The 18-year-old Woodland Hills High School graduate is one of 140 students who partook in the Delany Scholars Program, a district-wide initiative that provided mentoring and academic help to African-American male students in the sixth to 12th grades. The program, which was established two years ago with a $750,000 Heinz grant, came to an end last month when its funding ran out.
The initiative’s cancellation leaves a void where, however briefly, an avenue for growth and collaboration had been carved out for a group that educators often overlook.
Among the 4,000 students in the district, a little more than 1,200 are African-American males, but when they started the program, black male students were seven times more likely to be suspended than their white counterparts, superintendent Alan Johnson said.
“It’s not something we’re proud of,” Mr. Johnson said. “We’ve got to stop it.”