A study indicates that researchers entrusted with evaluating the educational outcomes of African American children must engage their practice for the public good and on behalf of these students. The Howard University Evaluation Training Institute is used as a guide to describe the steps for conducting quality evaluations, and to highlight the…

What is it about cultural diversity that challenges early childhood programs? One factor is that children enter early childhood and early intervention programs from families with a wide range of values and cultural experiences. Sometimes those values and experiences differ from those of the teachers and caregivers in those programs. Another factor…

The Parents Matter! Program (PMP) has developed three interventions for parents of 4th and 5th grade African-American children (9-12 years old). The overarching goal of all three interventions is to provide parents with knowledge, skills, and support for enhancing their efforts to raise healthy children. The interventions are: (1) Enhanced…

Fifty-three fourth- and fifth-grade Black American students completed questionnaire measures of their preferences for working cooperatively, competitively, and individualistically in their homes and classrooms. Students' perceptions of family members' and teachers' approval of each type of behavior were also measured. Students perceived that…

"Data Trends" reports present summaries of research on mental health services for children and adolescents and their families. The article summarized in this "Data Trends" presents findings from research examining the influence of collective socialization, concentration of disadvantage, and prevalence of crime on conduct…

Project Head Start was created during the heady, idealistic days of the mid-1960s. The idea for Head Start, a preschool program for disadvantaged children, emerged from the observation that, on average, poor and minority children arrive at school already behind their peers in the intellectual skills and abilities required for academic achievement.…

Objective: To determine factors influencing the use of outpatient mental health services provided by mental health professionals (OMHS) for children in foster care using a national probability sample in the United States. Method: As part of the National Survey of Child and Adolescent Well-being, detailed survey data were collected on 462 children,…

This study is about systemic containment of Black youth by authority structures within schools and law enforcement agents in racialized communities. Through the retrospective narratives of incarcerated Black students in a secure custody institution, vivid insights are provided into the construction of fear of Black youth and of the ways that…

Ecological barriers like racism and discrimination can weigh heavily on the shifting emotions of adolescents. We investigated the relationship of racial socialization experiences to the depression symptoms of 160 Black adolescents, including lethargy, low self-esteem, cognitive difficulties, social introversion, irritability, guilt, pessimism, sad…

This study examined the relationship between academic achievement of young African American children and access to and use of computers in their school and home. The sample consists of 1,601 African American public school children who attended kindergarten and 1st grade. Results indicate that access to and use of a home computer, computer area in…

In popular culture, the age of 40 is sometimes considered "over the hill." This is decidedly not the case for the Perry Preschoolers--a cohort of low-income, predominantly African American children who 37 years ago were randomly assigned to attend a high-quality preschool program. The latest findings from the well-known longitudinal study of this…

This research examined 2 strategies for encouraging children's narratives. Twenty-five European American and 31 African American children from low-income backgrounds (M age = 4.76) participated. Children were assigned randomly to either high or low elaborative narrative style conditions and to either a draw-and-tell or tell-only reporting…

It is widely accepted that high quality child care enhances children's cognitive and social development, but some question whether what constitutes quality care depends on the child's ethnic and cultural background. To address this question, secondary analysis of data from the two largest studies of child care experiences in the United States,…

An interview of 12 caregivers of African American children with mild disabilities from a large Midwestern city was conducted in order to obtain information on their views and experiences with needs and services provided for families of children with mild disabilities. Results revealed interesting information regarding most frequent and most…

This prospective study examined the association between perceived neighborhood violence and maternal monitoring and the moderating role of 2 sources of social support (coparents and friends/neighbors) among low-income African American single mothers. Mothers' ratings of neighborhood violence were associated with monitoring both concurrently and…