What/How would you teach/reach African-American (K-16) students?

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Permalink Reply by Nwokedi C. Idika on May 20, 2008 at 4:34pm

For me, it wasn't until I was in about 11th or 12th grade of High School that I realized that you could be a Doctor in something other than medicine. Introducing younger people to folks who have Doctorates in things other than medicine will go a long way.

I'd say exposure is key. If you took a poll of young AA males, most of them would probably say they want to be a sort of professional athlete. I think this stems from what they're exposed to and what they consider to be successful.

By exposing you to more positive images, I think it's easier to make the case for why it's beneficial to be continue on for advanced degrees.

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Permalink Reply by Pierre St Juste on May 21, 2008 at 1:06am

One way to reach out to students is by showing students that you can relate to them. We have to be able to show students that they are no different than us. We have to show them that you do not have to be a braniac to get a PhD. We have to show them that we share common interests such as music, entertainment, and so on. They have to look at us and be able to say, wow, if they can do it, so can I.

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Permalink Reply by Cornelius on June 23, 2008 at 4:17pm

I had a lot thoughts about this and have a longer response, but it goes in another direction and felt I would respond with something more concrete.

For younger students, we would read, play games and build stuff. I would spend a good bit of time discovering their interests and select group and individual readings based upon those interests. I would approach math probably the way my college algebra professor approached it where you build from the simplest concepts up and encourage practice. Math is a skill and I would find ways to facilitate a student working until she got to the level she wanted/needed to be. For fact-based material I would think go back and forth between macro and micro, where you show the big picture and fill in the details always reminding them where things fit in the larger scheme.

For older students (6-16) you have to focus what they would find useful and interesting. They have to see how something like this pays off, b/c they're more pragmatic than people give them credit for being. We lose a lot of students, young men especially, b/c they see the writing on the wall as far as what society says is their place in it. Sometimes I think we're talking about fixing bugs in the system, when what we may really be looking at is its design. You have to show both how to succeed in the system and how to succeed outside of it.

I think you should give young people opportunities to put their hands on something significant and real. I think we could bring back apprenticeships.

I've thought about forming businesses in areas of interests to youth: gaming, sports, media, fashion, graphic design, etc. For instance, I've thought about starting a mobile game studio where students could learn programming, interface design, computer graphics, maths, physics, AI, marketing, and so on. We're talking about small, bounded projects with small budgets, and a huge market when you consider something like the Apple AppStore.

I think in another thread, we should start discussing how we start changing our culture and its anti-intellectualism.

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Permalink Reply by Rashad L. Moore on June 23, 2008 at 10:41pm

I think the biggest gains can be made by actively seeking to make it "cool" to learn and to succeed in non-entertainment industries. Cornelius hinted at it above - anti-intellectualism. It has truly crippled the African American community.

If anyone knows anything about video production... I'd like to create a show in the style of MTV Cribs (one of my favorite shows), but showcase the cribs of some of the young, successful African American technologists. When I see some of the homes of these "stars" I'm struck by how their not any more elaborate than those of my colleagues. The hope is show our youth that you can have a phat house, a nice car, a big 401K, and a better way of life by studying science. And, it's doable!

Let's do it and put it on YouTube!

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