As a proud HBCU graduate, I can recall the days that I used to pass by our campus union during the height of the afternoon when numerous students would be milling about on their way to class or stopping for lunch. What stood out for me was the brothers from different cities in the Northeast and Middle Eastern states, standing around talking and joking with each other. They hailed from the New York City Metropolitan area, parts of North Jersey, Philly, Baltimore and D.C. There was light in them and happiness with veritable ease. There was never a need to feel anxious or distrustful when security drove by. Nor were they deemed a threat to the staff and community of students who walked by. This was in stark contrast to some of the brothers that they left at home holding up a corner somewhere. These brothers might smile upon greeting but usually wore a scowl of some sort and held on to a stiffness of masculinity because society called for it. That’s when I realized the difference between the two groups. The brothers holding up the wall outside our campus union were in a safe space. They had a freedom that the brothers back home didn’t have.
Some may argue that the brothers at home made choices that kept them from experiencing this freedom. I would counter that some choices are inconceivable when your home environment is drowning you, opportunities are few, your everyday movements are held under a microscope and people misjudge you. Under circumstances such as these, it is difficult to allow your mind to be free when you are physically chained under the policies of pervasive marginalization.
By observing my students in action, I was able to see the early makings of the two groups above. I have taught students, boys and girls, who lived on both sides of this fence and others who straddled it because they were uncomfortable on either side. One young man stands out to me because he made me confront my own pre-conceived judgments until I saw both sides of him. I’ll call him Raymond for anonymity purposes.
Raymond was about 16 or 17. He stood between 5’10” and 6’. A young African American male who showed his potential as a bright student. Yet he could easily be portrayed as ignorant and defiant simply because of his poor attendance record. However, when he came to class, he attempted to do his work for the most part. Mostly, he avoided my class because it was one of the few that was crowded. He didn’t know many of the students, therefore, he didn’t care to sit in desk grouping. Sitting in groups was also problematic for him because some of the students were not on his intellectual level. In addition, he didn’t like being bombarded with handouts simply because the principal didn’t allow teachers to use textbooks and the computers were never available for my class. He was frustrated with the entire school.
On occasion, Raymond would openly voice his opinion about each of the items mentioned above. While he may have blurted things out at times, he was never outright disrespectful to me. I didn’t quite know how to gauge him because on top of his excessive absences, he didn’t allow anyone to get close to him. Then something happened where over one week I was able to observe him outside of school on two separate occasions.
The first incident occurred while I was in route to work. I was riding the subway when I noticed Raymond sitting on the bench across from me but to my far left. He did not notice me, and I took advantage of this. I subtly threw my gaze at him. What drew my attention to him was that Raymond, who tended to be guarded at school, was entangled in a very tender moment. Seated beside him was a little girl, who appeared to be no more than about 8 years old. She was holding her backpack while her upper torso was bent over Raymond with her head in his lap, she was asleep. You could tell this was his little sister and he was escorting her to school. From time to time, he would look down at her lovingly to see if she was alright. At one point he stroked her hair then laid his hand on her shoulder, affirming her security. He gently awakened her before their stop and spoke to her softly before taking her hand and exiting the train. This was several stops before mine. It just so happened that this day I was running later than my usual one hour before school starts arrival. When I arrived 5 minutes before the start of classes, I couldn’t help but wonder if this was the daily ritual that kept Raymond from being on time for school. In a city like New York, it was not uncommon to see older siblings ferrying their younger siblings off to school. Some are as young as 10 years with this obligation because parents can’t be late to work. This wasn’t a degenerate hoodlum as society would have caste upon him, but here was a young man forfeiting his right to achieve greater by securing someone else’s future, his sister’s.
The second incident occurred two days later during second period. It was my planning period, and I stepped out of school for a quick moment to get a bottle of water from the deli across the street. As I was waiting for the light to change a group of about 6 or 7 teen males approached the corner on the opposite side of the street. They were headed towards me in the direction of the school. Raymond was among them. They were loud and joking around with each other just as the brothers had done on my college campus. That’s when I noticed a man on a bike stop to ask if he could take the group’s picture. I couldn’t fully hear the conversation, but he conveniently held a professional camera up in the air as proof of his intentions. Because I knew that these were high school students my antennae went up and the lawyer in me was prepared to intervene. I wanted to tell this man that they were underage, and his request was illegal without parental consent. I must have willed this into their heads because they told him “No” and he rode off before I could cross the street.
For those of you wondering why I would do something like that, the answer is simple. Those boys were not doing anything wrong at the time. They reminded me of some of the guys I grew up with. Some of whom had rough beginnings living in houses with newspaper shoved in the window holes to keep the frigid winter air from blowing inside. Absentee parents and meager food and clothing supplies. They were often the ones who got into trouble in school because maybe they were hungry or because they had learning disabilities that went undiagnosed. Some were in foster care, and a few teachers even treated them with irregularity. Given these odds it was rightly so that they began to disappear from radar after elementary school, only to be seen years later standing on the corner in groups just like that one. Ironically, these same guys would straighten up whenever I walked by and we exchanged greetings. They also made sure no one said anything out of turn to me or that I didn’t unknowingly walk into any unsavory situations. How could I act like I didn’t know them or that I was better?
So I decided that these teenagers standing on the corner across from me, bothering no one, deserved someone’s protection while they were still on the outside of juvenile detention or Riker’s Island, just as my former classmates did. This was especially so because I was inclined to believe that this so-called random roving photographer was an undercover cop. Here is another clue that made me believe he was up to no good. The boys all had on some combination of the same colors. To the photographer, it could have indicated that they were in a gang. However, there was a chance that they just dressed alike that morning, like all the other students in the school who I swore looked like clones. On most days you can’t tell one student from another. That’s when I looked down at myself and discovered that I was dressed in the same colors. I laughed at the rank chance of me coming to their defense and being falsely identified as an OG mother hen protecting her brood then being placed on some look out list?
When the light turned red, we passed each other in the street. Of course, Raymond didn’t notice me or intentionally tried not to acknowledge me because he was with his crew. The whole time these young men were laughing and talking smack to each other. One or two had backpacks, one held a notebook in his hand, while others carried nothing. After safely crossing the street, I turned back to confirm that they indeed were heading into the school.
At that moment I couldn’t stop thinking about Raymond’s interaction with his sister two days before. I made a mental note to try and reach out to this young man the next time he came to class. I wanted to ask him about his intentions in life and if I could be of some help to him. Unfortunately, I never got the opportunity to have this one-to-one with Raymond. He stopped coming to class and shortly thereafter he transferred to one of the other specialty schools within our building. Turns out he was concerned about graduating and wanted to get the credit hours needed as quickly as possible and the other school afforded him that opportunity.
Whether or not Raymond succeeded at graduating, I am not sure. I saw him a few more times in the building but that’s about it. Here was a young man who, but for his circumstances, saw life through a lens that kept him from escaping to some college like an HBCU where he too could stand among a group of his peers without the fear of being harassed or thrown up against a wall to be frisked for no reason. While he may have risked companionship that provided challenges under a false sense of security, this world drove him to that decision and made him feel that he didn’t have the power to dare himself to be free.
This is just another Paige from my book. If you are interested in my education consulting services, my contact information is below. Email: KindredConceptsLLC@outlook.com Phone: (516)986-8464
A Paige from my Book 