutions and have to prioritize the importance of competing elements such as funding journal subscriptions or upgrading housing.
"Funding resources to programs, materials, and institutions are critical budget issues that every institution has to face. For HBCUs there must be an atmosphere of building the endowment. In other words, ask yourself as a prideful alumnus of a great HBCU, when was last time you wrote a check to the alumni network? " Steele asked.
Steele, 53, said that graduate support of black colleges is about much more than mere intra-racial care.
"It is a two-way street. In order to be relevant, you must be able to maintain state requirements, but also to demonstrate the value of your education. No one should be reliant upon a third party to achieve their educational goals," Steele said.
Featured Poll
ADVERTISMENT
ADVERTISMENT