GOVERNOR PATRICK AND PRESIDENT OBAMA
At first glance, state Sen. Bill Perkins from Harlem, Grammy Award-winning musician Tracy Chapman and Massachusetts Gov. Deval Patrick may seem like an odd trio.
The truth is, they're tightly linked - connected by a New York-based organization that took its cues from the civil rights movement of the 1960s and gave good students the opportunity to excel.
Perkins, Chapman and Patrick all were students in a national program called A Better Chance (ABC). Founded by the heads of prestigious private and public schools across the nation, the 47-year-old nonprofit group's name clearly spells out its goal to take academically fit, economically challenged students and give them access to exceptional educational opportunities.
These three celebrated participants are some of the more than 12,000 middle and junior high school students who have attended some America's best college preparatory schools through the program. Its alumni have achieved greatness in fields such as business, law, politics and medicine.
"ABC was a result of the civil rights movement. We're not just a product of the ABC; we're a product of the civil rights movement," said Perkins.
Perkins, a confirmed city kid, attended summer orientation at Dartmouth College in New Hampshire in 1964 before starting classes at Manhattan's exclusive Collegiate School.
ABC began in 1963, the tumultuous year in which the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. made his moving "I Have a Dream" speech at the first March on Washington, and the year four young African-American girls were killed in the bombing of a Birmingham, Ala., church.
Against this dramatic backdrop, the headmasters of 23 independent schools made a pact to include disadvantaged students of color in their respective institutions. Fifty-five academically qualified students were chosen; Perkins was a member of that inaugural group.
"What you hear and what you see is ABC," said Perkins, speaking from his district office in Manhattan last week. "I was very fortunate, and I'm grateful," he said, adding that the program helped him "sharpen up the skills and the discipline to study, research, question and challenge."
About one-third of ABC scholars come from families that are receiving welfare or living in poverty, and 65% of the students come from single-parent households. But the program gets impressive results. More than 96% of ABC graduating seniors immediately enroll in college.
There are now 312 member-schools, including the Brooklyn Friends School in downtown Brooklyn, the Ethical Culture Fieldston School in Riverdale, the Bronx, and the Milton Academy in Massachusetts (which Patrick graduated from in 1974).
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