Article by Jessica Tomiko Anders
Photos of Academically Correct by Jessica Tomiko Anders


Hiphop is an important resource for reaching youth. 

My colleagues and I have created a learning model that provides underserved youth with lessons and activities that use standard methods of written and oral communication, while complimenting their home communities. We have produced a series of educational programs that incorporate this model. These programs are designed to ensure a safe and comfortable learning environment by training teachers, volunteers and students to teach and to learn in innovative ways.

Hiphop has become an international movement in both popular and intellectual culture and most of the programs use elements of Hiphop and music to teach language arts skills. Using Hiphop along with other teaching methods, we have been able to successfully engage youth in learning tangible subjects such as literacy, math and history as well as intangible values such as self-esteem and community pride.

One of our successful programs is Academically Correct (AC) at Austin-East High School. Created by Loretta Perkins and me, this program focuses on writing and engages youth of all reading levels by involving them in peer learning activities. 

The program consists of several stages. First, each student is invited to submit a writing sample. Second, a student board chooses samples and selects honors students to work with developing writers on edits and corrections. Finally, selected writers are featured on the school’s weekly television talk show, “Academically Correct,” to read and discuss their writings with the student hosts.

A significant segment of the program is geared towards truly engaging youth in writing and documenting their life experiences and other issues that are of interest to them. In order to do this, we have used cultural elements of Hiphop, such as the art of freestyling.

For instance, during April, National Poetry Month, student hosts for the AC program inaugurated a school-wide poetry contest called “Poetic Cypher.” The students felt this name spoke to the freestyle culture that prevails in inner city schools and also to the sense of open and friendly competition that would inspire participation.

The goal was to get students who would not normally write poetry for public consumption to feel comfortable sharing their thoughts.

As part of the contest, the student hosts researched the historical and multicultural use of Hiphop as a form of communication and shared their findings on the AC talk show. Each winner performed an original freestyle for the show. Those series of programs gained the broadest student support.

The positive response to the Hiphop model and its success in teaching literacy skills helped us realize that we need to work more closely with students to improve their overall reading and writing skills.

To do this, we have set up an after-school component for the Fall. Each week this program will feature a different group of ten developing reading/writing students who will attend a four-day session to work on their reading, writing and presentation skills.

In addition, Academically Correct will host workshops for teachers and education majors from the University of Tennessee. These workshops are adapted from methods and curriculum developed by D. Fischer Banks and me for the 2001 Mind Over Matter Writing Workshop in Gainesville, Florida.

Jessica Anders is the Program Coordinator at the Community Partnership Center at the University of Tennessee, Knoxville. You can reach her at janders@utk.edu.

Contact: D. Fischer Banks banks@hiphoparchive.org