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STUDY: Racial Gap in High School Dropout and Completion Rates Is Close to Non-Existent

By goodblacknews on January 27, 2020

via jbhe.com

A new report from the U.S. Department of Education offers new data on high school dropout and completion rates that state the gap between White and Black students in 2019 is no longer measurably different.

The status completion rate is the percentage of 18-to-24 year-olds who have left high school and who hold a high school credential. From 1977 to 2016, the status completion rate for White 18-to-24 year-olds was consistently higher than the rate for Black 18-to-24 year-olds.

Now, for the first time in 40 years, the status completion rate for Black 18-to-24 year-olds was not measurably different from that of White 18-to-24 year-olds. In 2017, 93.8 percent of young Blacks had completed high school compared to 94.8 percent of Whites.

Between October 2016 and October 2017, the number of 15-to 24-year-olds who left school without obtaining a high school credential was approximately 523,000. This so-called event dropout rate was 5.5 percent for Black students and 3.9 percent for White students.

The status dropout rate is the percentage of 16-to 24-year-olds who are not enrolled in school and have not earned a high school credential. In 2017, the status dropout rate for all 16- to 24-year-olds was 5.4 percent. For Blacks the status dropout rate was 6.5 percent, compared to a rate of 4.3 for White students.

The full report, Trends in High School Dropout and Completion Rates in the United States: 2019, may be downloaded by clicking here.

Whitney Houston, The Notorious B.I.G. to Be Inducted into Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 2020

By goodblacknews on January 15, 2020
2020 Rock and Roll Hall of Fame Inductees Whitney Houston and The Notorious B.I.G. (photos via commons.wikipedia.org)

Music icons Whitney Houston and The Notorious B.I.G. are among the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame‘s 2020 inductees, the organization announced this morning. The other inductees are The Doobie Brothers, Nine Inch Nails, Depeche Mode and T. Rex.

The 35th annual ceremony will air live for the first time this year — May 2, on HBO, from the Public Auditorium in Cleveland, Ohio. Tickets are on sale Feb. 27; performances and special guests will be announced later.

This year’s performance lineup will likely be filled with tribute performances, as half of the inductees — Houston, Notorious B.I.G., and Marc Bolan of T. Rex — are deceased.

Four of the inductees — Houston, The Notorious B.I.G., the Doobie Brothers and T. Rex — and nine of the 16 total nominees were on the ballot for the first time, with nominees Dave Matthews Band, Motorhead, Pat Benatar, Soundgarden and Thin Lizzy filling out that list.

Chaka Khan, with and without the group Rufus, and Kraftwerk have both been up six times. To be eligible this year, each nominee’s first single or album had to be released in 1994 or earlier.

To read more: https://variety.com/2020/music/news/rock-and-roll-hall-of-fame-2020-whitney-houston-nine-inch-nails-notorious-big-1203467065/

Danielle Outlaw Becomes 1st Black Woman Commissioner of Philadelphia Police Department

By goodblacknews on January 2, 2020
New Philadelphia Police Commissioner Danielle Outlaw (photo via Portland Police Bureau)

NBC News recently reported that former Portland, Oregon police chief and Oakland, California native Danielle Outlaw will be the new Police Commissioner of Philadelphia. She is the first black woman to hold that position.

Philadelphia Mayor Jim Kenney addressed his new hire, according to nbcnews.com, by saying: “I am appointing Danielle Outlaw because I am convinced she has the conviction, courage and compassion needed to bring long-overdue reform to the Department,” Kenny said in a statement. “With our support, she will tackle a host of difficult issues, from racism and gender discrimination, to horrid instances of sexual assault on fellow officers.”

To further quote the article:

Kenny added that such violence often disproportionately “impact women, especially women of color within the Department.”

Beyond addressing issues within the Philadelphia Police Department, Kenny said Outlaw will also work to curtail violent crime and gun violence. The city is currently experiencing a gun violence epidemic; more people were shot in Philadelphia this year than in any other year since 2010, according to the Philadelphia Inquirer.

Outlaw herself is quoted saying: “I am convinced there can be humanity in authority; they are not mutually exclusive.”

To read more: https://www.nbcnews.com/news/nbcblk/danielle-outlaw-becomes-first-black-woman-commissioner-philadelphia-police-department-n1108761

Tech Investor Arlan Hamilton to Fund Scholarships for Black Students at Oxford & Dillard Universities

By goodblacknews on December 4, 2019
Arlan Hamilton (photo via backstagecapital.com)

According to USA TODAY, technology investor and entrepreneur Arlan Hamilton is funding a brand new scholarship for black undergraduate students at Oxford University in the U.K., a first for the world-renown educational institution.

To quote the article:

The scholarship, partly named for Hamilton’s mother, will cover fees and living costs for one undergraduate student a year for three years beginning in 2020. The value of the scholarship fund is about £220,000 (or nearly $300,000), Oxford said.

Hamilton is a former music tour manager without a college degree who bought a one-way ticket to San Francisco with the goal of backing underrepresented entrepreneurs. She was so broke that she met with tech investors by day and slept on the floor of the San Francisco airport at night until one of them cut her a check.

Today she runs Backstage Capital, a venture capital firm that backs women, minority and LGBTQ founders who are overlooked by Silicon Valley and reflects Hamilton’s determination to overcome the complex set of biases and barriers that begin in preschool and persist in the workplace that keep women and people of color from gaining equal access to some of the nation’s highest-paying jobs.

Historian and Author John Morrow Is 1st African American to Win Prestigious Award for Military Writing

By goodblacknews on November 21, 2019
Dr. John H. Morrow, Jr., recipient of the 2019 Pritzker Military Museum & Library Literature Award for Lifetime Achievement in Military Writing (photo via prnewswire.com)

via pritzkermilitary.org

Military historian and author Dr. John H. Morrow, Jr. is the 13th recipient of the Pritzker Military Museum & Library Literature Award for Lifetime Achievement in Military Writing. Morrow is the first African American to receive the award.

The Pritzker Literature Award—which includes a gold medallion, citation, and $100,000 honorarium—recognizes and honors the contributions of a living author for a body of work dedicated to enriching the understanding of military history and affairs. Morrow received the award at a ceremony in Chicago earlier this month.

“I am truly honored to accept the 2019 Pritzker Military Museum & Library Literature Award for Lifetime Achievement in Military Writing,” said Morrow. “Receiving the award after nearly fifty years of historical writing, teaching, and consulting constitutes the ultimate affirmation of my career as a scholar of the history of modern war and society.”

Author or co-author of 8 publications, Morrow is an accomplished military historian and respected professor. His work includes The Great War: An Imperial History, The Great War in the Air, Harlem’s Rattlers and the Great War (co-authored with Jeffrey T. Sammons) and German Airpower in World War I, among others. He has gained recognition for his ability to demonstrate how the past and the present intertwine inextricably.

Professor Morrow is a 1966 graduate of Swarthmore College, where he majored in history. He earned a Ph.D. in modern European history from the University of Pennsylvania.

In 1971 Morrow became the first African American faculty member in the College of Arts and Sciences at the University of Tennessee, Knoxville. He joined the faculty of the University of Georgia in 1988 as Franklin Professor, and in 1991 was named chair of the history department.

In addition to serving as the Franklin Professor and Chair of the History Department at University of Georgia, Morrow has also taught at the National War College, the Air War College, and the U.S. Military Academy at West Point.

He has most recently served on the History Advisory Committee of the Department of the Army, the Dwight D. Eisenhower Memorial Commission’s Legacy Committee, and theFirst Flight Centennial Federal Advisory Board.

The Pritzker Literature Award is sponsored by the Pritzker Military Foundation. To learn more, visit www.pritzkermilitary.org.

Maya Rockeymoore Cummings, Widow of Rep. Elijah Cummings, to Run for His Seat in Congress

By goodblacknews on November 12, 2019
Maya Rockeymoore Cummings and the late Elijah Cummings (photo via heavy.com)

According to baltimoresun.com, Maryland Democratic Party Chairwoman Maya Rockeymoore Cummings,  widow of the late U.S. Rep. Elijah Cummings, is running for her husband’s seat in Congress.

“I am, of course, devastated at the loss of my spouse, but his spirit is with me,” Rockeymoore Cummings, 48, said. “I’m going to run this race and I’m going to run it hard, as if he’s still right here by my side.”

Cummings passed away on Oct. 17 from cancer after serving more than two decades in the U.S. House of Representatives. He left a record of fighting for the needy and battling for social justice and voting rights.

Rockeymoore Cummings, a public policy consultant who is founder of the Washington consulting firm Global Policy Solutions LLC and a former 2018 candidate for governor, said her husband told her months before he died he would like for her to succeed him.

Rockeymoore Cummings plans to kick off her campaign Tuesday at her home office in Baltimore’s Madison Park neighborhood. She said she will focus on issues important to the late congressman, such as battling the opioid crisis and “fighting for the soul of our democracy” against the Trump administration, but also on her areas of expertise, which include health and education policy.

Rockeymoore Cummings also said she will have a preventative double mastectomy Friday. She said her mother died from breast cancer in 2015, and her sister was diagnosed last year with the disease.

To read more: https://www.baltimoresun.com/politics/bs-md-pol-maya-cummings-20191112-ptsbywxf45ecjgyu5ovdeyqvyy-story.html

R.I.P. U.S. Congressman and Chair of House Oversight and Reform Committee Elijah E. Cummings, 68

By goodblacknews on October 17, 2019

Rep. Elijah Cummings, a key Trump opponent, dies at 68
— Read on www.latimes.com/world-nation/story/2019-10-17/us-representative-elijah-cummings-dies

Whitney Houston, Notorious B.I.G., and Rufus feat. Chaka Khan Nominated for 2020 Rock & Roll Hall of Fame

By goodblacknews on October 16, 2019
Notorious B.I.G., Whitney Houston, Rufus feat. Chaka Khan (photos courtesy Rock and Roll Hall of Fame)

Whitney Houston, Rufus featuring Chaka Khan and Notorious B.I.G. are among the 16 nominees for the 2020 Rock and Roll Hall of Fame inductees.

Houston and Biggie Smalls are on the ballot for the first time along with Dave Matthews Band, The Doobie Brothers, Motörhead, Pat Benatar, Soundgarden, T.Rex, and Thin Lizzy. This is the third time Rufus & Chaka Khan have been nominated.

Inductees will be announced in January 2020. The Rock & Roll Hall of Fame 2020 Induction Ceremony takes place at Public Auditorium in Cleveland, Ohio on May 2, 2020.

The Rock & Roll Hall of Fame offers fans the opportunity to participate in the induction selection process. Beginning October 15 and continuing through 11:59 p.m. EST on January 10, 2020, fans can go to Google and search “Rock Hall Fan Vote” or any nominee name plus “vote” to cast a ballot with Google, vote at rockhall.com, or at the Museum in Cleveland.

Eugene Bullard, the 1st Known African-American fighter Pilot, Now Has Statue at Museum of Aviation in Georgia

By goodblacknews on October 14, 2019
Eugene Bullard statue in Georgia (photo via aero-news network)
Fighter pilot Eugene Bullard (photo via wikipedia.org)

Eugene Bullard, who became known as the Black Swallow of Death, was the first African-American pilot to fly in combat. Bullard now has a statue in his honor, unveiled last week in Warner Robins, Georgia, at the Museum of Aviation next to Robins Air Force Base, and about 100 miles south of Atlanta.

To quote from CNN:

His distant cousin, Harriett Bullard White, told CNN she wept with joy as she placed a wreath at the statue during a ceremony, attended by Air Force officers, nearly two dozen family members and several surviving members of the Tuskegee Airmen.

“All my life I’d known how great he was. Of course, no one else knew who he is,” White said. “He’s an American hero and someone all Americans should know about.”

Born in Columbus, Georgia, in 1895, Bullard ran away from home as an 11-year-old, wandering the South for years before stowing away on a freight ship destined for Scotland.

The next year, 1913, he settled in France. When World War I broke out, Bullard enlisted in the French Foreign Legion, serving first in the infantry.

But after being wounded in battle, Bullard made a $2,000 bet with a friend that he could become a military aviator despite his skin color, according to the Smithsonian Air and Space Museum. He won the bet, receiving his wings as a member of the Aéronautique Militaire in May 1917. That November, he claimed he shot down two German fighters, though accounts vary as to whether those aerial victories could be confirmed.

Black military pilots wouldn’t become common in America until the famed Tuskegee Airmen began training to fly in 1941. President Harry Truman formally desegregated the U.S. armed forces with an executive order in 1948.

To read more: https://www.cnn.com/2019/10/09/us/first-black-fighter-pilot-statue-trnd/index.html

Kenyan Runner Eliud Kipchoge Breaks 2-Hour Marathon Mark in Austria

By goodblacknews on October 12, 2019
Eliud Kipchoge wins INEOS 1:59 Challenge in Vienna, Austria (image via twitter.com)

According to bbc.com, elite Kenyan runner Eliud Kipchoge, 34, has become the first athlete to run a marathon in under two hours, beating the mark by 20 seconds.

Kipchoge covered the 26.2 miles in one hour 59 minutes 40 seconds in the Ineos 1:59 Challenge in Vienna, Austria on Saturday.

https://twitter.com/INEOS159/status/1182933612162945024?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw%7Ctwcamp%5Etweetembed%7Ctwterm%5E1182933612162945024&ref_url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.bbc.com%2Fsport%2Fathletics%2F50025543

This feat will not be recognized officially as the marathon world record because it was not in open competition and he used a team of rotating pacemakers.

“This shows no-one is limited,” said Kipchoge. “Now I’ve done it, I am expecting more people to do it after me.”

To read more: https://www.bbc.com/sport/athletics/50025543