Back to the Future

In light of the unrelenting negative educational outcomes experienced by Black youth, its impact to the community, and the community's relative absence from the sociopolitical sphere of educational policymaking, this article explores how two specific periods in the educational history of African Americans provide a framework of how social networks and capital can be leveraged to make substantive progress towards achieving educational success for our youth. This discussion does not intend to romanticize or to invent an idyllic revision of a difficult and tumultuous past, or to suggest that community members are not currently engaged in any strategic action to affect educational change. It does intend to recognize that the structure of the social networks within the community as well as its generation and utilization of social capital played an important role in the historical struggle for educational access and quality

Epistemology · Political science · Public relations · Social capital · Social science · Sociology · Diverse Education Studies and Reforms · Gender Studies · History · Parental Involvement in Education · School Choice and Performance