By Dr. Umar Johnson
Nationwide — Black boys were gifted with an all-new G.E.D. test for the 2014 school year, which will make it even more difficult for them to escape the trappings of low expectations, as the only alternative to a high school diploma, the G.E.D., has now been made just as difficult to obtain as the diploma itself. Why a new G.E.D.? Politically-speaking, keeping Black boys from having a gambler’s chance at a decent life in this country seems to have become a fetish of the American Social Order. As states scramble to find more dollars to incarcerate young Black males, a quiet but very powerful sense of hopelessness is settling in amongst the Black boy population in America. In quiet protest, many have dropped out of school and have taken to the street corners, not necessarily to participate in the underground economy, but to puff their life away and daydream amidst the purple haze of marijuana. While educational racism and economic castration suck the life out of Black boys in America, the Black community sits distracted by American foreign policy initiatives, reality television shows, and professional sports. As neighborhood violence increasingly becomes a fact of life in Black communities, many are at a loss for what to do.
However, we know exactly what must be done. If we want to reverse the special education, ADHD, psychotropic drug, juvenile incarceration, and premature extermination wars against Black boys then we will have to build schools that are uniquely designed to teach Black boys, not only how to succeed in a racially-biased society, but also how to avoid the trappings of a racist criminal justice system. Unfortunately, historically Black colleges have been under attack as well. Many state higher education systems are underfunding HBCUs in an attempt to force mergers will larger white universities who are not sympathetic to the needs of Black youth. Other private HBCUs have struggled with financial difficulties and a lack of support from the larger African-American community. One such college is the historic St.Paul’s College in Lawrenceville, Virginia. Founded by a contemporary of the legendary Booker T. Washington, the great James Solomon Russell, St. Paul’s would be the perfect location for a residential school for Black boys. Located in a rural section of southern Virginia, not far from the North Carolina border, St.Paul’s campus is reclusive enough and sizeable enough to be the perfect psycho-academic training camp for the current generation of Black boys.
America’s foremost school psychologist and kinsman to Frederick Douglass, Dr. Umar Johnson, is attempting to purchase the St. Paul’s College to be transformed into the Frederick Douglass and Marcus Garvey RBG International Leadership Academy for Black Boys. This academy will be based on a global business model that prepares Black boys for self-employment and entrepreneurship, not merely acceptance into college. The banking establishment and the higher education systems of America are in collaboration to put more African-Americans into financial debt in the name of a collegiate education. This is a collegiate education that is increasingly becoming useless in the face of an economy that is becoming more global, while it does nearly nothing to ensure that enough jobs remain in the United States for college-educated young adults. This situation is sending devastating numbers of Black children with college degrees to the homeless shelter and soup kitchens of America.
Our children have to be taught how to make a living anywhere in this world regardless of the circumstances of the political economy in which they live. The FDMG Academy will teach our children to be masters of Agricultural/Agronomical Science, Economic/Financial Science, Political/Military Science, Nutritional/Dietary Science, Family/Community Science, and African-Centered Spiritual/Cosmological Science. In addition to these six core sciences, and the three “R’s,” our boys will be taught to master at least two building trades (i.e., electrical, cosmetology, plumbing, auto, carpentry, HVAC, computer network/design, masonry, etc). Why the trades? A man’s bread and butter are only guaranteed when he can work for them. During the 1970s America’s public school system began working in concert with the racist building trade unions to systematically see to the removal of the trade building programs from predominately Black high schools, which created a blue-collar skills gap in Black communities, particularly in the inner-cities, which was then quickly monopolized by white labor. With Black parents brainwashing their children into thinking that their is no hope without college, we have seen generation after generation of Black youth turn their backs on the building trades only to end up graduating Magna Cum Laude with a doctoral degree that has no marketability in the competitive job pool.
Why a residential academy? Black boys are disproportionately raised by single Black mothers, who oftentimes struggle escorting their sons safely and successfully into manhood. Although some Black mothers, blinded by the influence of Eurocentric feminism would argue that their sons don’t need fathers, many know otherwise. The crisis in Black male education isn’t really about education at all: it’s about the lack of masculine energy in the schoolhouse leaving our boys hungry for guidance from male role models that they rarely get to spend time with. Our residential academy will provide our boys with the discipline, structure and masculine energy needed from strong caring Black men. A heaven on earth, a home away from home, is what we have in store for our boys. A powerhouse academy where they love coming to school and never have to worry about being mis-diagnosed and thrown into special education for “invisible” disabilities like ADHD and Emotional Disturbances (ED). This would be the first residential academy in U.S. history for boys based upon the principles of traditional African culture.
The African-American community must change its paradigm and approach to education if our children are to have a fighting chance in this world. With white racism using the charter school movement as a front for its ethnic cleaning campaign, thereby gentrifying every major Black inner-city in America, public school will soon be a distant memory. If you care about the future of Black boys, and of all African-Americans please donate to help Dr. Umar Johnson acquire the historic St. Paul’s College, to be used as the FDMG Academy, before it is purchased by those not interested in the welfare of our children. Visit www.DrUmarJohnsonSchool.com for more information on the school project and to make your much needed donation to this critical fundraiser. We must raise $5M by August 21, 2014 and need your immediate help. Resumes are now being accepted at FDMGResumes@gmail.com.
Dr. Umar Johnson is a Doctor of Clinical Psychology, Certified School Psychologist & Certified School Principal. He is one of the most requested speakers in the world and has lectured in North America, South America, Europe, Afrika, and the Caribbean. He is author of the best-selling book “Psycho-Academic Holocaust: The Special Education and ADHD Wars Against Black Boys.” As a private-practicing school psychologist he works with parents, educators, superintendents, attorneys and mental health professionals to better serve the needs of African-American children. He is a descendant of both the great Frederick Douglass and Bishop Alexander Wayman , 7th Bishop under Richard Allen’s AME Church. Dr. Johnson can be reached at www.DrUmarJohnson.com or 215-989-9858. He welcomes correspondence from parents with issues protecting and educating their children from special education abuse and ADHD exploitation.