work to ensure that Black children have access to the tools necessary to advance their educational or career interests. You can read more about the organization by clicking HERE.
On April 26, 2018 the Black Parents Workshop published the following press release that should be of interest to parents and community members of southern Hudson County, New Jersey:
April 26, 2018
Black Parents Workshop Network Expands into Hudson County
South Hudson (SoHUD) Black Parents Workshop Affiliate Announced
(Maplewood,
NJ) – The Black Parents Workshop, Inc. has announced the establishment
of a Hudson County Affiliate – the South Hudson (SoHUD) Black Parents
Workshop that will focus on school districts in Hoboken, Jersey City and
Bayonne, New Jersey. SoHUD – Black Parents Workshop will hold a general organizing meeting for parents at 6:30 pm on Thursday May 10, 2018 at the Mary McCleod Bethune Life Center at 140 Martin Luther King, Jr. Drive in Jersey City.
The Black Parents Workshop, Inc., (BPW) is a Maplewood based
not-for-profit organization, founded in 2014 with the mission of
representing Black parents and their children for the purpose of
advancing equity in elementary and secondary education. The BPW focuses
on racial disparities in student access to courses, student discipline
and teaching staff, as well as culturally competent curriculum and the
treatment of students with special needs.
Black
Parents Workshop Chairman Walter Fields said, “We are excited and
encouraged by the formation of our new Hudson County affiliate. It
represents an important development in tackling issues that are the
function of structural racism in public education. We believe Black
students in Hoboken, Jersey City and Bayonne deserve better than what
they are currently receiving in their schools. SoHUD - BPW represents a
very important step in giving Black families a voice and a tool by which
to advocate on behalf of their children.”
Hoboken
parent-advocate Courtney Wicks said, “Between Hoboken, Jersey City, and
Bayonne, we all are taking on the same issues but there are definitely
nuances with each Board of Education that differs for each city. The
experience with the Board of Education has been mixed depending on which
South Hudson City. In Hoboken specifically, the Board of Education is
made up of entirely parents who currently benefit or have benefitted
from racial tracking and segregation and as a result there has been
stages of escalation that started with pacifying these issues, then
denying these issues, to outright hostility and the use of various forms
of intimidation. Ultimately, we feel the Hudson County Department of Education should be holding all of these districts accountable for their
discriminatory practices and lack of a comprehensive plan for realizing
true equity and access in each district.”
SoHUD leader Courtney Wicks, a parent with a child in the Hoboken Public School District, will join the Board of Trustees ( https://blackparentsworkshop.org/board-of-trustees)
of the Black Parents Workshop, Inc. Chairman Fields pointed out the
significance of the new Trustee. “For too long, the Black community in
New Jersey has allowed the fragmented nature of the state’s
hyper-segregated system of public education betray our common interests.
We may have over 600 public school districts in our state, but we stand
united with one mission – the education of our children. As parents, as
taxpayers, we are demanding that Black children throughout our state’s
21 counties receive the quality education prescribed by the New Jersey Constitution and federal statutes.”
Wicks noted, “Since the Brown vs. Board of Education decision 64 years ago, we still have not truly realized the promise of a
quality public school education free of discrimination and it falls
on our shoulders to provide pushback, a counter narrative, and to
fight to make the country better for our children.”
In recent weeks, the Black Parents Workshop has filed a federal lawsuit, Black Parents Workshop v. South Orange-Maplewood School District
(Case # 2:18-cv-02726) in U.S. District Court in the District of New
Jersey and appealed to the Middle States Association of Colleges and
Schools on behalf of Black students in South Orange and Maplewood, New
Jersey. The launch of the South Hudson affiliate is the first of several
expansions currently underway in and outside the state of New Jersey.
Jersey City Political Blogger Bruce Alston states, “Ultimately, we feel the
Hudson County Department of Education should be holding all of these
districts accountable for their discriminatory practices and lack of a
comprehensive plan for realizing true equity and access in each
district.” He further notes, “There is no way to correct the societal
issues plaguing the Black community unless we dismantle all the forms of
discrimination and segregation in public education.” Jersey City Parent
Advocate, George Fontenette further draws parallels to the climate in
the three Hudson County communities represented by the new affiliate of
the Black Parents Workshop. “We are seeing that the failure of Black
children is not only accepted but baked into the system- Black
excellence is the exception instead of the rule where policies such as
using discipline, classifications, and homeschooling are used
punitively, the use of leveling to racially track Black kids into lower
level academic courses, school segregation to separate and then
marginalize the emotional, psychological, and academic growth and
performance of Black children.”
Fields
added, “Though our work originated in a predominantly White suburban
school district, the issues we are confronting are systemic in nature
and are not limited by the boundaries of any one community. The
challenges in South Orange and Maplewood that Black students endure in
their fight for a legally entitled education in a nondiscriminatory
environment, is the same for Black students in urban school districts,
such as Hoboken, Jersey City and Bayonne. We are building a movement for
systemic change in public education. Our intent is to ensure that the
legacy of the Brown decision endures in New Jersey and that this
generation of Black children are educated in school districts that are
integrated throughout school buildings, in classrooms and in a manner
that prepares them for productive lives as adults.”
Over
the next two months, the Black Parents Workshop Inc., will be working
with its South Hudson affiliate to evaluate conditions in the three
school districts and make a determination as
to
the appropriate course of action to remedy grievances that currently
exist and racial disparities in student achievement. The Black Parents
Workshop is weeks away from launching its Union County affiliate and
currently in the preliminary stages of working with parents to organize
new affiliates in Colorado and North Carolina.
