by JILL GUERRA
Spirit Week is next week at my Oakland elementary school. Each grade level is assigned to plan one day of spirit week activities and/or theme. My fifth grade class was asked to plan the activities for Career Day. I started our Monday Morning Meeting by asking the class to discuss their ideas with their tablemates and then I would take suggestions. After a few minutes of discussion, hands flew up: “A basketball tournament,” “A football game,” “A relay race.” I tried to clarify that we aren’t focusing on one type of career (sports) and that our activities should center on the idea that there are a variety of careers out there. I explained that the whole school would be involved and that the idea is to explore, discuss, promote, learn about, and celebrate different career possibilities.
I told them how at my son’s middle school, several people from the community (parents) came in on Career Day to talk to students about their jobs. 3-5 adults came to each class and explained what their job responsibilities entail, what they had to study or learn in order to qualify for the job, how much money they make, etc… My students got mad at me, said I was not taking their ideas seriously. I asked them what their suggestions had to do with Career Day as a whole. Several boys said that they want to be football and basketball players and that it is their prerogative (in so many words) to choose to do so. They thought that my idea was pointless and they didn’t want to hear anymore about it. “We already know what we want to be,” whined Bishop.
Last year on Career Day, the majority of boys were dressed as athletes—football and basketball players only. I have been a teacher in my own classroom for five years now and every year I ask the students what they want to be when they grow up. In the four years that I have taught African American students, when I ask that question, without fail, the boys almost all want to be sports stars.
A different day, when we were discussing their futures, I started pointing out that all I was hearing about was sports. I asked why they didn’t choose from all the other possibilities. I told them that the reality was that most of them would not play sports, “Every boy I talk to wants to be a football player and that it is statistically impossible. There aren’t even enough positions available for all of you.” Tyrone raised his hand and told me, “That’s not fair, Ms. Guerra, you’re discouraging our dreams.” Well, that’s the last thing I want to do, so I replied, “I just want you to see more options for yourselves.”
Pedro Noguera, in the introduction to his book, The Trouble With Black Boys, discusses the fact that, in the mainstream media, there are only two dichotomous images of the Black male—the good and the bad. The “bad” is who we see on the news: Black men being arrested, in handcuffs, mug shots when a crime has been committed, etc. To some extent, and with acknowledgement from my male students, rappers have even become a “bad image” as well. The rap star has become too aggressive, is shown doing “inappropriate things” with/to women, sometimes doing drugs or drinking, and is dressed with tattoos—all images my boys have come to see as negative.
The “good” image of Black men that has been portrayed in the mainstream is rigid in scope—the athlete. The story goes… “The poor black child came from poverty and meager beginnings, but with hard work and dedication to his craft (basketball, football, baseball, golf?), he was able to rise up and beat the odds…” Ain’t that some bullshit. African American boys are handed the key to their salvation: play some ball (and make a whole lot of people a whole lot of money) and you will be accepted by society (and, of course, make some good money yourself).
So, you might be thinking what’s wrong with that? What’s wrong with boys getting involved in sports and having hope? Who knows, it might keep them out of trouble, and one day, they could even give back to their community.
Here’s what’s wrong with that: The dichotomous image of the Black male (of anyone) as either good or bad is shallow and limited. In our society (I would argue the global society), Black men are not viewed as complex human beings who are multi-talented, multi-skilled, intellectual, or hard working. My boys feel that to “make it,” to be successful, the only acceptable choice for them is to become athletes—there is no alternative; they don’t even see another possibility.
So you would think that what they need is just some exposure; maybe they haven’t seen a range of careers in their families, community, etc. I have tried within the past two school years, to expose my students to a lot—we’ve studied the 4 R’s (Reduce, Reuse, Recycle, Rot), resistance movements to mining in the Congo and the exploitation of cocoa bean workers around the world, the history of California from an indigenous perspective, Chinese immigration to San Francisco, labor movement in the U.S. They have had singing classes, art classes. We’ve been to peace camp where we learned about diversity and getting along. We’ve been to the farmers’ market, to the ballet, to see Alvin Ailey dance company, the South African all male singing group, Ladysmith Black Mambazo, and the African American women’s singing group, Sweet Honey In the Rock. They’ve been exposed to farmers, visual artists, singers, musicians, counselors, conscious rappers, actors, teachers, a principal, THE NEW PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES—all African American people doing non-stereotypical jobs and, still, my boys just want to play sports.
Noguera believes that, “… the only way we will begin to break the cycle of failure is if Black men are empowered and engaged in addressing these issues themselves. To not acknowledge that Black males have the capacity to make choices that will positively affect their lives… is merely another way of inadvertently contributing to their marginalization and powerlessness.”
So I continue to expose them to all I can fit in during the last four weeks we have together. I support them in challenging the stereotypes. I consider and beckon their background knowledge in everything we do. I accept them for who they are and I trust that they will develop and grow into vivacious, thinking, conscious negotiators of their lives and contributing Black men.
Jill, you are making a huge impact on these boys– while they tell you that you are squashing their dreams– you are giving them new dreams as well– during career day, I asked the 5th graders what they want to be when they grow up when they visited my classroom. Marcus told me he wanted to be a football/basketball player but explained how that wasn’t likely. Then he told me he wanted to also be a lawyer ’cause then he could create change.
yay!
It’s good you’re exposing them to a whole host of possibilities- but at fifth grade, 99.99% of boys of any color want to be pro athletes. It’s a whole lot scarier when kids in high school say they want to be a lawyer or doctor, and they’re reading at a third grade level…
Stan, thanks for sharing the stats on your experience. I was talking about my own experience and work based on research. I’m the mom of a son who is now 14 and has a very diverse group of friends. The response to the question of “what do you want to be when you grow up?” was very different for those kids than what I described in my post. I have also worked with kids from lots of different communities and I’ve never seen the problem I described in another community of people. This problem has been well-documented by scholars as well. To learn more about the history of negative media portrayals as it pertains to African American people, try reading, Toms, Coons, Mulattoes, Mamies, and Bucks, by Donald Bogle. For an understanding of the affect of these portrayals on the identity formation of African American people try bell hooks’ Outlaw Culture: Resisting Representation or Reel to Real: Race, Sex, and Class at the Movies. This is not an issue based on my own informal survey. This is a real problem and I witnessed it surface in my own classroom.
As far as high school students reading at a third grade level…. I guess their teachers better get on their jobs and get those kids reading if they want to support them in becoming doctors and lawyers, right?
I also don’t think one thing is “scarier” than the other. All forms of oppression are unacceptable – whether they be in an educational arena or in the media – it is all systemic and it all needs to be addressed – there is no hierarchy of oppressions.
Jill –
Once I started reading this piece I couldn’t stop. I completely hear everything you are saying and believe that yours is a balanced approach that does not dismiss these children’s realities but encourages them to push farther than they think they can go. Thank you for taking us into the classroom to get a closer look at some of the consequences of the state violence that is imposed on Black families in the United States on a daily basis.
Jill,
I loved reading your post. Your reflections are inspiring and thought provoking as always. I have two stories to share.
The first is of an African American student of mine when I was teaching at Berkeley. She had grown up in Oakland and wrote about how most of the kids she grew up with wanted to be basketball stars or football stars. She was frustrated, however, with academic literature that repeatedly discouraged and discounted the legitimacy of this dream. She argued that, while most of the African American boys she grew up with would not be professional football or basketball stars this dream was the most consistent path to college and money for college most of them had. It inspired them to keep their grades up, provided them with scholarships, taught them to work as a team, and engaged them in school in a way that eventually would open up other pathways–that they might be lawyers or educators. The reality of the racist world we live in is that, for black men, lawyering, teaching and being the president are also long shot careers, particularly when they are in underfunded, underperforming school districts where great teaching is an occasional privilege, not a right.
The second story is that I have been coaching middle school Volleyball and Soccer this year. Working in an underfunded, low-performing school district with African American, Asian Pacific Islander and Latin@ students. Our sports program is a hobbled together, local, underfunded affair. We do not have professional coaches, equipment, or transportation. The vast majority of our students, as they enter high schools with middle-class, mostly white students who have been steeped in well-funded after school and school sports programs, will be excluded from sports, just as they are from high track classes. Even talented and well trained students will get kicked off of teams because of grades and truancy.
All this has me wondering if there isn’t a way of seeing the dreams as connected. If there isn’t a way of recognizing that when a kid says that they want to play pro ball what they are also saying is, ‘I want to keep my grades up in high school,’ ‘I want to work extremely hard at something I care about,’ ‘I want to go to college’ and help them figure out what kind of additional dreams they need to have to make these things happen–even if it is only, in the short term, so they can play ball.
All this said, your words resonate very strongly. I hear your frustration at having all your efforts to show multiple pathways to African American ‘success’ and to cultivate dreams that are broader than the narrow stereotype repeated over and over again in the media cycles. All these experiences are now part of the broader background knowledge you beckon. Barack Obama writes in Dreams from My Father of his own search for black male role models and his love of basketball. I quote him at length, because, as always, he is eloquent:
“By the time I reached high school, I was playing on Punahou’s teams, and could take my game to the university courts, where a handful of black men, mostly gym rats and has-beens, would teach me an attitude that didn’t just have to do with the sport. That respect came from what you did and not who your daddy was….And something else too, something nobody talked about: a way of being together when the game was tight and the sweat broke and the best players stopped worrying about their points and the worst players got swept up in the moment and the score only mattered because that’s how you sustained the trance….I was living out a caricature of black male adolescence, itself a caricature of swaggering American manhood. Yet at a time when boys aren’t supposed to follow their fathers’ footsteps, when the imperatives of harvest or work in the factory aren’t supposed to dictate identity, so that how to live is bought off the rack or found in magazines, the principal difference between me and most of the man-boys around me–the surfers, the football players, the would-be rock and roll guitarists–resided in the limited number of options at my disposal. Each of us chose a costume, armor against uncertainty. At least on the basketball court I could find a community of sorts, with an inner life all its own.” (80)
I think that part of the explanation for your students’ uniform dreams of wearing a real uniform has to do with their age. When I (middle class white girl) was 14, I wanted to be a novelist. Well, now I’m very happily an English teacher! We have few African-American students at our public high school in Fremont, California (in the south-east Bay Area). But one of my 10th-grade students, when I asked him the Question, said he wants to be a social worker, to help young people. This is not a student who has had social workers involved in his own life; but he knows who they are, what they do, and values their contributions.
My father grew up in a low-income area of Boston without a father at home. He lived the dream and became a professional athlete and coach. While in those roles, he was often asked to attend student “career days” hosted by schools, districts, etc.
Rather than discourage the dreams, he tried to embrace their interest and encouraged the students to study what it takes to become an elite athlete. He asked them to think about their physical traits and learn about health and human development. He probed them about family genes and probability of developing the specific height or muscle/body mass needed for the sport of interest, generating interest in how diet, excercise, strategic thinking and other elements/behaviors could enhance their chances of reaching their dreams.
Then, he channeled that interest to the “outliers” found in sports, such as “Spud Webb” (?), and asked if the students understood their training routines, work ethic, knowledge development that gave them an edge over athletes with more natural physical benefits, etc … Were they making their plans, reading the necessary information, netoworking with the right people, interacting with the system or “pipeline” that those athletes follow to the “big leagues”? For example, in some cases the pipeline is through college and there are other pathways for specific sports.
Finally, are there other ways that you can increase the likelihood that you will be able to engage in work about which you are passionate. What are some of the other jobs related to that sport. Off the top of my head, these might include:
-video professional that works with athletes to examine and improve individual and team performance
-physical trainer
-communications and public relations
-agent and lawyers
-business office support
-sports writers and commentators
-arena managers and event planners
-phychologists to work with team on motivation and team-building
-sports medicine
…. and on and on … these added talents can make you a more attractive prospect for the value you can add to the team — as an athlete with additional skills or as someone who wants to be around athletes and “the game”.
Anyway, I think the sports career allows an engaging entry point for learning about related topics. My father was a prolific reader of military strategy books (every game was a battle in the war for the championship), motivation books, data analysis, video and computer programming, etc.
We can help students learn about probability in math class (2.5 percent of aspiring athletes make the team, I think … and even fewer survive past 3 years of playing and enter the ranks or coaching) but we don’t have to “tell” them that depressing information. We can show them the way and help them learn for themselves by doing their own research in a personalized way. We can also explore the best angle for a shot through geometry or introduce physics through sports. We are only bound by our imagination in creating integrated, thematic units that can help us learn about the larger world. Even the studies by Noguera can be presented and stimulate research on the topic of media messages and how to address them.
Sorry for rambling on but the dreams should be nurtured in my opinion and can lead to fruitful discovery for each of us.
Becky/Patrice,
I really appreciate your thoughtful comments. I agree, Becky, that the desire is to do well and to succeed. The issue, for me, I guess, is the bias I have against the sports industry – how human beings are “farmed” and their bodies are used, etc… I realized through this writing journey and dialgoue that I need to let go of that. Patrice, I think your suggestions are a smart and stragetic way to reach kids and support their dreams and growth while “expanding their horizons”. Reminds me of some of Jeff Duncan-Andrade’s work around Hip Hop and pop music in the classroom. Thank you all!
I think that part of the explanation for your students’ uniform dreams of wearing a real uniform has to do with their age. When I (middle class white girl) was 14, I wanted to be a novelist. Well, now I’m very happily an English teacher! We have few African-American students at our public high school in Fremont, California (in the south-east Bay Area). But one of my 10th-grade students, when I asked him the Question, said he wants to be a social worker, to help young people. This is not a student who has had social workers involved in his own life; but he knows who they are, what they do, and values their contributions.