Nearly a year after Waukegan Community School District 60 Superintendent Theresa Plascencia introduced the African American Male Achievement Initiative, a task force was formed, focus groups of students were held and potential programs were conceived.
Michael Gonzalez, the newly hired manager of special initiatives, has a vision of ways to help underachieving youngsters improve their skills and it involves some community involvement.
Recognizing extra time and attention may be needed, Gonzalez said he wants to make the school buildings available to families a few hours each Saturday. He hopes to inspire parents to read to their children.
“We need extra time to catch them up,” Gonzalez said. “If I can get the parents reading with their babies, just 15 minutes a day, if they can give their child 15 minutes a day, we’ll see some great strides.”
Gonzalez was part of the team updating the District 60 Board of Education about the African American Male Achievement Initiative July 13 at the Lincoln Center administration building in Waukegan before it becomes more active this school year.
From the start, Plascencia said the initiative needed to be a cohesive community effort led by people closest to it. A year ago, the overall graduation rate from Waukegan High School was 74% but 61.3% for Black males. Other statistics show a similar trend.
Not the largest group of students by far, there are 864 African American males in a district of approximately 14,000 students. Tasia Fields, the district’s director of equity and inclusion, said focus groups of middle and high school students added understanding.
While there was some positive feedback during the open-ended discussions, Fields said students expressed there was no effort to learn what happens outside of school. Others have felt they’re not well understood and teachers were unable to relate to them.
“Positive feedback was rare and often overshadowed by a feeling of being undervalued,” Fields said. “Students expressed a desire for more positive feedback and appreciation of their efforts. They felt every little mistake (was noticed) but ‘never the things we do right.’”
Just as Gonzalez said he wants parents to spend 15 minutes a day reading to their children, Fields said overall initiatives like the introduction of the science of reading into the overall curriculum are also important.
“I want to express this is one of the most important things that we can do for our African American Males and that is ensuring they are reading by third grade,” Fields said. “It is really critical to their success.”
With students now back in school, Fields said the task force will continue to meet to finalize an action plan. Already planned is a student summit next month along with another in the spring.
“You will see that some of these strategies overlap with some of the things we are already doing in the district,” Fields said. “There is a particular focus on the sense of belonging piece that was so pronounced in the data.”
Board member Christine Lensing suggested a summer program to help students who need more time developing reading skills. She is concerned some parents may be unable to offer the needed help.
“Parents of our students may be traumatized by our doing or another district’s doing,” Lensing said. “They may not have the same skill sets needed to support at home. We can’t expect families to help if they don’t have the skill sets to do so.”
Carolina Fabian, another board member, said there are students who are not struggling and may need a different kind of help to stop underachieving. Communication sent to families must consider both those with children in need, those doing well, and those achieving but can do even more.
“We have some who are gifted on the high end and I didn’t see any supports written out for those students,” Fabian said. “They don’t get enough support while we’re busy putting out fires over here.”
