This collection of non-partisan reports focuses on 18 hot-button social policy issues written by award-winning CQ Researcher journalists. As an annual that comes together just months before publication, the volume is as current as possible. And because it’s CQ Researcher, the social policy reports are expertly researched and written, showing all sides of an issue. Chapters follow a consistent organization, exploring three issue questions, then offering background, current context, and a look ahead, as well as featuring a pro/con debate box. All issues include a chronology, bibliography, photos, charts, and figures.

In its totality, this book explores subjects that are rarely available in primary literature publications and brings diverging fields together that are generally addressed separately in specialty journals. The book argues that past school failures are instructive. The author identifies the structural and emotional triggers that make it difficult for educators’ to overcome the social constructs that control the progress of Black students, reproduce inequities, subvert the socio-economic progress of the nation, and threaten the legitimacy of the U.S. public school system. One failure is informative; successive school failures are chock-full of must avoid school policies and instructional practices. The book analyzes the lessons learned from a list of school-imposed policies that have molded and determined the academic progress of Black students. The author argues that much can be discerned from that which undermined the performance of schoolteachers’ and public school systems. The quantifiable outcomes of past school practices can better inform educators and future teachers and school leaders. The book carefully analyzes the organic evolution of educators’ social constructs that regenerated inequities to reveal the road map for rebuilding genuinely inclusive and equitable public school systems that serve the interests of students and society. The book also provides in-depth analysis of various disciplines that identify the best methodologies to improve the teaching and learning of Black students, homeless students, and all other students. The book aims to offer a unique perspective by carefully unfolding the built in school structures that obstruct the abilities of school administrators and teachers to bridge the student achievement gaps and meet the objectives of consecutive school reform initiatives. The author’s distinctive approach stimulates the thinking of the entire field of education, and challenges accepted propositions commonly assumed about African American students. In short, this book offers a perspective that is rarely shared or understood by educators and practitioners in the field of education.

A handbook for anyone who wants to learn about how to be active in local, state, and federal government, The Citizen Lobbyist shows how to have a voice in creating public policy. More citizen involvement is needed in our government processes to ensure the voices of the people are heard over the money of paid lobbyists, unions, and coalitions, both in Washington, DC, and in state capitals across the country. All too often, public officials seem removed from the people who hired them to be their representatives and fail to work on their behalf. This book gives a step-by-step plan on how to lobby elected officials about the issues you care about, offers information on how to plan a lobbying meeting for individuals and groups, and provides sample lobbying worksheets and resources to assist with finding legislative information and history. It is your go-to reference for being a grassroots activist and citizen lobbyist.

Promotion Text for Children’s Human Rights and Public Schooling in the United States Julia Hall The United States tends to portray itself as a human rights leader. However, human rights concerns are confronted everyday by people in this democracy, including children. The purpose of this volume is to bring attention to the fact that against the backdrop of neoliberal expansion, serious human rights violations are taking place among children everywhere, including in the US. The daily struggles among groups of school children in the US are specifically considered here, such as children who are sorted by race, homeless children, transient children, child refugees, children as targeted by human traffickers, and/or child migrant workers. As the economy continues to constrict, more and more young people find themselves struggling to grow up on these razor thin margins of survival. Given current economic arrangements, such margins are widening. The definition of “children’s human rights” as understood in this analysis is taken directly from the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child [CRC]. Here emphasis is placed on ways in which the CRC could be used to serve more effectively the needs of the most vulnerable populations of school-age children in the US and elsewhere. Public schools could be the very place where children come to understand they have rights. Unfortunately, many children do not get this information. Instead the protections stated in the CRC and the realities of the lives of so many children are often worlds apart. This volume sets out to be a part of changing this.