Fifty-fIve years ago on April 4, 1966, Reverend Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. took his last breath after a fatal gunshot to his head from an assassin’s bullet, while standing on the balcony of the Lorraine Motel in Memphis. Among the witnesses at King's assassination was Jesse Jackson, one of his closest aides. Soon after King's death, Jackson went on to form Operation PUSH (People United to Save Humanity).
Since then, Reverend Jackson has continued the fight for equality from the classroom to the boardroom. On January 16, 2023, PUSH-Rainbow Coalition will sponsor its’ 33rd Scholarship Breakfast that Honors the Right to Vote and the KING LEGACY.
PUSH also dedicated itself to developing young people through reading programs and the creation of PUSH Excel. Reverend Dr. Janette C. Wilson, Esq., serves as Executive Director at Push Excel, the educational arm of Push Rainbow Coalition which showcases the accomplished works of youth inside the program with Push-EXCEL customized programs that are offered throughout urban cities in America amid growing demand for people across the nation to pay attention to that which oppresses people and how to fight back through focus and accomplishment.
PUSH Excel’s program emphasizes keeping inner-city youth in school while assisting them with job placement. The organization has been highly successful at compelling major corporations with a presence in the Black community to adopt affirmative action programs requiring the companies to commit to hire Black and minority executives, supervisors as well as Black suppliers, wholesalers, and distributors on their purchasing lists.
EDUCATION MUST BECOME A FEDERALLY PROTECTED RIGHT
This annual event continues the fight through its PUSH-EXCEL(501C3) educational arm offering financial literacy, and oratorical skills bolstered by forensic instruction from kindergarten through post-doctoral support. Education fortified with Civic Education and Social Responsibility. Students learn the efficacy (results based) of legislation as well as the role and responsibility of elected legislators on local, state, and federal levels.
Push Excel’s intentional outcome is to craft an evolved Blueprint of education for youth through its Saturday School of tutoring in STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering, and Math).
A quote from Dr. Martin L. King Jr., “An Architect draws a blueprint, model, pattern and guide for builders. No building is well built without a solid Blueprint -when you have educational skills no one living, dead, or unborn can do it any better, ” is a driving inspiration for the program.
Safe schools begin with safe home environments which lead to a sense of feeling safe in their community and feed the desire to go to /attend school. With so much violence in our communities, it’s imperative that we do more preventive work.
Facts support that, ‘Conflict Resolution’ and negotiation skills in communities reduce violence and build responsive leadership proficiencies for youth to navigate through chaos crisis, confusion, division, disconnection, and discord facing them today.
OUR FIGHT IS REAL
Disinvestment in advanced basic education is a national epidemic in America. Chicago has suffered more than enough disparity with closed schools and limited resources in majority African American schools from Pre-K to High School. Wilson built and designed one of Chicago Public Schools' most accomplished and successful programs that reduced street violence and increased attendance to all-time highs.
Studies by the Children’s Literacy Initiative deliver some glaring statistics.” In 2019,_before COVID-19 exposed the entrenched educational, health, and economic inequities Black and Hispanic families face,_research showed that through no fault of their own, 85% of_CPS_Black 4th graders and 79% of its Hispanic 4th_graders could not read proficiently,_yet_more_than half (56%) of their white classmates could.
Rev. Jessie Jackson says, “Students without food, shelter, clothing and social service support are unable to function within learning environments. Numbers are soaring, as rapidly deteriorating urban environments teem with violence and dissipating resources across America.”
Systemic racism has always been at the root of educational inequity. Traditional early literacy instruction centers whiteness' and deficit-based assessments, offering few mirrors and windows for students of color. Windows offer children a glimpse into the lives and experiences of people different from themselves. Mirrors reflect children’s own lived experiences. Both help children make sense of the world around them.
SAVE THE BABIES . . .
According to the Brookings Center for research, “ Many educators have come to realize that poverty and language barriers in urban schools are unacceptable excuses for appallingly low student performance. To write off these districts’ dismal achievement levels as inevitable is to consign a generation of city youth to live without prospects or hope. Reform’s day has come. The rescue of urban schools entails dismantling entrenched and patronage-driven school board bureaucracies, holding schools accountable for their performance, and encouraging well-planned experimentation with charter and contract schools, and vouchers.
Executive Director Wilson elaborates, “PUSH EXCEL represents a national focus with a collaborative approach to address issues facing vulnerable children in municipalities, as preemptive action. Outdated rules complicated by aging education infrastructure no longer comprehensively serve urban student populations.”
THE COMMITMENT
Each year the Breakfast serves as a showcase and testimony of what’s changed for the future of children, burgeoning leaders and salutes to those that continue to fight for justice as they forge new sources for youth through scholarship support creating new opportunities for success.
Event and Registration Details can be found @rainbowpush.org or call 773-373-3366.