LOUDOUN COUNTY BRANCH NAACP – SCHOOL BOARD PRESENTATION

THE EFFECTS OF PREJUDICE ON WHITE CHILDREN

 

We know that the impact of prejudice on white children is never as severe as the damage to children of color. However, we should not forget that white children clearly are harmed as well. This harm has economic, psychological and social implications for every white child. Therefore, it is both a practical and moral imperative that Loudoun County Public Schools work actively and immediately to ensure that all the system’s students have a level playing field.

    1. Economic implications. In the 21st Century global economy, the workplace, businesses, and corporations necessarily are diverse. White students coming from a school system that tolerates even subtle forms of discrimination will be poorly prepared for employment with these companies. Cross-cultural collegiality and teamwork among employees in a diverse, often multi-national, environment is a major job requirement now. Such companies do not tolerate, in fact as a key element of their bottom line, cannot tolerate prejudice and discrimination among their employees. Students who have benefited from the accidental factor of their skin color during twelve years of primary and secondary education will be unpleasantly surprised when they lose that privilege in the real world of work in the 21st Century.
    2. Psychological implications. Children of all ethnicities readily perceive unjust treatment of others, even if they are the ones benefiting from the injustice. When a white student sees students of color receiving more severe disciplinary actions than white students engaged in similar behavior, sees none or few faces of color in the Academy of the Sciences, in AP or Honors courses, or notices that a teacher seldom calls on students of color, he or she readily internalizes these messages with the following results:

      3. The social influences responsible for the development of racial prejudices in [white] American children at the same time develop deep patterns of moral conflict, guilt, anxiety, and distortion of reality in these children. In order to understand the basic and probably inevitable personality problem which the learning of racial prejudice imposes upon the child of the dominant group – who ironically enough is supposed to be the beneficiary of the segregation and discrimination imposed upon children of the minority group – one must understand that such a child is faced with a social situation containing inherent contradictions. The same institutions that teach children the democratic and religious doctrines – institutions such as the church and the school – also teach undemocratic behavior toward others. Prejudice and Your Child, Kenneth B. Clark, Ph.D., p. 79.

    3. Social implications. All people seek security and positive self-esteem. If students perceive that they are rewarded with privileges by virtue of the color of their skin, it frequently can be part of human nature to take the easy way and simply put someone else down, rather than work to build one’s own knowledge, skills and self-esteem by real effort and achievements. As Dr. Clark, a former president of the American Psychological Association, writes:

…[T]hese prejudices inhibit social progress… [T]hey are signs of primitive tendencies which express themselves in man’s inhumanity to man and in his tendency to depress, humiliate, and dehumanize his fellows… [P]rejudices are related to destructive social tensions and conflicts; … they threaten the stability of the democratic foundations of our nation by draining energy from the attempts at constructive solution of our many and vast social problems; and, finally,… they block the full creativity inherent in the personalities of white as well as [black] children. Ibid., p. 80.

Let us not forget that Loudoun County Public Schools’ own data show significant institutional disparities and discrimination. (http://www.pen.k12.va.us/VDOE/src/). In this regard, Heather Lewis-Charp makes specific recommendations for educators in a Phi Delta Kappan article in December 2003, "Breaking the Silence: White Students’ Perspectives on Race in Multicultural Schools":

…First, white students and students of color need safe spaces within the school where they can engage in dialogue on racial issues. Second, principals and teachers should look for strategies to integrate a multicultural curriculum into the core curriculum, so that students do not see it as peripheral or irrelevant. Finally, teachers may need additional support and training to understand and respond to white students’ attitudes toward race and the conflicts that arise between students of different racial and ethnic groups. (http://www.pdkintl.org/kappan/k03121e1.htm, p. 5).

Dr. Hatrick promised MSAAC that he would make cultural competence training mandatory for all licensed personnel beginning with the 2008-2009 school year. LCPS administration, MSAAC, the NAACP and most of the School Board know that such training must be systemic, must be on-going and must include follow-up and evaluation components, including student performance data. It needs to be given personally by empathic and skilled trainers who can elicit a positive buy-in from teachers. It must include among its elements awareness, knowledge and specific skills. It must not be a one-time session given by less-than-skilled trainers, or on-line, in order marginally and grudgingly to fulfill Dr. Hatrick’s promise. Top-down leadership and commitment are the key issues here—from the members of this School Board, to the Superintendent, to the principal, to the teacher in the classroom. See, e.g., "Diversity Training: Report to the [Loudoun County Public Schools] C[urriculum] and I[nstruction] Committee," December 7, 1999, by Dr. Lorraine Davis, John O’Connor and Richard Cunningham.

The ultimate purpose of any school system is to foster and improve all students’ learning in order to prepare them for a life as productive and economically self-sufficient citizens. We know that each of you on the School Board is deeply committed to Loudoun County’s children. We hope you also realize that there is no such thing as "passive anti-discrimination." Doing nothing condones discrimination. And discrimination hurts all our children. Psychologically, one of the most pervasive and pernicious factors contributing to the continuation of discrimination in this country is white denial. Most of us have very good intentions and do not consider ourselves to be racist; yet we continue to say and do things that are hurtful and destructive to people of color, and thus, to ourselves. We urge the members of this School Board to schedule your own cultural competence training with Beverly Bennett-Roberts, LCPS’ Supervisor of Outreach Programs. She’s in-house but has an excellent regional and national reputation.

April 4th was the 40th anniversary of the death of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. As he said:

Cowardice asks the question, ‘Is it safe?’ Expediency asks the question, ‘Is it politic?’ But conscience asks the question, ‘Is it right?’ And there comes a time when one must take a position that is neither safe, nor politic, nor popular, but because conscience tells one it is right.

 

Some useful resources:

http://www.ericdigests.org/2002-3/gap.htm - "Closing the Achievement Gap: Principles for Improving the Education Success of All Students."

http://www.pdkintl.org/kappan/k03121e1.htm - "Breaking the Silence: White Students’ Perspectives on Race in Multiracial Schools."

http://www.thefreelibrary.com/_/print/PrintArticle.aspx?id=138483004 - "Racial experiences influence us as teachers: implications for gifted education curriculum development and implementation."

http://www.naacploudoun.org/education.htm - 2007 letters to LCPS, 2004 report, et al.

http://naacp.org/about/resources/brochures/education_teacher_quality_final.pdf - "From the Courtroom to the Classroom: The Role of Teacher Quality In Closing The Achievement Gap." Includes charts of actions for school boards, et al.

 

Loudoun County Branch NAACP

Education Committee

April 8, 2008