Indianapolis Recorder, Indianapolis, Marion County, 19 March 1994 — Page 2

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THE INDIANAPOLIS RECORDER

SATURDAY, MARCH 19, 1994

‘Integrity with necessary compromise

EDITORIALS

Quality schools with no excuses The Alliance for Quality Schools has put forward a statement of principles as follows: Improved Student PerformanceReduced Overhead and Increased EfficiencyDecentralized Decision making New Models of SchoolsCommunity InvolvementThese five key points are the yardstick by which this group of candidates can be measured if all or any of them win seats on the I.P.S. school board this May. These ideas are hardly new nor are they radical. What would be new, would be the realization of these goals. This way of doing I.P.S. business and measuring the performance of the district will be a radical departure from past and current practice. Every year we graduate students with skills and diplomas that are so diverse in reality that the diplomas themselves as standards of achievement, have become all but meaningless. For example, we have (Washington), that has struggled with accreditation for two years. We have another, (Arlington), which received a national award as a model effort this week. To say that this is unfair to all those involved is an understatement. This tells us that there is a will and a way to improve the educational opportunities for every I.P.S. student. No need for excuses from Washington High school, because everyone connected with I.P.S. can share the blame for this educational blunder. There’s a serious need for action. Every year that goes by allows yet another group of students to escape without getting a proper basic educational experience, not only at Washington High but at a few poorly performing elementary schools and at some other high schools. As far as I.P.S. goes, there is so much to do that there is hardly time to blame anybody. All teachers and administrators have had the benefit of an education and they have had a fair shot at careers and decent jobs. Far too many of our current high school graduates will have a chance at neither unless they go back to school to learn what they are already supposed to know. In short we’ve wasted time and money and we have nothing to show for it but promises. No well meaning taxpayer wants our schools to continue to be mediocre. Nor does anyone want to hear a new set of election campaign promises that are never delivered. People want their children to be given the opportunity to realize their potential. We support the goals of the Alliance for Quality Schools and we will expect that this group of candidates will do as is has said it will do. But we will hold them accountable. We will not expect any excuses from them if they fail to deliver real progress toward their lofty goals. Every one living in the district working and those who pay taxes which support the I.P.S. district must hold whomever is elected, accountable, perhaps as never before, because the hour is late for our children and we’ve heard all of the empty promises that we can stand.

INDIANAPOLIS RECORDER DIRECTORY

Q«org* P. Stewart ’ Foumtar-Edttor-Publlshar 1800-1024

Marcua C. Stewart Sr. Edttor-PubHahar 1029-1003

Eunica Trotter Editor-In-Chief Publlaher 1000-1900

William G. Maya Publisher 1900-present

Vice Pres ./General Manager Charles Blair Executive Assistant KaN R. Lester Art Director John L Hurst Jr. Assistant Ait Director Jonary Setters Creative Director Martin Flash earn X Art/Production Raney Brewer Lifestyle A Religion Connie Gaines Hayes Education/JAWS Shonda McClain Arts A Entertainment Bryan Thompson Business .Annette L. Anderson Sports Stephan B. Johnson OcuteOon Managar Doborah Waiter

CecuiaOon Coordinator Marlon Sims Classified Advertising Sharon L Maxey Religious AdvarVaing Senovia Robinson Local Display Advertising Mike Harden Karen Russell Shaune Shelby Advertising Assistant Pam Jones Controller EncMudm Business Office Sundra Tale Crystal Dalton Jo Ann Hunter Vivian Waddel

The pundits here who analyze eyebrow archings, voice inflections and less are now convinced that Justice Harry Blackmun will soon retire from the U.S. Supreme Court. That would give President Qinton the opportunity to make a critical appointment that would effectively reverse the right-wing tilt of our top court during the aReagan-Bush

years.

The pundits note that Blackmun, the 85-year-old Minnesotan, has

the influence of Justice Antonin Scalia, who avoids condemnation for his far-right, anti-minority votes and opinions because he can say he has a “black” soul brother in Thomas, and (3) Days would be a cinch for confirmation, given his sterling background as a litigator for the NAAGP Legal Defense and Educational Fund, hisservice as head of the Civil Rights Division in the

The scuttlebutt here is that, if Carter Administration, and his record Blackmun has indeed been clearing of “integrity with necessary

recently purged his conscience of his conscience for retirement, compromise” as Solicitor General, guilt for his votes supporting capital President Qinton will name Solicitor Some White House aides are

General Drew Days, an African- arguing that the nation’s highest American colleague and professor tribunal desperately needs a member from Yale Law School, to replace who can play the Marshall role-of-him. conscience, speaking for the poor, An Afro-American lawyer I know the needy, the accused who are argued that Mr. Qinton and the unable to hire fancy lawyers, and the nation need Drew Days on the women who get cheated in

This Blackmun mea culpa comes Supreme Court because (1) He thinks employment, pay scales, promotions with more than 2,800 people now very much like the late Thurgood and most other aspects of American

sitting on death row - more than Marshall and would cancel out life.

enough for an execution-a-day right QarenceThomas’consistently right- But Mr. Qinton has several aides into the 21st century. wing votes; (2) He would weaken who tell him that the views of Days

punishment.

He has declared unconstitutional the imposition of the death penaltythis after his votes helped to allow several states to have more than 15 years of elecirocutions, gassings and

poisonings.

on these issues are very unpopular and might cost him votes in the 1996

presidential election.

The timid people around Mr. Qinton are correct in predicting that Days would face heavy fire from Bob Dole of Kansas, Orrin Hatch of Utah, Strom Thurmond of South Carolina and the usual band of troglodyte Republican senators who know that Days would be as liberal as Blackmun on abortion rights and the death penalty, and probably more liberal in opposing some of the other draconian portions of the crime bill

now before Congress.

We have learned that almost nothing a president does affects our lives more than his appointments to

the Supreme Court

So stay tuned for an announcement from Justice Blackmun, and then hold your breath for clues as to whether Bill Qinton really is determined to serve us up a dish of “blackened Supreme Court.”

Education crisis affecting young Black males

This nation is going to be in big trouble, and African-Americans in even bigger trouble, unless the education crisis affecting young Black males is resolved soon. A new study by the American Council on education says there was a .5 point decline in college attendance of young Black men between 1990 and 1992. Only 30 percent of Black men who have graduated from high school are in college. That means more young Black men are in prison, jails, on parole or probations, than are in college. That’s the scariest statistic I know. It suggests that our efforts to restore Black family strength and economic independence are in jeopardy. Other minorities didn’t lose ground during the 1990-1992 period. Hispanic men, for example, increased their college enrollment rate by six percent over that period. Forty-two percent of white men are in college. The study also says there was a decline in African-American high school graduation rates, from 77 percent to 75 percent. The African-American community’s future requires that we sharply boost both high school and college graduation rates. It’s critical for America, too. All decent jobs in the future will require a college education or at the least, a high school diploma or some technical education. If less than 1/3 of African-American men have college educations, that means over 2/3 will be effectively barred from the kinds of jobs that enable people to raise families and maintain decent living standards. With African-Americans soon comprising a fifth of the workforce, it’s in America’s selfinterest to act now. Unless we can immediately and comprehensively educate all African-American youth there’s going to be massive workforce shortages in the future. Jobs will be available, but we won’t have the people with the schooling and skills to fill them. And that army of unemployed people swelling the ranks of the poor will harbor the anger and resentment that threatens social stability. So that nation needs to act now to reverse the disastrous trends that show%oung AfricanAmerican men speeding toward marginality in a society that needs them in the mainstream. The public schools in poor, inner city

neighborhoods should be heightened, and communitybased organizations given a major role in working with young people and guiding them toward educational achievement. National education reform has to be based on the principle that every child is capable of learning whatever he or she needs to know to meet college admissions requirements. And the colleges need to finally get serious about increasing the numbers of minorities in their student bodies, with effective outreach

programs, scholarships and aid. Once in college, students should be provided with the guidance and faculty concern i that keep them in school and ^ aimed at satisfying careers. i^^kA \ The historically Black colleges and universities provide that kind of concern, which is why they have seen their enrollments rise while other institutions have failed to attract and retain African-American youth. If those financially strapped schools can do it, there’s no excuse for the institutions of higher learning that have failed to do it.

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Birmingham goes, so goes the nation

PHONE (317) 924-5143

New civil right’s book shows old Birmingham changing in many ways In Andrew Young’s new book, A Way Out of No Way, he remembers the Civil Rights Movement and his participation in it. He recalls the Birmingham of old. He remembers when the Southern Christian Leadership Conference made the decision to concentrate its efforts in that city, and the entire staff were fearful. He even recalls how Dr. King joked about who was going to give up their life in Birmingham, even delivering satirical eulogies for each of the staff. But Birmingham today is a different city. It’s a city with an African-American mayor and a majority-Black city council. Instead of Bull Conner heading the police force, an African-American, Johnnie Johnson is the police chief of an integrated force. Qearly, change has happened in Birmingham. Another index of change has recently taken place around the proposed opening of a new toxic waste transfer station in the predominantly African-American area of Titusville. Several local community organizations, including the Malcolm X

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By BERNICE POWELUACKSON

Grassroots Movement and the Titusville Total Awareness Group, joined with the Southern Organization Committee Youth Task Force still campaigned against the City Council’s approved bid to build the transfer station. On Jan. 15, in celebration of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.’s birthday, these community groups sponsored a youth march against the waste transfer station’s opening in their community. The march, which began at the Civil Rights Institute, was to go past City Hall and culminate with an anti-violence rap musical concert at a housing project. A few blocks from City Hall, the youth were confronted by police officers and violence erupted. Pictures of Birmingham police wielding nightsticks and spraying mace in the faces of Black youth soon appeared in newspapers.

Long-time Birmingham civil rights and religious leaders decried the violence, with several saying that not since the 1960s had they seen something like this happen in that city. But as bad as those pictures looked, they moved the new Birmingham into action. Richard Arrington, Birmingham’s mayor, met immediately with representatives of the Malcolm X Grassroots Movement to discuss the incident and explore constructive ways of dealing with the problems arising from the confrontation. Four days after the incident, the Mayor and community leaders held a press conference to state publicly their commitment to work together and to continue to communicate. More importantly, the city began to review its decision to allow the waste transfer station to open in Titusville. When the city ruled that the station could not open, its owners filed a $17 million suit against the city. The city and the owner of the station has now been reached. This is a new day in Birmingham. The waste transfer station will not open in Titusville. The youth completed their march on the fourth of March. They joined others in Selma that

weekend to commemorate the 29th anniversary of the SelmaMontgomery march. Seven years ago the Commission for Racial Justice released its landmark report. Toxic Wastes and Race. It showed that race is the most important single factor in the location of commercial hazardous waste facilities. It located hazardous waste sites in both cities and rural areas across the United States. The report took five years to complete. Everyday new waste stations are opening up in communities large and small. Some are toxic way-stations, others are not. Too often the community knows nothing of their presence until decisions have been made, and too often local governments and private companies don’t talk with local residents about what they are planning. But citizens do control their destiny of their own communities. Birmingham proves that. Fred Shuttleswofth, who as the local SCLC organizer in Birmingham, said thirty years ago, “As Birmingham goes, so goes the nation.” That was true then, and that is true now.