Recently, I tuned into some foolish conversation on facebook about how Obama was going to inspire little negro children to finally close the achievement gap. Much of this infuriating conversation hinged upon whether Obama, could inspire neglectful parents and their unruly little bastard children to shed their ‘culture of underachievement?’ What the fuck does any of that mean? Neither 'parental neglect' nor 'a culture of underachievement' substantively answer for the major disparities in education, known as the 'achievement gap.' How can social scientists even statistically group 'unfit parents' or a cultural group of ‘underachievers?' Much like trite, problematic, and racist notions of a supposed culture of poverty and the mythical black underclass with welfare queen and hypersexual baby daddy to boot, 'underachiever' and unfit parent (in this racialized sense) are not statistically substantive or significant categories. Who identifies themselves or can be identified as an underachiever or as part of a cadre of unfit black parents? These categories hinge upon tired tropes that span American history. From dancing Toms and Mammies to mythical Black rapists and ‘unfit mothers.’

Moreover, this problem of identifying the source from which Black 'underachievement' springs illustrates an important problem with the imprecise manner in which social scientists, politicians, and journalists misuse race as explanatory variable in statistical analyses.. Race, has no substantive explanatory power in understanding the ‘achievement gap.’ Racism, however, is a powerful statistical and rhetorical category to use in interrogating disparities in education, health, the legal system, etc. ad nauseum.

Schools with large percentages of Black and Brown students are underfunded, policed spaces that resemble penitentiaries. Even in racially mixed schools or majority white districts, individual actors (teachers, administrators) target Black and Brown students in identifying ‘troublemakers’ and ‘underachievers’ (See the Research out of Education Departments and some Social Psychology- many scholars label the discrepancies in perspective for white and black students, Huck-Finn and Nigger Jim bias). Thus, individual and systemic acts of racism and classism are much more powerful explanations for the so-called achievement gap. Thus, systemic and collective individual acts of racism and classism are much more statistically relevant categories than race, some ill conceived notion of racial pathology, or blackness in explaining the achievement gap. Solutions to disparities in education, health, etc. etc. must begin with interrogating and dismantling the institutions that constitute white supremacy and class inequality.

So if Obama is going to help make schools that don’t look like prisons, with equitable funding, he might positively impact the ‘achievement gap.’