<p>Me" “an IB magnet program in a very low performing high school that was about 80% black. To my surprise, my sons often were the only black males in their IB classes.”</p>
<p>Hanna: how much do you think various factors contributed to this phenomenon? Did you see HS teachers failing to encourage the black kids to excel, or black kids not having the grades/scores to get into the IB program, or black parents having lower expectations and not requiring their children to take a challenging schedule? Or some combination of the above?"</p>
<p>It’s a combination of lots of things.</p>
<ol>
<li>Some characteristics of some gifted students also are shared by students who should be served by special ed programs or who have emotional problems. For instance, a kid may be misbehaving in class because they are bored due to giftedness or because they have learning problems or emotional problems. From what I’ve read and seen, black gifted kids who act out are far more likely to end up in special ed or disciplinary programs than in gifted programs.</li>
</ol>
<p>I know several very intelligent black adults who were misidentified as not being too bright when they were young, and the only reason they weren’t shunted into special ed was because their parents fought to keep them in regular classes. One such person graduated from Howard Phi Beta Kappa and then got a Stanford MD. Another was working on his Ph.D. at Berkely when I met him. From what I’ve seen, the people most likely to be misidentified are black males, who tend to be more active than are students of other races anyway. </p>
<p>I also heard a researcher state that there’s a disproportionately high black prisoners who are intellectually gifted. Apparently they were failed by their school systems, so turned to crime.</p>
<p>I also think that the African American community is more likely to be anti intellectual than other cultures in the U.S. This probably is related to slavery where learning to read could cause a slave to be killed; and demonstrating high intelligence also could make one a target from whites. Indeed, many African Americans were able to survive and avoid punishments by appearing to be very stupid. This also was true even into the middle of the last century. A black person who appeared to be “uppity” – educated, smart, etc. – -was at risk of being harmed by whites.</p>
<p>The schools where most black students are educated have large numbers of teachers trained in special education, and next to no numbers of teachers trained in gifted education. If one’s only tool is a hammer, everything looks like a nail.</p>
<p>Due to the major problems with relatively low h.s. graduation rates, also the black community as a whole pays more attention to students who are having major academic problems, not the ones who are excelling or surviving. A black male who is simply in school – including h.s. and who hasn’t been to jail – is considered by many to be quite a success even if he has “D” grades. I’ve seen several articles in black publications that profiled black males who were successful and said things like, “Although many black men are in jail, X is not. He is…” Just look at how low the expectations are. I can’t imagine any other race thinking that it would be OK say something about a person who is successful.</p>
<p>With my own sons, who both are intellectually gifted, I repeatedly had to fight to have teachers expect my sons to work to their intellectual potential. Even with my husband and I pushing my kids and having high expectations for them, my sons seemed to bow to society’s belief that they were doing amazingly well to simply be taking AP classes. For instance, the school didn’t seem to care that my older S was carrying “Ds” in IB English despite having a 750 v and writing professionally for several major publications. </p>
<p>My younger son easily got As in IB upper level math classes, but when the school instituted an even higher level math class, S’s teacher (who was a very nice guy who also was in general supportive and well meaning) told S that he should not take it because only people like a kid who had gotten an 800 on the m test would be able to pass that class. Since next to no one was recommended for that class, and since my husband and I aren’t mathmeticians, we assumed the teacher was right.</p>
<p>The next year, however, that same teacher noticed that S was sailing through with easy As in his class, the second highest level math class. S also easily got a 780 M SAT. The teacher then realized that S should have been in the top math class and suggested that S take it the next year, but, unfortunately, it wouldn’t fit into his schedule.</p>
<p>Back more directly to your question. I have seen overall that black parents don’t appreciate the importance of their smart, capable kids taking an intellectually challenging curriculum. Understandably, often the kids don’t realize this either particularly since by selecting such a curriculum, they’ll probably be isoated from other black students, some of whom may also make fun of them for “acting white.”</p>
<p>In my city, the school system steered some black students into IB because the school system wanted the program to appear to reflect the racial make-up of the city. However, the school’s expectations for the black students were low. The black students were considered successes if they simply remained in IB until graduation. Meanwhile other students – including non native English speakers who hadn’t yet learned English well – were expected to make NHS and to obtain the IB diploma.</p>