The Debate

African American students may be the only children in the United States whose dialect is not recognized. Not only is it not recognized in many places, but, more often than not, it is totally ignored. The teachers are ignorant and many times refuse that it exists. This attitude encourages school administrators to classify students as being "marginalized and learning disabled." The different varieties of African American English occur because of "cultural, social, historical and political experiences shared by many people of African American descent in the US. This experience is one of family, community, and love as well as racism, poverty and discrimination"(Views of Linguist and Anthropologists on the Ebonics Issue, Morgan). In order to combat this growing dilemma in their school district, the Oakland United School District planned major reform. The following are a major indicator that Oakland had to do something about its African-American population.

Facts

• Oakland United School District has an enrollment of 51,706 and 53% is African- American.
• 71% of students enrolled in Special Education are African-American.
• 67% of truant students are African-American
• 71% of African-American males attend school regularly.
• 19% of 12th African-American students did not graduate.
• 80% of suspended students were African-American
• 1.80 average GPA of African-American students represents the lowest GPA in the district.

(From Oakland United School District Home Page- www.ousd.k12.ca.us/oakland.standard.html)

In order to confront these problems, the Oakland United School District (www.ousd.k12.ca.us/) proposed a resolution to support the celebration of differences of language by recognizing Ebonics. Over the past year, Ebonics has become a hot topic across America. The debate fired up between parents, teachers and students when Oakland passed their resolution instituting the recognition of Ebonics as a valid option for schools. The conflict included discussion of Ebonics and whether it could be classified as a separate language, a dialect of English, or slang. Many of the skeptics of the resolution are difficult to persuade of the validity of Ebonics because they have some common misconceptions. Oakland School Board Resolution December 1996 (http://linguistlist.org/issues/8/8-53.html)
Misconceptions (www.ousd.k12.ca.us/oakland.standard.html)

Myths

• OUSD decided to teach Ebonics instead of English
• The District classified students who speak Ebonics as Bilingual.
• OUSD is trying to gain federal funding.
• OUSD condones the use of "slang."
• There is no evidence that this resolution will help increase academic achievement.

Realities

• The District would not teach Ebonics but emphasize the importance of learning Standard English.
• Oakland is celebrating differences by providing students, parents and teachers the necessary tools confront several different languages.
• Oakland wants to increase students’ knowledge of language without discrediting their culture.
• English proficiency has been linked with academic achievement.

(Adapted from Oakland United School District Home Page)

In order to understand the issue of Ebonics in the Oakland United School District, one must understand the realities as well as what Ebonics really is. One must understand that it is in fact someone’s culture and has evolved through African and Caribbean Creole language.