This article focuses on the educational efforts of Syed Firoz Ashraf in the East Jogeshwari area of Mumbai and places his work in the context of the increasing communalisation of social life and education in a poor working class suburb in Mumbai city. Muslim community has been ghettoised in the metropolis to specific areas especially since the…

School shootings loom large in the collective imagination and young, White males commit a majority of these horrific crimes. Although many of the descriptions of school shooters in the media and scholarly studies attribute their actions to psychological problems and/or personal/social failings, these events are also often placed in a comparative…

Through the second half of the 1990s and into the early years of the 21st century, public attention to the plight of poor black Americans seemed to wane. There was scant media attention to the problem of concentrated urban poverty (neighborhoods in which a high percentage of the residents fall beneath the federally designated poverty line), little…

Few had heard of Irena Sendlerowa in 1999. Now, after more than 290 presentations of the student play "Life in a Jar," as well as a website with high traffic, and worldwide media attention, Irena is known to the world. Irena Sendler (as she became known), a social worker, believed in standing up for others. Her father, who was a doctor,…

America is failing its young Black boys. In metropolitan ghettos, rural villages and midsized townships across the country, schools have become holding tanks for populations of Black boys who have a statistically higher probability of walking the corridors of prison than the halls of college. Across America, the problem of Black male achievement…

Measuring student intelligence has been problematic in the United States since standardized testing first began in the early 1900s. The omnipresence of standardized testing in student populations is illustrated by the most popular contemporary tests which are used by some scholars to advance the notion that intelligence differences between whites…

Discusses the history and problems of the Community Action Program and the War on Poverty from the 1960s-1980s, highlighting San Antonio, Texas, and the San Antonio Neighborhood Youth Organization. Suggests that the War on Poverty's historical significance was more political than economic, and it emerged as a program that Hispanic and Black San…

Transnationalism and the experience of migrancy has lead to cultural dissonance for many newcomers from Muslim countries, unaccustomed to the culturally permissive social norms like consuming alcohol and partying, dating and premarital relations. Residing within culturally incongruent spaces, migrant Muslim communities often seek to shelter their…

Describes three tutoring centers--two in churches, one in an office building--where adults from the community provide voluntary after-school help to children from Chicago's disadvantaged Cabrini Green housing project. (SJL)

In this article, the author talks about Darcy Frey's famous book "The Last Shot: City Streets, Basketball Dreams," which was published in 1994. In his book, Frey describes Coney Island's urban renewal wherein most of the cottages and triple deckers had been replaced by a vast tract of housing projects where African Americans now reside.…

This case study of an inner city youth's efforts to become a world-class boxer presents an opportunity for professional counselors and career specialists to gain insight into the arduous process of transforming initial abilities into a mature expression of individual excellence. (Author/ABB)

"Your Average Nigga" contends that just as exaggerating the differences between black and white language leaves some black speakers, especially those from the ghetto, at an impasse, so exaggerating and reifying the differences between the races leaves blacks in the impossible position of either having to try to be white or forever struggling to…

Discusses a research project on how artists in rap videos create a "counter-discourse" (or ways of talking and thinking about) on themselves and the places they live. Focuses on the experience of sharing the paper based on this research, specifically considering a lecture at California State University-Dominquez Hills. (CMK)

Nine essays, originally presented at an interdisciplinary conference sponsored by the University of Chicago, address problems of the changing inner cities of older, industrial metropolitan areas. An introduction reviews important theories of urban development, and the impact of changing technology and racial composition. Part one includes an essay…

Discusses how many urban students are written off as unworthy of scant educational resources, using Weber and Marx to discuss how educational triage is best understood theoretically, exploring how broader processes of social distribution and triage link up with daily practices and policies in urban classrooms, and highlighting the need for a…