Literacy, language, composition, rhetoric and (not) the African American student: sick and tired of being sick and tired

I was sitting here with a bad case of writer’s block wondering how to arrange my arguments in the most persuasive manner. Hoping not to lose you, my K-12 language arts teachers, or you, my composition and rhetoric colleagues, or you, my fellow sociolinguists, or you, my new literacy studies family. And I sure couldn’t stand to lose my African American generalists or anyone who is sick and tired of being sick and tired of the decades long struggle to stamp out our failure in the literacy education of African American students.