Indiana’s governor candidates have long been enigmas to African-American Hoosiers and vice versa. Historically, African-Americans have been a fraction of the state’s total population, so Hoosier governors didn’t have to pay big attention to our community.
But now, 10.4 percent of Indiana, one-in-10, are African-American; with nearly 30 percent of Indiana’s capital comprised of African-Americans.
Hoosier candidates for governor can no longer be invisible ciphers to our community. This week and next, Just Tellin’ It will examine the two major candidates for governor, through their own words as they formally begin the main campaign season.
First, Mike Pence, the former talk show host, conservative acolyte and six-term congressman from East Central Indiana.
Pence’s acceptance speech at last Saturday’s Republican State Convention was intriguing, interesting and puzzling.
For months Democrats and media have slammed Pence for not being specific about his vision for Indiana; what he’d do as governor.
Pence began outlining his ideas in a speech that seemingly channeled former President George W. Bush’s advocacy of compassionate conservatism. If you remember, Bush’s espousal of compassionate conservatism included initiatives, particularly education, that Bush thought would benefit and appeal to African-Americans.
While acknowledging the efforts of outgoing Gov. Mitch Daniels, Pence opened his speech telling Republicans about some blemishes on Indiana’s Daniels-led record.
Said Pence, “As we gather today, 255,000 Hoosiers are out of work, nearly 1 million Hoosiers lack the most basic skills needed to find a job; 20,000 Hoosier teens leave school each year without earning a high school diploma; 22 percent of Hoosier children live in poverty; and 20 percent of Hoosier sixth-graders lack basic math skills.”
I’m glad Mike Pence loves data, like me. But Pence and his campaign brain trust need to get some of their data points correct.
Pence flatly got wrong the amount of Hoosier dropouts. I’m amazed Pence’s people used suspect data from the Indiana State Chamber of Commerce, instead of using official graduation data from Indiana’s Department of Education (state DOE); run by the GOP’s education darling Dr. Tony Bennett.
State DOE reports that Indiana’s public high school class of 2011 had a potential number of graduates of 74,161 and 86 percent of them; some 64,258 graduated on time in four years.
The 9,903 students of the class of 2011 that didn’t graduate on time aren’t all dropouts. According to the state DOE, which tracks every Indiana high school student’s fate during their four years, 4,224 students were actual Class of 2011 dropouts.
The remainder were students who received GEDs, needed more than four years to graduate high school, or received special education or regular certificates of completion.
The canard that Indiana has 20,000 dropouts annually isn’t supported by any facts. And I’m surprised Pence’s posse didn’t do their homework on such basic statistics.
Pence cited his wife of 27 years, Karen, who’s a classroom teacher, as a reason that education was a major focus of his speech. He started to lay out his education vision by saluting classroom teachers. “Indiana has some of the best teachers in the world and that there’s nothing that ails public education that can’t be fixed if we give parents more choices and teachers more freedom to teach.”
“Our schools must work for all of our kids regardless of where they start in life and regardless of where they want to start their careers,” Pence continued.
“This means our next goals must include improving the reading and math skills of elementary students, increasing graduation rates, improving the quality of Indiana’s workforce until the Hoosier state has the best educated and the best skilled workforce in America,” Pence exhorted.
Pence then surprised me and many by declaring, “And I believe the time has come to make vocational education a priority again in every high school in Indiana.”
Indiana’s top business leaders, along with Gov. Daniels and Superintendent Bennett have pushed the mantra of “college ready” in their education reform plans for the past eight years. Vocational education has been downplayed at many high schools, especially in IPS and some of the township and charter high schools.
Even educational reformers like The Mind Trust and others have given vocational education a short shrift. It’ll be interesting to see if Pence’s words about vocational education are campaign rhetoric or a core value he deeply believes in.
Pence also reinforced the central role high school must play in Indiana education saying, “Our schools (must) work for all our kids. Whether you’re college-bound, or you want to get right into a job, our high schools must be there to help every student start on success.”
Besides education and jobs, Pence talked about family. A devoted family man, Pence believes in the strength of the family. But I worry that Pence’s family devotion is based on the outmoded traditional American family of husband, wife and children.
In Indiana, said the 2010 Census, less than a majority (49.6 percent) of all Hoosier Households are husband and wife families. Among Blacks that percentage of husband-wife households is just 25.7 percent; Hispanics 50.3 percent and non-Hispanic whites 52.1 percent.
Pence exuded a moral imperative when he talked about family declaring in his speech that “to renew our land, we must strengthen the institutions that nurture the character of our people, most especially the family.”
Pence ended his speech, the final kickoff to his campaign for governor, by saying “Indiana must be the state where family works. Where men and women can get enough work to support a family. Where childhood poverty is in decline and strong, healthy families are on the rise. Where every child is cherished and protected and nurtured by those who are responsible for their care.”
Eight years ago, Mitch Daniels competed for African-American votes and received some in his first campaign and more in his re-election bid. Daniels was visible in Black communities in Indiana and speaking with Black media.
Though Pence has appeared in Black media in Indy more this year than Mayor Greg Ballard, Pence hasn’t engaged our community like the current governor.
As this governor’s race heats up, will Pence be heard and seen by Indiana’s nearly 700,000 African-Americans? Or will he be the un-Daniels and remain an enigma to our community?
See ‘ya next week.
You can email comments to Amos Brown at acbrown@aol.com.
