“Greatness is an Endless Journey
A Systematic Response to Saving African-American Male and Rebuilding the Village”
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Year the initative began (yyyy)
2001
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Which of these barriers is the primary focus of your work?
Culture of no accountability: Neither society nor men at risk act accountable to each other
Which of the principles is the primary focus of your work?
Change surrounding cultures to create a society that values and enriches young people’s transition to adulthood
If you believe some other barrier or principle should be included in the mosaic, please describe it and how it would affect the positioning of your initiative in the mosaic:
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Name Your Project
“Greatness is an Endless Journey: A Systematic Response to Saving African-American Male and Rebuilding the Village”
Describe Your Idea
Describe your program or new idea in one sentence.
The Center for African-American Male Research, Success, and Leadership at the University of West Georgia conducts seven distinctive programs to enhance Black male educational participation, including most notably: The African-American Male Initiative Learning Community, a first-year academic experience program; and Black Men With Initiative (BMWI), which develops African-American male student leaders.
What makes your initiative uniquely positioned to create change in your community?
For years, UWG has been lauded for its innovative educational programs that address specific academic challenges of its student body. The Center for African-American Male Research, Success, and Leadership continues in this tradition by addressing the retention, progression, and graduation rates along with the decline in ethical leadership of the most challenged group at the university: African American males. Since 2001 this Center, which is the only one of its kind in the nation at a majority public institution, has as its mission to address the challenges faced by African-American men in the academy by focusing on three main areas: research, modeling and training, and programming. The primary goal of the Center is to draw attention to the challenges facing African-American males. The secondary goal is to expand the conversations among African American male faculty, staff, alumni, students, parents, and community leaders about various initiatives that address these challenges at UWG. The third goal is to create a formal framework for working with African American males on a predominately white college/university campus. The fourth goal is to formulate and implement initiatives that address the societal, cultural, psychological, spiritual, economic, and historic challenges of African American males both inside and outside of the classroom. The fifth goal is to develop a stronger brotherhood/bond among African-American men at the University and throughout the nation.
Describe how you organize and carry out your work?
The Center’s work is met in the following ways: Developing and expanding educational, cultural, and social models, such as the BMWI program; Training African American males to be successful in college and in life as well as on ethical leadership; Creating a living/learning community which allows African American male students to live, interact, and learn in a supportive environment; Implementing meaningful programs and activities that educate/address critical needs of African American males; Creating a climate that fosters healthy mentoring/social relationships between African American faculty/staff and African American male students outside of the classroom; Enhancing and expanding training opportunities regarding leadership in all spheres; Convening a series of conversations between African American male students and other scholars to assess and address the barriers to, issues to, African American male success.
What is your plan to scale and expand your innovation into your community and beyond?
The Center is fortuate to have a yearly impact on nearly 250 African-American boys and young aged men. It is our desire to expand our efforts to every African-American male student at the university as well as the carroll county area. We realize that the challenges that beset African-American boys and young men are great and varying; as such, we are constantly modifying/assessing our current initiatives as well as developing innovative programs to continue our goal of rebuilding the African-American Village.
What other resources, institutional, or policy needs would be necessary to help sustain and scale up your idea?
The Center, having recently completed a year long assessment of our efforts over the past six years, discovered that there are several areas that would be necessary to sustain and expand our work. A permanent structure, support staff, curriculum review and development, publicity, and additional revenue. Overall, there needs to be a deeper commitment to increasing the recruitment and graduation of African-American males throughout every high school and college in the nation. Our work has shown to have measureable and sustained impact mainly because of our commitment and dedication to get involved as oppose to ignoring the problem. In addition, it is imperative that local, state, and national policy makers along with community and civic organizations work together to change various policies that hinder African-American males from succeeding, such as "The No Child Left Behind", the misplacing of black boys in special education classes, the over glamorization of sports, and the systematic entrapment of them in the criminal system.
Describe your impact in one sentence, commenting on both the individual and community levels.
We are making a differnce the world by rebuilding the Villiage one African-American man at a time.
What impact has your work achieved to date?
In brief, BMWI and the African-American Male Living/Learning Community students’ GPA for the fifth consecutive year were higher than the average African-American male at the University. The majority of them are carrying 3.0 or better (five members had 4.0). They also have summer interns with various Fortune 1000 companies and nonprofits. African-American males for the last five years, lead the majority of the student organizations on campus. We adopted an entire class of 7th and 8th grade class of boys at the local middle school. To date, all of passing their classes with a B average as well as showed a substantial increase on the Georgia standardized CRCT test . We have exposed students, faculty, staff, and the general community to lectures with world-class African-American male leaders/scholars, such as Dr. Cornel West and Mr. Richard “Dick” Gregory. These free lectures on campus have averaged more than 1,800 individuals in attendance.
Number of individuals served
CAAMRSL is please to acknowledge that it serves all students at the University of West Georgia and Carrollton Public Schools indirectly and approximately 300 African-American male freshmen through seniors as well as 50 junior high school African-American boys annually.
Community impact
Through our mentoring efforts at Carrollton Middle School, the Center via its students have logged over 1000 contact hours with our mentees. We have exposed them to several cultural events, such as a performance by the Alvin Alley Dance Company (Fox Theater in Atlanta), a tour of the Apex Historic Museum and the Martin L. King, Jr. Historic Center for Nonviolence (Atlanta, Georgia), as well as a lecture by Dr. Cornel West, noted scholar, author, and professor (Carrollton, Georgia). It has been reported by the middle school officials that there has been a decrease in the disciplinary problems and an increase in the academic performance of the young boys. The Rev. Dr. Martin King, Jr. Distinguished Lecture Series, which is apart of the Center , is designed to expose students, faculty/staff, and the general community of west Georgia to lectures/public conversations with African-American leaders. Our lecture series has impacted over 4,000 community individuals.
Society at large
In Georgia, African American males in post-secondary institutions have the lowest retention rate; the lowest graduation rate; the lowest G.P.A. over a four year period; the highest overall drop out rate; the highest percentage to lose the HOPE Scholarship after their first year; and the highest percentage to be dismissed from college due to disciplinary issues. The Center's efforts have increased the retention, graduation, and progression rates as well as leadership and civic engagements by African-American males at UWG.
What measure do you use to gauge your impact and why?
A project evaluation team coordinated by the Center and the Office of Institutional Research will consist of representatives from Academic Affairs, Student Services, and the project management team. A variety of outcomes/impact evaluation techniques designed to assess strengths, weaknesses, and growth with the program will be employed. Objectives are written in measurable terms. The evaluation team will review program outcomes constantly.
1. Pre and Post attitudinal tests will be administered to each participate at the beginning and at the end of each academic year.
2. Student enrollment, grades, disciplinary action and extracurricular participation will be tracked after each semester.
3. Focus groups will be conducted at the end of the year
4. The Noel-Levitz College Student Inventory Assessment is administered to all persons of the African-American Male Learning Community
5. Satisfaction surveys are administered to all participants of the Rev. Dr. Martin L. King Lecture Series and the W.E.B. Dubois Summer Empowerment Conference;
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How is your initiative currently being financed and how would you finance further expansion and/or replication?
Initially, the Center's work was financed out of my personal resources. However, partnerships with Walmart, Atlanta Gas and Light, UPS, Georgia Humanities Council, the West Georgia Founation, and the Community Foundation of West Georgia has provided resources in recent years. Two years ago, we were fortuante to recieve a two year grant from the Lumina Foundation for $25,000. I am currently working with the University's Sponosred Operations Office in applying for grants from the U.S. Department of Education, Department of Education in Georgia as well as other national foundations who have an interest in post secondary education, african-american males educational success.
Provide information on your current finances and organization:
Revenue: -Georgia Humanities Council $10,000.00,-Atlanta Gas and Light $10,000.00, -Lumina Foundation $25,000.00,-Carrollton Community Foundation $11,000.00, -Walmart.com$ 4,000.00
Total $60,000.00
Expenses:
Programs:
-WEB Dubois Summer Empowerment Conference $ 5,000.00
-Black Men With Initiative (BMWI) $10,000.00
-MLKing Distinguished Lecture Series Fall/Spring $10,000.00
-Bayard Rustin Community Outreach $ 5,000.00
-African-American Male Learning Comm. $10,000.00
-Study Abroad $15,000.00
Personnel
-student tutors (i.e., math, science, and English) $ 3,000.00
-student worker (2 students) $ 2,000.00
Total $60,000.00
Who are your potential partners and allies?
The Arthur Blank Foundation
UPS Foundation
Coke Foundation
Pew Foundation
Mellon Foundation
Bellsouth Foundation
Who are your potential investors?
Will and Jade Smith
Dr. William "Bill" Cosby
Oprah Winfrey
Ted Turner
Tavis Smiley
What is the origin of this innovation? Tell us your story.
In 2001, I was walking on the campus and saw an African-American male walking on campus with an over-sized white T-shirt and jeans below his knees. I walked up to him, after introducing myself to him, I asked him to lift up his shirt. Hesitatingly, he followed suit only to reveal that along with his jeans he had on a pair of boxers and two pair of shorts. I asked him if it was comfortable to walk around holding up his jeans, and he replied yes. I then asked him what his intended major was, and he responded "Banking." I made a pact with him that if he could find any banker that dressed like him, I would take him to lunch the next day. Admittedly, I did not think he would come to my office. To my surprise, the next day, he stopped by the office noting that he could not find anyone; thus, beginning a conversation about how to change the African-American male images and academic success at UWG. It was from that initial conversation that we along with seven other African-American males at university began to meet weekly. Not having any formal experiences in working with African-American males, I felt ill-prepared for such a calling until the biblical story of the Gadarene Demoniac came to my remembrance. It was the salient ideas of this story that became the principles of a high structured program which has evolved into the Center for African-American Male: Research, Success, and Leadership.
Please provide a personal bio. Note this may be used in Changemakers marketing material.
Said Sewell III, Ph.D., is currently an Associate Professor in the Department of Political Science and Planning at The University of West Georgia and Director of the Center for African-American Male: Research, Success, and Leadership. He received his B.A. in Political Science from Morehouse College, M.P.A. in Public Policy from Texas Southern University and University of Texas, and his Ph.D. from Clark Atlanta University in Political Science. Dr. Sewell, who has done post-graduate work at Harvard University, has researched, lectured, presented and published in the area of the black church and politics, urban and small city development, and African-American Male success
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