From The Seattle Times
By Leonard Pitts Jr.

Success breeds separation.

That’s the thing no one tells you, the thing sometimes you don’t realize, the thing that might make a child turn from his own potential. Success is like a pyramid, broad at the bottom, but narrow at the summit; the higher you go, the fewer people go with you.

It’s a frightening thing for anyone, but especially frightening, perhaps, when you are young, gifted and black and coming of age in a culture where “everything” — from the shows on television to the friends at your side — says there is a certain way people like you are supposed to walk and talk and act and be.

The young men and women of Self Enhancement Inc. know all about it. Take Emanuel Ford. He is 18, a student at Grant High. Ford was born in Inglewood, Calif., in the territory of the Bloods street gang. His parents were both drug addicts.

Then his mother straightened herself up and moved him here, where he is flourishing. He looks back at the old places and, yes, he says, he feels that separation.

“My cousins and all my family members down there are still doing the same thing, still smokin’ weed, still bangin’. I feel like if I was still in that kind of position, I’d probably be shot, probably dead or in jail. By the grace of God I … changed my life, got on the right road and now I’m headed on the right path.”

For 11 years, Ford has been a client of SEI, a network of support programs — tutoring, college prep, sports and more — serving 2,300 students a year between second grade and age 25. It is featured in this installment of “What Works” — my series of columns on programs that are making a difference for black kids — because it, well, works. Two-thirds of its students improve their grades and behavior; 98 percent of its high-school freshmen graduate on time; 85 percent go to college.

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