(BENNY NAPOLEON, Wayne County Sheriff hands out back-to-school goodies to children and their parents in Detroit.)
Many parents this week fulfilled an educational ritual or tradition by taking their kids to their first day of school. Children coming from nuclear family systems, to those coming from extended families and single parentage all were taken to school to begin the school year. I did the same with my son who started kindergarten even though he and another soccer teammate in the same class were complaining earlier in the morning even before the class began that the class was boring.
But the choice of taking your child to school does not come without anxiety and the fear of the unknown. Against the backdrop of what we’ve seen happen in the past including the Sandy Hook tragedy and others, we can only hope that the schools where children were dropped this week are keeping up with the latest safety tips. We can hope that innocent children who have no role to play in adult and societal conflicts do not become the victims of those conflicts as history has shown.
That is why a lot of parents who sent their kids to school this week are having a lot of anxiety and worries about the school environment and the classroom where the children are learning. It is not because some of these parents do not have faith in the school administrators, teachers and principals, it is simply that we have seen incidents where the safety of children was compromised and thus finding school administrators wanting or negligent.
It is even more concerning when you consider the fact that outside of home, children spend more time at school than anywhere else. Because of that, these children need a learning environment that is secure and nurturing and one that will help them find a sense of achievement in an atmosphere that allows the development of their cognitive skills and identifying their innate abilities.
With this, bullying comes to mind. The latest menace in schools, bullying has been a constant problem in a lot of schools where children who are the victims of bullying feel oppressed, abandoned and neglected. Every school should have a clear policy on bullying and provide measurable deterrence in place. No parent wants to send their children to a school where administrators and teachers are playing fiddle with bullying. Every child is born talented and no one should act like they have the divine authority to institute punishment or bullying on that child. And school administrators should not wait for the media to intervene before they act to address bullying cases in certain schools.
I asked Dr. Barika Butler, a board certified child and adolescent psychiatrist about parents feeling anxiety this week.
“It is not uncommon for both parents and children to have some anxiety about getting back to school or starting new schools or grades. Prepare yourself and your child as much as you can ahead of time. Drive by the school, even walk up to the door, meet the teacher before the first day if you can,” Butler explained. “Parents, it is important that you know your kids’ routines and what is expected of them and of you for the upcoming year. As always, breath deeply, count to 10, and if spirituality is important to you, pray over your children and their new adventure. Remember, this is an exciting time for everyone.”
On school safety, Butler said, “Unless you are living under a rock, we all know that school tragedies have become more commonplace. Most schools remain safe. If you are concerned, talk with your children about a safety plan. What to do if something goes wrong. A safe place to meet you in the event of an emergency and if they are old enough and have a cell phone, how to reach you and 911. Also, don’t be shy about talking to your school administrators and teachers about their safety plans and drills. Fire and tornado drills are not enough.”
Butler said all schools and classrooms should have a well thought out emergency plan including how the kids will escape and whether there is an escape route for each classroom.
“How are emergency officials contacted? These are your most precious commodities. Do not be shy about holding your school to the fire about a safety plan. When we as parents drop our kids off to school, we not only have to worry about how they are educated but how their safety is addressed,” Butler said. “It is the responsibility of every school and staff member to ensure the safety of our children.”
As we discussed parental anxiety in the newsroom Tuesday morning, one of my colleagues, raised the issue of “Black parenting,” in light of what happened in Ferguson, Mo. the death of Michael Brown who was heading to college. A lot of Black parents pray and hope that their children would not become the next Michael Brown, underscoring the difficulties and challenges of raising a Black boy in a society where he could easily be targeted or seen as a suspect by virtue of his appearance.
This kind of profiling is even more troubling when a new report this year showed that Black preschoolers are more likely to be suspended than their White counterparts. What in the world would warrant any educational administrator to suspend a four-year-old child from school? What can this child do that is beyond the control of the school?
The U.S. Department of Education’s civil rights division found that Black children represent 18 percent of kids in preschool programs in the nation. But these innocent Black lives make up almost 50 percent of preschoolers suspended more than once, thanks to the so-called “get tough” suspension policies which in reality is the foundation of the “school to prison pipeline.” The same report found that Black kids were expelled three times higher than White kids.
“It is clear that the United States has a great distance to go to meet our goal of providing opportunities for every student to succeed,” Education Secretary Arne Duncan said.
I appreciate Duncan’s politically correctness response to his own department’s indicting report. But the reality, Mr. Secretary, is that this report shows that racial disparity in education is not only at the highest academic levels like the University of Michigan, Michigan State University, Wayne State University and others where the end of affirmative action is taking a devastating toll on Black enrollment, it is also happening at the start of educational development-preschool. Preschool is where children are supposed to be molded and instead they are being suspended and expelled. If it is not race, and race alone, what other reason would warrant a harmless Black child to receive more suspension or expulsion at four or five years of age than his/her White counterpart?
But the nation’s no-nonsense Attorney General Eric Holder put the U.S. Department of Education report on Black preschoolers in the context that it rightly belongs because we cannot pretend not to know what is happening. And unless we have leaders who are willing to nip the problem at the bud we will continue to have a divided nation, divided community and divided schools. Unless there are men and women who are willing to call out this mindboggling disparity in educational treatment, preschools will become only a warehouse for these children instead of a learning environment.
“This critical report shows that racial disparities in school discipline policies are not only well documented among older students, but actually begin during preschool,” Holder said. “Every data point represents a life impacted and a future potentially diverted or derailed. This administration is moving aggressively to disrupt the school-to-prison pipeline in order to ensure that all of our young people have equal educational opportunities.”
The educational inequity documented in Duncan’s Education Department report is a failure of educational leadership at all levels. Again what kind of threat can a four-year-old or three-year-old child present in school that cannot be contained?
Denying these children access to education is equally a denial of their right to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. We should all hang our heads in shame that innocent and unoffending lives can be subjected to these harsh forms of discrimination.
It is almost as if these children are being set up to fail in kindergarten. Because if they’ve received that many inexcusable suspensions or expulsions in preschool, how can they come to kindergarten this week prepared? Worst of all it is already in their record that they are “troublesome,” which means they will now be targeted and the consequences could alter their entire life. Deemed “troublesome” for no justifiable reason, their path to educational success is now been paved with rocks and thorns and their chances of success is limited because somebody in preschool has a limited worldview and could not relate to children from varying backgrounds and thus pushed for suspension or expulsion.
As my colleague in the newsroom rightly pointed out, this is part of the reason why many Black parents are feeling anxiety this week, because the federal government’s own report says preschools are engaging in an unacceptable and selective provision of educational opportunities when it should be education for all.
Unlike adults, young children are free of prejudice. Unless it is imbibed in their minds they are open for exploration. Prejudice is a learned behavior.
When I volunteered this season to be the head soccer coach for my son’s school I noticed how all of the boys in the soccer kindergarten team were enjoying themselves. It did not matter to them how each child looked. It did not matter to them whether their soccer coach was Black. All that mattered was they were excited someone was willing to lead them in practice for their games.
In fact, at the end of one practice I asked all of the boys to sit down and form a circle and we reminded ourselves of the need to be nice to each other and be friends because we are all one team. As soon as they were ready to leave the soccer practice field, as their parents stood watching, some of the boys did not want to leave. A couple of them grabbed my leg, playing and refusing to go. That reminded me of the innocence of children. But it also reminded me of what Nelson Mandela said: “Sports has the power to change the world. It has the power to inspire. It has the power to unite people in a way that little else does. It speaks to youth in a language they understand. Sports can create hope where once there was only despair. It is more powerful than government in breaking down racial barriers.”
Even as all parents hope for a successful school year beginning this week, lets push for an education for all, not just for some. School administrators and teachers should give parents a reason to be anxiety-free and to be less skeptical about what will happen in school once they drop their kids off.
Bankole Thompson is the editor of the Michigan Chronicle and author of a forthcoming book on Detroit. His most recent book, “Obama and Christian Loyalty,” deals with the politics of the religious right, Black theology and the president’s faith posture across a myriad of issues with an epilogue written by former White House spokesman Robert S. Weiner. He is a senior political analyst at WDET-101.9FM (Detroit Public Radio) and a member of the weekly “Obama Watch” Sunday roundtable on WLIB-1190AM New York. Email bthompson@michronicle.com or visit https://www.bankolethompson.com.
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