Civil Rights

Still l Rise by Maya Angelou – Black History is Everyday

/ Ogo Okoye-johnson / 1 Comment

You may write me down in history 
With your bitter, twisted lies, 
You may tread me in the very dirt 
But still, like dust, I’ll rise. 

Does my sassiness upset you? 
Why are you beset with gloom? 
‘Cause I walk like I’ve got oil wells 
Pumping in my living room. 

Just like moons and like suns, 
With the certainty of tides, 
Just like hopes springing high, 
Still I’ll rise. 

Did you want to see me broken? 
Bowed head and lowered eyes? 
Shoulders falling down like teardrops. 
Weakened by my soulful cries. 

Does my haughtiness offend you? 
Don’t you take it awful hard 
‘Cause I laugh like I’ve got gold mines 
Diggin’ in my own back yard. 

You may shoot me with your words, 
You may cut me with your eyes, 
You may kill me with your hatefulness, 
But still, like air, I’ll rise. 

Does my sexiness upset you?
Does it come as a surprise
That I dance like I’ve got diamonds
At the meeting of my thighs?

Out of the huts of history’s shame
I rise
Up from a past that’s rooted in pain
I rise
I’m a black ocean, leaping and wide,
Welling and swelling I bear in the tide.
Leaving behind nights of terror and fear
I rise
Into a daybreak that’s wondrously clear
I rise
Bringing the gifts that my ancestors gave,
I am the dream and the hope of the slave.
I rise
I rise
I rise.

Advertisement

California’s $53 Million Lawsuit Settlement to Improve Reading

/ Ogo Okoye-johnson / Leave a comment

Children of the Promise Prep Academy

Children of Promise Preparatory Academy, a charter school in the Inglewood Unified School District is one of the schools that filed the lawsuit.

On Thursday February 20, 2020, in the Los Angeles Superior Court, 75 elementary public traditional and charter schools won a $53 million lawsuit settlement against the State of California for violating the students’ civil rights. The Ella T. vs. the State of California, lawsuit filed by students and their teachers two years ago claimed that the state denied the students their constitutional right to an equal access to a quality education because the students did not meet state standards in reading.

The lawsuit was filed by Public Counsel, a pro bono public interest law firm and the law firm of Morrison & Foerster. “We shouldn’t have to be filing lawsuits to establish a right to read. Achieving literacy for all children is one of the single most urgent issues in California, “This settlement is a milestone in that struggle,” said attorney Mark Rosenbaum from the Public Counsel law firm.

Read more here and here!

 

 

The Impact of School Composition on Black and White Achievement Gap

/ Ogo Okoye-johnson / 4 Comments

According to a recent study conducted by Bohrnstedt, G., Kitmitto, S., Ogut, B., Sherman, D., and Chan, D. published by the National Center for Education Statistics, there is a significant positive correlation between school composition and black-white achievement gap.

Using data from the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP) 2011 Mathematics Grade 8 Assessment and the Common Core for 2010–11, the study found that while the achievement gap between white and black students remains significant overall with white students performing higher, the “achievement for both Black and White students was lower in the highest Black student density schools than in the lowest density schools. For Black students overall, and Black males in particular, achievement was still lower in the highest density schools than in the lowest density schools.”

Policy makers and educational practitioners should use the results of this study to inform both allocation of resources, and instructional practices in this environment of increasing resegregation of public schools.

NAEP is the largest nationally representativ​e and continuing assessment of what America’s students know and can do in various subject areas.

Why Did Civil Rights Groups Demand Standardized Testing?

/ Ogo Okoye-johnson / 2 Comments

I wanted to share this blog because as an avid multicultural education practitioner, who believes in the provision of quality education for all students, it is important that social justice organizations who advocate for students ensure that the proposals they support which ultimately impact the groups they advocate for are research-based and will ensure for the welfare of all students. Share your thoughts and comments.

Diane Ravitch's blog

Civil rights groups issued a statement expressing their support for annual testing. The statement makes assumptions about the supposed benefits of testing that are surprising. After 13 years of federally mandated annual testing, how could anyone still believe that testing will improve instruction and close achievement gaps? Tests measure achievement gaps, they don’t close them. Standardized tests are normed on a bell curve. A bell curve has a top half and bottom half. It never closes. Standardized tests accurately measure family income. One need only look at the correlation between SAT scores and family income to see how closely the scores are tied to wealth and poverty. For reasons incomprehensible to me, these worthy organizations believe that children have a right to take standardized tests, even though such tests disproportionately benefit the privileged, not children who are poor or children with disabilities or children whose families have been discriminated against…

View original post 1,299 more words

Obama Education Department to Spend $4.2 Million to Help States Create Teacher Assignment Equity Plans

/ Ogo Okoye-johnson / 3 Comments

The No Child Left Behind Act of 2002 required all states to file an equity plan that explains their teacher assignments in order to ensure that strong teachers are placed in struggling schools and in schools in high poverty areas. However, 2006 is the last year that most states have submitted their plans. According to Catherine Lhamon, assistant secretary for civil rights at the Department of Education in a call with reporters on Monday, “We are all dismayed by the lack of compliance. We’re saying this is critical for us.”

$4.2 million will be spent by the Obama Education Department to provide  “technical assistance network” that will help states and districts develop and implement equity plans that highlight the causes of “their “excellent” teacher imbalance, craft a strategy to correct the problem and publicly report their progress”.