Newspapers / Winston-Salem Chronicle (Winston-Salem, N.C.) / Oct. 24, 1991, edition 1 / Page 4
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? Winston-Salem Chronicle "The Twin City's Award-Winning Weekly" 1 ; . "* Established in 1974 Ernest H. Pitt ? Ndubisi Egemonye Editor/Publisher Co-Founder Black issues School Board gets an 'F' We are tired of hearing the school system explain their ignorance of black issues by saying: We don't look at race, we just look at people. They didn't consider race in select ing members for the com They don't look at race as a factor in the dropout rate, yet dropouts are clustered in East Winston. They have very I little to say about the low scores of black students on achievement tests, and make much of an increase of two or I three percentage points, Spanking, switching and paddling have been historical ly accepted forms of disciplining children in the home, and about 1 ,000 paddlings take place in our schools each year. But corporal punishment has seen its day. It is not an effec tive way to discipline students. Some argue that teachers must maintain an atmosphere of law and order, fear and intimidation. We believe that teachers, rather than policing students, must nurture them in a climate of respect and understanding. Paddling and spanking do not teach good behavior. Paddling and spank ing convey only negatives: pain, fear, intimidation. Pad dling and spanking convey terrible messages to the child: 1) You deserve to be hit, 2) I am at my wit's end and can't think of any other way to reach you, so I'll hit you. "I was spanked, and I turned out O.K.," say nearly all proponents of corporal punishment. But one has to wonder if they have ever looked^t the alternatives. We do have ? effective methods of motivating children to behave better, and they do not involve hitting ? and our school adminis trators are aware of them. Dr. Jawanza Kunjufu, a Chicago educational consul tant, has written, and spoken extensively on the subject of I education and educating black males. Earlier this year vol ume two of his book, Countering the Conspiracy to Destroy Black Males , was published. As he puts it: "Teach ers must bond with their children. You cannot teach a child I you do not love. You cannot teach a child you do not respect. You cannot teach a child you do not understand." This past May, Dr. Kunjufu spoke to Winston-Salem educators on developing positive self-images and disci pline for black children. Dr. Ann Short, elementary school division director, mused this week about the possibility of bringing Dr. Kunjufu back for consultations. We applaud her suggestion. There are also a number of local and region al experts who should be consulted by the committe on alternative forms of discipline. We must reach out in a cre ative manner to tackle this issue. In Winston-Salem, the already heated issue of corporal punishment is further clouded by outright racism: The undeniable fact is that 70 percent of the paddlings go to black males. The school board is once again called upon to make a thoughtful, progressive decision. We hope they will. mittee to study alternative forms of discipline, yet 70 percent of the paddlings are administered to the buttoxes of black boys. Of 16 people on the committee, only two are black. 'For the Record' Over the next few weeks, Tang Nivri will unveil a new series of articles entitled "For the Record." This series will help us to focus on those among us who have helped to make us great. They aren't the rich or even famous. Instead, these ar? the people who have quietly helped us be who we are. But, by telling their story, hope fully, all of us will better understand who we are. Maybe one day, this series will turn out to be a collector's item for some enterprising history student. About letters ... The Winston-Salem Chronicle welcomes letters from its readers, as well as columns. Letters should be as concise as possibleartd should be typed for printed legibly. They also should include the name, address, and telephone number of the writer. Columns should follow the same guidelines and will be published if we feel they are of interest to our general readership. We reserve the right to edit letters and columns for brevity and grammar. Submit your letters and columns to: Chronicle Mailbag P.O. Box 1636 Winston-Salem, N.C. 27102 . , , - N , ? - ? - Reader responds to article oh paddling' To the Editor: I have recently moved to this area from a small community in the Midwest. I am a relatively young African -American lady that finds your newspaper enlightening and very much to-the-point. On this occasion, 1 am writing to you in regards to your recent article con cerning the paddling of students in our public school system. After reading my own viewpoint, you probably will not invite me to be a future guest editor, but here goes anyway! Regretfully and unfortunately, so many of our young African American students come from sin gle-parent homes. The mother is the dominant figure of the child's home. The child has no father nor do they even have a father figure. It is a shame, but it is true. Without a father, discipline is normally minimal. ..if at all. We send our children off to school each day with them not being conscious of the role of discipline in their lives. They do not respect the class room teacher which has become their authority figure. For the class room environment to be a learning ^environment there has to be disci pline! 1 am not an advocate of cor poral punishment, but there simply has to be some form of discipline because children will not learn in an environment where chaos prevails!! On the typical and traditional home of the white child, there is both a mother and a father. When the white child misbehaves they Teceive discipline commensurate with their "crime." ,r The white child goes to school fully aware of what constitutes 'wrong' and 'right.' They know that any misbehavior has certain impli cations for their lives. From an early age, they have been taught in their two-parent homes that you go to school to learn. The white children under stand the correlation between learn ing and getting ahead in this fast paced world! Disruption of the classroom setting is not on their agenda. - I can certainly validate this position which 1 am making to you. Just look at the test scores and over all grades of white children versus African-American children. We are behind! - Without discipline in the homes and in the schools, we will fall fur ther behind! We must not chastise the teachers who paddle our chil dren. Instead, we should chastise ? the parentis) who do not paddle the children. Our teachers are paid to be teachers not parents!! It should also be pointed out that we (African-Americans) pur sued legislation many years ago that would allow our children to attend schools whereby they would sit next to white children in the class room. Now, we must play by the same rules. If something is missing in our African-American homes (disci NOhWRE ? PEPATJN6 HOW'S? SW, CHRONICLE MAI LB AO Our Readers Speak Out pline) we cannot blame the teacher. As an African- American lady, I believe there should be discipline in the schools. With more constructive discipline, perhaps our scores in the classroom will go up and our crime rate will go down!!! Thank you for allowing me to write to your fine newspaper. Nirvana Jones Thanks for the help To the Editor: We mused recently as the last of eleven 40 cubic yard trailers lofcded with telephone books and corrugated cardboard left for Celo* tex in Goldsboro. More than 165 tons of books approximately one-third of the 300,000 books delivered had been recovered. The 1991 telephone book recycling effort for Winston Salem and Forsyth County had finally ended, except for the paper work. Keep Winston-Salem beautiful , and Browning Ferris Industries (BFI) are grateful to others who shared in this project: Document Centers of America; Food Fair of North Carolina; Keiger Printings The Kroger Company; North Car- ^ olina Baptist Hospital; Planters A LifeSavers; Rura Hall city govern ment; Sears, Roebuck and Co. Starlight Drive; Wake Forest Uni versity; all volunteer ? the heroes of this campaign; and all citizens and_brisiness cooperating in this effort. I iTaddition , we thank BeIF~ South Advertising and Publishing, Forsyth County, and the employees of the city of Winston-Salem for technical assistance. This effort her alded in a new era in recycling for us. Remanufacturing telephone books and cardboard into organic roof tiles allows us to come almost full circle in recycling, with the added dividend of keeping jobs for North Carolinians. When it is charged that Americans use more resources than much of the rest of the world, those of us concerned about our environment and our future struggle to move us all toward sustainability, preserving our resources. We applaud every - * one's efforts to reduce, reuse, recy cle, and restore. So far this year, we have collected 102 thousand pounds of recyclables at the spring Recy cling Day; 13,500 pounds of litter and 14,000 pounds of recyclables in the Glad Bag-a-thon; and, recently, 7.5 tons of debris removed from local waterways during the Big Sweep. i BFI joins Keep Winston-Salem Beautiful, Inc., in thanking all vol unteers who have made these efforts possible. Cecilia McDaniel Brown, Coordinator Keep Winston-Salem Beautiful, Inc. The debate Is on! - To the Editor: Once again, Congress is debat ing the National Endowment for the _by a recent amendment introduced by Senator Jesse Helms and passed by the Senate. The amendment pro vided the NEA is proscribed from funding works which are deemed to be "patently offensive." On the sur face this initiative might appear to be in the public interest. However uponctoser scrutiny, this legislation ? is not only vague but superfluous, difficult to enforce, and sends a chilling message about artistic free dom. Last year, a federal court acknowledged that such determina tions of offensiveness and obscenity s were the province of the courts. How then, could such a mandate be enforced by the NEA? Moreover, current NEA policy already pro hibits funding of obscene work's; thus rendering the amendment unnecessary. The amendment seems nothing more than an attack on the agency. Such an assault is unwar ranted. ^ For less than $1 per taxpayer annually, the Endowment has sup-s ported the cultural life of this, nation. In North Carolina support from the Endowment has had a. tremendous effect on the quality of life in our state. The American Dance Festival, the United Tribes oL North Carolina and the North Car olina Maritime Museum, all aided, by the NEA, have made lasting con-, tributions to the diverse, rich culture of our state. 5 During its 26 year history, only a handful of grants have teen con sidered controversial out of over 90,000 funded projects. In fact, mis-, representation of the agency is the greatest weapon that its opponents have. The NEA should be given a . fair chance to do what it does best; ^ award grants to, those creat(v\ artists deemed to be excellent Hb/ their peers. The National Endowment for the Arts was created to recognize. Artistic excellence, not enforce a nationwide decency policy. After 26 . years the agency has adhered to its mission, demonstrating our nation's, commitment to art of the highest quality. The NEA should be a source of ^ r~ ? ? , national pride rather than a source of controversy. The current debate also -Tftftefffrg-4 4uU-nnr rh#?righf?ri democratic freedom is at risk. Pub lic funding of the arts should not be automatic, but if government* becomes the arbiter of acceptable art as a pre-condition for funding, it will certainly signal an ominou?. future for the freedom of expres sion. . Sincerely, Cathy Stuart, Executive Director Leave 'them' "There's no way this system's equal," Samuel Williams told USA Today, as he sat with his wife and three children in his comfortable DeKalb, Ga. home. Williams, a local black busi nessman, and his handsome family look typically middle-class Ameri can. But to Williams, his success isn't complete. Something or someone has to do something to get more white people in his and his family's life. After 22 years and millions of dollars spent to bus blacks to * schools in De Kalb so they could be near whites, and vice versa, there still aren't enough of the pre cious whites around to satisfy the black Williams' of the world. So these blacks have gone to court to get more "integration." There is and never will be law to stop whites from running from blacks and certainly not to like them. Moreover, they're excelling in De Kalb schools with other blacks. Over 50% of the black students attend schools that are 90% black; 25% of white students attend a school that is 90% white. "We've done what we needed to and all we can do to desegre gate. Wc have the Mto-M (Majori alone and help yourself ty to Minority busing) program. We have a desegregated faculty. Our schools are financed on an equal basis," says De Kalb board Chairman David Williamson. - He might have added that blacks in De Kalb schools are 125 Williams in Milwaukee, allows poor black children to out perform middle-class white children and all blacks in traditional public schools. But the Milwaukee NAACP doesn't want them "educated," it wants them "integrated." The posi TONY BROWN Syndicated Columnist points above the national average on the Scholastic Aptitude Test. But black achievement doesn't impress Williams. "There's no way this system's equal," Williams told USA Today. He wants "justice" from the courts. But how much more "injus tice" from the courts do blacks want? What more can the courts do? The problem is that most white people don't want to be with black people ? not that the courts don't order it. That's why sensible black people are returning to the educa tion of black children themselves. The movement for choice in public schools, led by Polly tion doesn't improve anything ? blacks or the country. It's a retro grade philosophy with counter-pro ductive effects and few friends. "Is court-ordered school bus ing effective in eliminating segre gation?" USA Today asked two blacks and three whites. "No, It has served to confuse a generation of black Americans... They have no bonding with their community," Ernest Boger, a black from Daytona Beach, replied. "No. I don't think its effective. If you have children bused from one school to another, they will still socialize within their own - group without mixing with others. Busing doesn't bring about the effect of total integration," was the response of Linnie Muse, the other black and a nurse from Houston. , " The Supreme Court is now,, hearing the De Kalb case. Xnc)/ Williams, the De Kalb intcgrar tionist, is tickled pink thai;, Clarence Thomas is not there to vote. * He should be glad that Tony , Brown is not on the Supreme Court ; because, instead of helping him., find more white people, I'd tell him to read "Minority Party" (Reguerjf Gateway), a new book by PetcC Brown. The author pulls no punches in reporting the disgust the white * population feels for black popula-" tion. It's not the courts, the Repubfi? can party or school administrators. White America is sick and tired ?f black people begging them for handouts, preferences, guaranteed success and social acceptance. If you're black and don't like* what I say, I hope you get mad (net angry) enough, to remember what your momma (not mother) told , you: "If someone doesn't want to. V be with you or help you, you ' should have enough pride in your self to leave them alone and help yourself."
Winston-Salem Chronicle (Winston-Salem, N.C.)
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Oct. 24, 1991, edition 1
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