The prevalence of mental health challenges continues to worsen among adolescents, with Black American adolescents experiencing rates of suicide attempts that are increasing faster than any other racial and ethnic groups. Research has found that the neighborhood environment impacts mental health through the type and level of stress that people…

This study investigated microaggressions Black children experienced in early childhood education during the pandemic. Using racial microaggressions as a framework, we sought to gain insights into these experiences through counter-narratives from parents of Black children. Parents provided unique insights into their children's experiences, giving…

This paper studies the impact of the First Great Migration on children. We use the complete count 1940 Census to estimate selection-corrected place effects on education for children of Black migrants. On average, Black children gained 0.8 years of schooling (12 percent) by moving from the South to North. Many counties that had the strongest…

Racial disparities in infant health conditions have persisted for decades. However, there is surprisingly limited evidence regarding the long-term consequences of these disparities. Using novel linked administrative data from Texas and the shift to Medicaid Managed Care (MMC), I show that MMC-driven declines in infant health worsened cognitive and…

Black children today fight to define their own futurity beyond the myth of low aspirations -- a dominant societal ideology which limits Black success to careers in professional sports and entertainment and blames Black families and communities for devaluing education. Informed by career aspiration research and qualitative methodologies, this study…

Online racial discrimination (ORD) has been found to have deleterious effects on the psychological and academic outcomes of youth of color. Racial centrality (i.e., the extent to which one regards their racial group membership as important to their identity) may be a powerful buffer of these effects and has been identified as an important…

This article examines children's literature written by African American teachers during the first part of the twentieth century. Drawing on theories of racialization, I analyze children's books written by two African American teachers: Helen Adele Whiting (1885-1959) and Jane Dabney Shackelford (1895-1979). I argue that their books represented…

Research often overlooks the cultural significance of outdoor spaces for Black communities and their interactions with nature. Because of this prevalent oversight, there is a lack of emphasis on successful examples of how nature interactions have positively impacted Black children. This research study counteracted deficit models in environmental…

The twentieth-century migration of Southern-born African Americans--the Great Migration--was a landmark event in American history. More than seven million African Americans left the South between 1915 and 1970 in search of better economic and social opportunities for themselves and their children. Prior research has found evidence that the Great…

Historically Black youth have been labeled as needing to be "saved" and "fixed" because they are "at-risk," "broken," and more likely to subscribe to deviant behavior. This deficit rhetoric frames community-based education programs (CBEPs) that serve Black youth as vital spaces that must prevent and save…

Family instability has negative consequences, on average, for child and adolescent behavior, cognitive scores, and educational attainment. Beyond changes involving parents, many children experience household changes involving extended family and nonrelatives. These children are less likely to graduate from high school and complete some college…

The constant dehumanization of Black fathers and boys in the media, education, politics, pop culture, and society is traumatic. Deficit perspectives and a racialized political climate often negatively portray the moral, familial, and relational practices that Black fathers and boys engage in with their family members in their homes. Using…

The current study examines the contribution of racial congruence on young children's speech and language production to determine if African American children produce more or different language with an African American assessor, as opposed to a White assessor. Participants for the current study were selected from a larger group of children…

Drawing on the work of critical scholars, this study is guided by the idea that systems and structures are malleable, and young people can challenge the conditions and policies which inform their lives. Utilizing qualitative methods, I investigated how nine adult youth workers from three different non-profit organizations supported youth of color…

Purpose: This paper aims to contribute to a growing body of work (re)imagining the future for Black girls by calling Western notions of time into question. At its core, this paper argues that all Black girls are imaginative beings and that it is essential that Black girlhood imagination as a mode of future-making praxis be considered an integral…