Dropping Out Of High School Is Often The Road To Ruin For Black Boys

It's not known what's in the minds of black boys when they decide to drop out of high school. What is clear is that they have set out on a hard road of low-wage jobs, high unemployment and far too often, jail, according to a recent study.

Nearly 23% of black boys who drop out of high school end up in jail, in prison or in a juvenile justice facility, according to a nationwide coalition that wants the country to develop a national re-enrollment strategy to encourage former students to return to school to earn a diploma or a GED (General Education Development) certificate.

"Dropouts become incarcerated at a shocking rate: 23 of every 100 young black male [high school] dropouts were in jail on any given day in 2006 and 2007 compared with only six to seven of every Asian, Hispanic or white dropouts," according to the study, "The Consequences of Dropping Out Of High School: Joblessness and Jailing for High School Dropouts and The High Cost To Taxpayers."

The Center For Labor Market Studies at Northeastern University in Boston, which prepared the report, studied the earnings, family income, incarceration and parenting issues of high school dropouts ages 16 to 24.

Other organizations also have looked at this issue.

The Alliance For Excellent Education, a Washington, D.C.-based national policy and advocacy organization, said in 2009, 1.3 million students dropped out high school, up 8% compared with 1.2 million students who quit high school in 2008 before receiving their diplomas.

"Nationally, about 71 percent of all students graduate from high school with their class, but barely half of African American and Hispanic students earn diplomas with their peers," Jason Amos, a spokesperson for Alliance For Excellent Education, tells NorthStar News.

Seventy-six percent of white students graduate on time compared with 51.2% of African-American students, 55% of Hispanic students and 50% of Native American students, says Amos, adding that the on-time graduation rate for black boys is below 50%, although Amos could not provide an exact percentage.

Students who have trouble reading and or solving math problems begin thinking about quitting school in the ninth grade, Amos says.

"Schools get what they call 'the ninth grade bulge' when about 35% of freshman cannot make the transition to 10th grade," he says."Students in this category can sound out words, but they are unable to think critically about what they have read."

High school students who drop out also have something else in common. Many of the students attend what Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore calls "dropout factories"

"The crisis is neither silent nor invisible: one in three high schools students do not graduate, and more than half of those dropouts are produced by just 12% of high schools--schools commonly known as "dropout factories," where just 60% or fewer entering freshman progress to their senior year three years later," according to the Center for Social Organization of Schools at Johns Hopkins University and the Common Core of Data from the National Center for Education Statistics.

There are 2,000 high schools in all 50 states, called dropout factories, and they produced an estimated 470,000 dropouts from the class of 2007, reports Johns Hopkins. "Dropout factories are located in urban, suburban, rural and small-town America; in large schools and small," reports the Alliance for Excellent Education. "Their one unifying characteristic, however, is that they disproportionately serve our nation's poor and minority students."

Dropout factories finally have gotten the attention of the U.S. Senate.

On September 23, Sen. Jeff Bingaman (D., N.M.) introduced the Graduation Promise Act, which, if passed, would authorize $2.5 billion in new funding to turn around low-performing high schools. School districts could spend $2.4 billion on high school improvement and dropout reduction. The legislation also would authorize $60 million in competitive grants for the development, implementation and replication of effective secondary school models for struggling students and dropouts.

According to the report, "The Consequences of Dropping Out of High School," leaving school before graduation is often a ticket to unemployment, poverty and jail for black boys. In addition to black male high school dropouts being jailed at high rates, they are unemployed at much higher rates than Asian, Hispanics or white high school dropouts.

Only 31% of black male high school dropouts are likely to be employed compared with 43% of Asians, 46% of whites and 53% of Hispanics, the study says.

"This implies a jobless rate for blacks of 69% followed by Asians at 57%, whites at 54% and Hispanics at 47%," says the report, writes the Center For Labor Market Studies.

For high school dropouts who find work, it usually means low-skill jobs that pay little. High school dropouts earned an average salary of $8,358 in 2007 compared with high school graduates who earned $14,601 annually, says the Center For Labor Market Studies.

Once black boys realize they made a mistake by quitting school many want to return to complete their education, but they don't know how, Amos says.

The Center for Labor Market Studies, which worked with the National Urban League, the Alternative Schools Network in Chicago and other groups, wants federal and state governments to organize a re-enrollment program for high school dropouts.

A national re-enrollment strategy needs to become a fundamental element of America's national enrollment agenda in the U.S. Department of Education, the groups say. ^ Top|Share

Source: U.S. Sentencing Commission 2006 Datafile

Bill Introduced To End Drug-Sentencing Disparities

Under the nation's current drug laws, a black man convicted of holding five grams of crack cocaine will end up spending a long time behind bars. On the other hand, a white man convicted of holding five grams of powder cocaine may receive probation.

This disproportionate racial effect in drug-sentencing has been the subject of arguments among observers of the legal system for many years because the law's inequities have led to the imprisonment of large numbers of black men, according to the The Sentencing Project, a Washington, D.C.-based organization that promotes more effective alternatives to prison.

Last Thursday, Sen. Dick Durbin, (D., Ill.), took steps to change the law, when he introduced The Fairness In Sentencing Act 2009. If passed, the law would end the controversial 100 to 1 disparity between crack and powder cocaine sentencing.

Under the current law, it takes 100 times the quantity of powder cocaine to trigger the same five-year mandatory sentence as it does for five grams of crack cocaine.

Because politicians believed crack cocaine users were prone to violence, they placed the drug in its own special category.

"Crack cocaine is the only drug that carries a mandatory prison sentence for first-time possession. Sentences for crack cocaine are two-years longer than for methamphetamine and four-years longer than for heroin," The Sentencing Project says. "A person convicted in federal court for simple possession of five grams of crack is subject to a mandatory five-year prison term while a person convicted of possessing five grams of powder will probably receive probation."

Durbin's legislation, which has 10 co-sponsors, including Sen. Patrick Leahy, (D., Vt.), chairman of the Senate's Judiciary Committee, and Sen. Arlen Specter, (D., Pa.), chairman of the Senate's Crime and Drugs Subcommittee, was introduced into the Senate Judiciary Committee.

Durbin introduced his bill during the same month as the 23rd anniversary of the Anti-Drug Abuse Act of 1986, which resulted in harsher punishments for low-level crack cocaine offenses compared with powder cocaine offenses, although the two drugs are pharmacologically very similar, say legal observers.

Marc Mauer, executive director of the Sentencing Project, endorsed Durbin's bill.

"The racial disparity in federal incarceration, which resulted from the 1986 law, has contributed to distrust in the justice system by minority communities," Mauer says.

In May, The Sentencing Project published an eight-page paper that discussed the racial impact of the crack sentencing.

Although two-thirds of crack cocaine users are white or Hispanic, in 2006, 81.8% of crack cocaine defendants were African American, The Sentencing Project says.

"African-American defendants have a 20% greater chance of being sentenced to prison than white drug defendants," The Sentencing Project says. "Between 1994 and 2003, the average time served by African Americans for drug offenses increased by 62%, compared with an increase of 17% for white drug offenders. "Moreover, African Americans now serve virtually as much time in prison for a drug offense (58.7 months) as whites do for a violent offense (61.7 months)."

Sen. Durbin's legislation is a companion bill to the Fairness In Cocaine Sentencing Act of 2009, which passed the U.S. House of Representatives Judiciary Committee in July. The legislation, introduced by U.S. Rep. Robert "Bobby" Scott, (D., Va.), also would eliminate the 100 to 1 disparity between crack and powder cocaine.

When the House Judiciary Committee voted 16 to 9 to approve Scott's bill, Julie Stewart, president of Families Against Mandatory Minimums, said the legislation "would restore basic fairness in the nation's sentencing laws." Families Against Mandatory Minimums is a Washington, D.C.-based non-profit organization founded in 1991 to challenge inflexible and excessive penalities required by mandatory sentencing laws.

In an e-mail message to NorthStar News, Andrea Strong, Families Against Mandatory Minimums' director of member services, said neither Durbin's nor Scott's bills, if passed, would be retroactive.  ^ Top|Share

Two Men Cleared Of Crimes

Two black men in Kentucky and Texas, who served long prison terms for crimes they did not commit, recently received some good news.

The most-dramatic event occurred in Dallas, when a judge ordered the immediate release of Richard Miles, who had served 15 years of a 40-year sentence for a 1994 shooting that left one man dead and a second man injured. The judge ordered Miles released from the courtroom instead of having him return to prison to complete prison-release paperwork.

The judge released Miles, 34, after determining he did not receive a fair trial. The Dallas District Attorney's office failed to notify Miles' attorney that another man had confessed to the crime, the judge said. Since DNA evidence did not clear Miles of the crime, a hearing must be held to formally declare him innocent of the murder and attempted murder.

If found not guilty, Miles will receive $80,000 for every year he spent in prison plus an annuity worth of at least $40,000 under Texas law.

In Louisville, KY, a prosecutor said Edwin A. Chandler, who served nine years for the 1993 murder of a convenience-store clerk, was innocent of the crime.

The prosecutor, David Stengel, made his statement after two witnesses came forward, clearing Chandler of the murder, and the police discovered new forensic evidence. Chandler had been on parole since 2002, and on Tuesday, a judge overturned his conviction. Stengel, Jefferson County Commonwealth's Attorney, said he will help Chandler receive restitution from the state for the years he spent in prison. ^ Top|Share