The Wall Street Journal recently revealed news which should gladden the hearts of parents of teenagers everywhere: "cognitive empathy", the wiring in children's brains that enables them to understand and care about how others think, only begins to develop at age 13. So when your sweet middle schooler disappears and is replaced by an eye-rolling, door slamming "who is [...]
Are you or your sons STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering, Math) enthusiasts? Do you want to be? Sounds like the new show "The Big Brain Theory: Pure Genius" premiering on the Discovery Channel tomorrow (May 1) is right up your alley. This show will feature an impossible sounding engineering challenge each week which teams of skilled contestants will attempt to [...]
As college admissions results roll in, here's some good news to consider: For the fourth year in a row, all of the 167 seniors in Chicago's Urban Prep Academies schools have been accepted into four year colleges or universities. The Urban Prep Academy network has expanded since GCP reported their success last year ("And Now For Some Good News [...]
How can we help our wonderful, maddening, lovable, frustrating, genius, unmotivated, spectacular sons grow into healthy and happy young men? In our ongoing efforts to seek parenting advice and info from people who have made finding answers to these kinds of questions their life's work, GCP connected with Dr. Michael G. Thompson, the renowned clinical psychologist and boy guru [...]
Last night I had the incredible pleasure of sitting at a friend's small dinner party for Jazz at Lincoln Center and listening to Wynton Marsalis jam with his quintet in her living room(!). As Wynton introduced their final piece, "Take the A Train", he mentioned that he had the opportunity to meet Duke Ellington back in 1971, when he [...]
Several New York City principals have suggested that the disproportionate number of Black and Hispanic students suspensions in NYC public schools can be traced to the failure of teachers and administrators to understand the street-wise origins of the students' aggressive behavior. In an article found here the principals suggest that these students are having trouble understanding that the combative [...]
Yesterday evening GCP attended "A Conversation with Julian Bond and Anderson Cooper", to hear CNN anchor Cooper interview Bond about his life in the civil rights movement. Bond, who was the co-founder of the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC) and more recently the Chairman Emeritus of the NAACP, reminisced about the evolution of his work in the civil rights [...]
Walter Dean Myers, award-winning author of "Hoops", "Monster", Fallen Angels," "Sunrise Over Fallujah", and many other young adult novels, has been named the nation's third Ambassador for Young People's Literature. As the new (and first African American) National Ambassador, Myers will tour the country for two years, speaking at schools and libraries about reading and literacy. Myers, 74, will [...]
Here's an inspirational story from The Washington Post to savor along with your Thanksgiving leftovers: Coach Natalie Randolph, an African American believed to be the only woman currently coaching a high school football team in the country, led her Coolidge High School Colts earlier this week to the Turkey Bowl, Washington D.C.'s public school football championship. This was the [...]
GCP is keenly interested in promoting educational models and practices which have demonstrated success with our boys, particularly those that can be scaled up to impact the greatest number of children. As you know, much of the current education reform discussion revolves around how to effectively measure and improve teacher quality, whether standardized tests are the best way to [...]