Closing the Racial Academic Achievement Gap »

Matthew Lynch is a doctoral student at Jackson State University. He has taught courses at the university level and has conducted numerous workshops on education. He lives in Hazelhurst, Mississippi.

With the arrival of the No Child Left Behind Act, the so-called racial achievement gap has attracted more concern and controversy than ever before. According to this timely analysis, the myth of the racial achievement gap has nothing to do with genetics—and everything to do with a host of embarrassing yet reversible social and pedagogical failures, including low teacher expectations, unrealistic time tables for learning goals, irrelevant curricula, ineffectual teaching methods, careless administrators, poor parental involvement, negative peer groups, and self-esteem issues. For every problem raised, the text offers a level-headed solution, culminating in a plan for closing the supposed racial achievement gap for good.