Call Me Mister is receiving national recognition

Historically, less than 1 percent of South Carolina’s elementary school teachers are African-American men.

The solution was launched when Clemson University and three historically black colleges — Benedict College, Claflin University and Morris College — created the Call Me Mister program to recruit, train, certify and secure employment for African-American men as teachers in the state’s public elementary schools. The first class of Misters was graduated in May 2004 and entered classrooms as role models, mentors and leaders for future generations.

The four founding members of the program have been joined by South Carolina State University and four two-year colleges — Midlands, Orangeburg- Calhoun, Tri-County and Trident technical colleges. Clemson is responsible for overall marketing and development, and each school recruits for its program.

Prospective Misters must demonstrate a commitment to becoming a teacher and interview. The program includes about $5,000 in tuition assistance, but its real value to the Misters — and their future elementary students — is a high degree of personal development.

For minority and non-minority children, the Mister leading their class represents something they don’t have in sports stars and entertainers: a black man of authority that they can reach out and touch.

Call Me Mister is receiving important national recognition.

This week, the program was held up before national education leaders and lawmakers as a program that effectively addresses problems facing young African- American males in getting an education.

The College Board held a briefing on Capitol Hill to release a new study, “The Educational Crisis Facing Young Men of Color.” The briefing was conducted with the Asian Pacific American, Black and Hispanic congressional caucuses to raise awareness of the barriers that minority male students face in educational attainment.

The report cites some of the reasons that men of color are facing educational challenges, including a lack of role models, a search for respect outside of education and poverty challenges. The report calls on policymakers at the federal, state and local levels, as well as foundation and community leaders, to heighten public awareness and explore policy options to improve the plight of young minority men.

Call Me Mister national director Roy Jones was a panelist for the Capitol Hill briefing. He said, “Our program specifically addresses almost all of the reasons the College Board study cites for the disparities in educational attainment for minority men. The crisis facing minority men is not going away any time soon, but Call Me Mister puts good men in a place — the classroom — to start making a significant difference.”

As noted historically black universities, Claflin and S.C. State have particularly important roles to play in Call Me Mister, a program that stands to gain momentum with the College Board’s findings and aggressive support of efforts to reverse the educational plight of young African-American men.

The (Orangeburg) Times and Democrat