A Plan That Works

His conviction is based on the most personal kind of evidence--his own childhood in East Chicago, Ind. Comer tells how he and three friends started out at an integrated school in one of the more comfortable parts of town. All of them were as intelligent and capable as anyone at the school. Yet, Comer sadly reports, he was the only one of the four to "survive'' school and succeed in life; one friend died young from alcoholism, another has spent much of his life in jail, and the third has been in and out of mental institutions.

Comer believes that the only difference between him and his friends was their family experience. Although his parents had little education--Comer's father was a steel-mill laborer with a 7th grade education and his mother was a domestic with no formal schooling--they gave their children the clear, consistent message that school was the ticket to a better future. The five Comer children went on to earn 13 college degrees between them, thanks, Comer says, to that unwavering encouragement and support.

"That experience made me aware that we were losing too many bright, able people'' because they lacked family support, Comer says. "All of those young people could have been successful, and yet they all went on a downhill course because of something that didn't happen at home and something that...