Several hundred business, political and health care and education leaders spent a Saturday morning and afternoon working on solving problems in Prince George’s County and the state of Maryland.

The Maryland Black Issues Conference, held on Sat., Nov. 7 at Bowie State University, was billed as a “solution-based conference.”

Vittrup's mentor at the University of Texas, Rebecca Bigler, ran an experiment in three preschool classrooms, where 4- and 5-year-olds were lined up and given T shirts. Half the kids were randomly given blue T shirts, half red. The children wore the shirts for three weeks. During that time, the teachers never mentioned their colors and never grouped the kids by shirt color.

The kids didn't segregate in their behavior. They played with each other freely at recess. But when asked which color team was better to belong to, or which team might win a race, they chose their own color. They believed they were smarter than the other color. "The Reds never showed hatred for Blues," Bigler observed. "It was more like, 'Blues are fine, but not as good as us.' " When Reds were asked how many Reds were nice, they'd answer, "All of us." Asked how many Blues were nice, they'd answer, "Some." Some of the Blues were mean, and some were dumb—but not the Reds.

Bigler's experiment seems to show how children will use whatever you give them to create divisions—seeming to confirm that race becomes an issue only if we make it an issue. So why does Bigler think it's important to talk to children about race as early as the age of 3?

Her reasoning is that kids are developmentally prone to in-group favoritism; they're going to form these preferences on their own. Children naturally try to categorize everything, and the attribute they rely on is that which is the most clearly visible.

How do researchers test a 6-month-old? They show babies photographs of faces. Katz found that babies will stare significantly longer at photographs of faces that are a different race from their parents, indicating they find the face out of the ordinary. Race itself has no ethnic meaning per se—but children's brains are noticing skin-color differences and trying to understand their meaning.

When the kids turned 3, Katz showed them photographs of other children and asked them to choose whom they'd like to have as friends. Of the white children, 86 percent picked children of their own race. When the kids were 5 and 6, Katz gave these children a small deck of cards, with drawings of people on them. Katz told the children to sort the cards into two piles any way they wanted. Only 16 percent of the kids used gender to split the piles. But 68 percent of the kids used race to split the cards, without any prompting. In reporting her findings, Katz concluded: "I think it is fair to say that at no point in the study did the children exhibit the Rousseau type of color-blindness that many adults expect."

Bigler ran a study in which children read brief biographies of famous African-Americans. For instance, in a biography of Jackie Robinson, they read that he was the first African-American in the major leagues. But only half read about how he'd previously been relegated to the Negro Leagues, and how he suffered taunts from white fans. Those facts—in five brief sentences were omitted in the version given to the other children.

After the two-week history class, the children were surveyed on their racial attitudes. White children who got the full story about historical discrimination had significantly better attitudes toward blacks than those who got the neutered version. Explicitness works. "It also made them feel some guilt," Bigler adds. "It knocked down their glorified view of white people." They couldn't justify in-group superiority.

Minority parents are more likely to help their children develop a racial identity from a young age. April Harris-Britt, a clinical psychologist and professor at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, found that all minority parents at some point tell their children that discrimination is out there, but they shouldn't let it stop them. Is this good for them? Harris-Britt found that some preparation for bias was beneficial, and it was necessary—94 percent of African-American eighth graders reported to Harris-Britt that they'd felt discriminated against in the prior three months.

But if children heard these preparation-for-bias warnings often (rather than just occasionally), they were significantly less likely to connect their successes to effort, and much more likely to blame their failures on their teachers—whom they saw as biased against them.

Harris-Britt warns that frequent predictions of future discrimination ironically become as destructive as experiences of actual discrimination: "If you overfocus on those types of events, you give the children the message that the world is going to be hostile—you're just not valued and that's just the way the world is."

"But where are the conservative conviction politicians in Washington who will use this situation to loudly demand justice, and promote school vouchers, for the poor kids in P.G. County? As many have noted, the lack of access to a quality education is a civil rights issue, one that calls out for vouchers as an emergency measure for kids stuck in failing schools. For any who doubt this, consider the account of Jessica Pinkney, a Prince George’s County high school junior, who told a Post reporter that two days after the school year began, she was finally moved to the cafeteria from the gym, because the cafeteria had air conditioning. And then she was given an index card with the number 195 on it — her place in line to receive an academic schedule. This should not happen in America, and when it does, the citizens under the thumb of the authorities responsible should be liberated from their dependence."

Four books that have been long out of print by the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. will be published again under a deal with Beacon Press brokered by King's youngest son.

In a statement, Dexter King called the deal "an historic partnership."

"Beacon Press will be a dedicated public outlet for his work and will help bring his urgently needed teachings of nonviolence and human dignity, and his dream of freedom and equality to a new global audience," said Dexter King, chairman of his father's estate.

President Obama...admitted that the Muslims all over the world were denied certain “rights and opportunities.” He admitted that Muslim-majority countries were treated as “proxies without regard to their own aspirations.” He also underscored the failure of the Muslims in coping with “the sweeping change brought by modernity and globalization.”

“This cycle of suspicion and discord must end,” asserted the President. Peace-makers must be empowered. A new beginning must be ushered in between the US and the Muslims. He vowed to fight against the negative stereotypes of Islam wherever they appeared. Brave words. The President’s speech unfolded a brave vision. One hopes that Obama will be able to translate his grand vision into reality.

Speaking about the negative stereotypes of Islam, Obama referred to similar stereotypes of America. Unfortunately America has earned these stereotypes by what it has been doing in the last few decades in many countries, just as Islam has earned its stereotypes by its actions. No one can deny what Obama says about the liberal attitudes of America towards diverse cultures, races, religions and languages. “[T]here is a mosque in every state of our union, and over 1200 mosques within our borders,” said the President.

Several pairs of eyes follow the girl as she pedals around the playground in an affluent suburb of Baltimore. But it isn't the redheaded fourth grader who seems to have moms and dads of the jungle gym nervous on this recent Saturday morning. It's the African-American man—six feet tall, bearded and wearing a gray hooded sweatshirt—watching the girl's every move. Approaching from behind, he grabs the back of her bicycle seat as she wobbles to a stop. "Nice riding," he says, as the fair-skinned girl turns to him, beaming. "Thanks, Daddy," she replies. The onlookers are clearly flummoxed.