Supporting Black Home-Insecure Mothers in Charlotte, North Carolina

Black Mothers

Welcome to the Supporting Black Home-Insecure Mothers in Charlotte, NC Project.

Dr. Kendra Jason, Dr. Janaka Bowman Lewis and Dr. Tehia Starker Glass are Gambrell Faculty Fellows for their project, “Bridging the Gap: Black Women and Families & Social Mobility in Charlotte, NC during the COVID-19 pandemic." This project centers Black home-secure mothers as problem solvers, policy influencers, and change makers when it comes to social mobility, or the ability to move up in society to access better education, housing, employment, and economic opportunities. in Charlotte, NC.

Nearly 80% of Black mothers are breadwinners of their family.

Black women are the economic core of many Black families, yet, their voices and experiences are missing in economic policy and practice-based solutions concerning the problems they navigate daily.

For Mothers

Black mothers, in particular, experience higher poverty rates and lack the opportunity for social mobility.

As housing affordability steeply declines in Charlotte, Black mothers face even more uncertainty. Further, COVID-19 exacerbates this economic crisis magnifying racial, gender, and income inequalities; and put their childrens’ education at risk. There is an urgent need to identify the systems and policies that leave families who live in poverty behind.

Research

Making a Difference

The 2014 Chetty et al. study declared Charlotte as 50th in the largest 50 cities for children who are born in poverty to acquire the upward mobility to move out of poverty.

See Research

UNC Charlotte

The Supporting Black Home-Insecure Black Mothers in Charlotte, NC Project is led by three Black Motherscholars at UNC Charlotte: Dr. Kendra Jason, Dr. Janaka Bowman Lewis, and Dr. Tehia Starker Glass.

As Black mothers and scholars of Black experiences, equity, anti-racism, and social justice, Drs. Jason, Lewis, and Glass wanted to better understand COVID-19’s impact on vulnerable Black mother’s social mobility– including housing security, work, and their children’s educational stability.