The first all day session of the Wheelock/ Delores Walker Johnson Center for Thoughtful Leadership at Atlas Learning Communities - The Education of Black Male Youth -offered a great opportunity to a group of 50 educators to think about the issue, and to leave with a specific action to take to make a difference in their students lives.

Plenary speaker David Banks (see yesterday’s posting) said we’ve talked about the negative experience of Black Male Youth, written about it, held conferences about it, talked again about it, written additional books about it, and held more conferences about it. “It’s time we do something about ,” Banks asserted. He said he had been influenced to return to education by a headline in The New York Times: "Black Men-An Endangered Species?"
Banks, in more detail than Monday night, described the Eagle Academy for Young Men, a New York City Public School, which he founded three years ago. While his emphasis was the creation of an all around culture where Academic Excellence, Leadership, Character Development, Mentoring, Integrity and Community Service could thrive, he recommended that the first thing that everyone could do, was to find a one on one mentor for those particular Black Youth who give the teachers and administrators the most problems. “Not only will those boys do better but you’ll gain new cheerleaders for your school,” Banks suggested.
Eagle Academy provides a separate mentor for each of its 265 young men. The mentors come from all walks of life, and are asked to stay with their mentee for his four years of high school.
There is a full time Mentor Coordinator for the program. Each Mentor must pass a criminal back ground check, participate in a 3 hour training, and meet with other mentors one Saturday a month to share best practices.

“It’s a powerful experience to walk into a large room and see a group of men doing the right thing.” David Banks

The emphasis on mentoring hit a chord with the attendees. When asked at the end of the day to write one thing each planned to do as a result of the day’s experience, many gave variations of the following:

“I am determined to find mentors for the boys in my school.”

“Implement a mentoring program for sixth grade boys.”

“Develop a Mentoring Program for my male student.”


Hopefully many of these attendees will share through comments on this blog how their plans are materializing.