Berkeley has best success with black students in US

In Berkeley, California, 75% of Black Students Graduate One of Highest Graduation Rates in United States for Black Students

Berkeley has best success with black students in US By Camilo Smith 09/20/2011 Graduation Day, July 11, 2011 (Berkley Unified School District) One of the school districts with over 75 percent of its African-American student body graduating is located on the West Coast. Out of 271 African-American students who attended Berkeley High School, 205 graduated last year. That's one of the highest African-American graduation rates in the country. The Berkeley Unified School District made closing the education gap a top priority. Just three years ago the school district, led by a grassroots coalition of community, civic and religious organizations, including the group Parents of Children of African Descent initiated a program called the 2020 Vision program. The program's sole focus is to close the achievement gap in Berkeley public schools by the year 2020. In June 2008, the Berkeley City Council and Berkeley Unified School District School Board adopted resolutions that sought to improve education along racial lines to eliminate disparities between white and Asian students and black and Latino kids. "It's not just the district. It's the city of Berkeley, the university, the people and faith-based organizations," said Debbi D'Angelo District Director of Research and Berkeley Evaluation and Assessment. "It's just so powerful. Everybody is working together." The Berkeley school district has had the benefit of parcel taxes to apply towards meeting the equity goals for students of color. The funds are used to pay for data and teacher training, among other things. "I think that the things we have done is to make the education more personal," says Karen Hemphill, an African-American mother of a recent Berkeley High School graduate. Another son is in his junior year at the school. Hemphill, who is also a member of the school board, says that about five years ago the city began looking at ways to close the education gap. Officials took notice that a problem was brewing, Hemphill said, because a health department study in 2006 referenced Berkeley's racial education disparity as a growing problem for the community. According to Hemphill, the school system began to look at how it was teaching children before high school. "We stressed elementary school and middle school. We were really focusing on Algebra I, Geometry and Biology," she says about the core classes that most successful students take by the time they reach high school. One of the middle schools in the city, which is about 80 percent students of color, was cited by Education Secretary Arne Duncan for its scholastic achievement. Berkeley's latest schools data comes from the children who entered high school from 2006 to 2010. They were part of a more decentralized school, says Hemphill. The high school is broken up into smaller "mini-schools" that specialize in specific subject matter, such as a the Green Academy that focuses on ecology. There's also a school for biotechnology. But it's not just the academics that are the draw for students. The school has no shortage of extracurricular activities, which former students and schools officials alike say make it a positive environment for young people. "There's a lot to engage kids on campus, so that kind of keeps them there," Hemphill says

Queens Sickle Cell March 9-25-11

The Ten Most Dangersous Cities in America

The Ten Most Dangersous Cities in America We must bring hope, education and economic revitalization to these cities to change their plight!

The Most Dangerous Cities in America by Douglas A. McIntyre, Michael B. Sauter and Charles B. Stockdale Wednesday, May 25, 2011 Earlier this week, the FBI trumpeted the news that violent crime dropped 5.5% in 2010 while reported property crimes fell 2.8% during the depths of the worst economic slowdown since the Great Depression. The news, though, is far from positive. Though most regions of the U.S. saw declines, the Northeast saw an increase in murders (8.3%), forcible rapes (1.4%) and aggravated assaults (0.7%). Why that region was affected by crime more than others isn't clear. Perhaps it was because of the grinding poverty found in some of the area's cities and their high cost of living. The Police Executive Research Forum polled 233 local law enforcement agencies in 2009, and found that the link between poverty and crime was inextricable. A prolonged recession would only make matters worse, the research showed. After reviewing the data, PERF Executive Director Chuck Wexler told Reuters, "We are not saying there is going to be a crime wave, but we are saying this is a wake-up call and we anticipate the situation will continue to deteriorate." A 24/7 Wall St. review of 2010 FBI crime data shows violent crime rose in several of the largest and poorest cities in the U.S., particularly those which have been in decline for some time. Even when crime rates dropped, older urban areas still had more violent crime than other cities. Philadelphia, Cleveland, Buffalo and Hartford finished high on the FBI's list but failed to make the final 24/7 Wall St. ranking. The crime problem is not completely explained by crimes committed. Police forces are supposed to keep crime rates down, but officers have begun to disappear from the streets of some large cities. Pontiac, Mich., part of the corridor of high crime cities that runs from Detroit to Flint, recently turned over its police operations to the sheriff's office of Oakland Country, where Pontiac is located. Old industrial towns need to cut costs as populations fall and tax receipts recede, but the money trouble almost makes it certain that criminal activity will grow because it is mostly unchecked. 24/7 Wall St. looked at the ten most crime-plagued cities in the U.S. with populations of more than 100,000. We used a measurement of crimes per thousand people which is part of the new FBI database to determine the order. We compared these figures to unemployment rates and median income. The recession may have ended, but crime has not eased in these troubled cities nor will it anytime soon. Our list is dominated by towns like Detroit, New Haven, and Baltimore. Parts of these cities are fortresses of crime. Much of the violent crime in Detroit is committed in the old Palmer Avenue section of the city, which is far from the shiny skyscrapers where GM has its headquarters. Baltimore's Front Street neighborhood is a world away from the new office towers of companies like financial giant T Rowe Price on Pratt Street. The crime-plagued Lamar Avenue section of Memphis is also far from the city's ritzy neighborhoods. Unemployment will inevitably improve in these cities. The most hard-hit sections, however, may never completely recover. They failed to do so after the last economic upswing -- and the one before that. Some part of all the cities on this list will be home to high levels of violent crime permanently. And, if the money used to keep police on the streets falls in most of these municipalities, containing the problem to a few neighborhoods will be hard. It would be nice to believe that criminals sit out a recovery, but they don't. These are America's 10 Most Dangerous Cities: 1. Flint, Michigan Population: 109,245 Violent Crime Per 1,000: 22 2010 Murders: 53 Median Income: $27,049 (46.1% below national average) Unemployment Rate: 11.8% (2.8% above national average) The number of violent crimes committed in Flint increased for all categories considered for this list between 2009 and 2010. Perhaps most notably, the number of murders in the city increased from 36 to 53. This moves the city from having the seventh highest rate of homicide to the second highest. The number of aggravated assaults increased from 1,529 to 1,579, a rate of 14.6 assaults per 1,000 residents, placing the city in the No. 1 rank for rate of assaults. Flint police chief Alvern Lock stated late last year that he believed the city's violence stemmed from drugs and gangs. Flint has a relatively small median income of about $27,000 per household. The city also has a poverty rate of 36.2%. 2. Detroit, Michigan Population: 899,447 Violent Crime Per 1,000: 18.9 2010 Murders: 310 Median Income: $26,098 (48% below national average) Unemployment Rate: 12.7% (3.7% above national average) The city crippled the most in America's post-industrial era is almost certainly Detroit. The Motor City has suffered from high rates of unemployment, homelessness, and crime. The city has one of the ten highest rates for three of the four types of violent crime identified by the FBI. Detroit has the sixth highest murder rate, the fifth highest robbery rate, and the second highest rate of aggravated assault. In 2005, a major reorganization of the city's police department took place after a federal investigation identified inefficiencies within the system. According to an article in The United Press, opponents of Detroit Mayor David Bing called for further intervention by the Justice Department in several shootings that occurred last year. 3. St. Louis, Missouri Population: 355,151 Violent Crime Per 1,000: 17.5 2010 Murders: 144 Median Income: $34,801 (30.7% below national average) Unemployment Rate: 9.3% (0.3% above national average) Violent crime in St. Louis fell dramatically between 2009 and 2010, and has decreased since 2007. Despite this, crime rates remain extremely high compared with other cities. In 2010, the city's murder rate and rate of aggravated assault were each the third worst in the country. With regards to both violent and nonviolent crime, St. Louis was rated the most dangerous city based on FBI data released six months ago. As of December 2010, the murder rate in St. Louis was 6.3 times that of the state of Missouri. The city's gunshot murder rate for residents between 10 to 19 years old is also the second highest in the country, behind only New Orleans, according to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. 4. New Haven, Connecticut Population: 124,856 Violent Crime Per 1,000: 15.8 2010 Murders: 22 Median Income: $38,279 (23.8% below national average) Unemployment Rate: 9.6% (0.6% above national average) New Haven has historically had the highest rate of violent crime on the east coast. The impoverished, crime-ridden parts of the city stand in stark contrast to affluent Fairfield county to the West, and elite Yale University, which is located within the city itself. The number of murders in the city doubled last year. New Haven has the eighth highest rate of robbery and the fourth highest rate of assault in the U.S. The New Haven Police Department is considering adding cameras at every intersection in one of the neighborhoods where shootings are the most common. 5. Memphis, Tennessee Population: 673,650 Violent Crime Per 1,000: 15.4 2010 Murders: 89 Median Income: $34,203 (31.8% below national average) Unemployment Rate: 9.9% (0.9% above national average) Memphis has high rates for all the violent crimes considered for 24/7 Wall St.'s rankings. It has the sixth highest rate in the country. Incidents of violent crime in the city dropped slightly less than 15% between 2009 and 2010 though. Memphis Mayor AC Wharton attributes this decrease to Operation Safe Community, a citywide plan developed in 2005. The plan consists of a number of strategies meant to increase crime prevention, through toughening punishments for criminals, and the effectiveness of the city's legal system, through changes such as expanding court programs so that they operate consistently and at full capacity. 6. Oakland, California Population: 409,723 Violent Crime Per 1,000: 15.3 2010 Murders: 90 Median Income: $51,473 (2.4% above national average) Unemployment Rate: 11% (2% above national average) Oakland's violent crime dropped about 5.5% between 2009 and 2010, from about 6,800 to 6,260. The city nevertheless has the tenth-highest rate of rape, the ninth-highest murder rate, and the second highest robbery rate in the country. In 2010, there were 7.12 robberies for every 1,000 Oakland residents. According to an article in the San Francisco Chronicle, Mayor Jean Quan has attempted to combat break-ins and theft by creating programs to keep potential wrongdoers off the streets by starting late-night basketball programs. It it unclear if these policies have worked. 7. Little Rock, Arkansas Population: 192,922 Violent Crime Per 1,000: 15.2 2010 Murders: 25 Median Income: $38,992 (22.3% below national average) Unemployment Rate: 6.8% (2.2% below national average) Little Rock has one of the highest rates of aggravated assault and forcible rape in the country. Since 2009, reported assaults has increased while reported forcible rapes have decreased. According to Lt. Terry Hastings of the Little Rock Police Department, quoted by local station FOX16, Little Rock was "down almost 12 percent across the board on crime" in 2010. This may be accurate for many crimes, and especially nonviolent crimes, however, according to FBI data, violent crime increased from 2009 to 2010.  8. Baltimore, Maryland Population: 639,929 Violent Crime Per 1,000: 14.6 2010 Murders: 223 Median Income: $38,772 (22.7% below national average) Unemployment Rate: 7.4% (1.6% below national average) Baltimore had the eighth-highest rate of violent crime per capita in 2010 among cities with 100,000 or more residents, and the second-highest east of the Mississippi. The number of violent crimes has dropped slightly in the past year -- from 9,600 to 9,300 -- but the Maryland city has some of the worst rates of dangerous offenses in the country. This includes the tenth-worst aggravated assault rate -- and the fourth-worst murder rate in the country. 9. Rockford, Illinois Population: 156,180 Violent Crime Per 1,000: 14.5 2010 Murders: 20 Median Income: $36,990 (26% below national average) Unemployment Rate: 13.3% (4.3% above national average) Rockford has unusually high violent crime rates for a city of its size. Most notably, the city has the fourth highest rate of aggravated assault in the country, with 10.5 cases for every 1,000 citizens in 2010. During the same period, 20 murders occurred, almost double the number in 2000. Quoted by the Rockford Register Star in 2007, Winnebago County Sheriff Dick Meyers said that he believed the city's "location worked against [it,]" as Rockford receives traffic from the drug markets in Madison, Chicago, and Milwaukee, resulting in heightened rates of violence. 10. Stockton, California Population: 292,047 Violent Crime Per 1,000: 13.8 2010 Murders: 49 Median Income: $45,730 (8.9% below national average) Unemployment Rate: 18.4% (9.4% above national average) With a jobless rate of 18.4%, up from 18.1% a year ago, Stockton, California has one of the worst unemployment problems in the country. The huge percentage of unemployed residents may have contributed to horrible crime rates in the city, which is located 40 miles east of Oakland and San Francisco. Stockton was rated one of the most miserable cities to live in the country by Forbes in March, 2010. Violent crime was one of the chief measurements for its ranking. Of the 267 cities with populations over 100,000, Stockton has the 27th highest number of murders per 1,000 people and the 12th most aggravated assaults per 1,000. Last year, recognizing the crime problems in the city, the state temporarily diverted hundreds of California Highway Patrol officers to aid the city's overwhelmed police department. William H. McDonald Advocates for Change

African American Day Parade 2011

NAACP at Troy Davis Protest Rally Nrw York City 9-16-11

Afro-American Correction Retirees in Washington DC 9-13-11

Major U.S. Cities Are Emptying of Black Children

Major U.S. Cities Are Emptying of Black Children

Black children leaving large U.S. cities in droves, analysts say for a variety of reasons By DAVID B. CARUSO, Associated Press  July 1, 2011  NEW YORK - 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. Once a school, now a condo in New York City. 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. Overall, the census found nearly a half-million fewer black children living in the 25 largest U.S. cities than there were a decade earlier. By comparison, the number of black adults living in big cities has hardly budged. Demographics experts said a combination of factors appeared to be at work. Americans in general are having fewer children than they once did, due mostly to increased use of birth control. That has been true, too, among black mothers. Teen pregnancy rates among blacks have also plummeted. But the more significant trend, experts said, may be a migration by young black parents to the suburbs. For many, that pull of a place with safer streets, higher-achieving schools and more housing space for the dollar has apparently simply overridden any desire to stay in flawed inner-city neighborhoods, simply because they are black capitals. "I'd been in Harlem for 16 years, and when I first came, I was young, and I was excited and it was a Mecca. But progressively each year, it got rougher and rougher to be here," said Rachel Noerdlinger, a publicist whose clients include the Rev. Al Sharpton. "The violence. The profiling by the cops. I just started to get really, really frustrated." Finally, she decamped across the Hudson River to the suburban quietude of Edgewater, N.J., taking her 14-year-old son with her. "He misses Harlem. He's a teenage boy who, unfortunately, grew up here. Edgewater is quiet and slow. He's constantly complaining," Noerdlinger said. But as for herself, she said: "I'm in heaven. I just love it. ... If I had done this 20 or 16 years ago, I would be a completely different person." In several cities, the change has come just as historically black neighborhoods have been making a steady recovery from decades of horrific decay and neglect. Oakland, a city fraught for years with violence and high poverty rates, has at last been experiencing a renaissance, but the number of white hipsters, Asians and Hispanics moving in has been outpaced by the number of black families that have disappeared.