Young Gifted And Black Summary

Young Gifted and Black: Promoting High Achievement among African American Students, a compilation of three essays, presents a compelling argument on the experience and achievement of African American students in schools. Leading African American theorists, Theresa Perry, Claude Steele, and Asa Hilliard 3rd each contribute a moving essay to the book. The authors investigate how African American students experience school in a society that has historically devalued their intellectual abilities. Young Gifted and Black demands a new understanding of the distinctive obstacles that African American students face in American schools and point to a variety of education practices that can alleviate these challenges and promote academic excellence.
It has been forty years since the civil Rights Act was signed into law and the African American achievement gap persists and shows no signs of …show more content…
Dr. Asa stipulates that the achievement gap is not a gap between black and white students and test scores but a gap between the current performance of African students and levels of excellence (p. 138). In his opinion equal opportunities to learn does not yet exist and students should be required to reach excellence of academic and social performance. This may very well be the most interesting point of the whole book. He goes on to say that many African school communities have a history of low performance and typically foster an environment that is satisfied with either grade level or below grade level performance. In the current situation everyone is spending their time “teaching to the C students” unable to find the time or energy to raise the academic level of their students. From single parent household, socioeconomic status and special education rates there are a plethora of excuses for why students are not being motivated to perform at a level of