Black Scholars Open Fire On Kangan Roxbury Project

A local committee of black scholars decided Dec. 2 to campaign publicly against a research project being carried on in Roxbury by Jerome Kagan, professor of Social Relations.

Jean Morrison, coordinator of the committee, said yesterday that the project was rejected because of the national implications it might have in determining guidelines for future government-funded educational programs.

The Community Research Review Committee (CRRC), established last summer by the Boston Black United Front to review and evaluate all research being done in the black community, originally rejected Kagan's project to study the "cognitive development" of children on Oct. 30

Morrison said that, as far as the CRRC knows. Kagan intends to continue the project.

Both Richard Kearsley, research associate in pediatrics working on the project, and Kagan were not available for comment yesterday.

The CRRC released in September a statement outlining their standards for evaluating research proposals.

"The criteria are aimed toward controlling the researchers who run willy-nilly through the Black community with no sense of commitment to or responsibility for the lives of the people they affect." James Jones. assistant professor of Social Psychology and member of the Association of Black Faculty and Administrators, said yesterday.

"The statement says precisely that you have to adhere to these requirements and if you don't. you can try your luck." Jones said.

Jones Gaid the CRRC hopes that it will become " normal process" for re-searchers to submit outlines of their projects to the committee.

"Harvard and other universities will presumably understand that the CRRC fully intends to monitor research in the Black community," Jones added.

Several members of the Association of Black Faculty and Administrators at Harvard were instrumental in forming the CRRC and are now serving on it with other black behavioral, medical, and social scientists.

One of the CRRC's requirements is that "projects to be conducted in the Black community must provide to the CRRC sufficient funds for the committee's operation," estimated at about ten per cent of total project funds.

The CRRC statement also stipulates that "all research conducted in the Black community must involve significant Black personnel, including a Black co-investigator who is approved by the CRRC."

Kagan's research, to be conducted over a four year period, will center on a group of black infants from 31/2 months to 31/2 years of age. The CRRC is concerned about the effects of intense research on such young children, Morrison said.

The National Institute of Health is funding the research project.