Focus 580; The National Urban League

Good morning and welcome to focus 580. This is our telephone talk program My name's David Ensor. And we're glad to have you with us in this part of the show. First hour today we'll be talking about the Urban League and we have two guests with us in the studio and we're pleased to have them both here with us is Hugh Price. He is president of the National Urban League. He has had that post since July of 1904 and he is in the area to help the folks here locally in the Urban League of Champaign County celebrate their 40th anniversary. He'll be speaking at their anniversary dinner tonight here in our area and also joining us is Tracy Parsons he's president of the Urban League of champagne County. We're glad to have them here and as we talk of course questions are welcome. The number here in Champaign Urbana 3 3 3 9 4 5 5 toll free 800 2 2 2 9 4 5 5 at any point here people are welcome to call all we ask is people just try to be brief so we can keep things moving along and accommodate as many different folks as possible but anybody is welcome to join the conversation. Thank you both very much Mr. Price Mr. Parsons for being here. THANK YOU THANK YOU

bugger. The Urban League just last fall I believe celebrated its 90th anniversary and the organization is probably now as strong as ever although when you took over in 1904. It was not even as good a shape as it is today that was big deficit. I think people are really concerned about the future of the organization. What when you became the head of the national level what did you do to turn things around. We took a look at the strengths of the organization and the legacy of the organization and the needs of the organization there's several things that popped out of that that our board had a den of FIDE when I was hired in that that I focused on obviously when you're you've got a lot of reading flowing you've got to stop that so we had to do something very difficult which was to trigger a downsize that resulted in 47 out of 100 in 10 staff people leaving that was very wrenching because we are a family and folks didn't really understand why they had to be done. But we had to bring the books into balance.

As a result of that we stabilized the organization reached financial equilibrium and we have now had five straight years of surpluses. Secondly we had to reconstitute our National Urban League board we had terrific people who were deeply committed to our movement but they had been on the board a long time and we needed fresh energy. So we placed term limits and time limits on trust these six years and we said everybody who'd been on more than six years that they had one more year to serve. And we had 20 trustees leave at one time and we were able to bring in a lot of new leaders for the for the board. And we did a lot of work in supporting our affiliates and fortifying them we've done a lot of provided a lot of technical assistance and time. We set about trying to establish a strong identity for the league. We set a policy agenda for the league. We focused on heavily on children because that's the foundation for progress. And we concentrated on our

mission statement and we made it clear last year that the Urban League is no longer the second oldest this of the second oldest that we are the oldest and largest community based movement devoted to empowering African-Americans to enter the economic and social mainstream. And that's who we are in the 21st century. There are other organizations that have have similar mission at least to the extent that they're about empowering African-Americans. You touched on this a little bit but I wonder if you could talk a little bit more about how you think the Urban League is different or are there ways in which the Urban League is different from other organizations that might seem to be similar. Well there are many organizations that are kindred spirits. The ACP was founded a year before the league. It is focused principally on breaking down the legal barriers to opportunity and in the early years of concentrated on eliminating lynching our our focus was

quite different back then and remains different today our goals for our people are the same but the league has always been there to help people who are coming into communities like Champaign Urbana or Detroit or New York who came to town and said I need help figuring out where are to live where I can get a good job where I should send my children to school. So we have a a base of direct service and social service which has been part of the legacy of our movement throughout Urban Leagues are professionally staffed organizations in the community which is a distinction from other organizations. Tracy PARSONS We have a very dynamic leader here we've got a strong Urban League that's here 24/7 not on a volunteer basis but it is here day in and day out to provide services and leadership and advocacy and policy work. So that's that's a major distinction between the league and other organizations and we have a division of labor. Sort of an unspoken division of labor between the organizations

were some are principally focused on advocacy or litigation. We are there focused on mobilization and service. And I guess maybe I should have mentioned beginning when I was introducing the guest that you've been in your job here with the Urban League of champagne County about as long as Hugh Price has been hit on the national level was the same year it was the same year where roughly about a month apart. And actually I attended the national conference in July 94 in Indianapolis before it actually started here to kind of get a head start and we've really tried to mirror what he was brought to the table on the national level here locally. I think he's been very progressive in his thoughts about where we should be moving the population that we serve. And so we've tried to coincide with what he's talked about on a national level here in the program to development areas that we have as for our organization. I want to talk a little bit about what the Urban League has been doing here in

Champaign County. Well I think you know one of the things that I didn't talk a lot about when I first arrived was the state that this Urban League was in. And so it was an organization that also was riddled in debt a good deal of complacency I think maybe had set in. So we've had to almost reinvent ourselves here as well. We're involved in program development and serving our constituencies in the area employment training housing development. We've taken on the area of technology the last couple of years very involved in the area of education. And so we're celebrating our 40th anniversary. Since I've been here in 94 we've doubled in size and your budget is about 3.5 million and it's about one point for when I arrived I had 11 staff members and I think right now about 31 and we had five or six programs and now we have almost 25 different

programs. So we've had a great deal of success the last few years and reinventing ourselves we've moved into a new location that's much more visible and has on site technology on site parking it can be found now versus in a back alley where we were when I first arrived so. We've worked hard with national and trying to do some very similar things here in Champaign. I make a point about the situations we both inherited. This is a very daunting work. And you know terrific and visionary people preceded us. In my case it was John Jacob who is the head of the National Urban League before me. Tracy's predecessors you know built organizations on the shoulders of their predecessors. But it's grueling and at some point you run out of gas and you've got to pass the baton and so you know we sort of caught our predecessors at the tail end of distinguished careers and you know all the organizations you know and all organizations needed an injection of new energy and so that's work that we've done and any

progress that we've made has been as they built on the shoulders of those who've gone before us and the process of regeneration should be built into the way any organization operates. What does the money come from to fund the activities of the Urban League the National Urban League draws funding from a variety of sources we have fundraising events like our annual dinner. We get some net proceeds from our annual conference. We get a lot of support from corporations in this country from foundations from direct mail we will mine any source that we can think of. And we've also worked to build our endowment. When I arrived darn dominant was around 8 million dollars. Counting cash and commitments in this and assuming that the stock market doesn't stay in the tank are endowments up around 28 million dollars now which has been it's critically important to the viability of the of the organization over the long haul. Any government money. Yes we have government contracts. Not nearly as many is that in the heyday of so-called categorical grant programs back in the 1970s.

Basically most government grants are flowing through straight through to localities that used to flow through us so we we have some government support but it's not nearly as big a factor in our budget as it once was. How about in the here and one where exactly the opposite. You know we have a number of governmental contracts whether they're fair federal and state grants as well as local governments were operating a number of programs for city government here in our community. We also are number two funded agency through the United Way. We also as our annual dinners this evening that is a fund raising event for us and we've we embarked on a campaign called achievement matters a campaign for African-American achievement a couple of years ago and that has been a major revenue source for us as we've worked to stabilize our economic state as well. I should introduce again our guests for this first part of focus 580 Tracy Parsons is president of the Urban League of champagne County. They are celebrating their 40th anniversary and to help them here in our studio and here in Champaign Urbana. If you

price he is president of the National Urban League and questions are welcome 3 3 3 8 W. while toll free 800 to 2 2 W while I'm well I know from having looked at your website that there are as far as the National Urban League is concerned there are these three major areas that you're particularly interested in education and economic self-sufficiency and racial inclusion. Maybe we could talk a little bit about each of those sorts of things and then what sort of programs you're involved in and to try to get at each of those things starting with education particularly here we're talking about young people. Right the league launched the campaign for African-American achievement about four years ago because we decided that we needed to do our level best to mobilize our community too. Embrace the message that achievement matters. We want to get our children on the achievement page believing that it is critically important to do well in school. So for example here in Champaign-Urbana the Urban League had staged events to celebrate youngsters who were doing the right thing and I think the last one you had about

5000 young people that's designed it for the adult community to say to youngsters we want you to embrace these values and to strive to do well in school. We've created a national achievers society for youngsters who are excelling in school and getting B averages or better and they are inducted into our achievers society which in effect is a national achievement gang with its own rituals and regalia and its own credo and its own colors. And there we say we really do value academic achievement. And interestingly enough a lot of people say young boys aren't into achievement but at our event out in and Kansas City last year about 40 percent of the youngsters who were inducted were boys which is really exciting we had 1700 people out at the church that day in celebration of achievement. As we look ahead we're going to focus increasingly on early literacy news because that reported yesterday that the. National Assessment for Educational Progress which is a snapshot of education across the country found that

in the year 2000 roughly 63 percent of African-American youngsters are believing reading below basic in the fourth grade. So we've got our get our children coming into school ready to learn and to read and we've got to make sure that when they exit elementary school they are on the achievement page and reading on grade or better. Are we working with parents and community organizations in partnering with organizations like Scholastic magazine in order to help parents know what they need to do and also to say to the schools that we need for you to focus on this issue. We're the second area of concentration. If you want to continue is an economic self-reliance. We're deeply involved in helping people land to good jobs. The Urban League here has the new set program which is designed to help folks understand what the career possibilities are in the field of transportation. One out of every eight jobs in the American economy is transportation related. And those are good jobs and so we're helping people to learn about that. We're focusing on

helping people buy their first homes and so there's a home credit counseling program here at the Urban League of Champaign County which is raised right on the mark in terms of what must be done. And the third major concentration is race relations and we've been in the thick of the battles too. Preserve affirmative action in the principle of inclusion that is embedded in affirmative action. We have been in the forefront of fighting against racial profiling in trying to put an end to that awful practice and to deal with a lot of the discrimination is still exists in the criminal justice system. And I would just say one of the thing about the media by the way I think that the job that the press has done on public radio and newspapers around the country and staying focused on racial profiling has made a huge difference. It's a lot of people in the civil rights community and community organizations are saying this was a problem and officialdom didn't want to believe it they were in denial but the fact that the press stayed on the case kept peeling away at The Onion has helped to demonstrate that there is indeed a problem that must be addressed. So those are the three areas of

concentration at the national level and they are reflected in the work that the Urban League here in Champaign County is doing. We have a caller here we get to in just a moment but I thought just because you mentioned in passing than the National Assessment of Educational Progress I do want to mention that tomorrow morning on the show we're going to talk about this we're going to talk about what that has to do with improving student achievement. What these test scores tell us we'll have three guests for this program. Kevin Seymour from the Illinois State Regional Office of Education. Carmen Pfeiffer who is also with the state of Illinois She's deputy superintendent for standards assessment and accountability so these people are in the state educational bureaucracy and also Brian stacker who is a researcher with Rand. They put out a report looking at all the scores from all the various states recently and we thought would be a good thing for us to talk about particularly since the the Bush administration has put a lot of emphasis on the idea of testing and

accountability and these days in education it seems like that's one of the big. You know words you hear about every time you turn around the Kaaba I would hope that when you have them on you would not only explore what the findings are but also what some of the correlations are that there's some fascinating lessons in the report. They report on on what the circumstances of youngsters are that who tend to do well in the reading scores and you find out for example that parents are monitoring and restricting the amount of television that children who read well watch their books in the home that there's a lot of recreational reading that goes on that parents read to their children. Have the children read to them. In other words reading is valued activity and it's protected activity in the home. That is something that we've got to focus on in our community and I hope that you in the interviews with them draw out those lessons because embedded in the data is very important lessons for what parents can do to make a difference.

Very good so that will be on this program tomorrow morning in the 11:00 hour so tune in for that a guest again this morning our Hugh Price and Tracy Parsons you Bryce is president of the National Urban League. Tracy Parsons is president of the Urban League of Champaign County. And the questions are welcome we do have a caller here ready to go in Aurora. So let's talk with him on our line number four. Well I I was going to ask what do you feel is your greatest achievement working with the in the. I've been like what. What do you feel is your greatest achievement. About a month after I took this job there was an article in a magazine called Emerge it's an African American magazine and the title of which was is the National Urban League dead. We're here in emerges no longer in publishing. That may be not to be blunt about it but what we have done is we've taken a hard look at who we are and what our role in our mission is in the 21st century here in Champagne

County and across the country. We've worked together to inject new energy new focus new determination. And we have defined ourselves for the 21st century in a way that I think ensures that we will continue to serve and to lead in our second century. So I think that that is the greatest achievement and the greatest sense of satisfaction that I feel. About what we've done on my watch. I have a question to ask and I hope by formulate it correctly there is such a need for a computer with literate people and I'll be honest and to bring people in from other countries. I feel that I ought not to be necessary. It seems to me that we have enough people that could be trained for this work what are you doing to to achieve. Oh I help with that. We're doing several things at the affiliate level many of our urban leagues

including here in Champaign Urbana have set up community technology centers where young people and parents have a chance to use modern technology and become conversant in comfortable with it. Secondly our whole stress on. Education and an early literacy is critically important because you can't navigate the instructions on a computer. If you can't read you can master the engineering involved in high tech. If you haven't taken algebra you can't take algebra if you can't do the the word problems in algebra at the national level we've been very involved in the debates of the H-1B legislation which will lift the number of visas that allow people from outside the country into work in the technology field. And we have said if you're going to lift the visas there's got to be a concerted effort by the federal government to train native young people young people born in this country for this industry.

Earlier this morning in a meeting with a cross-section of community leaders I said you know one of the things with so many technology entities right here in Champagne Urbana one of the challenges you might put to them is to say we want you to partner with community organizations like the Urban League game with the school system to create some new small high schools that are technology focused in that you know identify some young people who are who enjoy math and science and bring those youngsters into a school that focuses explicitly on technology and get them ready to move right on into the world of technology that is something that those firms can do that will make a tremendous contribution. So those are the kinds of initiatives that I believe have to be undertaken at a community level and also at at the federal level. Well I'm very glad to hear that because I really feel strongly that our own people. What is the job rate. Black in the country. Well it's around 7 1/2 percent it's for better or for worse we're on about twice the national average and there's been a little bit of an uptick because of the economic slowdown but

it was running about 7 percent before the slowdown. It's now about 7.5 or perhaps approaching 8 percent. Well good luck in your work. Thank you so much for your call. I wish you well. Thank you for the call. Well I think it's it's particularly noteworthy I think in this community we do have folks especially folks who are involved in the local community computing effort prairie net that have been working to try to bring people into the technological age to make computers available to them have some basic training made available to them so that people who perhaps otherwise wouldn't be able to can have some access to that technology and be able to benefit by being able to get on the Internet and do things like look for information on employment or anything else that they're interested in. We've been very involved with that project with prayer. We were the community partner. That has distributed well over 700 computers directly into the hands of the low income population.

I believe we've set up about 10 community sites throughout the community and Housing Authority complexes churches boys and girls club as well as the Urban League and so we continue to work on that. My concern always is that we stay a little bit behind the eight ball. We're still dealing with getting. Access and educating our community about the importance of technology is changing and an evolving daily. And so we have to do some things to catch our community up but we are very involved in that issue. We have to get more of our young people taking science and math in advanced science and math. One of the most influential books I've ever read is is a book called tribe's which analyzes how various ethnic groups have survived and prospered in the face of great adversity. Talks about the Brits who once ruled the world it talks about the East Indians and Palestinians Jews etc.. One of the basic messages is that those groups that have survived and prospered have focus both on education but also on being on the leading edge of

knowledge so that you are in the engine driving change rather than always trying to catch up with the caboose and. Tracy's point is absolutely on target we've got to get more young people into these leading edge fields. We've got a lot but we need a lot more youngsters who are who are in those in those fields. We're at our midpoint already let me just real quick again introduce our guests. The last person you heard Hugh Price He's president of the National Urban League and also here in studio with us Tracy Parsons he's president of the Urban League of Champaign County. Hugh Price is here to help the folks locally celebrate their 40th anniversary he'll be the keynote speaker at the 40th anniversary dinner of the Urban League of Champaign County that's tonight. And your questions are welcome 3 3 3 9 4 5 5 4 Champaign Urbana. Also we have a toll free line good anywhere that you can hear us that is 800 to 2 2 9 4 5 5. We have some of the callers here the next person in line is in Peoria. And that would be Line 1.

You know good morning. Yes. You're going to or your Caterpillar tractor company. They have 11 hundred young people from the MTA that every computer division. Are you aware of this. Let's say I'm not surprised by that. There are a lot of interesting things going on as we have a global labor market with those young people here. There was an amazing article The New York Times the other day Do you know that when you call a credit company and speak to someone about a in issue with your credit card account you may be talking to someone who is actually in India who has a pseudonym in American pseudo nym and who will give you the name of a town where they live. And it's all fake they know what they're supposed to do they know the help they're supposed to provide but they've got they've got American names and they've got American locations and they've got relatives who have American names so they tell you the point of all this is the way that we really deal with the global labor market in a global economy. And

we've got to do our level best to make sure that our young people are prepared for the careers that are that are unfolding and that's the whole point of our achievement campaign has been so much explosive growth in the economy that companies are trying to fill in as best they can and of course they try to fill in with the cheapest labor they can. I don't two boys that went over there and they worked in the shop and they have a down there for months and thought that they had a little more moxie than the average. They sent them to. Had repaid their two weeks in the US are paying their wages. Well they were learning computers. Well you know there are a lot of young people born overseas and who live in hardscrabble circumstances who find America very attracting attractive in terms of the money they can earn the lifestyle they may come here on to this H-1B program for a while and send a lot of money back home and then then return. I think that we'll see less of that if we can prepare more of our own young people for these industries

and that's the whole point of our campaign and that must be the whole point of the school system here and across the country. Thank you. Let's go back here locally to another caller. Lie number two in Champagne Illinois hello. Nice to talk to you on Mr. Price and also Mr. Kerry. Tracy JCM starts right now. I had a brain cramp Tracy get older. There's another way of thinking about that someone said that they still have a photographic memory. They just don't get same day service anymore. But at my profession I grew up in the Jim Crow South. I went I only nominee nominee associated with the existence chain to the land of Lincoln expecting more and has been rudely awakened to the fact that north of the Mason-Dixon line we want to start in the south where it is no better just a little bit more subtle but you understand what I'm saying. Yes or we are losing the race here as well and still. Drama in Arkansas. But I do have some questions of you and Mr. Hugh Price

and I do respect immensely both of you and and I'm using this term losing the race because I'm reading a book now by a neo conservative African-American linguist from the University of California John McWhorter. John McWhorter and boy a self flagellation of black people at its worst. You know but I try to listen to their perspective of the Clarence Thomas is Shelby Steele and John McWhorter who's younger than I so I don't think he ever experience what I experience growing up in trying to give where I am now. But one thing one of the points I want to make one I do believe that your focus on academic achievement and the achievement gap is very noteworthy. My question to you and I just read the statistics on the fourth grade reading scores how do granted two thirds of all Americans in the fourth grade not performing up to standards but a higher percentage of African-American significantly higher percentage of African-Americans especially African-American males are not reading at the fourth

grade level. And that is a basic skill that you must fail to be integrated into the global economy of the 21st century. What are you doing. And again in fact I never really went to seriously I think the parents are involved should be involve the community should be involved. Well what about getting a puppy. Teachers to get involved in a way that they really can't competently without fear apprehension. Do you know what African-American students especially African-American males do. Well I think you put your finger on a very tough point as matter of fact. You may have given my speech tonight. First I would say there there has been a lot of progress and we really ought to celebrate the progress that's been made by our community in you know the previous century and in the aftermath of the Brown decision. I mean there's no question in my mind that African-Americans are much better off than we were in the heyday of segregation. But it's also no question of him I would not as far along as I think we figured we would be 50 years

after the Brown versus Board of Education decision. And part of the key is this that this education challenge that we face that you you really pinpoint. I think there are two kinds of things that have to be done and one is our community has got to become obsessed once again with the importance of academic achievement. Back in the aftermath of the Emancipation Proclamation folks may not have been educated they may have been slaves but there wasn't any doubt in our community about the importance of achievement and education and we raised our children with that in mind. Somehow we lost that obsession as a people. Obviously there are exceptions but we sort of got derailed over the last 20 or 30 years and we've gotta get back on track with that and that is the whole point of our you know academic achievement campaign. We've reached out to fraternities and sororities and barbers and beauticians to say and ministers to say we've all got a pull on the oars on this and make sure that we know what's going on with our kids that we're doing what we can and

that we're holding the schools accountable. Now you raise a related let me just if I could you raise the related point to what's the obligation of the schools. Yes. I think the schools are stuck in the mud along with the children. And when you look at the studies as many as half of the teachers who are teaching our children are not properly prepared they don't know the subject matter and a surprising number of them don't even believe that our children can achieve at high levels. I'm on the board of directors of Metropolitan Life Insurance Company we did a big survey last year and found that two thirds of the teachers that we surveyed did not believe that the children they taught were likely to go to college. But two thirds of the children we surveyed expected to go to college. So you've got a real serious disconnect there. And so we've got to get at that and I think we've got to give. We've got to increase compensation for teachers so that we attract a stronger more motivated people into the field. I think we've got to create schools that are

probably smaller that have a lot more flexibility than they have now. We've got invest in real professional development for the teachers. We've got to make sure the schools have the books and the technology. And frankly I think we've gotta hold the schools strictly accountable. I for one believe that every public school should be put on a performance contract and they should be told that if you get 60 to 70 percent of the children on grade or better in the basic subjects then you can continue to function. But if you fall below that threshold then we have to talk and you know we expect you to approve but if you chronically fail to improve then we're going to we're going to bring a new team in or we may have to shut this school down and let the children go elsewhere. We've got to enter a no nonsense era. Academic Performance and academic countability principally for the adults. Thank you Mr. Price and thank you thank you for the call. I might just say that that locally most school districts in Champaign-Urbana are working under office of civil rights agreements and working

towards student achievement specifically for African-American students. Part of that obviously is working directly with teachers. We know that. And one of the elementary buildings and champagne school district conducted a survey of the teachers and only a third of them even believe that the students had the capacity to be successful. And so that school we know is having a great deal of training being done for the teachers but that also I think is a very clear indication that there's a great deal of work that needs to be done around teacher expectation and teacher performance. Well one of the core keys is to mobilize parents to make sure that they understand what's at stake and to instead try to get parents to the point of saying we're not going to stand for this kind of education any longer. That's the way it works in the suburbs where the schools function well the parents are on those schools and they do not stand for lousy achievement and lousy schools and we've got to reach the same point with our urban schools.

I want to one of the things I want to ask you about was how how it is. We all should be thinking about racism here now in 2001 and I ask the question because it seems to be the case that so many European Americans. Seem to believe that there isn't any or at least that it's not a big deal. Now that we had civil rights we went through that and that equality is the. The conditions of the day and as the caller suggested there perhaps are some African-American intellectuals political leaders people like that who who would make that same case. But I'm sure that many other African-Americans would say that's bunk. Yes there still is racism. How do we think about that now. Well it's still it's still here. I think it is subsiding a bit but there it's still here this is a complex country. When when you think about the quality of public education and you look at the differences

between the caliber of teachers that states allow to teach in urban districts as opposed to suburban districts at root you've got a society which says we're going to tolerate one quality of education for children of color and poor children another for well-to-do children when you look at the quality of the facilities how modern the lot of the suburban facilities are how well equipped they are as opposed to the urban facilities. And you see it's so implicit in that is racism and indifference. Jim Crow is running amok in the criminal justice system. When you look at the discretion that police officers exercise when they stop a white child who's got a little bit of cocaine or marijuana as opposed to an African-American child. Police officers tell me that the routine is to take a middle class white child back home to the parents black child goes down to jail in the lock up. It continues all the way through the studies show. Patterns of arrest

patterns of sentencing patterns of incarceration and length of prison time. The majority of substance abusers in our society are white. The overwhelming majority of people in jail for substance abuse are Latino or African-American. So it's very very clear. Finally it's amusing. I had quite a wonderful experience Friday night I went to the annual dinner of the Horatio Alger Association which is a big organization holds a dinner in Washington to celebrate and recognize leaders and particularly corporate leaders who have risen above hardscrabble lives in hardship to become major corporate figures. Virtually all of those honored were. People who had you know those parents had been an alcoholic or separated and they had you know they had been poured cetera et cetera as one African-American who was honored it was Franklin Raines who

had some tough situations in his own life. Franklin Raines brilliant African-American is the CEO of Fannie Mae. The the white CEOs who were honored that night had gone to. I mean hard driving smart bright people have gone to state universities and community colleges it cetera almost without exception. Franklin Raines the only African-American who was honored was a graduate of Harvard Law School a Harvard undergraduate school and was a Rhodes scholar. It's questionable whether this country is yet ready for people who have modest academic backgrounds and who are of color to become CEOs in this country. To get to the top tension all too was a classmate of who heads American Express was a classmate of Frank ranges at Harvard Law School. So to get to the top of corporate America you still got to be a Jackie Robinson the Willie Mays or Hank Aaron or a Hall of Famer. Whereas

people from more modest circumstances who are white get to rise to the top will equalize all of that over time. But there's no question that you still see for all the progress that's been made and it's fantastic to see rains in addition Dalton and others at the top. We still have a long way to go and we chip away America on the question of race America is a work in progress and we work at making progress. I am thankful that I am I was born in this country that I am an American and I don't care where I've ever traveled anywhere in the world and I've been very fortunate to travel I'm always thankful when I touch back down and I thank my lucky stars that I was born here because I think conditions for African-Americans are better here than any place in the world. But that doesn't absolve us of responsibility to keep working at making this country better. The other point I make is with the profound. Population changes under way in this society with African-Americans and Latinos now comprising about a

quarter or more of the population. And by the year 2050 close to half of the population the country has to continue to work on this because we will fail as a society if we don't figure out how to bring everybody into the fold at every level of American society. And I think I would just add locally here. I tend to focus on racism as it relates to the economic state of our community. We have a very we have very few African-American owned businesses. He was touched on education no issues that we're fighting. You know we recently had a climate survey done to assess the state of our school district and champagne and and we're still fighting to prove legitimate instrument. And so and so we have a great deal of work to do here locally one of the issues is that it's uncomfortable for people to talk about. And so we tend to back away from the issue and and we use code words and we use it. Surface things to

mask the issue of race in that do with it. We have about 10 minutes left actually a little less and I should introduce Again our guest Tracy Parsons is president of the Urban League of Champaign County. Hugh Price president of the National Urban League and we have a caller here ready to go bring into the conversation. 3 3 3 9 4 5 5 If you're here in Champaign Urbana where we are do also have a toll free line. If it would be a long distance call for you you'd like to join us that's 800 to 2 2 9 4 5 5. The caller here is in Urbana. And it's Line 1. Hello. Blacks in pursuit principles that have benefited Latinos like me quite a lot for which I'm thankful. But I was I'm I'm afraid I'm calling in with that of the complaint here because that last call and change and the difficulty. Dealing with unruly black kids especially

especially males that all female and I'm going to tell you a little story. Recently I taught at a local high school. The class was half black half white the blacks all sat by themselves are white all whites all that by themselves the blacks were kind came in kind of en masse after the bell and were unruly and loud and did not want to take any kind of instruction. And this was hardly a and this is hardly an exception. And I've been to schools in the in the area and very often if someone's coming in late to class. It's one of the black students unfortunately I don't have to be right to observe this. Half the sentence you know and there's a

real deep problem in dealing with this. I've come to the conclusion that the best way to express it is to say that. A lot of these kids are just not living up to their responsibility in the classroom. It's you know I hated being in the school myself like I can I can commiserate with them sitting eight hours almost eight hours in the day listening to often very boring stuff. You know it's difficult to do but you know that does not justify them. They're just throwing away their education the way they do and having no ability no way really to do sanctions. You can't really gone out of school because that would be even worse for the community and what I see is that parents are not coming and need to see this for themselves.

They really need to see this for themselves. I wish maybe the Urban League or whoever actually serves some of this stuff perhaps they've noticed. There really would have to be clandestinely now but maybe through a videotape or something but something. Done too many too many too many class hours are being thrown away because we cannot deal with our ruly kids and unfortunately a large number of number of them are in the black community. I just wish to address that putting the onus on the teachers. Believe me it is a real error. Their hands are tied. Let's come down the point where you just have a couple minutes let's get a response from. Well I mean I think you raise a number of tough questions I would only say that there are lots of schools around the country serving the same kinds of young people that are performing quite well. Schools have gotten a handle on that I would not

absolve parents of their responsibility there are community organizations or churches and we've got to do a much better job but there are ways of structuring schools where young people really feel. Excited about being there feel that they are that they belong there and that the educators have confidence in them and I think we've got to create more of those kinds of schools. The other point I'd make is that we have a lot of issues with young people in our society. By and large it's not black kids who are bringing guns in the schools and killing their classmates. So that's happening in the white community I want to jump racial in anybody but across this country we have a lot of issues with parenting of children and the fact that we don't do a good job as a society of parenting and loving and supporting and guiding our children is manifesting itself in different ways in different parts of our communities but by and large our children are bringing guns into school and killing their classmates and shooting their teachers. So I think all of us have to check ourselves out on these issues and we've got to

rededicate ourselves to providing children with the support and love and guidance that they need in order to grow and to be successful. One thing I want to ask you about quickly one of the things that came out of the most recent census and apparently was a surprise to some people was just how quickly the the numbers of Hispanics in the United States had grown faster than had been predicted. And now at least the last thing I read I think said that now there are more Hispanic Americans than there are African Americans. Well there's been several years ago the birthrate among Hispanics in this country surpassed the African-American birth rate we have known that. This trend was underway and was only a question of what year they would pass our population because the projections according to the census were that by the year 2050 the Latino population would be about 25 percent of the American population and about twice our size. And we knew they would overtake as it was just a question of whether it was going to be in 2001 2002 November or March of which year does that

does that have some particular significance you think to do the African-Americans of. Well I mean I think it has a psychological significance when you move from number two to number three in the political food chain. You've got to adjust to that reality I think it has strategic significance. For me it means that we've got to focus ever more on the very issues that the Urban League focuses on which is getting our folks into the economic and social mainstream promoting high levels of academic achievement economic self-reliance building wealth so that we aren't dependent on politicians who may not pay as much attention to us in the future. And lastly. Using our political leverage at 13 percent of the population we are still much larger than the margin of victory in virtually any political election. So we've got to be ever. And we've got to be smarter than ever about using our considerable political leverage but with the basic messages that we have to focus on the fundamentals going forward and be less reliant on the public sector and government for solving a

lot of our you know economic needs. We are going to have to stop there with our thanks to our guests Hugh Price president of the National Urban League and Tracey Parsons president of the Urban League of champagne County Mr. Price is here to help the folks locally celebrate their 40th anniversary he'll be the keynote speaker the 40th anniversary dinner of the Urban League of Champaign County. Tonight both of you. Thanks very much. Thank you. Thanks for having us join us.