to about a year ago and in may liberty media which is owned by john malone who owned the media properties that put in a bid for the 17 million a share and that is being considered i believe the company is doing due diligence at this point remains to be seen whether the deal will be closed. there were favorable signs as both the loan and the barnes and noble chairman have spoken highly of each other in the media. ..

>> our schedule starts with a talk on the state of african-american literacy, delivered remichael lomax --

>> welcome to the 13th annual harlem book fair. my name is max rodriguez. i am the founder of the event. [applause] [applause] >> thank you. [applause] >> and i'd like to thank you all for joining us for a conversation in community, a conversation in books, a conversation on who we are, where we see ourselves, where we hope to see ourselves, and how we get there. that's what we do at harlem book

fair. we kind of assess ourselves and we celebrate ourselves and we plan for ourselves and we plan for our families and our children and our community. and we bring in the authors that talk about the themes that drive us, that drive our everyday life. we have them come up and say more about what you may have read on that page or what you might like to read on that page. and that is the harlem book fair. the intention of this event is to create the presence for joy, for acknowledgment of each other, for self-acknowledgment, for assessment, for access to information, and the way the means by which to use that information for a better tomorrow. that's the harlem book fair. so thank you for joining us. within that conversation, you know, we all know that there are

statistics and we know in the moment where -- what we feel about education. where we land in that space. it's either accessible, it's either a challenge, we either meet it well, we don't meet it well, the whole range. and for us, as a community, it's, you know, it's a foundation for us. it's a foundation that constantly needs to be supported. we always have to infiltrate into our children the importance of reading, of education, it's really -- it really is how we are as a community have lifted ourselves up. the natural partnership and partnership that i'm very much humbled by and really happy about is the relationship that we've been able to develop with the united negro college fund. it seems to be such a natural

and easy marriage. and i have asked dr. michael lomax who is the president of the uncf to deliver frankly the state of african-american education and literacy. we know that there are many state of messages that are given. but not often enough do we have a chance to make public announcement about who we see ourselves to be. and what's wrong? what can be righted? and how we get there. so with no hesitation at all, let me greatfully, joyfully, happily present dr. michael lomax, the president of the united negro college fund. thank you. >> thank you, max. thank you, max. [applause] >> i'm delighted to be here. and to be a part of this 13th annual harlem book fair. and to help inaugurate what i

hope to be an ongoing relationship with this wonderful institution in harlem and hopefully around the country. i've been asked to address the state of african-american literacy and education. the name of this event, the venue in which it is being held, the lineup of speakers and the competition of the audience could seem to point to an upbeat assessment. here we are afterall, at the harlem book fair. in an auditorium named for a great african-american poet, novelist, and playwright langston hughs who was almost a lifelong, certainly from his adulthood, from the time he came from new york to attend columbia in the early 1920s was an almost continuous lifelong resident of harlem. when are in the library named after and built on the

collection of a great afro caribbean, shoneberg. we are just around the corner from an harlem book fair venue, this one name for another poet, one the leaders with hughes of the harlem renaissance and the subject, by the way, of my doctoral dissertation. in an earlier life, i used to teach literature, sonya sanchez, and i shared offices at college. i look further down today's program and see not only my former office mate, but dr. julian, president for the college of women, and a distinguished author in her own right and my colleague, dr. carlton brown, president of another uncf member institute, clark, atlanta, university, and

a distinguished educator. but today i'm going to talk about humor. something african-american college presidents don't get to talk about enough. surveying the cone -- cornucopia of african-american literature, we can only join in marveling at the curious thing to make a poet black and bid him, her seam. and yet a look back at the history of african-american literacy and education dictates a mixed verdict. we have come far in this century and a half since the civil war and emancipation. but we have still a long way to go on our educational and literacy journey. we have within our community a thriving cohort of well educated and highly literal men and women. but we have an enormous

population of brothers and sisters who have been passed by, who have been denied the education they need and deserve, and because they have been passed by, face uncertain and insecure prospects. yet even more hinges on education than the futures of individual men and women. it is the future of a community, the future of harlem, it's the future of black america, it's the future of the nation and the future of the world. it has been just over a century since the first waves of the great migration brought african-americans to harlem in large numbers. it was then termed a city within a city, a city of refuge as harlem renaissance short story writer rudolph fisher termed in the wonderful story that appeared in lax landmark volume,

the new negro in 1925. city of refuge. and now so many of those refugees are in another generation returning south. harlem has ridden the cycle up through the harlem renaissance followed by a punishing depression in a hard period. and now unsettling period where it is today. social taboos have evaporated and harlem real estate is becoming a boom. demographics are shifting. and the economics of remaining in harlem are unsettling residents who's roots go back generations. the challenge today is whether harlem can moat -- can both

prosper and be a community of opportunity for african-americans. as harlem goes, so goes the nation. whether it can will depend in large measure on the education it offers students of color. will it offer them the education they need from preschool through college to build their careers, support their families, and give back to their communities? education that will qualify them for the jobs that will allow them to afford to stay in this city of refuge in the 21st century? the kind of education is now available only to a few. can we make it available not just to some, but to many? to all. that change like any important change involves some disruption in the lives of people and

institutions. some i'm referring to the lawsuit of the teachers union and the naacp have brought to block chancellor walcott's reforms. the lawsuit that has been decided against that union and the naacp last week. some shrink from that disruption. preferring, i think, to sacrifice the futures of the many who need an education for the welfare of the few who are charged with providing that education, but are falling short. the future of african-american literacy and education in harlem will depend on the outcome of battles like these and in who's favor they are resolved. the battle is over, and the students won this time. parents will get to choose where they can send their children. but it may not always be so.

for the first four score in seven years after the declaration of independence, declared that all men were created equal, it was illegal to teach a slave to read and to write. it wasn't just bad -- it was illegal against the law. people could go to jail for teaching an african-american to read or write. the prohibition was not unconsidered. those who decreted and enforced it knew that slavery would not survive and prosper in an environment where slaves got the opportunity to get an education and have freedom of self-expression. even after emancipation and even after the end of the civil war, even after the passage of the institutional amendment that proported to guarantee equal protection of the laws, it would be another century, another 100 years before the first supreme

court decision that equal education was a constitutional right. today the jim crowe laws are off of the books. it doesn't cru black students, black faculty, black administrators. african-americans serve at the head of the nation's largest corporation. african-american sits in the white house. by any measure, that is progress. but if that is -- if that is one america, there is as well, as we well now, another america. in this other african-american of 100 students who start the 9th grade in that african america, only three -- only three will complete college.

compared to 10 white students. now the ten is nothing to be proud of. but the three is appalling. much of the difference between the college graduation rate of people of color and the majority population is, of course, financial. the cost of college, and the inability of millions of family incomes to keep pace with the cost continues to be the single largest factor in the inability of families of color to send their sons and daughters to college. and the inability of those sons and daughters once enrolled to stay in college and graduate. ask any college president, ask any african-american college president, ask any president, what's the number one barrier, staying in school, paying tuition, and room and board. the country, in other words, has allowed more out of neglect and indifference than by intention, i believe. the development of a system of

de facto educational failure. that impacts all children unacceptably and more children of color severely. who pays the price? most immediately, of course, low income african-americans and other people of color. students who end their education after high school will earn over the course of a career $1 million less than their college educated counterparts. they earn less because the best paying and fastest growing jobs and careers require college as an entry-level requirement. the next level of jobs, the assembly line jobs that require only a high school diploma and a good work ethic, the great majority of those jobs have evaporated. when people came from the south in 1930s and '40s from new

york and pittsburgh and detroit, left the farms, left the sharecropping to come north. they came to take jobs on the assembly line. they didn't have to have a great education. they had to have a great work ethic and they could earn a good living, support a family and buy a home and move on up. the jobs don't exist anymore. if the jobs at the top require college and the factory jobs have disappeared or moved off shore, what's left for the high school graduate? answer, the bottom rung of jobs. the low paid service jobs. these are those -- there are those who say that's okay. that we have enough college graduates and we don't need anymore. a few months ago, i debated a pair of the college deniers as i call them, college professor and rider on a pbs debate. i posed this question to them. is this the answer that you give to your own children and to your

own grandchildren when they ask you whether they should be go to college? do you tell them, oh, you don't need to think about it. we've got enough of those? they didn't answer. they didn't need to. we know the answer. that's not the answer they give their own children. that's the answer for somebody else's children. we know who that somebody else is. but it's not only the noncollege graduates who suffer, families pay the price too. low incomes mean less security, less ability, for example, to send the next generation to college. communities suffer too. lower incomes and less job security translates into less taxes paid which means less money for schools, roads, and parks. nor is the price that communities pay denominated only in dollars and cents. college graduates voted higher, they volunteer at higher rates, they give blood at higher rates, they are more engaged citizens.

businesses pay a high price for educational neglect as well. their competitiveness depending on their access to a college educated work force. and if they can't get those college educated employees, their competitors in china and in india and in singapore and other countries can. and believe me, they are producing more college graduates. this is a bleak future. but it does not have to be hopeless. there is a tendency even within our computer to throw up our hands at the college to regard large number of low-income children of color as beyond hope. i'm here to say not only that there is hope, but there are solutions. take the challenge of helping low-income children of color go to college and stay through graduation. for more than a decade now, uncf and the bill and melinda gates

foundation have partnered on the gates millennium scholars. this program awards to 1,000 low-income students of color, african-american,, hispanics, ad after more than a decade of growning 14,000 of these. gates scholar has a five year graduation rate of 88%. double the number of nonstudents of color. and a six year graduation rate of over 90%. much higher than the overall national graduation rate and comparable to the graduation rate from the students of highest income families. what's the millennium scholars formula. it's money. a lot of money. $1.6 billion. it's money. but it's understanding that students need more than just a

check. they need academic support, they need mentoring, they need social support, they need all of the kinds of support that students from higher income families, students from families where college is a tradition, they need all of the kinds of support that other students take for granted. so if you hear anyone say that low income minority students can't get through college, that we can't empower them to get through, you tell them, yes, we can. so we know that we can help students of color get through college. can we help them get to college? can we give them the kind of education before they step into a college -- on to a college campus that they need in order to do college course work once they actually get there? and again, the answer is, yes, we can. sometimes people are surprised

to hear the president of uncf where colleges is our middle name speaking out about precollege education. but the fact is that education is a continuum. it's a pathway. the pathway from slavery to freedom as frederick douglass called it. like any pathway, you can't reach your destination without starting at the beginning and staying until the end. so students need to learn algebra ii and precalculus in high school in order to succeed in college math. they need to start learning their numbers in preschool, becoming proficient in arithmetic in grade school and taking algebra in middle school. it's the same for every course of study, every critical learning skill. all too many of the schools that our children attend, they are not getting the kind of preschool to high school education that will make them

competitive. as a result, of the african-american students who graduate from high school and enroll in college, approximately half must take remedial courses. and that is courses for which they pay full college tuition, but receive no credit. so learn subjects they should have been taught and gotten command of before they got to college. and that's only students who enroll in college. think of the number if we applied that standard to those who's education ends in high school. these numbers like the numbers for college graduation paint a bleak picture, but not a hopeless one. in fact, the outlook for improving the precollege education our children get has never been more hopeful. for one thing, we have the president in the white house who recognizes the value of the education to the country who has called education the economic issue of our time.

a president who has committed billions of dollars to an aggressive program of improving public education. and we have in cities and states around the country mayors and chancellors and superintendents who have instituted public school reforms designed to start making schools better, not some day, but today. here in new york, this administration has made education reform one of it's top priorities and mayor bloomberg has given two chancellors, first joel klein and now dennis walcott the authority and support they need to make the changes that have to be made. one of those changes has been the growth of public charter schools. charter schools have flourished here in harlem. the wall street journal last night -- last year reported that

harlem had 37,700 students educating kids in these communities. these charters and the leaders like the harlem children zone, led by jeffrey canada, like the academies, and the success charter schools will not and cannot replace all of the public schools. but they are a right now educational option for students and families who need and deserve a better education. not some day, but right now. they are also great educational laboratories, where innovative approaches to learning can be tried, tested, and refined before being taken to scale in the public school system. and because they are choice options for students who believe that they are ill served by the system, school they attend, they are a competitive force, pushing system schools to get better. again, not some day, but right

away. that choice and that competition are absolutely vital forces in making our schools better. absolutely vital. our families need to be able to make a choice. and they need to have competitive options to choose from. and in giving our children the education they need to prosper, here in harlem or whenever they make their homes. that must be our goal. of course, charter schools are not the only force for public school reform in harlem and new york city or around the country. schools systems are working to help teachers and schools improve the education they give their students. teachers who cannot improve will not improve are being replaced. schools that cannot improve -- schools that are failing are being shut down and reconstituted. like change in any great

constitution and in our school system our great institutions change can be painful and disruptive for individuals who are affected. but the ultimate standard has to be the students who's lives are at stake. are they learning what they need to in order to progress in their education to and through college? are they learning what they need to in order to build their careers to support their families and to give back to their communities? you know, when they lawsuit was filed here at about location of charter schools in spaces where traditional schools are and the issue was should we shut down now schools that have been termed failing? those who file the lawsuit say we should take more time to try to fix those schools. but every day you ware house the student in the failing school.

it's the day that that student losing the opportunity to prepare for the competitive world that he or she will face upon graduation. if we don't take care of these kids now, -- now -- their futures in prosperity, and the future and prosperities of our communities are threatened. some have shrunk from the promise of change and from the necessity to make change. uncf, it's member colleges, universities, and scholarship programs have help educate generation after generation, including many of the story figures in harlem history and culture. and it is uncf considered judgment, indeed our firm conviction that the place for those who -- for those who are committed to the generation of our next generation is with

chancellor walcott on the side of charter school and aggressive school reform which does not accept failure complacently. with the courts decision in favor of the chancellor reform, most if not all of the issues have been resolved. we are gratified by that outcome. uncf did not agree with the position taken by those who filed the suit, but with a decision handed down, it is time for awful those who oppose to stand together and make sure the kids get the opportunity to learn not not future, but to learn right now. my friends, for centuries education has been our lifelong. in slavery, as frederick douglass said, it became our pathway out of slavery. martin luther jr. fought for our

legal right for education. they did not fight alone. they didn't will it into existence, they mobilized america, black and white to demand the right for the education. together they fought and together they won. now it is our turn to fight. for the right to a good education, a rigorous education, an education that starts on the first day of preschool and doesn't end until at least college graduation day. and nobody hands a child an education. you got to teach that child. and the lesson that child learns that education means work. and the harder that you work the more education you will get. the fight will not be won by mayors and chancellors alone, nor by charter schools or the people that started them. the fight will be won only, can

only be won if all of us demand that good education, that many so of us got became made a right for all americans. because if we, the people, demand not only will this -- not only this mayor, but other mayors and all of the successors and all of the mayors across the country will make it their priority. the decision between charter schools and the union, the most powerful and surprising voices i thought were the voices of parents who demanded the right to choose the school, in this case, the charter school they wanted for their children. the right to choose not some day, but now. the supreme court heard them and

ruled in their favor. i hope and pray america heard them as well. that their powerful voices will be supported by all of us who want america -- american children of color to get a 21st century education. when that happens, and i think it will happen, i will ask to turn to the harlem book fair to speak on the state of african-american literacy and education. but the state that african-american literacy in education is strong and getting stronger. for now, my message is that america has yet to live up to it promise. black children are still more likely to attend a failing school, and too many will either not graduate from high school,

or will graduate with a diploma that does not signal they are college ready. harlem, we have work to do. president obama has challenges us to regain our global position as the number one producer of college graduates. we're now not even in the top ten. today -- to do that, we must double the number over the next ten years of african-americans who graduate from college. this spring and during the course of this year, 120,000 african-americans earned a college degree. 120,000 of the three million who are pursuing a college degree. we need to double that number to 250,000 over the next ten years. to do that, we must increase substantially the number of college ready high school graduates that we produce in every district, where african-americans attend schools.

to do that, we must close failings schools and replace them with either high performing public schools, including charter schools, good schools that will make sure those degrees mean something. to do that, uncf will do it's part, supporting education reform all across this country. but we need you, harlem, we need you, harlem to join us in making sure that every child gets a high quality public education that will prepare them for college, career, and citizenship. every child must have that chance. because as uncf has told you for 40 years, a mind is a terrible thing to waste. thank you. [applause] [applause] >> i think i went over my time. [laughter]

>> michael lomax, president of the harlem negro fund wrapping up his speech at new york library for research in black culture. live coverage from the 13th annual harlem book fair will continue after this short break. up next, the panel discussion of the late manning marables discussion of the recent " malcolm x." >> there's a book about machiavelli that's sitting on my desk that came out several weeks

ago. i want to read that book about machiavelli. and then there's a book called "reckless" which is about what went on in terms of the financial crisis in the country and what led up to it and involved two local businesses, freddie mac and fannie mae. so i have -- i know lots of players. i'm curious to read and find out what happened there. and then there's some thing that is i want to go back and read. you know there was recently a controversy about huck finn. and the use of the n word. and there was a professor who took it out of the text. and this sparked a controversy about sanitizing american history or in the context of my own book, sort of politically correct speech code and how inappropriate it was given the fact that mark twain, samuel clemons wrote it with the power of that word intended.

so i want to just take a look at what the sanitized, if you will, text looks like. i've picked up that book. again, that's sitting on my desk. and then there are -- there are two books. i'm trying to remember their names. it's such an opportunity to help out our authors that i'm reading. but one is a book by lawrence block who's a mystery writer. and i think it's called a drop of the hard stuff. it's a mystery novel. and lawrence block is to me just a terrific, terrific mystery writer. that's actually at the top of my list. if i wasn't here tonight, i'd go read lawrence block. yeah, i think lawrence block is terrific. and then george, who's a mystery writer who writes about mysteries that are set in washington, d.c. has a new book coming out. his wife told me about it

because she exercised at the same y i go to. i'm looking forward to that. you know, he has to -- he sets scenes on streets that i travel every day. i want to see what george has done. >> tell us what you are reading this summer. send us a tweet at booktv. >> host: july was a busy month in publishing news with the liquidation of borders, and now the latest on the google book settlement. what's the latest? >> guest: there was a hearing. he wasn't happy. the bottom line is both parties want more time. even though judge chin granted an extension, the next hearing

will be september 15th. he's really pushing for something to happen. and if the two opposing parties, google and the authors guild and the association of american publishers working in tandem. if they don't seem to come to some sort of an agreement, judge chin intimated that he may have to come to some sort of ruling and force the issue. he could also like to see just more things happening. it's -- this hearing has been delayed and delayed all summer long. originally, there was something supposed to happen in april. then it was june, then it was july. now we're being pushed off to september. and after so many years, i mean the original lawsuit happened around six years ago or so. and the fact that judge chin has already moved -- he's been promoted up to the second quarter of appeals. he's, you know, this is one of his outstanding cases in the southern