Addressing the many unique academic challenges that face black males—from low self-esteem, absenteeism, fatherlessness, and gangs to not accepting middle-class values, the impact of hip-hop culture, and drugs—this book provides answers and hope to teachers and the afflicted students and their families. With more than 75 solutions for educators to implement in their schools, including mentoring programs, rites of passage, internships, motivational speeches, counseling, and cooperative learning, this helpful resource shows how issues of retention, illiteracy, special education, and dropping out are simply symptoms of a much larger disease, and, if left unaddressed, will continue to stunt the education of black students.

Exploring the reasons why more than 70 percent of teens stop going to church when they reach adulthood, this impassioned proposal outlines ways that churches can retain their youth populations by giving them opportunities to take on leadership responsibility. Difficult questions, meant to foster self-exploration and self-evaluation within the community, include Are we discriminating against youth? and Do youth feel empowered in our church? Congregations and church leaders are encouraged to take a look at the effort they make to engage teens in terms of budget, space, and programs and to implement methods for increasing this effort and increasing teen involvement. This analysis of religious communities also illustrates models of churches that are utilizing teens in leadership positions and uses these models to propose and advocate a whole new paradigm for the role of youth in the church.

Offering information for use inside and outside of the classroom, this educational resource delineates how black males learn differently from other students and what can be done to most effectively reach them. Outlining the differences as both behavioral (attention span, aggression, maturation, energy level, and pressure from peers) and educational (verbal skills, organization, gross and fine motor skills, and reading interests) among others, this proposal provides real-world experiences alongside theories, making this an essential guide for educators, parents, counselors, psychologists, and others involved with black male adolescents. A section on how the majority of teachers, who are nonblack and female, can extend their education to overcome differences within the normal classroom setting, and help to reduce the number of black males in special education, is also provided.

Outlining the 10 most significant reasons behind the high drop-out rate amongst black male students, this guide provides more than 30 solutions towards addressing this national crisis. Revealing that currently close to one half of black males do not graduate from high school, this exploration pursues the causes behind this alarming statistic and looks at many angles of the issue, including poor parental involvement, low expectations from teachers, boredom, negative peer pressure, and lack of positive role models. The solutions presented—including smaller classes, single gender classrooms, relevant Afro-centric curriculums, cooperative learning, motivational speakers, and higher expectations from teachers—are designed to provide prevention strategies for administrators and teachers, as well as empowerment principles for students.