African-American students exposed to lead three times more likely to be suspended than white students

Your author is in "dreamland" ... all kinds of statistics, yet silly conclusions.  

I grew up in the same neighborhoods, in the same kinds of houses, with the same kinds of paints, that the so-called "dis-advantaged" kids did.  I went to a high school where white's were a minority, even during the early '70's.  Lead was all around us, but it wasn't confined to just the black kids.  The difference is the white kids didn't eat the lead paint.  We re-painted the homes we rented, fixed the holes in the walls from previous "tenants" and generally kept the properties in good shape.  When my parents could finally afford to buy a home (20 years after they got married and I was entering high school), we had to paint and fix it up as well.

The issue isn't lead, it's parents!!  

If I, or my siblings, did anything similar to what the "dis-advantaged", poor, down-trodden kids did, we would get our butts kicked on top of other punishment and loss of privileges.  The call to our home from a school administrator would have set off World War III.  All three of my brothers were “hyper” and had trouble sitting still.  We all quickly learned that being loud, obnoxious and disrupting class had dire consequences.  We also learned that skipping school or not doing homework was not tolerated and could become very painful.  We were “taught” the importance of school and grades and learning.  And we were also taught that anything less than the best was not acceptable.  We were also taught to look out for each other and our two sisters.  That meant adjusting schedules to make sure each of us got to our after school activities and jobs.

We wanted to get through school to learn, to become "something" and make our parents proud.  When we didn't get high marks (A's, B's) we were ashamed, and had to explain why we were doing substandard work.  If the failures continued, we started losing privileges and freedoms.  I had to spend a lot of extra hours at home learning basic math when I hit the seventh grade.  If I didn't try, or was acting lazy when doing homework, my Dad had a belt handy and the inclination to use it.  As a result, my brothers and sisters and I were all in the top 25% of our classes academically.  (And, even with "corporal punishment" we all became productive citizens with families of our own.  All of our kids are also excellent students, who are smart and strive to achieve and take pride in what they do.)

The black kids go to school because the truant officers harass them and their parent if they don't show up.  Their parents kick them out of the house in the morning to get them out of the their "hair".  Many black parents didn't have a clue when report cards came out and certainly didn't make a big deal out of the grades their kids earned.  (That's a first-hand quote from a black friend.)  I guess that's why Blacks have a 50% or higher drop out rate in most big cities.  In some big cities, they quote the first-day show up rate.  It's considered a good day when they hit 80%.  One fifth of the black student population doesn't show up (which is required by law) and officials celebrate -- because it could have been worse.  In past years it has been worse, to the tune of 50 to 60% attendance rates.

As I saw it, growing up where half the school was black, the kids that succeeded (blacks or whites) either had the internal discipline and drive to do the work, or had parents who lit a fire under their cans and would not accept substandard behavior.  In my case it was the latter.  In my black friend's case, he had the smarts and a mother who cared and nurtured.  Many of his friends were basically dumb, lazy and out of luck.  Their parents (if they knew who they were) "gamed the system", blew their unemployment and government checks on drugs or the track, and couldn't be bothered to deal with the kids' learning or discipline problems.  For a lesson on "black culture" and their view of the world, listen to their music.  Much of it is vile and demeaning toward themselves and everyone else.

Other cultures (Asians, some Latinos, Irish, Italians, Germans, Bosnians) have endured the same low-income environments with the same lead exposure and wind up getting educations and jobs.  They keep moving out of the "bad" neighborhoods toward success.  

Many blacks do not want to do what it takes.  They think just showing up is reason enough to get a grade or to get paid.  They don't want to go to school, they don't consistently show up for trade school and apprenticeship training and they think attendance records are a joke.  I'm not talking ALL blacks.  Some are excellent tradesmen, doctors, lawyers and teachers.  But, the good ones are far outnumbered by the mediocre, lazy, educated-but-semi-skilled trolls who expect to be paid no matter how they perform.

Black contractors complain and cause work stoppages because there aren't enough blacks on a government job.  But, when businesses go to hire blacks, specifically to answer the black contractor's complaints, the blacks don't have the skills to do the job.  They want the contracts but cannot perform the work.  In many cases, when they actually do the work, it is cited for being substandard and in some cases their performance bonds are pulled.  Other contractors have to be brought in to rework and finish the jobs.

A few days ago I watched a young black electrician swear that he wired a job right, while his foreman is holding bare, unterminated wires between his fingers, in a junction box were all the wires were supposed to be terminated with wire nuts to the appropriate circuits.  Since this is the only electrician assigned to the area, so there's no question about who did the wiring.  Yet the guy stands there with a chip on his shoulder, insisting he did it correctly, while others are getting shocked working near the equipment.  The inference is that he is being treated unfairly because the foreman found problems with the wiring.

In this black electrician's case, he has just about finished a four-year apprenticeship and has worked close to 8,000 hours.  Yet he doesn't take enough pride in his work to double-check what he's done and didn't have the “ambition” to learn to read wiring diagrams after three years of apprenticeship schooling that includes two days a week of paid classroom training.

If this were an isolated occurrence, it wouldn't be an issue.  Unfortunately it happens way too often.  From past experience I can tell you that four out of five black apprentices can't read well enough to work through a wiring diagram with a set of specifications.  They don't have enough skill to work unsupervised and usually have to be paired with someone who can take and follow directions.  The fifth black apprentice goes on to be a journeyman and eventually a foreman and in a couple of cases general foreman.

You can talk about the effects of lead all you want.  What you've done is "cloud" the real issues, authenticated their excuses, and prolonged the agony.