10/29/2007

The College Affordability Crisis Is Not Going Away

Algernon Austin presents an excellent, concise, and wonderfully read scholarly examination of the complicated landscape of race, class and popular perception. Besides the prison industrial complex, black strides in education, poverty rates, crime and other indices contradict claims that blacks are “moving backward.”
--Jeffrey O. G. Ogbar, Director, Institute for African American Studies, University of Connecticut and author of Black Power: Radical Politics and African American Identity (The Johns Hopkins University Press), 2004 and Hip-Hop Revolution: The Culture and Politics of Rap (University Press of Kansas), 2007.


Purchase Getting It Wrong: How Black Public Intellectuals
Are Failing Black America
by Algernon Austin
Barnes & Noble.com Amazon.com

[Find out The Truth about Black Students.]
________________________________________________________________________

[This past week the New York Times illustrated that when some people show their underwear it is high fashion. When other people do it, it is a criminal offense. The Times also reported that college costs are still rising which prompted a re-post of this piece from last year below.]

Ninety-two percent of black students believe that a college education is important for success today. Ninety-six percent of their parents feel the same. These were among the findings of a study commissioned by the Sallie Mae Fund. The study examined the views of high school students and their parents in five cities.

While many commentators have been fixated on the erroneous idea that black students do not value education, the truly important educational issues have received little attention. One issue that has been neglected is the impact of the skyrocketing cost of college on black students’ college graduation rate.

The good news is that in 2004, 22 percent more blacks received bachelor’s degrees than just four years earlier. The bad news is that the black college graduation rate is still 20 percentage points lower than the white rate.

The cost of college is not the only factor behind this difference in college graduation rates, but it is an important one. Many blacks know very little about financial aid. Some black students do not even attempt to go to college because they don’t know how they would pay for it.

The large increase in the cost of college and changes in financial aid practices have greatly increased the economic burden of higher education on low-income families. The National Center for Public Policy and Higher Education found that it costs the poorest 20 percent of families 16 percent more of their family income to send a child to college today than in 1992. The middle 20 percent of families spend 5 percent more of their family income and the top 20 percent, 1 percent more. The Center also found that colleges now give more grant aid to middle- and upper-income students than low-income students.

Many low-income black students are placed in a difficult bind to pay for college. Reasonably, they are reluctant to acquire a great deal of debt. The average black college student graduates with over $20,000 worth. But they do not have any good alternatives. The maximum Pell Grant award for low-income students only covers about one-third of the costs of a four-year college today, but it covered nearly three-quarters in the 1970s. The vast majority of students who receive the grant do not even receive the maximum award.

In a desire to avoid debt, low-income black students may select a college that they can attend part-time and commute to. These decisions would allow them to save and earn money by staying at home and working part-time. While these are economically rational decisions, they all make it more likely that the student does not graduate from college.

It is often a difficult process for black students who are the first in their family to go to college and who are used to a predominantly black environment to become acculturated to a predominantly white college. Black students who are fully immersed in college life by attending full-time and by living on campus appear to better make the adjustments and attachments they need to help them stay in college. Students who try to save money by enrolling part-time and commuting may end up with perhaps less college debt but also no college diploma.

Low-income students of any race should not be forced to choose between large college debts and a college diploma. We need to find ways to reduce college costs and increase the amounts of grant aid going to low-income students. In 2004, the National Center for Public Policy and Higher Education gave 36 states an “F” grade for college affordability. This year there were 43 “Fs”. Hopefully, we will recognize the magnitude of this crisis and act soon. If we do, we will make big strides in increasing the numbers of blacks who graduate from college and ease the burden on all low-income college students.

References
“Higher and Higher Education: Trends in Access, Affordability, and Debt,” Demos Policy Brief #1, Winter 2007.

Patricia Somers, “The Persistence of African American College Students: How National Data Inform a Hopwood-Proof Retention Strategy,” in The Academic Achievement of Minority Students: Perspectives, Practices, and Prescriptions, ed. Sheila T. Gregory (Lanham, MD: University Press of America, 2000), 249-265.

Watson Scott Swail and Dennis Holmes, “Minority Student Persistence: A Model for Colleges and Universities,” in The Academic Achievement of Minority Students: Perspectives, Practices, and Prescriptions, ed. Sheila T. Gregory (Lanham, MD: University Press of America, 2000), 391-433.

“A Test of Leadership: Charting the Future of U.S. Higher Education,” U.S. Department of Education, 2006.


Share this article with a friend. Use the email icon below.

--Algernon Austin, Ph.D.

Copyright © 2005-2007 by Thora Institute, LLC. All Rights Reserved. Reprint this article in your newspaper or magazine. Contact the Thora Institute to purchase reprint rights.
_ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _
[The Thora Institute needs you.]

10/22/2007

A Flawed Concept: “Black-on-Black Crime”

Algernon Austin presents an excellent, concise, and wonderfully read scholarly examination of the complicated landscape of race, class and popular perception. Besides the prison industrial complex, black strides in education, poverty rates, crime and other indices contradict claims that blacks are “moving backward.”
--Jeffrey O. G. Ogbar, Director, Institute for African American Studies, University of Connecticut and author of Black Power: Radical Politics and African American Identity (The Johns Hopkins University Press), 2004 and Hip-Hop Revolution: The Culture and Politics of Rap (University Press of Kansas), 2007.


Purchase Getting It Wrong: How Black Public Intellectuals
Are Failing Black America
by Algernon Austin
Barnes & Noble.com Amazon.com

[Find out The Truth about Black Students.]
________________________________________________________________________

For more than a decade, people have been talking about the concept of black-on-black crime without really thinking about what they are saying. They view black-on-black crime as a unique and particularly heinous development in black America. They never say exactly what pattern of crime we should hope for instead. White-on-black crime? Black-on-white crime?

What the people lamenting the occurrence of black-on-black crime do not realize is that most whites in the U.S. are victimized by other whites, but one never hears anyone talking about white-on-white crime. In Mexico, Mexican Hispanics are mainly victimized by—guess who?—other Hispanics, yet there is no hand-wringing over an idea of “Hispanic-on-Hispanic crime.” In China, Asian Chinese victimize—you guessed it—other Asian Chinese, but, again, there is no shock over the fact that Asians would prey on other Asians. Only black Americans have the privilege of being condemned for a nearly universal phenomenon.

Black-on-black crime is a ridiculous concept. It has emerged and is sustained by the strength of anti-black sentiment in American culture. It is certainly legitimate to be concerned about the high rates of “street” crime in black communities. The next Black Directions report will address this very issue. But it is wrongheaded to be surprised that blacks mainly victimize blacks. Most “street” crime across the globe is intra-racial.

Share this article with a friend. Use the email icon below.

--Algernon Austin, Ph.D.

Copyright © 2005-2007 by Thora Institute, LLC. All Rights Reserved. Reprint this article in your newspaper or magazine. Contact the Thora Institute to purchase reprint rights.
_ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _
[The Thora Institute needs you.]

10/15/2007

The Burden of a Flawed Health Care System

Algernon Austin presents an excellent, concise, and wonderfully read scholarly examination of the complicated landscape of race, class and popular perception. Besides the prison industrial complex, black strides in education, poverty rates, crime and other indices contradict claims that blacks are “moving backward.”
--Jeffrey O. G. Ogbar, Director, Institute for African American Studies, University of Connecticut and author of Black Power: Radical Politics and African American Identity (The Johns Hopkins University Press), 2004 and Hip-Hop Revolution: The Culture and Politics of Rap (University Press of Kansas), 2007.


Purchase Getting It Wrong: How Black Public Intellectuals
Are Failing Black America
by Algernon Austin
Barnes & Noble.com Amazon.com

[Find out The Truth about Black Students.]
________________________________________________________________________


A recent survey by the Rockefeller Foundation documents the burden our current health care policies places on blacks.

The survey researchers found that almost one-quarter of blacks do not have health insurance. One-fifth have not gone to the doctor because of the cost, and almost one-tenth have been unable to take a child to the doctor because of the cost. A fifth have not filled a prescription because of the cost. A similar amount have had to take money out of their retirement funds to pay for medical costs.

As Michael Moore has illustrated in his documentary Sicko, the problems faced by Americans with health insurance best illustrate the failures of the system. Many blacks who have health insurance are very worried that their health coverage will not be there or provide enough in their time of need.

The following are some of the specific issues that blacks with coverage are very worried about. One-fifth are very worried about losing their health coverage. Slightly less than a fifth are very worried about being able to pay for co-payments, deductibles and other costs. A quarter of blacks with health insurance are very worried about being able to afford a major hospital stay. Fifteen percent are very worried about being able to pay their health insurance premiums. About a fifth are very worried about being able to afford prescription drugs.


Source: The Rockefeller Foundation, American Worker Survey, Q8c.

About a fifth of blacks with health coverage have worries about their ability to meet their basic health care needs. Worrying about being able to afford adequate health coverage should be the concern of people without health insurance. If we were to include the blacks who were “fairly worried” and “slightly worried” to the totals, it would amount to about half of blacks with health insurance. If people with health coverage do not feel secure about their access to health care, what does that tell us about our health care system?

Contact your elected officials and tell them it is high time that the U.S. joined the Western, developed world and provided health care for all.

Share this article with a friend. Use the email icon below.

--Algernon Austin, Ph.D.

Copyright © 2005-2007 by Thora Institute, LLC. All Rights Reserved. Reprint this article in your newspaper or magazine. Contact the Thora Institute to purchase reprint rights.
_ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _
[The Thora Institute needs you.]

10/08/2007

American Health Care: Very Expensive, Very Low-Quality

Algernon Austin presents an excellent, concise, and wonderfully read scholarly examination of the complicated landscape of race, class and popular perception. Besides the prison industrial complex, black strides in education, poverty rates, crime and other indices contradict claims that blacks are “moving backward.”
--Jeffrey O. G. Ogbar, Director, Institute for African American Studies, University of Connecticut and author of Black Power: Radical Politics and African American Identity (The Johns Hopkins University Press), 2004 and Hip-Hop Revolution: The Culture and Politics of Rap (University Press of Kansas), 2007.


Purchase Getting It Wrong: How Black Public Intellectuals
Are Failing Black America
by Algernon Austin
Barnes & Noble.com Amazon.com

[Find out The Truth about Black Students.]
________________________________________________________________________


Source: Karen Davis et al., Mirror, Mirror on the Wall: An International Update on the Comparative Performance of American Health Care, The Commonwealth Fund, May 2007, p. viii.

The U.S, spends more than twice as much per capita on health care as the United Kingdom, yet a recent report ranked the U.K.’s health system first and the U.S.’s last among six nations. We pay the most to get the least.

Mirror, Mirror on the Wall: An International Update on the Comparative Performance of American Health Care by Karen Davis et al. compares the health care systems in Australia, Canada, Germany, New Zealand, the United Kingdom and the United States. The researchers compare the countries on the quality of care, access, efficiency, equity, and the promotion of healthy living. The U.S. scored last on access, efficiency, equity, and the promotion of healthy living. On quality of care the U.S. was second to last.

The report states:
The most notable way the U.S. differs from other countries is the absence of universal health insurance coverage. Other nations ensure the accessibility of care through universal health insurance systems and through better ties between patients and the physician practices that serve as their long-term “medical home.” It is not surprising, therefore, that the U.S. substantially underperforms other countries on measures of access to care and equity in health care between populations with above-average and below-average incomes.
With the inclusion of physician survey data in the analysis, it is also apparent that the U.S. is lagging in adoption of information technology and national policies that promote quality improvement. The U.S. can learn from what physicians and patients have to say about practices that can lead to better management of chronic conditions and better coordination of care. Information systems in countries like Germany, New Zealand, and the U.K. enhance the ability of physicians to monitor chronic conditions and medication use. These countries also routinely employ non-physician clinicians such as nurses to assist with managing patients with chronic diseases.
For decades, nations in the developed world have provided high-quality, inexpensive health care to all of their citizens. The U.S. stands alone with an expensive, low-quality health care system than covers fewer and fewer of its citizens each year.

Share this article with a friend. Use the email icon below.

--Algernon Austin, Ph.D.

Copyright © 2005-2007 by Thora Institute, LLC. All Rights Reserved. Reprint this article in your newspaper or magazine. Contact the Thora Institute to purchase reprint rights.
_ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _
[The Thora Institute needs you.]

10/01/2007

Separate and Unequal Nursing Home Care for Blacks

Wednesday, October 3, 2007 ON
THE TERRORDOME: Lies and Truth About Fears of “Acting White”

CJSR FM88
www.cjsr.com
6 PM Mountain Time

Sociologist Algernon Austin, author of Getting It Wrong: How Black Public Intellectuals are Failing Black America, discusses lies and truth about Afrikamerica, and the surprising identity of who is spreading the lies. We’ll hear from Austin about which distortions are being disseminated about Afrikan Americans and how careful research and straightforward reading of easily available evidence demands an overturning of many popular myths, including the notion that Black students avoid their studies for fear of “acting White.” That’s all on tonight’s edition of The Terrordome: The Afrika All-World News Service.

Check out all the details on THE BRO-LOG!

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -


From Separate and Unequal: Racial Segregation and Disparities in Quality Across U.S. Nursing Homes:

"Black residents," the authors of a study published in Health Affairs (September/October 2007) report "are more likely to live in poor-quality nursing homes." Blacks reside in highly segregated nursing home facilities. The highest nursing-home segregation was found in the Midwest.

"Black nursing home residents were 1.41 times as likely as whites to be in facilities cited with a deficiency causing actual harm or immediate jeopardy to residents, and 1.7 times as likely to be in a nursing home that was subsequently terminated from Medicare and Medicaid participation because of poor quality. In addition, blacks were 1.12 times as likely as whites to reside in a nursing home that was greatly understaffed, and 2.64 times as likely to be in a facility housing predominantly Medicaid residents."