Reported by April V. Taylor

Dr. Umar Johnson has long been considered an expert on how the American educational system uses learning disabilities to label black children, particularly black boys. He holds a Doctor of Clinical Psychology degree and is a Nationally Certified School Psychologist. He has also worked as a trainer, teaching educators and mental health care staff on a variety of psycho-educational topics, and as a child therapist. He is the author of Psycho-Academic Holocaust: The Special Education & ADHD War Against Black Boys.

As recently reported by the Atlanta BlackStar, Dr. Johnson is now trying to take his work and message to the next level by purchasing St. Paul’s College, a HBCU located in Lawrenceville, Virginia. If he is able to raise the necessary $5 million by August 21st, he is hoping to convert the college into a boarding school for African American men. Dr. Johnson believes the residential educational facility will be a valuable tool in helping Black men overcome the educational racism that is prevalent in schools across America.

He hopes to rename the school the Frederick Douglass and Marcus Garvey RBG International Leadership Academy for Black boys. The curriculum would include training students based on a global business model that will enable them to pursue careers of “self-employment and entrepreneurship.” Dr. Johnson is aiming to provide young men with real world experiences, so that they will be more prepared when entering the labor market. In a statement on BlackNews.com, Dr. Johnson states that the he believes “Our children have to be taught how to make a living anywhere in this world regardless of the circumstances of the political economy in which they live. The FDMG Academy will teach our children to be masters of agricultural/agronomical science, economic/financial science, political/military science, nutritional/dietary science, family/community science and African centered spiritual/cosmological science.”

To make a donation towards Dr. Johnson’s purchase of St. Paul Paul’s College and the opening of the Frederick Douglass and Marcus Garvey RBG International Leadership Academy, click here.

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