A recent study conducted by UCLA and NYU researchers concluded that minority (which included African American, Chinese, Dominican and Russian) students as young as second grade recognize stigmas against their ethnic groups and experience increased anxiety because of these stigmas. However, these elementary school students are more motivated about school than their European American classmates. Read about it here, [...]
A professor at a Pennsylvania university recently set out to determine how college student's grades are impacted by their Facebook usage. Today's New York Times reveals his study's surprising conclusions, in an article found here. The study found that while spending an inordinate amount of time on Facebook is related to negative outcomes, just checking Facebook for a few [...]
Today’s New York Times features an article, found here, which details how little today’s schools teach about the history of the Civil Rights movement and how little today’s students know about basic civil rights history. Julian Bond, the former civil rights activist who began teaching the history of the civil rights movement twenty years ago, speaks of having students [...]
Today's New York Times Magazine includes a very interesting article, found here, about how the heads of a Manhattan private school and a national charter school program are working to help their students develop good character traits as well as good study habits. The private school head feared that his school's focus on testing at every juncture and encouraging [...]
Now that our sons are back in school, it’s time for parents to focus on our Back to School To Do List. Here are a few things you can do to help your son start the school year well: •Review your son’s schedule. Find out what you can about the teachers from your son, other parents and whatever adult [...]
Cyberbullying is a huge issue for children and parents in this digital age. Common Sense Media, a non profit organization devoted to helping families navigate the world of media and technology, has developed a "Cyberbullying Tool Kit" to help educators and parents deal with this problem. The toolkit, which can be found here, includes parent tip sheets on cyberbullying [...]
A generation ago, when I was a kid being bused into a predominantly white school in Brooklyn, I faced daily taunting and intimidation on the school bus from other Black students, who accused me of “acting white,” and “thinking I was cute” for the crime of being the only Black kid picked to be in the class for high [...]
Henry Louis Gates, Jr., Director of Harvard's W.E.B. DuBois Institute for African and African American Research, and Gaston Caperton, President of the College Board, have written an essay in today's Huffington Post and theRoot.com calling for national focus on educating young Black men. You can read it here. Gates and Caperton co-hosted a webcast discussion of this topic today [...]
"Push for A's at Private School is Keeping Costly Tutors Busy", an article in today's New York Times, details the extensive and expensive tutoring underground in NYC private schools. According to this article, which can be found here, over half of the students in NYC private schools hire tutors during the course of their K-12 years. The article highlights [...]
Dr. Pedro Noguera is the Peter Agnew Professor of Teaching and Learning at New York University’s Steinhardt School of Culture, Education and Human Development. Dr. Noguera is a nationally recognized expert on the best practices to narrow the achievement gap between African American and Latino students and White and Asian students. He has worked both with high poverty urban [...]