By Genoa Barrow | OBSERVER SENIOR STAFF WRITER

Efforts to hold local school districts accountable for African American academic achievement have taken a step forward as a new Parallel Black School Board has been formed.

Faye Kennedy explained how visitors could pose questions to the board. Photo (c) Observer / Larry V. Dalton

The new independent board is the brainchild of the Sacramento Area Black Caucus and stems from its “The State of Black Students’ Education” report released in June 2007. The report outlined the disparities in educational outcomes among local Black students. The report called for a number of solutions including dedicating specific federal funds to addressing African American students, a teacher’s training academy and a parallel school board.

“I would like to see all school districts in Sacramento County be held accountable to provide quality education to all Black children, because the majority of our children are not receiving quality education,” shared Parallel Executive Council Member Eloise Matthews.

Joining Matthews on the board are Laura Byrd, Sharon Chandler, Dr. David Covin, Faye Kennedy, Lailah Muwwakkil, Ranmerlee “Ray” Sumlar and Crystal Taylor.
The watchdog entity will initially focus its attention on the Sacramento City Unified School District. Rosa Parks Middle School is also the site of early efforts, which include a mentoring program.

“Our principal emphasis is not the school districts themselves but the education school districts provide for our children,” Kennedy shared.

Sacramento City Unified School District Board President Manny Hernandez says he doesn’t see the move as adversarial.

“We’re very fortunate in Sacramento to have, by my last count I think we had 20 different advisory boards that are helping the district and thank goodness, we do have 46,000 students. You can’t have a group of four or five, or in the case of the school board seven people, who think they know everything. We don’t. We rely on parents. We rely on teachers and we rely on administrators to give us information and then we try to make the best decision,” he continued.

While Hernandez thinks the parallel board can be a positive, he says advisory boards are just that.

“I want to make sure everyone knows that the school board, the one that the public elects in a duly, state sanctioned election. That’s the board that makes the decisions. If there’s a problem, for example if there’s a complaint about a teacher, about a principal or hall monitor, or a board member, you might want to go to the parallel board, that’s OK to get more information, to get support, but ultimately, it’s important that people know they also need to go to the school district and the school board, because these are district employees,” he said.

According to Parallel Black School Board, its primary purpose is “for us as African-descended people to take the initiative with respect to the deep and broad-reaching deficiencies in the public education of our children.”

The Parallel Black School Board, which formed seven months before it initially announced, is meeting at 10 a.m. on the first Saturday of every month at the Oak Park Methodist Church. The church is located at 3600 Broadway. Meetings are open to the public. For more information, call (916) 484-5025.