Schools that aren’t able to properly support students with children or who have experienced trauma also create hostile environments for Black girls, who play a larger role in caretaking than their male counterparts and are more likely to have experienced intimate partner violence. The failure of schools to examine these factors is based in sexism, but efforts to protect Black boys at the expense and exclusion of Black girls also happen through advocacy work and even government initiatives.
“As public concern mounts for the needs of men and boys of color through initiatives like the White House’s My Brother’s Keeper,” Crenshaw said in a statement, “we must challenge the assumption that the lives of girls and women—who are often left out of the national conversation—are not also at risk.”
According to the Feminist Majority Foundation’s 2014 report on sex-segregated K-12 public schools, almost all of the 106 all-boy and all-girl public schools serve a majority of African American and/or Latina populations as do 43 percent of coed schools with sex-segregated classrooms. These schools often enforce dangerous gender norms and provide more resources for boys, thus putting girls at a distinct disadvantage. Dr. Sue Klein, FMF’s study director, reminds equity advocates that “the new Title IX single-sex guidance from the US Department of Education’s Office for Civil Rights and other protections such as State Equal Rights Amendments prohibit sex discrimination in education and that it is exceedingly difficult to justify excluding boys or girls from valuable programs, just because of their sex.”
Education can be one of the most powerful factors defining a young person’s future. Conversations about the “school-to-prison” pipeline – a system in which Black students are criminalized and otherwise pushed out of school and at risk for incarceration – have, for too long, rendered girls’ experiences invisible. The groundbreaking Black Girls Matter report makes an indisputable fact that Black girls, as well as boys, have specific needs that should be addressed by our education system and policies that shape young people’s lives.
Article Appeared @http://feminist.org/blog/index.php/2015/02/05/black-girls-matter-new-report-exposes-gendered-and-racial-disparities-in-education-too-often-erased/