A Choice of Colors

Baltimore exploded last night. It began with the young people, high school students, urging each other, encouraging each other, to meet at the mall after school to express their anger and frustration at the death of another Black man at the hands of police. The message, spread by social messaging, spread quickly, setting the stage not only for many students to respond, but also for the police to be in place, and the media to be there to record it all.

The family of Freddie Gray, the young man that lost his life at the hands of the police, had eloquently expressed their desire that no protests be held on the day of the funeral, but their wishes would be ignored. The mayor of the city, Stephanie Rawlings-Blake had repeatedly assured the residents of the city that the death was being investigated, and that those responsible for any wrongdoing would be held accountable. She too, was ignored.

Before the evening was done, rioters had attacked police with bottles and rocks, a pharmacy, mall and other businesses had been looted, police cars had been burned, at least two large fires had occurred, and almost twenty police officers had been injured. Media reports indicate that more than 200 rioters were arrested. The mayor has declared a curfew. The schools are closed. The Baltimore Orioles have cancelled their games, and the Governor has called out the National Guard to maintain order in this beautiful city less than 50 miles from the nation’s capital.

All of this occurred in West Baltimore, one of the poorest neighborhoods you will find in the United States.

For Black America, this is another “Tale of Two Cities”, a reincarnation of “the best of times, and the worst of times”. Never before, has a Black person in the United States had the opportunities for educational, professional, political, and economic success that exists today. On the other hand, the illiteracy, imprisonment, unemployment, frustration, hopelessness and anger that exists for large segments of the Black community is as bad as it has been for any ethnic group in the history of our country.

It would be impossible to find a single person that was participating in the destruction of West Baltimore last night that had a college or technical degree, a household income of $40,000, a steady job, a car and a mortgage.

During the Great Depression, the unemployment rate for all Americans got as high as 24.9%. In 1939, it was still at 17.2%. Today, the unemployment rate for African-Americans in Wisconsin is 19.9%. In Nevada, Michigan, Iowa, and the District of Columbia, it’s more than 15%. In Illinois, Missouri, and Washington, the unemployment rate sits at 14%. In California, Connecticut, Indiana, Georgia, Mississippi, Alabama, New Jersey, Ohio, Minnesota, Colorado, Rhode Island, and Tennessee, the unemployment rate for African Americans exceed 10%. Nationwide the unemployment rate for African Americans is 11.4%, twice as high as the rate for whites.

For Black America, the Great Depression continues.

Despite the relative prosperity of the technical and college educated, corporate, entrepreneur, home owning Blacks of America’s cities and suburbs, there still exists neighborhoods of crushing poverty and hopelessness in the rural enclaves and inner cities of America. This is where the inferior schools are found. This is where the missing men are in prison or dead as a result of the continuing wars between themselves. This is where the fear and loathing exists between police and the communities they are sworn to protect and defend. This is where a culture of mediocrity has been embraced, and the uniquely human need for dignity manifests itself in ways that result in the events that occurred in Baltimore, Maryland last night.

It was the spring of 1971 at Benjamin Russell High School in Alexander City, Alabama. The senior class was gathered in the auditorium for its last class meeting. The purpose of the meeting included deciding on class officers, a class song, a class flower, class colors, and a class motto. The great experiment had begun four years earlier, in 1967. George Wallace’s pledge of “segregation forever” had evaporated. The fears of the apocalypse had failed to materialize. The children of this small rural Alabama town, Black and white, had integrated the school, and was about to graduate.

We had come to know each other during four of the most tumultuous years of the 20^th century. We had witnessed war, assassinations, and riots. We had learned not to fear each other, to respect each other. Some of us had become friends.

As I sat in the auditorium I started to think of the great Curtis Mayfield. He was one of my favorite musical artists, not just for his music, but also because of the power and beauty of his lyrics. Many of his songs were focused on equality and civil rights, and the words of those songs were as important to me as any textbook I read. As I was thinking of him, someone asked for a nomination for a class motto. Instinctively, I got up and said “I’ve got one”. I walked to the stage and stood before my classmates, all 220 of them. Two hundred whites, and just 20 Blacks. I was thinking of the words from a Curtis Mayfield song called “A Choice of Colors”. I said…

“People Must Prove to the People, That a Better Day is Coming, For You and For Me. With Just a Little Bit More Education, and Love For Our Nation, We’ll Make a Better Society”.

There were no other nominations. Our class approved my suggestion unanimously. I like to think that we were true to our motto, that our society today is a better one than the one we had in 1971.

However, watching the chaos in Baltimore last night made me wonder.

The Making of a Principal

It is always constructive to start a conversation by finding common ground, something that the participants agree on. Let’s start with this. In K-12 education, Principals are really important. It would be very hard to find a successful school, public or private with an incompetent Principal.

Unfortunately, a large majority of Principals are woefully unprepared for the requirements of the job. Now, in order to make a statement like that, one has to be intimately aware of what those requirements are. It would help if they have experienced the demands, expectations, stresses, and day to day occurrences first hand.

I have.

Most of the people that criticize the nation’s schools have legitimate concerns. They are correct to demand improvement. They are correct to demand equality in funding, better teachers, and better student outcomes.

What they may not realize is the most direct, cost-efficient way of obtaining those results is by focusing on the proper training and selection of the Principals. Once those Principals are selected, it is very important that they are given the autonomy and authority to pursue the desired results. They should be highly rewarded for success, and held accountable for failure.

Most of today’s Principals were outstanding teachers. Unfortunately, the skill set required to be an outstanding teacher is woefully inadequate preparation for being a Principal. My experience as a teacher lasted only five years. Fortunately, I had other professional experiences before becoming a teacher that turned out to be perfect training for my years as a Principal.

My career began as an Administration Manager for the International Business Machines Corporation. IBM gave me excellent management training and experiences that I relied on extensively as a Principal. After thirteen years with IBM my expertise included inventory management, personnel management, accounts payable, budgets, contract administration, distributive leadership, facility management, public speaking, motivational strategies, performance planning, counseling, and evaluation. All of these things were essential skills that contributed to my success as a Principal. None of them were taught to me in the undergraduate or graduate schools of education that I attended.

My pre-Principal education did not end there. I left IBM to purchase a franchised business, and became acutely aware of the pressures of being the final decision-maker. Five years as a business owner and I became completely sensitive to the importance of payrolls, and the enormous effect that meeting it and getting it right has on employee loyalty and morale. The importance of bank accounts, balances, and general ledgers became clear. I also came to appreciate how critical relationships with the community and other businesses were to my ultimate success. Perhaps just as importantly, I learned what it was like to be on call 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, the focus and stamina that requires, and the unending pressure of being ultimately responsible for everything. You don’t learn that as a teacher.

Five years as a teacher completed the preparation for me. Every successful Principal has to be expert in pedagogy, or the methods and practice of teaching. Additionally, a good teacher is aware of the importance of, and practices successful group dynamics, classroom management, parent relations, and educational ethics. Of course, education is ultimately about relationships, and the great teachers, the ones that become Principals excel at building and nurturing positive relationships with all of their stakeholders, including students, parents, teachers, administrators, and members of the community.

The nine years that I spent as a high school Principal were highly successful by any measure. Test Scores? We improved our State Assessment scores in English by 253%, and our Algebra scores by 395%. Increased rigor? We increased the number of students taking Advanced Placement classes from 30 to 700. College and Career Readiness? For five consecutive years, 90% of seniors applied to four-year colleges, with a 70% acceptance rate. We were approved as an International Baccalaureate school. We were featured in a Harvard Business School case study, Forbes Magazine, and several times in the Washington Post. We were featured on both sides of the political spectrum, including the Center for American Progress and the Heritage Foundation. Deloitte named us “School of the Year” in the National Capitol Region in 2010-2011. The US Department of Education featured us on its “Doing What Works” web site. We opened a student-run branch of a local credit union on campus, and our students built a broadcast studio on campus as well. We convinced the State Senate to fund a press box for our football field, and persuaded the county government and board of education to fund and build a new auditorium for the school. We received three formal citations for excellence from the Maryland General Assembly, and two more from the Governor of the State. We also received a commendation from the County Government.

We also received an invitation for 50 of our teachers and students to visit the White House from Michelle Obama.

All of this occurred at a high school on the outskirts of Washington DC in which more than 65% of the students received free and/or reduced meals, the majority lived in single parent homes, a school in which many in the community had lost all hope.

I know that the immediate response to this will be “can this be duplicated”? My response is “I don’t know”. What I do know is that it is possible to re-think how Principals are trained and selected. I know that if I had taken only what I learned in school and as a teacher into my job as a Principal I would not have been as successful as I was. As a Principal, I needed every bit of the training and expertise I accumulated as a manager at one of the world’s great corporations and as an entrepreneur.

 More importantly, I had to insist on the authority and autonomy the job demands. I needed the courage to be different.

Every new Principal would benefit from receiving management training at one of America’s successful businesses. Our schools are living, breathing organisms, communities that a Principal is responsible for organizing, nurturing, educating and disciplining. Let’s invest in and then have the courage to trust our school’s leaders.

Capital Punishment

I am against the death penalty. My reasons include the fact that sometimes it is applied arbitrarily. Sometimes it is applied without due process. Sometimes it is applied due to racial bias.

I realize that many people disagree with me on this, and I respect that. My best friend and I have had some of our most passionate arguments over the death penalty. We have agreed to disagree.

One week ago today, Walter Scott, a fifty year old Black man was summarily executed in North Charleston, South Carolina. His obvious crime was failing to cooperate with a police officer. He was shot in the back eight times. He was unarmed. The executioner was Michael Slager, a police officer.

On August 9, 2014, Michael Brown, an 18-year old Black man was executed in Ferguson, Missouri. His crime was allegedly shop-lifting and walking in the middle of the street. Twelve shots were fired at Brown. He was unarmed. The executioner was Darren Wilson, a police officer.

On July 17, 2014, Eric Garner, a 43-year old Black man was executed in Staten Island, New York City. His crime was selling cigarettes without a license. He was choked to death. He was unarmed. The executioner was Daniel Pantaleo, a police officer.

In the case of Michael Brown and Eric Garner, local authorities were not forthcoming with information about what happened and what was being done about it. The result was public anger, large-scale protests and demonstrations, and in the case of Brown, additional violence. Tensions were exacerbated when grand juries refused to indict the executioners.

In the case of Walter Scott, the authorities in South Carolina are to be commended for doing the right thing, and doing it quickly. The executioner was arrested, put in jail, and charged with murder. There will be a public trial. A jury composed of the citizens of North Charleston will decide on Michael Slager’s guilt or innocence. That is as it should be, in the United States of America. As a result, there were no widespread protests or subsequent violence in North Charleston. That is all that people anywhere really want, justice for all.

The sad reality is that the vast majority of death penalty victims in the United States are Black men summarily executed on the streets of the United States without any due process of law. No lawyer, no trial, no jury, and no chance for any last minute confession or penance.

For those that do make it to court, the results are grim and unquestionably racially biased.

According to the Death Penalty Information Center, since 1973, 152 people that were on death row waiting to die have been exonerated and released. Of those exonerated and released, 79 (52%) were Black.

 Since 1976, 76% of the victims in death penalty cases were white. Only 15% of the victims were Black.

Don’t get me wrong. I am not a pacifist. If someone tried to harm my family I would defend my family to the death. But, for the crime of murder, I believe that a long life in prison, in solitary confinement, with hard labor whenever you did see the sun, is more of a punishment than death. Many religions (including my own) teaches that forgiveness is available to all. What happens to the mass murderer that confesses his sins on death row, has a religious conversion, and is then killed? Will he go to heaven?

Death is an end, inevitable and as egalitarian as anything in life. It is not a punishment. The tragedy of the premature, unnecessary death is undeniably real and can bring about incredible grief for family and friends. But we find comfort and solace in our religious beliefs, confident that there is “a better place”. Why would we think that sending a murderer to that “better place” sooner than later is punishment?

Who would bear the responsibility if the 152 people that would have died at the behest of the government since 1973 had not been cleared of their alleged crime?

Who bears responsibility for those that were innocent but were not cleared and died anyway?

We have a responsibility, as individuals, and as a society to protect our lives, property, and institutions from those that would damage or destroy them. To remove those individuals from the society is just, and allows us to correct the human errors that we will surely make.

To kill them is barbaric, uncivilized, and non-correctable.

It doesn’t matter if you are in the courtroom, or on the streets of North Charleston, New York, or Ferguson.

Apocalypse Now?

The date was January 14, 1963. Fifty two years ago. The streets of Montgomery were packed with visitors from all over the state. Many others were there from other states. The local, state, and national media were there as well. The occasion was the inaugural address of the newly elected governor. The speech had been written by Asa Carter, founder of the local Ku Klux Klan. The editors of the local daily newspaper, the Montgomery Advertiser, had urged the fiery young governor-elect to remove the fateful passage from the speech, but their request was denied. He stood on the portico of the Capitol building, looking down on the mass of people stretching down the boulevard known as Dexter Avenue. Surely, he was aware of the symbolism. This was the same place that Jefferson Davis had stood as he was sworn in as the first (and only) President of the Confederacy.

And then, he said it.

“Today I have stood, where once Jefferson Davis stood, and took an oath to my people. It is very appropriate then that from this Cradle of the Confederacy, this very heart of the great Anglo-Saxon Southland, that today we sound the drum for freedom as have our generations of forebears before us have done, time and again through history. Let us rise to the call of freedom-loving blood that is in us and send our answer to the tyranny that clanks its chains upon the South. In the name of the greatest people that have ever trod this earth, I draw the line in the dust and toss the gauntlet before the feet of tyranny….and I say….Segregation today….Segregation tomorrow….Segregation forever!”

Five years later, the man that said these words would run for President as an Independent. He would carry 5 states, including Georgia, Mississippi, Louisiana, Arkansas, and Alabama. He would garner 46 Electoral votes, 13.5% of the total vote, and 9.9 Million votes. In other words, he was not alone in his sentiments or his vision for the future of America.

It would be foolish to think that this point of view on diversity, that was so demonstrably prevalent 50 years ago no longer exists.

Xenophobia, homophobia, and racism are all fueled by fear. So what are so many people in America afraid of? Why the intolerance? Why so many voter suppression efforts? Why so many reactionary laws targeting the LGBT community? Why so much animosity toward immigration reform efforts?

According to the US Census Bureau, the percentage of the American population classified as white was 75.1% in 2000. In 2010 it had decreased to 63.7%. At the current rate, it is estimated that in less than thirty years America will no longer be a country where white people are in the majority. In 2005, only 28% of the American public supported same-sex marriage. Today, more than 50% of the public supports it, thirty seven states have legalized it, and a conservative Supreme Court seems primed to make it the law of the land.

America is changing. Rapidly. And “Change”, is scary.

The number of Americans that are 65 years or older is larger than it has been at any time in the country’s history. According to the 2010 census, more than 40 million Americans are 65 or older. They make up 13% of the total population. They also make up the base of the Republican Party. They grew up in the sixties. Many of them did not go to integrated schools, do not socialize with minorities, and did not compete against them in the workforce. They are very resistant to the change that is occurring in America today.

The firestorm generated by Indiana’s religious freedom law is the latest example of the conflict between competing views of America’s future, the old and the new, “segregation forever” or “I have a dream”.

The differences are real, deeply ingrained in the fabric of our nation’s culture. They will not go away easily, if ever. It is a cultural divide that was settled, but not forgotten, by civil war. Economic forces have forced the Indiana legislature to reconsider its effort to clothe its bigotry in subtle legislation. The same forces have prompted the governor of Arkansas to reconsider his legislature’s similar effort. Nevertheless, every Republican presidential candidate did not hesitate to weigh in on the side that the Republican base demands. They know that they cannot win a Republican primary without pleasing the base.

I am reminded of the first shots fired at Fort Sumter.

Once, George Wallace was asked why he started using racist messages. He is quoted as having said, “I tried to talk about good roads and good schools, and all these things that have been part of my career, and nobody listened. And then I began talking about n*****s, and they stomped the floor.”

They stomped the floor. They stomped the steps. They stomped the street and they stomped the grass in Montgomery….On January 14, 1963.

The minorities are coming. Will the older, white Americans allow it to happen? Or will they take America with them, to their graves?