12 Black Boys

10.03.10 By Rachel Singh

Last week, four people were murdered in Mattapan, up the street from my school and right next door to one of my students. One of the victims was two years old. Had he lived, perhaps he would have been a student at Young Achievers. Last week’s nightmare brings Boston’s homicide total up to 49, which should not surprise anyone who advocated against budget cuts for youth jobs this summer. The precinct to which Mattapan belongs bears 14 of these 49 murders, which should not surprise anyone who has seen the dearth of resources - jobs, city services, grocery stores - there. If we are going to be outraged over these murders, let us be outraged at the profoundly unjust system that has caused them. 

I decided to become a teacher because I had all these big ideas about what was wrong with society, and I saw schools as the best place to start fixing them. I wanted to be part of a movement of teachers committed to justice every day in their classrooms, teachers who were not just closing the achievement gap in test scores, but providing a radical education to create critical-thinking citizens who would go on to change our society. That was the big picture. But then I met and fell in love with each of my students, not as potential soldiers for change, but as the dear, precious little people that they are. My days became filled with the technicalities of how exactly students learn how to read and how to build number sense. I think about what each student needs to be successful, and how quickly I can learn how to give those things to them. But the murders of the people just up the street - three of whom had once been someone’s first grade students and one who should have been - remind me to never stop asking myself this crucial question: What is the relationship between my daily work in the classroom and my goals for social justice and social change?

There are 12 boys in my classroom, and they are all black. Most of them are pretty wiggly. Some can already read. One of them draws dinosaurs and monsters in his spare time. One of them chuckles with delight during read aloud. When we shared our hopes and dreams, one boy said his dream was to become a dancer. I suspect that one of them has a crush on the young lady who sits next to him. I studied prison in college, so I know the facts; they’re what made me want to do this work. I know that at any given moment in the America we live in, 20% of all black men serve time in prison at some point in their lives. 60% of black males who drop out of high school spend time in prison, and 53% of black boys across America do drop out. The life expectancy of a black man is 68 years, which is closer to the expectancy for men in Iraq than white men in this country. But all these statistics look very different when I have 12 bright black faces to apply them to. If a black man is more likely to go to prison than college, then what does that mean for my 12 beautiful boys? What do my students need so that they don’t become statistics?

Well, for one thing, it means I have to do everything in my power to help them graduate and go to college, since the statistics look much better for the college-educated cohort. As their first grade teacher, I feel like it’s my job to lay the foundation for their next years in school. If I do my job - and I pass them along to others who are doing their job - together, we can make sure they continue to learn and grow and tackle challenges like scholars and citizens. Education seems to serve as a sort of protection from bullets and prisons, but I don’t think it’s enough. It’s not education in and of itself that is a safeguard, but it’s what a high quality education gives students that protects them.

These children need some way to make sense of a deeply unjust and ugly world in a way that makes them feel powerful and free. A real education will give them that power, that hope, that freedom. And it’s not the phonemic awareness that will help them learn how to read and the number sense that will help them master math that comprise that liberating education; it’s the belief in their own power as a result of mastering those skills, the belief in their own value as human beings and members of a community that so many school deny our children.

So where does that leave me, the college graduate who decided to become teacher? Well, at the very least, I can swear that I will do everything in my power to help each and every one of them make a year’s progress in reading and math. But equally important, I want to help nurture all the beautiful things in their nature and teach them how to be their very best selves. And as they empower themselves, perhaps I can teach them how to recognize the beauty and power of others and what justice looks like. That was my dream coming in, but I am finding that I have no idea how to actually do it. Hopefully, as I learn how to become a teacher this year, perhaps I can also learn how to teach for liberation and justice too.