In order to better deal with challenges that Black male students face in the Charlotte-Mecklenburg Schools (CMS), a task force has recommended that the school system create an all-Black boys school in district, WBTV 3 News reports.
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Here’s one of the staggering statistics that inspired the idea: 20,000 Black male students were given short-term suspensions in CMS last year in comparison to only 3,000 White male students were given same disciplinary action.
The task force believes such a school would build leadership, business and academic skills for Black male students. While all-Black male schools are not a new concept, taxpayers in the Charlotte-Mecklenburg area have mixed feelings about the idea.
Though one Black student thinks it is an excellent idea. “The African American male wouldn’t have to argue over females,” Rising 9th grader George Whitley said. “And we can just get along and relate to each other.”
Whitley also believes a new school with one gender and one race would be safer.
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“We wouldn’t have to worry about insults and racism,” he added.
Vanessa Dixon, a taxpayer in the school system, says there is a real need for an all-Black male school. “Growing up at a certain point, you have to stick together and know what it means to help each other,” she said.
Though CMS school board chairperson Mary McCray said an all-Black male school may be illegal. “If we are going to have an all-black school, all male school then we must create an all female school because of Title IX,” she said.
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The task force’s recommendations include recruiting a diverse teaching corps for CMS and revising the school district’s discipline processes. There is no word on whether or not CMS will seriously pursue the recommendation of an all-Black school.
Perhaps the best example of an all-Black male school is Chicago’s Urban Prep Academies which, for its fourth consecutive year, reports that all of its 167 seniors have been accepted at four-year colleges or universities this fall. It is a charter school, so it does not have to fall under any Title IX rules that a public school would have to comply with.
Watch news video of the CMS task force all-Black school recommendation below:
