An Arkansas advocacy group has set out to prove what group members and community leaders say they already know: that black men and boys face systemic barriers white males don't.
These barriers are often the result of policy decisions, according to studies focusing on health, wealth and education sponsored by the group.
"Honestly, none of this is new information," said Ginny Blankenship, the education policy director for Arkansas Advocates for Children and Families. "We just really wanted to push it in front of people again because we simply can't let things go on like this."
The most recent study, released Wednesday, concludes a series that began in May. Arkansas Advocates is a nonprofit group that conducts research and advocates for policies that "improved the lives of Arkansas children," according to its website.
Issues outlined in the reports include a gap in average wages, rates of children living in poverty, infant mortality, rates of enrollment in advanced classes and disciplinary practices, among other things.
Continuing community programs address these issues, and the group recommends policy changes for each part of the study.
The latest study comes as advocates in Louisiana, Mississippi and Arkansas seek to collaborate and initiate change regionally, said Kymara Seals, a policy director with the Arkansas Public Policy Panel. The group works to "organize communities to create infrastructure, set goals and develop action plans for better schools, safer neighborhoods, accountable government," according to its website.
Leaders from all three states met for the first time in person in June to discuss what issues they wanted to tackle and start networking with one another. Although each state has its own campaign, leaders are collaborating on broad topics of criminal-justice reform, education, economic opportunity and civic engagement, Seals said.
"We're trying to change a region, not just a state," Seals said. "It just makes sense. We all face the same inequities."
The policy panel works closely with Arkansas Advocates, and Seals said one of their short-term goals was to push for more protections against wage theft, which is one recommendation included in the Arkansas Advocates study. Wage theft happens any time workers are not paid for the number of hours they worked, said Eleanor Wheeler, a senior policy analyst with Arkansas Advocates.
"There are are some different policy options to address wage theft, but really some of them are pretty simple," Wheeler said.
One is to require pay stubs so that there is a paper trail showing hours worked, Wheeler said. Another is requiring an earned-income tax credit similar to the federal credit. Twenty-four states require an earned-income tax credit.
The Arkansas House of Representatives rejected a proposal last year to offer a state-level tax credit that was designed to provide relief for the lower-third income bracket, the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette previously reported.
Seals said her group has been advocating for an earned-income tax credit for years. Such a law could help to close the wage gap that exists between black and white workers in Arkansas because it would benefit people who make less money, she said.
The Arkansas Advocates study shows that the median income for a black male worker is about $11,800 a year less than a white man's salary.
Giving kids a strong start through early-childhood education is tied to success in the workplace, Blankenship said.
Black males are the least likely racial group to finish school -- about 62 percent graduate from high school while about 74 percent of white males do.
This disparity has ties to unfair disciplinary practices, Blankenship said: Kids who are punished more often are less likely to keep going to school.
"We find that black boys are disciplined at far greater rates than white boys for the same behaviors -- things like being tardy, not turning in work on time," she said.
The study shows that in 2013, black male students in Arkansas were suspended nearly four times as often as their white counterparts.
The report commends the state for passing a law banning out-of-school-suspensions and expulsions for children in kindergarten through fifth grade, but one policy solution suggested by the study calls for expanding that ban to include more alternatives to suspensions and expulsions through high school.
"We think that a lot of schools are still behind the times in updating their disciplinary policies and practice for a new generation of kids, who may have different needs now than they did in the past," Blankenship said.
Arkansas Advocates is working on a list of recommendations for a commission within the Arkansas Department of Education that is re-examining discipline policies in the state.
Corrigan Revels, who mentors high school-aged black students, said this is an issue he sees with the teens he works with. Revels was the first in his family to finish college with a bachelor's degree and attributes much of his success to a mentorship program he participated in when he first started college.
In Magnolia, where he grew up, he didn't have any black male teachers to help him, and his parents were unsure of how to navigate things like financial aid and the college application process, he said.
"I want to be somebody that I wish I had for myself," Revels said. Now, he works to help students finish high school and start on the path to college.
He also said he would like to see more of a push to teach professional skills throughout the state, something that Ken Wade, the interim director of the Urban League of the State of Arkansas, said he is working toward.
The Urban League reopened in 2016, after being absent in the state for nearly 30 years, and Wade said he started working on job training and professionalism soon after. The Urban League is a national civil-rights group with smaller chapters.
Wade says his goal is to develop programs in the areas of employment, family and community health, affordable housing and education. The board is scheduled to choose among three candidates for a full-time director position next month, Wade said. He did not apply for the job.
"You're looking at the staff. I can't do it all," he said.
The group has put on a few job fairs across the state. They're designed for people ages 18 to 30, where they can learn basic skills such as how to interview and how to build a resume, Wade said. He added that usually one company comes in and makes hires that day.
The job fairs are part of the League's outreach efforts to rural communities; sometimes they are combined with a health fair.
"It's very informal," he said. "You come, and you get your blood pressure checked or whatever you need."
Marquita Little, a health policy director with Arkansas Advocates, said more work is needed on the health aspects of black male lives. Despite high rates of health care coverage, outcomes remain poorer than for white boys and men, she said.
Black children are more likely to die at a younger age than white children, the health portion of the study shows. Infant mortality rates for black children are at nearly 11 per 100,000, while white babies are at closer to 7 per 100,000.
"Infant mortality is one of the areas where we see the greatest racial disparity," Little said.
About five years ago, the Arkansas Department of Health's Office of Minority Health and Health Disparities started looking into the disparity, said Michelle Smith, the office director.
The agency started promoting flu shots during pregnancy, breast-feeding, taking folic acid and safe sleeping for infants. In 2016, efforts were expanded to focus on educating fathers.
The office now puts on "safety baby showers" and "safety tailgate parties" for expectant mothers and fathers to learn about baby-proofing the home, safe sleep and proper latching techniques for breast-feeding, Smith said.
The department also has home visiting programs to ensure that new mothers have the right kind of care, said Brad Planey, the branch chief of family health.
"They're taking on the world one family at a time as opposed to a campaign, but I feel like that's the kind of thing that can make a difference," Planey said.
Implementing these types of programs in "high-needs communities" is one of the policy recommendations included in the Arkansas Advocates report. Another, which Little said would help get high-quality care to hard-to-reach areas, is recruiting more minority-group health professionals.
"That's not just because it improves care for the racial minority groups, but actually physicians who are from, or identify with, or are a part of a racial minority group are just much more likely to practice in underserved communities," Little said.
One policy the state could implement would be to provide financial incentives to doctors who practice in high-needs areas, she said.
ShaRhonda Love, the executive director of the Arkansas Minority Health Commission, said the commission is working to start a scholarship for students who are interested in going into the medical field. The commission also is trying to expand health care coverage by using a new mobile unit.
Love said the mobile unit will be up and running in December. It's a customized, 36-foot bus with two exam rooms, a waiting area and a screening area. The goal is to drive to where people are, identify their health needs and then refer them to local physicians for follow-up care.
It will cost about $290,000 to get started, Love said.
The Legislature established the commission in 1991 to study and identify gaps in health care for members of minority groups.
Love added that she hopes to be able to connect patients with minority-group physicians and that her office provides cultural competency training for doctors so they can better serve patients.
"I think when you are able to have someone that has a similar background or understanding of your culture, it helps," Love said. "It also helps for individuals to speak to cultural differences as well as it helps individuals and patients to feel comfortable asking questions."
A Section on 08/05/2018