Growing up in a fragmented, fatherless family is the greatest barrier to success for students, argues Ian Rowe on Flypaper. “Racism and poverty are diminishing in their significance as the causal factor driving the heartbreaking trauma and despair we as educators witness in our students nearly every day.”
Children born to unmarried mothers, by age of mother and year of birth
From 2000 to 2012, more than 12 million babies were born out of wedlock to women aged 24 and under, according to the Centers for Disease Control. Most of these children will grow up in poverty.
“Yes, black lives matter,” writes Rowe, who is black. But he asks: “To whom? Each black life, or any life of any race, must matter most to the two people who chose to give birth to and/or raise that girl or boy.”
Rowe wants educators “to teach the next generation about family formation and the sequence of personal choices that give them the best shot at life fulfillment.”
Via Joanne Jacobs