Look for our Salute to Excellence in Health Care special section next week!
@stlouisamerican
@stlouisamerican
St. Louis American In person event April 14th – For tickets see page A8
The
Serving, empowering and advocating for equity in St. Louis since 1928
CAC Audited APRIL 7 – 13, 2022
stlamerican.com
Jackson’s path to Supreme Court seems clear Confirmation expected this week
By Alvin A. Reid The St. Louis American While Supreme Court nominee Ketanji Brown Jackson’s Senate confirmation seems assured, Sen. Dick Durbin (D-Illinois) said on the Senate floor that some Republicans were hurtful and unfair to her. “It pains me to even bring it to the floor, but this notion that she is soft on crime. The law enforcement groups would not be endorsing her if they believed she was soft on crime,” he said. And the notion that somehow, in the words of one Republican senator, quote, ‘her sentencing endangers children.’ It’s painful because he said as much in front of her family, and I thought about that, how painful that must have been for her to hear those words. They’re not true.” While Durbin said “there are things that could have been handled better” when Democrats were in the minority during confirmation hearings, he chastised some GOP members for going too far. “To take one or two situations, each of them unique in their factual
See JACKSON, A7
Photo by Andrew Harnik / AP
Supreme Court nominee Ketanji Brown Jackson meets with Sen. Mitt Romney, R-Utah, in his office on Capitol Hill, Tuesday, March 29, 2022, in Washington.
Both propositions easily pass in St. Louis
COMPLIMENTARY
‘We’ve got to do better by Black children’ Leaders call for action on Black youth literacy
Youngest Black learners may be lagging behind due to pandemic By Sophie Hurwitz For the St. Louis American
Props R, 1 get citywide support
By Alvin A. Reid The St. Louis American St. Louis voters Tuesday overwhelmingly supported two ballot issues, including one that strips the Board of Aldermen of responsibility for drawing ward maps every 10 years. Proposition R passed with 69% of the vote, easily surpassing the 60% threshold needed. Approval means a citizen commission will take over the redistricting process after the 2030 U.S. Census data is released. “The voters of St. Louis n “The voters City have spoken; they of St. Louis want accountability and City have spotransparency at the Board ken; they want of Alderpersons,” LaShana Lewis, Show Me Integrity accountability Education Fund board chair and transsaid in a statement. parency at “On behalf of Show Me Integrity, thank you to our the Board of Alderpersons.” dedicated coalition partners who made this possible. We – LaShana Lewis look forward to building more cross-partisan coalitions for transformative change in our region, and we invite partners to join us in that conversation.” While opposed by Board of Aldermen President Lewis Reed, the city’s Democratic Committee, and some labor unions, Show Me Integrity’s Lewis said Proposition R “was written by St. Louisans in an open, community-driven process in consultation with national experts.” The ballot measure establishes a four-member commission picked randomly from applicants by an aldermen-appointed oversight board. The oversight board will be composed of three retired judges and representatives of Comptroller Darlene Green’s office and the city Planning and Urban Design Agency. Those commissioners would then select another five to create a nine-member panel. Public hearings would be held during the commission’s mapping process.
Vol. 94 No. 2
Spring swing
Photo by Wiley Price / St. Louis American
Nisean Rigmaiden, 3, gets into an early morning swing session in Vanita Park with his aunt, Kendra Rigmaiden, Saturday, April 2, 2022.
Even before COVID-19, only about 20% of Black third-graders in the city of St. Louis were reading on or above grade level, according to the Black Education Research Collective. This problem with literacy levels is hardly confined to the city. It is representative of a pervasive issue throughout the region. The disruptions to learning that COVID-19 brought, according to the research collective at Columbia University, have made the situation worse. In a July 2021 report, it found that around 45% of Black educator respondents were “extremely” concerned about the academic progress of Black students in the of COVID-19, n Youth literacy is wake and a little more than a strong predictor 30% of respondents of later success: A felt that the mental health and wellness student who can’t Black students was read at grade level of “extremely impacted.” by third grade is Research has well four times less established that literacy is critical to students’ likely to graduate ability to thrive. Youth by age 19 than literacy is a strong a child who does predictor of later sucread proficiently by cess: A student who can’t read at grade that time, according to an Edweek. level by third grade is four times less likely com study. to graduate by age 19 than a child who does read proficiently by that time, according to an edweek.com study. And if students fail to meet minimum literacy requirements in the third grade – which 75% of Black St. Louis students and 35% of white St. Louis students don’t meet – they run the risk of being held back a year in school until they do. Known as a reading retention law, this statute in Missouri (and many other states) incentivizes schools to hold back the children who don’t pass third grade reading assessments–such as the majority of the Black children in the city of St. Louis. Local leaders such as Julius B. Anthony, founder of St. Louis Black Authors of Children’s Literature, are on a mission to change that landscape and make literacy education in St. Louis work for Black kids. “The reality is that Black children weren’t doing well prior to the pandemic,” Anthony said. “And so it makes perfect sense that what was a cold prior to the pandemic has turned into a severe flu as a result of the pandemic. And so, our issue continues to be a severe one, a nefarious one, and as we look at Black children this isn’t new for us.” Anthony added that mainstream narratives often blame Black kids themselves for lagging behind in literacy, when in reality the problem is structural,
See LITERACY, A6