EquityBlog

Today in Sacramento PolicyLink will deliver testimony at the California Assembly Select Committee hearing on the Status of Boys and Men of color to address the critical barriers impacting African American and Latino male youth across the state and the U.S.

Compared to other ethnic groups, young boys and men of color in America are more likely to:

• Have far less access to quality schools, teachers and after-school programs that provide safe spaces to learn and play
• Encounter disproportionately harsh disciplinary and punitive practices and policies
• Experience severely high levels of poverty, joblessness, incarceration, and violence

These statistics reveal a national crisis about which PolicyLink Founder and CEO Angela Glover Blackwell and Maria Echaveste, former Deputy Chief of Staff for President Clinton, had this to say:

“Our convictions derive from on-the-ground observations of what’s happening to the most marginalized, as well as the lived experiences of black men and boys with whom we are intimately familiar.

“We wouldn’t dare let a 10-year-old African American kid leave home in pants sagging way lower than they should; no matter that his white classmates in “cool” Berkeley do the same without being stereotyped or stunted.

“We hear the angst and frustration of a nephew, locked up when he was 16 for committing the sort of crime for which a white teen is remanded to community service: ‘Tia,’ says he, now 30, ‘I’m trying to do better but I can’t get a job. When they hear I have a record …’

“For us, the personal, professional and policymaking are bound together. We are emboldened as mothers, sisters, daughters, aunts and advocates by what our kin have endured, even as we push for truly at-risk males from other families of color to get a fairer chance.”

You can read more in today’s Sacramento Bee opinion section.

We all know that America’s demographics are rapidly shifting.

But when you see this amazing time-lapse map showing just how dramatically the face of America is changing, there’s no doubt we have to invest in America’s tomorrow.

Please view the map, share it, and tell us what you think it means for our nation’s future.

–Angela Glover Blackwell

PS – Many thanks to our partners at the USC Program for Environmental and Regional Equity for developing this map with us.

The new March 2011 unemployment numbers are out…and once again the media is hailing a “better than expected ” report.

But a quick look behind the numbers shows that stark inequities remain by race. (For white, black, and Asian data from Bureau of Labor Statistics, click here. For data on Latino households, click here.)

(Note that BLS only supplies data on Asia households not seasonally adjusted)

UPDATE:

Thanks to the inimitable Joan Walsh for pointing out that Latino unemployment rate fell this month, while the black unemployment rate rose slightly.

That got me thinking: what do the racial-recovery trends look like since the economy began showing signs of life back in the fall? Well, it looks pretty interesting. What do you make of these recovery numbers?

Drop: 1.9%

Drop: 0.5%

Drop: 1.0%

Drop: 1.0%

Great video from the US Dept of Education on the reality behind the DREAM Act. From the Dept of Ed’s announcement:

The five-minute piece profiles Samantha Hernandez, a sophomore at California State University Dominguez Hills, and shows the support she receives in pursuit of her academic and career goals. Samantha’s story is told in her own words, as well as those of her fellow students, faculty advisor, college president, and family members — all in Spanish. The camera follows Hernandez on campus and at home in South Central Los Angeles, where she lives with her mother and sisters.

Release of the video coincides with the signing this week by President Obama of a proclamation commemorating National Hispanic-Serving Institutions (HSIs) Week. The proclamation celebrates the unique accomplishments of HSIs and their contributions to the community. California State University Dominguez Hills is among the more than 200 HSIs serving more than one million Hispanic students across the nation.

President Obama has set a goal that by 2020, America will have the highest proportion of college graduates in the world. While today, approximately 40 percent of U.S. adults are college graduates, he has targeted 60 percent to give our nation the best educated and most competitive workforce. This goal includes graduates of both four-year colleges and two-year colleges.

The video is entitled, “La universidad: un sueño alcanzable,” (“College: An Attainable Dream”) and is closed-captioned in Spanish and in English. Watch it at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0DKxOPfSzak.

The poverty numbers released today by the US Census Bureau were, to quote a colleague, heart-breaking. While the big number being talked about today is that one in seven Americans is now below the poverty level, that doesn’t tell the whole story.

If you look deeper at the data, the story of who’s hit first and worst is clear. The lowlights:

• More than one in four blacks, Latinos, and non-citizens is below the poverty line
• Biggest drop in real income was among blacks and non-citizens (4.4% and 4.5% drop, respectively)
• Hispanics and non-citizens saw the biggest jump in poverty (2.1 % and 1.8%, respectively)

And those already hit hard are getting hit HARDEST in this recession: