Why Black Men [Supposedly] Can't Finish College

Peep the link above for an Essence write up of an AP survey on "Why Black Men Can't Finish College?"


1/6 of me want to find the AP research so I can read the conclusions and have some more insight myself. I'm sure it's nothing that hasn't been said before...but it's nice when numbers back it up.

1/6 of me wants to find the AP research to discredit some part of it, because that's what I've been trained to do.

1/3 of me is (as I often am of recent) disgruntled with Essence for basically regurgitating an Associated Press project without adding more nuance and then having the nerve to title the piece so negatively. I'm not saying to go start finding excuses for black men not finishing college, but you can flesh out a news piece.

1/3 of me is extremely happy its pushing 1AM and I can excuse myself out of thinking because I should be asleep.

Most of the comments on the Essence website seem to point to men spending their college time chasing women. Do you agree that this is the problem?

http://www.essence.com/news_entertainment/news/articles/education_news_why_black_men_struggle_to_finish_college

When I Grow Up! Revisited.

So it is unlikely that this awesome concierge position will actually be my future. (I have no real future career). But it does remind you of that special time in elementary school when this question is first asked and wide eyed optimistic children respond with the careers that society seems to be based around. You then have a classroom full of doctors, nurses, teachers, police officers, fire fighters, U.S. presidents and hair stylists. However as you get older reality starts to set in, as well as likes, dislikes and your parents desires change those goals and more diverse careers emerge like lawyers,journalists, fashion models, actors, and artists.

At some point when you start college you learn what an investment banker is and that there are these organizations called consulting firms and hedge funds. (Some kids know what they are growing up, but I'm not talking about those privileged ones.) Once again career ideals change and people who once wanted to be a doctor or teacher see the lure of business and venture there. But is there anything inherently wrong with that?(Full disclaimer: I went to the dinners, decided Boston Consulting Group was the only firm I liked, started my cover letter and then remembered I did not really want to do that so never applied.)

The New York Times visits the issue this week in a piece entitled "Big Paychecks or Service." The author discusses the pull on students who once had other goals to enter business fields where they can make loads of money. Usually its a base salary around 60-70 thousand and then tens of thousands of dollars added on in bonuses-serious cash for a 21-23 year old to make on their first job, and a salary that most people in other career fields,say primary education or journalism, spend their careers attempting to earn.

The article does address a huge issue in that many people do lose sight of their larger goals in life chasing money at a young age. I have also seen the torture it wreaks on students in the process. There are countless interviews and math evaluations. You fly around the country so that different offices can determine their approval in the midst of working on your thesis, carrying a full course load, and you are still expected to participate in student life. Students take the leap from "I came here to go back and better my community" to "I came here and want some money so I can ascribe to the lifestyle in front of me, the community will figure it out eventually."But it also ignores the fact that many people also choose this path for other reasons. For one, some people actually have families that need financial assistance and this is perhaps the best way out at the moment. People also have plans for their lives post banking. This often serves as the launchpad for one's own business ideas. Many do go back to working towards their goal and this was simply a fun or necessary financial detour along the way. Similarly, just like young people that go about their grand tour post college, this banking lifestyle is a great way to travel and live in other cities essentially on your jobs dime.


Also there are tons of students that just don't have a clue as to what they are doing post graduation. They flit and flutter around during the summer and find a job that often is not in hard core business. Others do go for further education bettering themselves and building more debt in the process. And still several do reach their original goals simply taking detours along the way. It's not a dichotomy of "we help people" vs. "we help ourselves." Often it's more of a mix and I have heard of quite the fair share of students doing teaching programs just to get the free education masters whether or not they will ever actually use it. Even more, there are some people that actually enjoy the idea of investment banking and consulting and hedge funds and all that business jazz. They love quantitative evaluations

This long ramble was just to say that I found the New York Times article biased. Within the limits of the line or word count I am certain there was a way to take into consideration the other side of the story and not simply paint a wide brush over the students that pick a different route. Maybe colleges should enact more loan forgiveness programs like the ones available at several law schools. Perhaps that would help in the battle.

Sidenote: I did like the point about schools homogenizing their students. While not necessarily in the case of careers, there is a point there.

Interesting Fact

It seems a surefire way to success is not graduating. Why didn't I think of that?

Bonnie Raitt was a student at Radcliffe (Harvard) back in the day studying Social Relations and African Studies. She dropped out to follow a community of musicians to Cambridge.

It's all right Bonnie, be cool...you still can't make us love you ...

Source

Minorities and Campus News Papers

So, I think this off topic from my usual postings, but then again--there is no real connecting theme, beyond my obsession with Vanity Fair, journalism, and the popular culture of my youth. So in that vain, I'd recommend checking out this article on racial politics in college newspapers from Campus Progress. This was a persistent issue on my campus that I suffered reading several emails about. Still not much change happened. I don't think that its simply that minority students lack an interest in the poor paying field of journalism (why did I choose this path again?), because as far as I can tell HBCU's have campus newspapers and shock even communications majors(note: never attended one and don't intend to). There's even a student branch of the National Association of Black Journalist (NABJ) I think it's a larger issue of minorities on medium to large size campuses not being attracted to various campus activities en masse. Sure there's a sprinkling over a variety of clubs, but there's only a sprinkling over the entire campus in general. Add on all the various minority groups, including minority papers, and you have a group of overspent students constantly proving themselves and their right to be there, that adding one more activity can be a bit much. In my experience, just among black students there was a umbrella group, an African group, a Caribbean group, a male group, a female group, a theater group, 2 singing groups (one became too integrated with whites for some folk), a business group (mixed with other minorities), a secret homosexual group, community service organizations within three of those groups, some dance groups, publications in three of these groups, loads of multi-thousand dollar events and people were still trying to start more.

I also have a feeling that some enjoyed the racial homogeneity of some of their clubs after mixing it up all day anyway. It may have been like going home at night to family. Not saying its right, but its human.

HAUL,
The Queen