SSW 03.02.16

RESTORATIVE JUSTICE

C O M I N G S O O N ONE EARTH COMING SOON ONE EARTH FILM FESTIVAL ONE EARTH FILM FESTIVAL FILM FESTIVAL Moving Planet, Moving People

Moving Planet, Moving People Moving Planet, Moving People CH

MAR , 4-6 6H R1C 20 MA H C R A , 6 M 4- , -616 40 2 2016

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“This Changes Everything” OFFICIAL SCREENING EVENT OFFICIAL SCREENING EVENT Saturday March 5, 3 PM “This “This Changes Changes Everything” Everything” Saturday MarchStation 5, 3 PM Experimental Saturday March 5, 3 PM

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Stay after the film to learn about concrete, local action opportunities. First Presbyterian food program and other local advocacy groups will be present.

6100 S. Blackstone Ave, Chicago 6100 S. Blackstone Ave, Chicago Stay after the film to learn about concrete, local action opportunities. First

Stay after the filmprogram to learn and about concrete, local action opportunities.

First Presbyterian food other local advocacy groups will be present.

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SPONSORS 2 SOUTH SIDE WEEKLY MARCH 2, 2016 SPONSORS ¬

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SOUTH SIDE WEEKLY The South Side Weekly is an independent nonprofit newsprint magazine written for and about neighborhoods on the South Side of Chicago. We publish in-depth coverage of the arts and issues of public interest alongside oral histories, poetry, fiction, interviews, and artwork from local photographers and illustrators. The South Side Weekly is dedicated to supporting cultural and civic engagement on the South Side and to providing educational opportunities for developing journalists, writers, and artists.

Editor-in-Chief Osita Nwanevu Executive Editor Bess Cohen Managing Editors Jake Bittle, Olivia Stovicek Politics Editor Christian Belanger Education Editor Mari Cohen Music Editor Maha Ahmed Stage & Screen Julia Aizuss Editor Visual Arts Editor Corinne Butta Editor-at-Large Emeline Posner Contributing Editors Will Cabaniss, Sarah Claypoole, Eleonora Edreva,

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Send submissions, story ideas, comments, or questions to editor@southsideweekly.com or mail to: South Side Weekly 6100 S. Blackstone Ave. Chicago, IL 60637 For advertising inquiries, contact: (773) 234-5388 or advertising@southsideweekly Read our stories online at southsideweekly.com

IN CHICAGO A week’s worth of developing stories, odd events, and signs of the times, culled from the desks, inboxes, and wandering eyes of the editors Dark Days Governor Bruce Rauner, although wary of weighing in on the presidential race, took a strong stance on Monday: "The one thing I will say, and I will say emphatically, there is no place in American society for the Ku Klux Klan.

There is no place in American society for racism and bigotry. I'll say that."

This wildly uncontroversial statement was forced out of Rauner’s mouth

by Republican frontrunner Donald Trump’s recent disingenuous reaction to an endorsement by David Duke, former Grand Dragon of the Ku Klux Klan. Meanwhile, Mayor Rahm Emanuel swung at Trump’s low-hanging fruit by making a sweeping indictment of what he calls the “dark forces” Trump is playing with (which include Benito Mussolini, whose quote Trump recently retweeted) as well as a less-than-elegant joke that compared the presidential race to Trump’s reality show “The Apprentice.” Fortunately, unlike on “The Apprentice,” the winner of the presidential race is not determined by Trump’s whims. Well, not completely, at least.

Segregation in CPS As Black History Month comes to a close, and Chicago reflects on its progress towards racial harmony, many Chicago families remain frustrated with Chicago Public Schools. Although the institution has changed a lot over the years, one source of acrimony has existed for decades: segregation. Some

parents remain frustrated with the lack of integration within schools while others worry about the new environment integration will create for their kids. In light of these discussions, Kartemquin Films has made and released a documentary showing the historical origins of the problem: their new film ’63 Boycott narrates the 1963 boycott of CPS’s segregationist policies.

A Dream Deferred The Lakeside Development, a massive building project designed to turn the ruins of a South Chicago steel plant into a second downtown, has run into serious trouble. On Monday, Pittsburgh-based U.S. Steel, which owns the land and had promised to supply developer McCaffery Interests with equity for the project, announced that the two groups have split ways. The (lack of ) new development means that Lake Shore Drive will be rerouted to pass through a bunch of empty fields from 79th to 92nd Streets for the foreseeable future. This leaves the developer’s plans for 17.5 million square feet of new commercial space up in the air, even though construction of a Mariano’s seemed close to beginning as part of the development’s first phase in 2014. In an interview with Crain’s, however, CEO Dan McCaffery didn’t seem too worried, and why should he be? He’s got successful developments across the country, including massive projects in the D.C. area.

IN THIS ISSUE a healing space

"do you know who's hiring?"

It has taken decades for restorative justice to become the method of choice. sonia schlesinger...4

The goal is to have students document their journey in tackling youth unemployment. marissa warner...11

crossed wires

They read stories of children given demerits or spanked for every word they spoke in Spanish. sammie spector...6

in the weeds

“I can’t imagine what businesses it’s going to bring in, except maybe a snack shop.” lewis page...7

notes from the white rhino

If students feel like they do not belong, the data will never improve. ray salazar...12

Cover art by Ellen Hao

S

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walking the walk

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MARCH 2, 2016 ¬ SOUTH SIDE WEEKLY 3

A Healing Space

Activists embrace restorative justice as a tool to dismantle the school-to-prison pipeline in CPS

BY SONIA SCHLESINGER

E

very Tuesday, fourteen University of Chicago students sit down with fifth, seventh, and eighth grade students at Chavez Elementary School in Back of the Yards to discuss topics ranging from Langston Hughes to friendship to getting in trouble in class. Participants cannot talk over one another; instead, they pass a talking piece from person to person so that each feels comfortable speaking.

The UofC students are members of the newly created Chicago Peace Corps (CPC), founded in the summer of 2015 through the University’s Sargent Shriver Fellowship Program which provides fellows with leadership training in public service. They are keeping Circle, a practice intended to create dialogue and build community. Beyond support and discussion, the Circles include conflict resolution and healing practices.

Circle is just one component of a multifaceted approach to justice known as restorative justice, or reconciliation between offenders, victims, and their community. At its core, restorative justice aims to transform society’s understanding of punishment.

“We think of crime as infractions against the state,” said CPC director Ivan Parfenoff.

“The victim doesn’t matter, whoever instigated the conflict doesn’t matter, it’s just about the punishment. But there are other ways to do it.”

Restorative justice mandates substitutes for prison as the primary means of punishment, mainly in the form of sentencing Circles between perpetrators and victims of the crime.

In schools, it involves drastically reducing the number of suspensions and expulsions. CPC, along with Chicago law schools, churches, and social justice organizations, teaches restorative justice in Chicago Public Schools (CPS) as an alternative to long-established zero-tolerance policies that require automatic suspension or expulsion for some disciplinary offenses.

Restorative justice methods have also been endorsed by many activist groups. The Black Youth Project 100 has advocated for restorative justice in schools and communities and within their own organization: when Chicago BYP100 organizer Malcolm London was accused of sexual assault, the group wrote on its Facebook page that it intended to hold him accountable using a “transformative and 4 SOUTH SIDE WEEKLY ¬ MARCH 2, 2016

COURTESY OF THE CHICAGO PEACE CORPS

Founding members and Directors of Chicago Peace Corps participating in a four-day long circle training to practice peace circles and restorative justice. This session was held at the Precious Blood with Father David Kelly and youth participants. restorative justice process.”

Ultimately, organizations like CPC are working to dismantle the school-to-prison pipeline. But it has taken decades for restorative justice to become the method of choice.

T

he concept of restoring justice to a victim and to a community, rather than to the state, is not a new one. It is known for its roots in early civilizations, including restitution for violent and property crimes in Sumer and Babylon. Ireland operated under the Brehon Laws prior to the Norman invasion in 1169, which called for compensation rather than punishment. Some Southern African communities use Ubuntu today.” The

term translates to “human kindness” and the philosophy of Ubuntu favors reconciliation over retribution, and restorative justice over punitive laws.

Since the 1970s, lawyers, educators, policy-makers, and activists have been working to bring a similar system to the U.S., where many believe the traditional justice system is broken. Victim-offender reconciliation programs emerged in Kitchner, Ontario in 1974 and in Elkart, Indiana in 1978 to encourage dialogue between perpetrators and victims of crime.

Meanwhile, Americans’ concept of criminal justice had changed under President Nixon, who repeatedly asserted that the 1960s’ 120 percent increase in crime stemmed from

a lenient criminal justice system rather than from social causes. While crime decreased significantly, advocating for “weak on crime” policies grew akin to political suicide, and incarceration rates soared.

Restorative justice practices continued to develop haphazardly in local forms throughout the nineties, but national efforts stopped.

Schools took on zero-tolerance policies after 1999 in response to the Columbine school shooting, including harsher disciplinary practices and police in schools.

T

hough restorative justice efforts have cropped up in schools throughout the country for decades, they are particu-

EDUCATION

COURTESY OF THE CHICAGO PEACE CORPS

Ivan Parfenoff, Director of the Chicago Peace Corps, talking with Father David Kelly in the restorative justice cafe that is held biweekly on Art on 51 Street.

Fr. Kelly is the Executive Director of Precious Blood Ministry of Reconciliation ("Precious Blood") in Back of the Yards, and is a prime figure in promoting restorative justice in the city of Chicago. larly difficult to establish in Chicago, according to Murphy. “I would say what’s making Chicago worse than other places is high levels of segregation,” she says. “These people are segregated from birth and the schools have become pipelines to prison.”

A 2015 University of Chicago Consortium on School Research study found that about one-third of African-American boys and twenty-three percent of African-American girls received out-of-school suspensions in CPS during the 2013-14 year, even after suspension rates for CPS overall had dropped significantly from the previous year.

Michael Seng, a professor at Chicago’s John Marshall Law School, started a Restorative Justice Project at John Marshall five years ago in an attempt to alleviate these discrepancies. The program sends John Marshall students into juvenile courts and city prisons to observe proceedings. They are then trained as peer counselors and Circle-keepers to work in schools with initially high suspension rates.

“I think it’s been very positive for the law

students,” Seng said. “It shows them alternative ways to deal with offenders and heighten their skills in alternative dispute resolution.”

According to Murphy, who now works with the John Marshall students, the program has proved successful for CPS students as well.

“The kids don’t believe in justice yet, so they call it restorative practice,” she said. “But it’s opening a door for them where there really wasn’t one before.”

In some ways, the school district has facilitated the growth of restorative justice in CPS. In 2006 the School Board officially removed all zero-tolerance-related language from the Student Code of Conduct, and in 2014 the Board implemented a Suspensions and Expulsions Reductions plan, which called for the addition of more than one hundred restorative practice coaches and other support for restorative justice in schools. By the halfway point of the 2014-15 school year, out-of-school suspensions had fallen sixty percent; expulsions fell sixty-nine percent.

Father David Kelly of the Precious Blood

Ministry of Reconciliation, which works with offenders, believes these programs still have a long way to go. “There are some good programs in CPS schools but in my experience CPS has not really embraced a restorative philosophy,” he explained. “It’s the exception to the rule if you find a CPS school with a strong restorative program.” Funding needs for restorative justice programs exacerbates this issue. CPS Restorative Justice Coordinator Edwin Johnson, was laid off in January as part of CPS budget cuts.

CPS Deputy Press Secretary Michael Passman said that the loss of Johnson will not have major effects on schools already using restorative justice. “CPS is fully committed to supporting restorative practices that help students resolve conflicts in a safe, constructive manner while keeping them in the classroom so they can continue to learn and grow,” he said. Johnson’s duties have been transferred to other CPS employees with restorative justice experience.

Parfenoff, who studied CPS restorative justice policies during his training as a CPC Circle keeper, maintains that the loss of an official coordinator will not prove significant because the CPS employees have not received thorough enough restorative justice training anyway. He explains that, “while I think it’s a step backward for him to be fired, I don’t think that they were necessarily going about it in the best way to begin with.”

Advocates argue that funding should not inhibit these practices in CPS, as restorative justice is in fact far cheaper than its alternatives. Enforcement of zero-tolerance policies necessitates funds for expulsion hearings, police officers, and security guards. In 2010, CPS designated $51.4 million for security guards in schools and $8 million per year for Chicago Police Department officers in each of the city’s ninety-six high schools. A 2012 study by the High HOPES campaign, a coalition of organizations against harsh school discipline, found that a full-time restorative justice coordinator in each CPS school plus training services and compensation for those involved would cost CPS $43.8 million or less than one percent of the CPS budget.

According to Seng, most agree that restorative justice is an obvious solution to CPS students’ challenges. “I’m not sure there are

critics…the results seem to be overwhelming that it does make a difference,” he said.

“Students really like it because it gives them a chance to express their views and teachers and administrators are very supportive.”

Regularity is key to this: Parfenoff says that CPC Circles have proved particularly successful when held consistently over an extended period of time. “I’ve been working with my group…since September, and there’s been a really remarkable difference in how open these students have become,” he said. “It’s been difficult, but I’ve found that over time they’ve gotten to a point where they’re comfortable opening up about their family, friends, and life at school.”

Some assert that school-based policy is not enough. “We’re really missing the idea that there needs to be school-community integration,” said Nancy Michaels, Associate Director of Roosevelt University’s Mansfield Institute for Social Justice and Transformation. “You create a restorative space in the school, but the kids walk out the doors to an un-restorative community. In a perfect world we would build circles between schools and community personnel so that they could know one another, because right now they really don’t.”

For Father Kelly, the value of school-community collaboration has proven true multiple times. He points to the story of a young boy he worked with who robbed a home. Courts offered a Circle for the boy’s sentence that would include conversation with the victim, his family, and some people from the surrounding community. The boy had been expelled from school and one of the community members, a retired school principal, worked with him until he returned to school. The man the boy had robbed was a basketball coach. Perpetrator and victim began shooting hoops together, and the victim became a mentor for the boy.

“A new relationship was forged,” said Kelly. “It never happens if you enter into a place of division because it’s hard to seek reconciliation. But if you look at the values you carry and the relationships you can create, the issue becomes so much less. I’ve seen that over and over again.” ¬

MARCH 2, 2016 ¬ SOUTH SIDE WEEKLY 5

VISUAL ARTS

Crossed Wires

Josh Rios explores the role of language in Mexican-American identity

BY SAMMIE SPECTOR

T

wo curtains of chicken wire stood in front of a semicircle of audience members, connected by another thin wire. From an opening in one, a speaker played recorded phrases from English-to-Spanish and Spanish-to-English learning books while a man stood behind, half-caged, appearing to read along. The sparse layout spoke multitudes, with the harsh grates recalling not just the chicken coops of rural towns but also being “cooped up,” border fences, corralling people.

This is how the performance piece “I Am American: I Speak English,” created

by Chicago artist and SAIC lecturer Josh Rios and his collaborative partner Anthony Romero, began. As it continued, the duo, each member in his own chicken wire encampment, took turns reading aloud through those small openings, holding up the stories of children in the fifties and sixties who were punished for speaking Spanish rather than English in school. Passing books of oral history between them by rolling them in a tire or simply tossing them, they read stories of children given demerits or spanked for every word they spoke in Spanish. It’s a gripping manifestation of Rios’s grappling with personal and historical relationships to language.

Rios is Mexican-American, but his parents decided not to teach him Spanish. As Rios grew up, he found that he still identified with a culture that was often frustratingly hard to connect to due to the language barrier. In turn, he used art to bridge the gap he found in his “cultural lens,” or how he views ideas through Mexican-American-influenced eyes. This is the lens he inhabits in “I Am American: I Speak English.”

Both Rios and Romero grew up in Texas, though they didn’t meet until college.

Throughout their friendship, they discussed their experiences with Spanish, trying to an-

6 SOUTH SIDE WEEKLY ¬ MARCH 2, 2016

alyze what led both of their parents not to raise them as Spanish-speaking. Both had initially felt that they were the only ones, that only their parents had made this choice.

To find material for the piece, Rios and Romero immersed themselves in their Texas history: in the fifties and sixties, Mexican-American children in public elementary schools were banned from speaking Spanish during school hours. Even students who were not yet fully fluent in English were told they could not speak Spanish. These strict school policies sometimes involved corporal punishment.

“We began to realize that one of the reasons we might not have been taught Spanish was that it was drilled into our parents’ heads that it wasn’t the language of commerce, education, politics, whatever,” said Rios. “That it would be more important for us to speak English fluently, that Spanish didn’t seem relevant.”

He and Romero are perhaps investigators above all: their extensive research was based on oral histories and found objects rather than sets of empirical data. The artists worked together to interview older generations, Rios’s parents included, and reviewed thousands of books in order to conduct the performance. The insight Romero and Rios gained from their research was quite personal: they discovered that they had been separated from their language in more ways than one. “The first shame comes from these elementary school students not being able to speak their cultural language, thus parents not passing it on,” said Rios. “Now, a generation later, I’m wondering if I’m ‘authentic’ because I can’t speak the language, but I still identify as Mexican-American. I feel like I would be in a better position now if I did learn it. Especially trying to conduct this research, it would have come in handy.”

When asked how he and Romero ex-

JASMIN LIANG

ecuted the piece, Rios thought about it for a while and then told me what they didn’t want in their performance. “One thing we don’t want to do is spoon-feed lessons didactically,” he said. “Our guests are usually

artists; they’re interested in the complexity, maybe more interested in the confusion as a productive critical state to be in.” His best solution is to not worry too much about cramming information into a single piece.

“Now, a generation later, I’m wondering if I’m ‘authentic’ because I can’t speak the language but still identify as Mexican-American.”

—Josh Rios

“We don’t treat all of this research as specialized insider info, as precious, we take it as a universal fact. We extrapolate these experiences. We show our audience our truth, rather than negotiating with them; we have them accept, then experience.”

The performance was held at the Poet’s Theater, a gallery space in Logan Square, after its leaders approached Rios and Romero to create a new project for an ambitious three-day festival. To understand his and Romero’s work, Rios tells me I must first understand Poet’s Theater—it’s not just your typical poetry reading. “It’s an actual genre,” Rios said. “It has a weird, strange performance-hybrid wackiness to it; it’s a lot of fun. It’s very interdisciplinary—lots of rich, inspiring foundations.”

Having devoted so much time, written so much work, and earmarked so many pages for “I Am American,” Rios says the Poet’s Theater performance won’t be its last iteration; he and Romero are considering putting their material into a book, and the objects will have a legacy in later projects.

“No matter what I’m doing, I always

have my ears and eyes open quite a bit,” he said. This observant outlook has paid off in myriad ways. Rios once came across two vinyl records from the seventies that were English-speaking courses, a dated Rosetta Stone of sorts. Most of the fast-track English course included pragmatic phrases such as “Where can I get a job?” or “Where is the grocery store?”, intended to get a new English speaker through the day. When he scoured for American records teaching Spanish, the parallel phrases had an almost reversed content, more along the lines of “How was your vacation?”

“It was very telling for me,” he said. “I took what I found interesting in these records and books, and they seemed to form an early modernist poetry of sorts.” This was what focused “I Am American” for Rios, the discovery that sent him researching for hours and entrapped him in chicken wire during the performance. With the use of such found objects—labels, books, and oral testimonies—he produces performance and poetry, both of which remain close to home. ¬

MARCH 2, 2016 ¬ SOUTH SIDE WEEKLY 7

In the Weeds

Medical cannabis comes to Commercial Ave.

BY LEWIS PAGE

O

n a boarded-up window behind wrought iron bars in South Chicago hangs a sign posted by the Bureau of Zoning and Land Use. It reads, “Applicant seeks a special use [sic] to establish a medical cannabis dispensary,” and marks the site of what will likely be the first medical cannabis dispensary on the South Side of Chicago.

The dispensary, helmed by Illinois Grown Medicine (IGM), would be the third to open in Chicago since the Illinois Compassionate Use of Medical Cannabis Pilot Program Act went into effect on January 1, 2014. The Act, effective for four years, allows patients diagnosed with any of approximately forty debilitating medical conditions, including spinal cord injuries, glaucoma, and multiple sclerosis, to apply for a medical cannabis registry identification card. At present, twenty-nine medical cannabis dispensaries have been licensed. Only two of these dispensaries—Dispensary 33 on the corner of Clark and Argyle and Modern Cannabis in Logan Square—are located within the city limits of Chicago.

The building, located at 8554 S. Commercial Avenue, sits across the street from some firm opposition, in the form of Frank’s Auto Rebuilders Inc., run by brothers Frank and Joe Bustos. Frank Bustos says that the posted sign is hidden from view, and that most people in the neighborhood are not aware of the proposed dispensary. He is concerned about an increase in crime that he speculates the dispensary will bring.

Bustos recalls being the lone voice of opposition on January 11 at a 10th Ward public meeting about the proposed dispensary with the South Chicago Chamber of Commerce and Alderwoman Susan Garza. Garza says that the vast majority of those in attendance at that meeting, as with an earlier meeting on January 6, were in favor of the dispensary as

8 SOUTH SIDE WEEKLY ¬ MARCH 2, 2016

“a way to bring additional jobs and security to the Commercial Avenue shopping district.” Several days later, on January 15, the Zoning Board of Appeals approved plans for the dispensary. If the dispensary is opened, Bustos—a local business owner for over thirty-five years—has said that he will sell his business and leave.

The benefits of making a holistic remedy for debilitating conditions available locally seem indisputable to supporters of the dispensary. To detractors like Bustos, the prospect of a company filling a storefront with cash and cannabis in an area struggling with crime is, at the very least, worthy of suspicion.

With national and local legislation on cannabis in flux, and a lack of local precedent, conversation between sides is fraught. The 10th Ward dispensary will open, barring any unforeseen circumstances. But the disjointed debate over the dispensary has left a small, adamantly opposed minority fighting a losing battle.

The opposition, which includes the Bustos brothers, is concerned that the high volume of cannabis and cash on the premises would attract theft and illegal drug trade.

Johnny Acoff, a retired police officer who is now the vice president of the South Shore Gardens Betterment Association, shares these concerns. “Some people have money, and some people don’t, and the people who don’t have the money want to get the money,” he says. “That’s my professional opinion from thirty-one years on these streets.”

“It’s the worst thing,” Acoff continues.

“It’s just the worst possible thing.”

Garza acknowledges that crime has been a problem in the area for many years and is an ongoing concern to homeowners, but has hopes that private security provided by the dispensary will provide a deterrent. Despite an amendment recently approved by the City

Council Finance Committee and soon to be voted on by the full council, that would loosen security standards for dispensaries in Illinois, IGM will proceed with its original security plan, which includes round-the-clock on-site security and monitored surveillance of adjacent streets, sidewalks, and alleys.

Along with reduced crime rates, Garza is optimistic that the dispensary will bring

impression on the communities of the Hyde Park Township, the area which it aims to serve. Spokesperson Desiree Tate says that as a minority-owned and operated organization, made up mainly of black Chicagoans, IGM is particularly enthusiastic about and well suited to the task of establishing the first dispensary on the South Side.

“We want to be the ones to be able to

“I think they have a misrepresentation of what this really is. They are not willing to be educated.

They have a preconceived determination of, you know, ‘we don’t want it, we don’t want it, we don’t know why we don’t want it.’”

—Desiree Tate, Illinois Grow Medicine spokesperson a much-needed boost to the local economy.

Her office is currently working with IGM on crafting a Memorandum of Understanding concerning hiring from within the 10th Ward. IGM has committed to hiring several individuals from the Ward, using union contractors, and unionizing their shop through United Food and Commercial Workers.

Acoff remains unconvinced. “They say it’s going to bring in businesses,” he says, “but I can’t imagine what businesses it’s going to bring in, except maybe a snack shop.”

Despite comments like these, IGM remains hopeful that it can make a positive

provide the medicine to this community,” Tate says.

IGM’s previous plans to open a dispensary in the 8th Ward were brought to a halt by vocal community opposition spearheaded by a group called the Eighth Ward Accountability Coalition (EWAC). As in South Chicago, a sign was posted on the building where the dispensary was slated to open. Resident Jerry Brown, who lived across the street from the building, began knocking on doors as soon as he saw the posting. Brown, sixty, an affable, lifelong Chatham resident, sees himself as particularly familiar with the community. As

MARIJUANA

LEWIS PAGE

Once a laundromat, this building at 85th Street and Commercial Avenue in South Chicago will likely soon become the site of the first medical marijuana dispensary on the South Side. Across the street is Frank's Auto Rebuilders Inc., whose owners are among the opposition fearing the dispensary will bring more crime to the neighborhood. he recalls it, only one person was neutral on the issue of the dispensary, while every other person behind the 102 doors he knocked on was opposed.

A series of community meetings with 8th Ward Alderman Michelle Harris and representatives from both IGM and the Chatham Business Association were populated by crowds of ardently opposed 8th Ward residents, many of whom held signs that read, “We don’t want it.” Harris eventually sided with EWAC and voiced her opposition to the dispensary in front of the Zoning Board of Appeals. IGM withdrew its application for

that location on November 20.

Jerry Brown and EWAC rallied opposition around two main points of contention.

The first was what Brown called “quality of ownership.” The brother of the director of operations of Harborside, a California-based firm that had partnered with IGM in the 8th Ward venture, had pleaded guilty on August 6, 2001 to a charge of possession of cannabis with intent to distribute. Brown and others in the 8th Ward felt that the involvement of the DeAngelo brothers was worthy of suspicion.

“You should hear some of the stuff these guys [the DeAngelo brothers] say. They think that

marijuana should be had after dinner, like a glass of wine,” said Brown, shaking his head.

IGM has parted ways with Harborside, rendering this complaint inapplicable to IGM’s plans for the 10th Ward. Desiree Tate says that IGM’s split with Harborside had nothing to do with EWAC’s complaints in the 8th Ward. She says that such accusations are baseless and that the partnership, like many business partnerships, “simply didn’t work out.” IGM now operates with a new consulting partner, the Denver-based dispensary Natural Remedies.

Brown’s second concern was “quality of

life,” saying that the dispensary’s location in a commercial strip in the 8th Ward was uncomfortably close to schools, parks, and a popular roller-skating rink. In South Chicago, the Bustos brothers cited similar concerns about the dispensary’s proximity to churches and schools. Alderwoman Garza does not share this apprehension; she argues that the building on Commercial Avenue is far from schools––well beyond the thousand-foot distance required by the Compassionate Use of Cannabis Act––yet still located close enough to mass transit to be accessible to patients.

(Neither parks nor churches are mentioned

MARCH 2, 2016 ¬ SOUTH SIDE WEEKLY 9

MARIJUANA

in the restrictions outlined by the Act.) With only two other dispensaries in Chicago, the ideal location for a dispensary, or whether there is such a thing, is undetermined. Brown has said that he would prefer it if the dispensary were established in an industrial area. According to DNAinfo, Mayor Rahm Emanuel and Alderman Edward Burke of the 14th Ward proposed an ordinance in 2014 that would have restricted medical cannabis cultivation centers and dispensaries to manufacturing districts within the city limits. The ordinance was rejected in favor of regulations that allowed dispensaries on commercial strips. Brown and Acoff have expressed suspicion about the dispensaries’ location with a shopfront on a commercial strip; Acoff believes that if cannabis were truly intended for medical use, it should be sold across the counter in a drug store.

The variation in legal status of cannabis across the nation further confuses the discussion. Medical cannabis is discussed in the national media as both a legitimate end on its own and as a stepping-stone toward the legalization of recreational marijuana or more relaxed penalties for drug possession and use.

Alderman Burke once used Colorado’s recent legalization of recreational marijuana as an example of the possible abuses of medical cannabis law. In the same meeting Alderman Brendan Reilly attempted to distance Illinois from comparisons to Colorado while still advocating for medical cannabis, noting that Illinois law specifically limited medical marijuana to those who were suffering from “horrendous and sometimes terminal diseases.”

The list of approved diseases is another point of contention in Illinois medical cannabis law. On January 29, Rauner’s administration announced their rejection of a proposal that would have added eight new conditions, including autism and post-traumatic stress disorder. The relatively short list of conditions that qualify for medical cannabis has caused some to worry about the economic viability of the dispensaries.

With such back-and-forth over the de-

10 SOUTH SIDE WEEKLY ¬ MARCH 2, 2016

If the dispensary is opened, Bustos—a local business owner for over thirty-five years—has said that he will sell his business and leave. tails of the implementation of the Compassionate Use of Cannabis Act pilot program, it is unclear whether those most affected by the program will be lucky recipients of cutting-edge medical technology or canaries in the coal mine. Some, like those who rallied opposition in the 8th Ward, identify themselves as falling squarely in the latter camp.

“There’s good money, and there’s bad money,” says Brown. He likens the situation to the biblical story in which a town is tormented by demons. Jesus casts the demons into a herd of pigs, and the pigs and the demons run out of town together. The town loses its livelihood, but retains something more important than anything financial security could provide.

“There is just a negativity attached to marijuana,” Brown told the Chicago Citizen this past November.

Others like Bustos and Acoff will likely not be satisfied unless the dispensary, and its inseparable association with marijuana and crime, is excised from their neighborhood like the demons and the pigs.

Tate understands the reaction that the idea of an establishment that sells cannabis can provoke. “A lot of people in our families have been hurt by illegal marijuana,” says Tate. “So it’s been a very difficult decision to make.”

In an interview with the Weekly, Brown said he was hoping to work with a lawyer along with Acoff, the Bustos brothers, and

other business owners in the 10th Ward to halt IGM’s plans by filing an injunction.

When contacted on February 24, Frank Bustos said he had not heard from Brown since he visited their shop in January. Without an injunction, Desiree Tate predicts that the dispensary will open its doors in June or July.

IGM is currently making efforts to familiarize patients and their surrounding communities with medical cannabis before the dispensary opens. To date, IGM has held six workshops in senior buildings throughout the Hyde Park Township. Tate says that in these workshops, IGM provides information about qualifying conditions, the benefits of medical cannabis, and the registration process. IGM plans to continue holding workshops like these, in senior buildings and other community centers, at least once a month.

“I would hope that those who are opposed to a dispensary would keep an open mind,” Alderwoman Garza writes.

Tate, however, understands that some will remain unconvinced, no matter how many workshops or information sessions are held. “I think they have a misrepresentation of what this really is,” she says. “They are not willing to be educated. They have a preconceived determination of, you know, ‘we don’t want it, we don’t want it, we don’t know why we don’t want it,’” Tate says.

“Some people just aren’t willing to learn about it. We understand that.” ¬

Notes from the White Rhino One way to decrease the dropout rate in CPS

Ray Salazar

O

n February 22, Chicago Public Radio and the Better Government Association reported that Chicago Public Schools made significant adjustments to the high school graduation numbers that senior leaders and Mayor Emanuel touted for years. To many of us teaching and working in CPS, this was no surprise. We know much of our work has become a numbers game. The data obsession pushes conversations about changing the data with little or no time to discuss the underlying factors producing the data.

If CPS leaders, school administrators, teachers, and staff spent less time obsessing over data points and instead focused on the underlying issues we can address reasonably, the data would improve by itself and we’d provide more meaningful learning opportunities to our students.

One key element that can drive data improvement is the quality of professional relationships in schools. As adults, we know that when we don’t feel valued or included or safe in our workplace we, if we have the option, usually look for another place of employment. It’s the same for high school students.

We have a responsibility to make school a place where students feel like they belong. Almost anyone who walks into a school building can sense both the strong and the damaged relationships in a school. Our human instinct helps us sense inclusivity; we can also sense tension.

Paramount to this is looking for examples of student voice in our schools. This does not mean that students get to say whatever they want, whenever they want, to whomever they want, however they want. It means schools demonstrate a commitment to promoting and listening to responsible uses of student voice.

We need to provide opportunities for students to express themselves in multiple formats inside our classes and inside our schools if we want students to help us change the data by feeling motivated to come to school, to learn, to earn good grades, to avoid misconduct, to graduate, and to enroll in some post-secondary option.

If students feel like they do not belong, the data will never improve.

A recent DNAinfo Chicago article explained the passion that some students have for a mariachi program. One program leader articulated how some students come to school because of the program.

But in the current data-obsessed culture, teachers are forced to comply with so much data entry (a typical high school teacher enters about 240 grades to an online grade book each week) that this leaves little time for teachers to build strong, professional relationships through meaningful academic experiences and after school programs.

Years ago, with the support of student leaders, I sponsored the Spanish Club at one Southwest Side neighborhood high school. We hosted after school parties with a DJ for every holiday. We organized field trips and brought in guest speakers.

With other teachers and student leaders at that neighborhood high school, a group of us organized a weekend leadership retreat for sophomores and juniors—groups at high risk of dropping out.

At another school—with the help of students—I sponsored the Literary Magazine Club. (I did not get paid extra for any of this). I haven’t sponsored any after school club in about seven years. There’s no time with today’s emphasis on compliance.

I’m not saying that we need to do away with grade entry or the requirements that help teachers plan and document our work. A teacher’s primary responsibility is high-quality instruction. What I am saying is that we need to remember the human element in what we do.

We cannot change parenting. We cannot solve poverty.

We cannot control our students’ lives outside of school. But making sure that our students feel valued in the school setting is what we do have control over. If students feel valued, they’ll be more willing to accept the responsibility of protecting the opportunities they’re given.

At meetings over the last twenty years, I’ve listened for the red flags put up by some colleagues and administrators who carry a deficit-based view of our students. They blame parents. And in some cases we need to. I’ve known “low-income” parents who buy their son a pre-driven BMW to help him get to school—where he does nothing. I’ve known parents who belittle their high-achieving children and tell them explicitly that they are nothing.

But after working at alternative, neighborhood, and selective-enrollment schools mostly on the Southwest Side, these parents are the exception. Still, I know every community is different.

The red flags that always signal poor professional staff-student relationships are raised when a school staff member makes comments that negate his or her lack of responsibility in our students’ education. If we don’t challenge these views, they spread even among highly dedicated staff members because we’re so burned out that it’s easy to accept irrational solutions to complex problems.

We need to create schools where students know and feel that the adults in the building take pride in what we do and value the opportunity to work with the young people who do show up.

We need to celebrate students’ progress. And we need to let students fail.

I’m a strong advocate of the University of Chicago's Consortium on School Research's findings that predict a student’s likelihood of graduating based on freshman year's grades. In too many instances, however, I’ve learned how this research is misinterpreted so that we no longer allow students the opportunity to learn from short-term failure. In these contexts, so much responsibility falls on the teacher to hunt

down the student and provide (what seems like) unending opportunities to earn a passing grade. We fail to teach young people how to save themselves.

Teachers become as ineffective as helicopter parents.

If more administrators and teachers allowed for the reasonable short-term failure (failing a test, lowering a grade due to missing assignments, dropping a grade temporarily), we could prevent the long-term failure (intense credit recovery, careless absenteeism, “transferring” but really dropping out).

Students would learn how to save themselves during an academic struggle. Still, we’d need to be sensitive about our approaches, not wave an “I told you so” finger in their faces, so students reflect and grow.

Our district and city leaders fuel an obsession with data that fails to accept that some students’ learning styles simply do not align with a traditional high school setting pushing college for all.

Alternative options for obtaining a high school diploma need to exist as long as they do not short-change our students.

These programs provide the flexibility for students who do not find or cannot find fulfillment in a traditional classroom setting—sometimes because of situations bigger than any adult could handle. However, the quality of these programs needs to be consistently checked.

The argument these days seems to always be: “We need to fund neighborhood schools more.” For decades they were funded better than they are now.

But in the eighties when I attended a neighborhood high school and in the mid-nineties when I started teaching, plenty of neighborhood high schools had high drop-out rates or students who got pushed out. Throwing money at the problem won’t automatically solve the drop-out problem.

Many teachers and staff in CPS do believe in our students. We’re simply overwhelmed by the obsession with data and documentation that we lose valuable conversation time by focusing on the quantity of data we must produce, submit, or review.

Or we’re so overwhelmed by the work that we fall into the trap of self-preservation instead of following through with our self-transformation as professionals. By doing this, we limit how much we help students transform themselves.

Teachers and staff need the opportunity to focus on the quality of the professional relationships we attempt to build.

Giving teachers time to prepare and deliver meaningful learning opportunities, then reflect on them, not only contributes to good teacher-student relationships, but it also leads to more professionally productive collegial interactions.

So many data meetings begin with the question, “What do you see?” when we look at pie charts and graphs. We need to change the question to, “What do you believe when you see our students in this data?”

The lens we’d then have would help us identify the belief systems we carry or need to carry, the resources we must demand, and the practices we could implement to change the significance and the credibility of the data everyone sees.

This column was first published on Ray’s blog, The White Rhino (www.chicagonow.com/white-rhino/) on February 22.

Since 1995, Ray Salazar has been an English teacher in the Chicago Public Schools and is a National Board Certified teacher.

He started writing The White Rhino about education and Latino issues in 2011. Ray lives on the Southwest Side. Follow him on Twitter @WhiteRhinoRay ILLUSTRATION BY JAVIER SUAREZ MARCH 2, 2016 ¬ SOUTH SIDE WEEKLY 11

"Do you know who's hiring?"

South Side youth explore unemployment & other challenges through media

Marissa Warner

A

s a black woman born and raised on the South Side of Chicago, I went through adolescence and young adulthood unaware of the harsh realities that community members faced just blocks away from my Chatham home.

Yes, even black people can have blinders on, blocking us from the issues that surround us in our communities. My blinders slowly came off after the 2008 housing market crash, when neighbors started walking away from properties that had been family homes for multiple generations. At that time, community underemployment began to cave in on the prideful, sheltered, long-standing black middle class of Chatham.

Even then, it still felt too inconvenient and too much of a burden for me to carry the weight of the disenfranchised people who looked like me. The guilt of being a black person who “made it” was all-consuming. I received a bachelor's degree, had career counseling opportunities that were not available to others, and planned to pursue a career as a journalist.

I could no longer avoid these realities when I accidentally fell into the work of helping Chicago youth in the nonprofit world. At first, I saw my internship with Community TV Network (CTVN), a youth media organization that has taught at-risk youth video production skills for over forty years, just as an interesting opportunity to get college credit. But it was refreshing to see youth feel compelled to speak their truths in front of professional camera equipment and be empowered by broadcasting their own stories.

Two years later, now as the Journalism Coordinator and Video Instructor for CTVN, I visit our high school video production classes. We work in several alternative schools, where many of the students have been expelled from or have dropped out of Chicago Public Schools.

At Joshua Johnston Fine Arts and Design Charter School on 95th and Ashland Avenue, students lumber into school in the morning just like any teenager would,

12 SOUTH SIDE WEEKLY ¬ MARCH 2, 2016

and much like I did when I was their age. Some students file in excited and boisterous, wanting to be heard by their counterparts. Their youthful spirit was all too familiar to me. There were also quite a few déjà vu moments when I witnessed some young ladies proudly flaunting nineties hairstyles like Janet Jackson’s “Poetic Justice” box braids.

These throwback hairdos were as interesting to look at as some of the mass incarceration-themed student artwork and ancient ethnic styles of dress hung on the walls.

The school’s principal, Dr. Joyce Bowen, is a big advocate of the arts. It’s ironic to me that the “forgotten youth” of Chicago get more exposure to the arts in alternative schools than I did in CPS. After losing the music teacher in our CPS elementary school to budget cuts, I started to believe that arts programs were a luxury only afforded to specialized arts and magnet schools in Chicago.

There were other things I tried to make sense of in this new atmosphere. House arrest ankle bracelets sometimes peeked out from between Nike Jordan shoes and khaki uniform pants. Occasionally, parole officers would stop me in the hallway asking for directions to the main office to check in with students on probation who were only allowed to leave home to go to school.

Regardless of their predicaments, the self-awareness and openness that came about during brainstorming sessions for video projects was a reminder that these students were all bright and gifted, but somehow lost their way, or lost sight of their potential.

Last spring, during prom season, Johnston students produced a short documentary about “flakey” relationships.

Eighteen-year-old Miesah Davis, a cheerleader who would freestyle R&B lyrics in class, opened up about her interactions with high school aged guys. “I have a son, and I had a son at a young age with a high school male’,” she said on camera. “He was still in the streets, and you know doing the things that high school males do, so it didn’t work out, but we have to co-parent and all that; but it really changed my views on dating in high school and dating while you’re a teenager. So that personal experience itself was a rollercoaster. I wouldn’t want to go through anything like that now.

So relationships for me right now? Naw. Do I want one?

Yeah, but right now? No.” Davis graduated from Johnston in the spring of 2015 and is currently pursuing her music career.

This year’s documentary is about finding jobs. Many of the students in the video production class will be graduating this year and are fearful that jobs won’t be available for them after working so hard on getting a diploma they thought they wouldn’t get.

“Do you know who's hiring?” the students often ask me and my coworker, Alexander Skalomenos, also a video teaching artist for CTVN. “Have you tried applying to retail or fast food jobs around here?” I ask. Many of them have gone to several interviews and can’t seem to get employed.

Youth joblessness in the city is a harsh reality. Alternative Schools Network and University of Illinois at Chicago (UIC) released a report about it in January that got a lot of media coverage and prompted politicians to encourage more local companies to hire young people. The report, “Lost: The Crisis of Jobless and Out of School Teens and Young Adults in Chicago, Illinois and the U.S.”, found that in 2014, 88.5 percent of black male sixteen- to nineteen-year-olds and 46.9 percent of black male twenty- to twenty-four year olds in Chicago were out of work—the highest percentages in the country.

After reading these statistics out loud in class, students chimed in and said they often felt discriminated against when trying to get jobs in the city and didn’t want to go downtown to look for work.

It seemed as if the few who had job experience worked locally in small blackowned businesses. If they couldn’t get jobs at big companies and there were limited jobs at small businesses, I asked them, how could they find work?

“Start our own businesses,” a reluctant Kaleem Veal said while still twisting his “Baby” dreadlocks and pondering his words. During that class session, Veal mapped out plans to have his own car dealership and worked out how much money it might cost him for car insurance and to hire a small staff.

In the columns in this series, I will be taking you with me as I attempt to guide students through what it might take to create their own job opportunities. I try to capture my students’ moments of hope and their understanding of the world and of themselves. The goal is to have students document their journey in tackling youth unemployment.

You will walk through the alternative school system with me and hear the raw voices of youth excited to take ownership of their lives and their image in the media.

The self-awareness and openness that came about during brainstorming sessions was a reminder that these students were all bright and gifted but somehow lost their way, or lost sight of their potential.

Marissa Warner is a Chatham resident and a graduate of Columbia College Chicago’s Journalism program. As CTVN’s Journalism Coordinator and Video Instructor, she provides resources for nine video instructors by planning and facilitating community news projects for their After School Matters and alternative high school students.

ILLUSTRATION BY JAVIER SUAREZ

BULLETIN The Future of Solar Energy Illinois Institute of Technology, Perlstein Hall, 10 W. 33rd St., Room 131. Wednesday, March 2, 3:15pm–4:30pm. (312) 567-5835. RSVP to Donna Hale (dhale2@iit.edu) or Peg Murphy (murphym@iit.edu). c2st.org Join the MIT Energy Initiative (MITEI) at a lecture given by Robert C. Armstrong on solar energy and its commercial, technical, and policy aspects. Professor Armstrong is MITEI’s director and a member of the MIT faculty and National Academy of Engineering. (Yunhan Wen)

Police and Capitalism: A Socialist Analysis 57th Street Meeting of Friends, 5615 S. Woodlawn Ave. Wednesday, March 2, 7pm. (773) 850-0476. chicagosocialists.org A wide variety of views are currently being aired about policing in Chicago, but what do the Marxists think? At this meeting, members of the International Socialist Organization will share their understanding of the situation. (Adam Thorp)

Black Girls Code Enova International, 175 W. Jackson Blvd., Ste. 500. Thursday, March 3, 6pm–8pm. (312) 5684200. blackgirlscode.com This revolutionary nonprofit, which provides girls of color with computer programming skills and experience in technological innovation, is kicking off its Chicago chapter.

Register as a participant or volunteer, and stay to view the organization’s award-nominated documentary. (Sara Cohen)

Campus Wars: Free Speech vs.

Safe Spaces?

Seminary Co-op, 5751 S. Woodlawn Ave. Thursday, March 3, 6pm–8pm. (773) 752-4381. semcoop.com Supporters of the hard-line position in favor of campus free speech have rallied behind the UofC’s Statement on Principles of Free Expression. Professor Geoffrey Stone, the statement’s author, will consider the issue

just south of the campus venue where Cook County State’s Attorney Anita Alvarez was prevented from speaking by protesters not three weeks beforehand. (Adam Thorp)

On the Table Information Session Kennedy King College, Building U, Room 143, 740 W. 63rd St. Friday, March 4, 8am–9:30am.

(866) 737-6951. onthetable.com On May 10, the Chicago Community Trust’s On the Table talks return, engaging small groups of community members in discourse on unifying the Chicagoland community at large. Attend this preliminary information session to host your own conversation or learn more. (Sara Cohen)

Testifying for Climate and Reproductive Justice Arts Incubator, 301 E. Garfield Blvd. Saturday, March 5, 4:30pm–6:30pm. (773) 702-9724. conceivablefuture.org Consider our collective future at “Conceivable Future,” a lecture on how climate change impacts childbearing. Writer Josephine Ferorelli and sociologist Meghan Kallman present this open class on what their current demands for an end to U.S. fossil fuel subsidies mean for our children. (Anne Li)

Fundraiser Against Human Trafficking in Thailand Pilsen Breakfast & Grill, 1454 W. 18th St. Saturday, March 5, 8pm–1am. (312) 631-3620. facebook.com/pilsenbg Right now, Pilsen local Andrés Velarde is fighting against human trafficking in Thailand—but he can’t do it alone. Drop by for a Skype conversation with Velarde and a raffle fundraiser to support his work. Free appetizers will be provided. (Christopher Good)

What is public record?

How to use the Freedom of Information Act to get government documents A workshop with attorney Chaclyn Hunt of the Invisible Institute

Saturday, March 5, 2016 1pm–3pm

The Pursuit of Happiness: Transgender Equality in 2016 Quadrangle Club, 1155 E. 57th St. Monday, March 7, 6pm–7:15pm. Free. (773) 834-4671. politics.uchicago.edu Mara Keisling, executive director of the National Center for Transgender Equality, ILLUSTRATION BY JAVIER SUAREZ

southsideweekly.com/workshops

MARCH 2, 2016 ¬ SOUTH SIDE WEEKLY 13

EVENTS

has been invited by the UofC’s Institute of Politics to speak about the ongoing fight against transphobic prejudice and violence. As a leading activist and authority, Keisling will be sure to lead a vital discussion. (Christopher Good)

Writing My Wrongs Seminary Co-op , 5751 S. Woodlawn Ave. Tuesday, March 8, 6pm. (773) 752-4381. semcoop.com Shaka Senghor, a former prisoner charged with second-degree murder, is now a leader in criminal justice reform and a motivational speaker. He will discuss his redemption story Writing My Wrongs at the Seminary Co-op.

(Yunhan Wen)

Church in Social Action: Radical Nuns First Lutheran Church of the Trinity, 643 W. 31st St. Thursday, March 10, 6pm–7pm. (312) 225-3099. darstcenter.org American nuns were once a classic symbol of conservative values; in recent decades, they’ve developed a radical reputation. Dr. Joel Cruz, of the Lutheran School of Theology at Chicago, will discuss the history of radical nuns like seventeenth-century scholar Sor Juana Inés de la Cruz. (Adam Thorp)

VISUAL ARTS Voces de Mujeres 2016: Celebrating Women's Month Carlos & Dominguez Fine Arts Gallery, 1538 W. Cullerton St. Opening Friday, March 5, 6:30pm–10:30pm. (773) 580-8053. carlosanddominguez.weebly.com/ Celebrate Women’s Month right by attending Voces de Mujeres 2016. The exhibit features seven local female-identified artists, each displaying a unique perspective on the world through stunning artwork. Food and refreshments will be provided. (Bilal Othman)

Bodies of Power and Desire for a New Architecture Gray Center Lab, 929 E. 60th St. Friday,

14 SOUTH SIDE WEEKLY ¬ MARCH 2, 2016

March 4, 3:30pm–5:30pm. Free. (773) 8341936. graycenter.uchicago.edu UofC professor Laura Letinsky is hosting a conversation in conjunction with her exhibition, “Unsuspending Disbelief ”. Letinsky will teach artists to rethink the links between image and context in order to force their viewers to detach image from the frame of photography. (Sam Royall)

Pilsen Art House: Eye of the Beholder Pilsen Art House, 1756 W. 19th St. Opening Friday, March 4, 6pm-11pm. Through March 31. Free. (708) 715-0995.

This month’s First Friday Art Show at the Pilsen Art House displays the work of Chris Hodge, who made the poster for the 2014 Art In Your Eyes festival, alongside fluid works by Lorie Ranker and angular pieces by Matthew Christopher. Acoustic folk musician Scott William will be performing. (Alex Weiss)

Art Show: Collective Voices Montgomery Ward Lounge, University of Illinois at Chicago, 750 S. Halsted St. Friday, March 4, 5:30pm-8:30pm. (773) 883-4633. apnaghar.org Explore themes of gender violence, immigrant rights, incarceration and discrimination at “Collective Voices, Shared Journeys”. The show is presented by Apna Ghar, an organization that provides services for victims of gender violence in immigrant communities.

(Anne Li)

Chicago And Vicinity Opening Shane Campbell Gallery, 2021 S. Wabash Ave. Opening Saturday, March 5, 1pm-4pm. Through April 23. Wednesday through Saturday, 12pm–6 pm. (312) 226-2223. shanecampbellgallery.com The Red and Green lines meet at Cermak, just blocks away from Shane Campbell Gallery. Drop by to witness another convergence: fifty local Chicago artists get together in an exhibit that champions creativity, diversity, and collaboration. (Bilal Othman)

Artist Talk: Sabina Ott with Chris Kraus Hyde Park Art Center, 5020 S. Cornell Ave. Sunday, March 6, 2pm. Free. (773) 324-5520. hydeparkart.org With household items like spray paint and insulation foam, Guggenheim Fellow and Jackman Goldwasser artist-in-resident Sabina Ott creates hermetic, self-contained worlds.

To celebrate her new installation at HPAC, who cares for the sky, Ott will be joined in conversation by radical filmmaker and literary critic Chris Kraus. (Christopher Good)

MUSIC Christian Scott aTunde Adjuah The Promontory, 5311 S. Lake Park Ave. Friday, March 4, doors 7pm, show 8pm. $15 standing room, $20-$30 seats. (312) 801-2100. promontorychicago.com Whether scoring movies or collaborating with the likes of Prince and Thom Yorke, trumpeter Christian Scott aTunde Adjuah is a tireless innovator: he’s singlehandedly pioneered the “whisper technique” and the “forecasting cell,” what he describes as a “complete hybrid of a consonance and a dissonance.” The future has never been brighter. (Christopher Good)

Ms. Lisa Fischer Thalia Hall, 1807 S. Allport St. Saturday, March 5, doors 7:30pm, show 8:30pm. $29–68.

All ages. (312) 526-3851. thaliahallchicago.com After appearing in the acclaimed 2013 documentary <i>20 Feet from Stardom</i>, Lisa Fischer—who sang background for many of the most influential musical acts of the past forty years—has broken out into a solo career of her own. She will be joined by Grand Baton, a backing band that draws influence from African, Middle Eastern, and Caribbean music traditions. ( Jake Bittle)

B. Dolan and Ric Wilson Reggies, 2105 S. State St. Tuesday, March 8.

Doors 8pm. $10 in advance, $13 day of show.

18+. reggieslive.com

B. Dolan, a rapper incubated at the renowned Nuyorican Poets Café in New York City, brings his sometimes cynical and always unique sound to Reggies. Ric Wilson accompanies with his own glitchy, sunny brand of hip-hop, along with FelixFast4wrd and Haphduzn. ( Jonathan Poilpre)

Freida Lee Mo Better Jazz Chicago, 2423 E. 75th St. Friday, March 11. Doors 7pm. $10 donation. (773) 741-6254. mobetterjazzchicago.us Come enjoy food and drinks as singer Freida Lee takes the Mo Better stage. A twentyone-year veteran with experience alongside jazz greats including Chicago pianist John Young, Freida and her singing style are reminiscent of past jazz pioneers while affirming her place as a living legend among us. (Kezie Nwachukwu)

Fantasty Wesley Kimler Studio, 2046 W. Carroll Ave. Saturday, March 12, 9pm. Free with RSVP. 18+. do312.com/fantasty VAM Studio celebrates its one-year birthday with a huge exhibition, featuring live performances and visual art from the city’s coolest underground talents. Prepare for 3D video, performances by Glass Lux, Daryn Alexus, Owen Bones, DJ Taye, Sirr Tmo, and more... and possibly live animals. (Zoe Makoul)

STAGE & SCREEN The Amazing Nina Simone Studio Movie Grill, Chatham 14, 210 W. 87th St. Thursday, March 3, 7pm. $6. blackworldcinema.net Join Black World Cinema for their celebration of Women’s History Month by watching the amazing documentary The Amazing Nina Simone. Simone, a versatile artist who spoke against injustice with her songs during the Civil Rights Era, remains an inspiration for many. (Yunhan Wen)

Seeds of Disunion: Classics in Black Stereotypy Film Series: Gone With the Wind, part 1 Black Cinema House, 7200 S. Kimbark Ave. Friday, March 4, 7pm–9:30pm. (312) 8575561. rebuild-foundation.org At this screening of the first half of Gone with the Wind, you can critically evaluate the historical revisionism and romanticization of slavery in the movie, in addition to admiring Vivien Leigh. Conversation led by UofC Professor Jacqueline Stewart and Northwestern Professor Miriam Petty will follow. (Yunhan Wen)

Trifles Staged Reading Augustana Lutheran Church, 5500 S. Woodlawn Ave. Friday, March 4, 8pm. $5. (773) 4936451. hydeparkcommunityplayers.org Celebrate Women’s History Month with a salon-style, staged reading of Trifles, an example of an early feminist one-act where the stereotypical understanding of the “women’s sphere” is brought out in high relief. Enjoy the performance, the talk, the friendly atmosphere—and all the snacks. (Yunhan Wen)

Indie City Writers Suspense Workshop 57th Street Books, 1301 E. 57th St. Saturday, March 5, 10am. Free (with the purchase of a Libby Hellmann novel). (773) 684-1300. semcoop.com

Parade Film Festival will make for the perfect head start. Drop in for several short films about Irish culture and a screening of the 2015 Best Picture nominee Brooklyn. (Christopher Good)

Reading the Black Library: Baldwin and Bowers Stony Island Arts Bank, 6700 S. Stony Island Ave. Tuesday, March 8, 6pm. Free. (312) 8575561. rebuild-foundation.org At this reading, Chicagoan author Tony Bowers will reinterpret his autobiographical book of short stories, On the Nine, through the lens of James Baldwin’s classic “Sonny’s Blues.” In the following discussion, audience members are welcome to share their own experiences.

(Christopher Good)

The Set Speaks Propeller Fund Studios, 4th floor of Mana Contemporary at 2233 S. Throop St. Through March 31. Open Monday – Friday, 9am-5pm; Saturday, 12pm-5pm. Free. (312) 850-0555. acretv.org

Lines in the Dust

South Side Irish Parade Film Fest

“Who gets the best education in America?”

This is the question asked by Lines in the Dust, playwright Nikkole Salter’s gripping look into education inequity, poverty, and its human cost. Join director Phyllis E. Griffin for the play’s Chicago premiere. (Christopher Good)

If you’ve been waiting with bated breath for the Chicago River to run green, we’ve got great news for you: the South Side Irish

Call for Weekly Lit Submissions The Weekly plans to begin publishing original poetry by South Side residents on a regular basis.

Submit your work for consideration at lit@southsideweekly.com

For ACRE TV’s new programming block, seven groups of artists will take turns broadcasting a nonstop camera feed from their studio. Falling halfway between the schlock of Big Brother and the avant-garde stylings of Hito Steyerl, the exhibition—which will be streamed live—promises to deliver everything from #newglobalmatriarchy to soap operas for two months straight. (Christopher Good)

Award-winning author Libby Fischer Hellmann is teaming up with Indie City Writers for a book signing of her new novel, Jump Cut, and a writers’ workshop. With advice on how to seamlessly incorporate basic techniques of suspense into any genre of writing, it should be a thriller. (Martin Awano)

Beverly Arts Center, 2407 W. 111th St. Saturday, March 5, 6pm. $16 general admission.

(773) 445-3838. southsideirishparade.org

South Side Weekly

eta Creative Arts Foundation, 7558 S. Chicago Ave. Through March 27. Friday and Saturday, 8pm; Sunday, 3pm. $30, discounts available for seniors, students, and groups. (773) 752-3955. etacreativearts.org

MARCH 2, 2016 ¬ SOUTH SIDE WEEKLY 15