All Articles Tagged "african american youth"
Unemployed And Undereducated: Study Finds Black Youth Are Disconnected
Image: Shutterstock, Jeff Cleveland
It isn’t a myth that black youth are being left behind. It is a reality and a new study, “One in Seven: Ranking Youth Disconnection in the 25 Largest Metro Areas,” has the evidence. The study looked at the number of youth who are disconnected in America. We aren’t talking hi-tech disconnected, but socially disconnected. The government defines a disconnected youth as one who is not in school or working.
“One in Seven” found that youth disconnection is highest in the largest metro areas of the U.S., meaning that African-American teens are the most impacted. According to “One in Seven,” 5.8 million young adults or one in seven young adults, ages 16 to 24, are socially adrift. The study was conducted by social scientist Sarah Burd Sharps, who said in a press release for the study she co-authored with Kristen Lewis, “One in Seven is a wake-up call to this country. Disconnection can affect everything from earnings and financial independence to physical and mental health, and even marital prospects.”
AOL reports, that the study discovered “African Americans between the ages of 16 and 24 have the highest rate of youth disconnection at 22.5 percent, a figure that holds significant monetary implications beyond any one racial or ethnic group. Last year alone, youth disconnection cost taxpayers $93.7 billion in government support and lost tax revenue.”
The study didn’t just leave it at presenting the statistics; it also gave recommendations for stopping youth disconnection. It suggests providing “meaningful support and guidance both to young people aiming for a four-year bachelor’s degree and to those whose interests and career aspirations would be better served by relevant, high-quality career and technical education certificates and associate’s degrees.” Lewis concluded in the press release, “In today’s economy, everyone needs some education beyond high school, but as a society, we need to rethink the ‘college-for-all’ mantra that devalues and stigmatizes career and technical education. Instead, we should provide robust pathways to postsecondary certificates or associate degree programs for those who choose this route.”
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Is Urban Lit Harmful to Youth?
(Huffington Post) — It started out innocently enough with a simple question, “So what types of books do you enjoy?” I was in the process of interviewing participants for my dissertation and this question was supposed to be an icebreaker. Interestingly the responses that I received from the African-American adolescent girls were not so simple. The young women, ages 14-21, informed me that they enjoyed reading romances, mysteries, and poetry, but they also enjoyed reading ‘Urban Lit’ or ‘Street Fiction’ novels as they are sometimes called. For me, their responses were a little bit startling because I’ve read a number of urban literature books and found them somewhat provocative and sexually explicit with portrayals of sexual coercion, trading sex for goods (i.e., rent, designer clothes & purses), rape, gun violence and substance abuse. In fact it took me almost 6 months to read B-More Careful by Shannon Holmes, due to its violent content and sexually explicit material. Don’t get me wrong, I enjoyed the book and would recommend it to any adult but I struggled with some of the content. So, as I queried some adolescents about the books they read, I began to wonder about the numbers of young teens reading these books? What impressions are these books leaving them with and is the content affecting their risk behaviors and with whom are they discussing these books?
Chicago's New Curfew Law
(Chicago Tribune) — Edward Da’Quan Smith dangled upside down, his lower legs wrapped around the metal rungs of the monkey bars at Kenwood Community Park. On a recent Tuesday night, the South Side park was abandoned except for the boy’s family — a rambunctious trio of children racing around the playground under the watchful eye of Da’Quan’s mother. ”When it’s dark, people can hide in the shadows,” said Da’Quan, somersaulting to the ground and landing firmly on his feet. “In every little corner, there is a piece of the dark where they can hide.” Even at 10 years old, the fourth-grader grasps the dangers facing children on Chicago’s streets. “It’s in the nighttime that violence breaks out,” said Da’Quan, with a glance toward his mother, who smiled in approval.
Economics Drive Down Smoking Among Black Youth
(HealthCanal.com) — A new report in the American Journal of Public Health suggests that increasing cigarette prices combined with other social and economic factors appear to be behind the steep decline in smoking rates among African American youth that occurred between 1970s and the mid-1990s. The report argues that racial differences in parental attitudes, religious ties, negative health perceptions (and experiences), worsening poverty, increased food stamp use and price sensitivity were major factors contributing to the more rapid decrease and continuing lower rate of smokingamong black youth than among other groups. “Some have suggested that African American youth substituted other forms of tobacco, alcohol and other drugs for cigarettes,” said Tyree Oredein, the corresponding author of the report and a doctoral student at the UMDNJ-School of Public Health. “However, there was an overall decline in the use of both licit and illicit drugs among black high school seniors from the mid 1970s through the early 1990s alongside the fall of cigarette use.” Oredein is also an adjunct professor of health and nutritionsciences at Montclair State University.
Cops Get Ready to Take on ‘Flash Mobs’
(Washington Examiner) — Washington-area police said they are preparing to combat the “flash mob” phenomenon, a new tactic being used by criminals and violent youths around the country and in the region. Flash mobs are groups that form quickly, often coordinated using social media such as Twitter and Facebook. The earliest flash mobs engaged in more innocent pursuits such as dancing or throwing snowballs, but some groups are now gathering to attack innocent bystanders, fight among themselves or commit other crimes. About 30 young people suddenly showed up at a 7-Eleven in Germantown at 2 a.m. Saturday and began grabbing merchandise off the shelves. People swiped drinks, candy and ice cream, and then left almost as quickly as they appeared — without paying.
Youth Program Brings Fears of London-Like Mobs to Chinatown
(Washington Examiner) — The District is organizing a “youth engagement” program Friday night for the teens who gather in Chinatown every weekend, but some business owners fear the event will draw more youths to the area and unleash destructive forces similar to the mobs that have been rioting in London. ”We’ve been assured that the police department will deal with it,” said Proof owner Mark Kuller, who has decided to close the restaurant’s patio Friday night — one-third of his summer seating — rather than submit his customers to the sound and crowds he expects to come.
Cities Crack Down on Mobs of Black Teens
(Christian Science Monitor) — State police are roaming the Wisconsin State Fair in Milwaukee, looking for teenage troublemakers. Philadelphia is stepping up enforcement of a curfew for teens in the Center Citybusiness district. Chicago police have beefed up patrols along the city’s “Miracle Mile” district in response to recent teenage “flash robs,” some which police say were orchestrated via social media. What connects the three city crackdowns are teen-perpetrated crimes that are part opportunistic, part thrill-seeking, and, some residents fear, part racially motivated: dozens of black teenagers collectively targeting, and attacking, white people they don’t even know. Resentment fueled by dogged segregation, poor unemployment opportunities for young black men, and historic inequalities may all be playing into an atmosphere of racial discontent, sociologists say.
Census Shows Decline in Black Kids in Big Cities
(AP) — A catastrophic flood emptied New Orleans of much of its black youth. Powerful social forces may be doing a similar thing to places like Harlem and Chicago’s South Side. Over the past decade, the inner-city neighborhoods that have served for generations as citadels of African-American life and culture have been steadily draining of black children. Last year’s census found that the number of black, non-Hispanic children living in New York City had fallen by 22.4 percent in 10 years. In raw numbers, that meant 127,058 fewer black kids living in the city of Jay Z and Spike Lee, even as the number of black adults grew slightly. The same pattern has repeated from coast to coast. Los Angeles saw a 31.8 percent decline in its population of black children, far surpassing the 6.9 percent drop in black adults. The number of black children in Atlanta fell by 27 percent. It was down 31 percent in Chicago and 37.6 percent in Detroit. Oakland, Calif. saw a drop of 42.3 percent, an exodus that fell only 6 percentage points below the decline in flood-ravaged New Orleans.
Study: Academic Achievement Lowest Among Minority Men
(Los Angeles Times) — Young black and Latino men lag behind their contemporaries in nearly every measure of educational attainment, with many failing to attend college or earn degrees and large numbers facing the prospect of unemployment or incarceration. The findings are included in two reports released at a briefing Monday by the College Board Advocacy & Policy Center. It was hosted by Harvard University’s W.E.B. Du Bois Institute for African and African American Research in Cambridge, Mass. The reports cull census data, academic research and in-depth interviews to paint a bleak picture of the educational experiences of young men across four racial and ethnic groups: African Americans, Asian Americans and Pacific Islanders, Latinos and Native Americans.
Advocate Helps Kids Stay Safe and in School
(Chicago Tribune) — Stevie Powell pulled his maroon minivan to the curb next to a weedy empty lot in Englewood. ”Five minutes,” he warned, as Dimonte Pryor, 19, slid open the door and sauntered to his house. Powell, a big man with a quiet voice and the shambling gait of an overgrown kid, didn’t want any delays. He was driving Pryor and Davonte Flennoy, 19, to a formalwear store to be fitted for prom tuxedos. Powell is not their father. He is their advocate, a key role in the intensive mentoring program that has been a linchpin in the Chicago Public Schools’ vaunted anti-violence initiative. He waited for Pryor. In the back seat, Flennoy idly twisted a lock of hair. Pop. Pop. Powell scanned the street. “Did that sound like shots?” he asked. ”I don’t know,” said Flennoy, unruffled. “Could be someone putting nails on their roof.” Pryor came out, smoking a cigarette. He had changed clothes. Instead of his school uniform polo shirt, he was wearing a white T-shirt bearing the image of a young man with a cocky grin in front of a glowing white gate. Spray-painted letters on the back read, “RIP D-LO.”
