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Chicago’s teen magazine; written for us, by us
Pedal Power
Bike shop helps keep kids off the street
Passed TO FAIL Is your diploma bogus?
Lifeline for teens Texting out an S.O.S.
The Good Side
When foster care works
Coast over to page 58 for movie reviews
Fall | winter 2013–2014
Spring 2014
Summer 2014
STUDENT STAFF
PROFESSIONAL STAFF
High School Benito Juarez Academy High School Bloom Trail High School Chicago Academy for the Arts Chicago Talent Development High School Chicago Vocational Career Academy Curie Metropolitan High School Disney II Magnet High School EPIC Academy Eric Solorio Academy High School Foreman High School Hyde Park Academy High School Jones College Preparatory High School Jones College Preparatory High School Jones College Preparatory High School King College Preparatory High School King College Preparatory High School Lane Tech High School Lane Tech High School Lincoln Park High School Lincoln Park High School Lincoln Park High School Lindblom Math and Science Academy Lindblom Math and Science Academy Marist High School Northside College Preparatory High School Northside College Preparatory High School Ogden International High School Ogden International High School
Student Susana Gonzales Naheige Lewis Kiersten Lofton Jessica Garner Shane Calvin Yenifer Diaz Rafael Yanez Natalie Phillips Michelle Navarro Juan Martinez Jasmine Moore Miles Littleton Jon David Nacionales Avendah Watson Joshua Phillips Brandon Towns Nathan Cordero Aaliyah Olridge Sydney Furlow Camille Warden Langston Harris Shelby Joyner Suliyat Olagbenro Solomon Davis Leoncya Ngoma Christian Thorsberg Marey Anderson Dakota Shepard
Providence St. Mel School Rickover Naval Academy Social Justice High School South Shore International High School St. Ignatius College Prep Thornwood High School Urban Prep High School Urban Prep High School Von Steuben Metropolitan Science Center Von Steuben Metropolitan Science Center Von Steuben Metropolitan Science Center Walter Payton College Preparatory High School Whitney Young Magnet High School Whitney Young Magnet High School Whitney Young Magnet High School
Enia Gregory Jovana Vajogic Luis Barrera-Gonzales Ari Slaughter Stephanie Tinsley Kyra Henderson Eugene Nichols III Jameel Rice Kaylin Roskens Maria DeLeon Edwin Saquimux Christopher Ferguson Cecilia Morrow Tonyisha Harris Mariah Santora
Brenda Butler executive director Kevin Obomanu program coordinator
Billy Montgomery journalism lecturer (Roosevelt University) and professor
LINKS MENTORS Journalism high school mentor
Tonyisha Harris, WhitneyYoung High School
Journalism graduate mentorS Jazzy Davenport DePaul University Nader Ihmoud Columbia College Sydney Lawson Columbia College
Professional journalists
Monroe Anderson reporter and columnist (Chicago Tribune, Newsweek, CBS 2) Nia Andrews publisher, One Purpose Magazine Leah Banks academic adviser, University of Illinois, Chicago Brandon Campbell news anchor/reporter, WGN Radio News Tracey English reporter (Chicago Sun-Times) Rhonda Gillespie reporter (The Chicago Defender, The Citizen), TheRoot.com Glenn Jeffers reporter (Ebony Magazine, Chicago Tribune), editor, Kellogg Magazine
Candi Meriwether adjunct journalism instructor, Columbia College Clarence Waldron adjunct journalism instructor, Columbia College and Northwestern University
Regina Waldroup reporter, NBC 5
Avis Weathersbee editor (Chicago Sun-Times); editor/consultant (Jetmag.com), "Ebony Magazine"
Jean Williams reporter (Chicago Sun-Times), American Dental Association Michael Zajakowski picture editor, Chicago Tribune
Journalism Professors
Hope Daniels associate radio broadcast professor, Columbia College Peter Von Buol adjunct journalism professor, Columbia College
magazine design
Erik Nelson Rodriguez graphic designer, Chicago Tribune
Cover photo
James Foster photographer, jfosterphoto.com Photo of Maalik “Leek� Gardner, bike specialist at Blackstone
Special thanks to Omar Castillo, Ahmed Hamad, Tess Hynes, Rena Naltsas, Chris Richert, Carolina Sanchez, Kyra Senese and the Columbia College Journalism Department. Columbia Links is committed to supporting and providing quality journalism instruction and training to Chicago teens and teachers. Columbia Links is the product of the leadership and commitment of Columbia College Journalism Department associate professors Nancy Day and Curtis Lawrence. Columbia Links is supported by Columbia College Chicago and funded by the McCormick Foundation and Dow Jones News Fund.
columbialinks.org If you are a Chicago teen interested in participating in Columbia Links, call 312-369-8993 or email columbialinks@colum.edu
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Editor’s Note hree seasons. Three journalism academies. Three reporting challenges. The student participants in the 2014 Columbia Links program rose to those challenges—to explore “cautionary tales,” “lessons from school” and “a South Side summer”—and the thorough, well-researched results are manifest in the articles published here, in this latest edition of R_Wurd magazine. The Chicago-area high school reporters found stories in their communities and among their peer group, covering such topics as the warning signs of teen depression, students’ take on returning physical education to the CPS curriculum, and the vision and reality of Chicago public housing. The Links students learned to ask tough questions, to seek out facts and to develop analytical thinking, all the while increasing their news literacy quotient. So page through R_Wurd and take a look at select stories from each academy.
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CAUTIONARY TALES –Winter 2014
Learning from the experiences, and often the mistakes, of others is one way we discern how to navigate those same tough byways. It’s no different for today’s teens, who face age-old problems, as well as those not dreamt of by earlier generations. Links reporters found stories that bridged all their contemporary challenges, offering solutions to prevent teens from having to learn the hard way. Finding a crisis hotline that addresses today’s youth’s unique problems, such as bullying, and lets them text their counseling need, is a modern method of reaching kids using their lifeline—social media. This is just one of the stories our teens cover. They also report on CPS’ new sex education policy and examine the redux on the school breakfast program.
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A CLASS ACT: Lessons from school —Spring 2014
And the explorations didn’t end there. With an eye toward issues that popped up where they spend the bulk of their time, our reporters opened the book on what was going on inside the schools. The importance of teens having a real voice in the decisions that impact their schools was paramount in one student’s look at Chicago Public Schools’ newly created Student Advisory Council, which gives kids a voice in how their schools are managed. And, still looking for answers to the overwhelming problem of the violence impacting teens, our reporters cover the death of Hadiya Pendleton, a promising CPS student who was caught in the crossfire of this violence epidemic.
A SOUTH SIDE SUMMER —Summer 2014
When spring gave way to summer and that final school bell rang, our teens hit the streets looking for stories that resonated on the city’s South Side. And they found some good ones: A bike shop in the Woodlawn neighborhood that also rolls out programs that help keep kids off the mean streets—and lets them earn a free bike by putting in a little sweat equity. Our reporters also unearthed a hip, urban clothing store in Chatham that boasts lines from some of their iconic outfitters such as Pharrell and Jay-Z. And, keeping watch on the environment, our intrepid reporters look at the sticky issue of petcoke, which some Southeast Side residents are fighting to ban. So many stories to cover in the lives of teens . . . And the Columbia Links 2014 journalism academies took them on.
Caution a ry ta les
6 Lifeline for teens Piling it on 10 Teens in a crisis text hotline
Stressing out on schoolwork
15 A good morning start 18 The abuse spiral
Hurting animals may lead to domestic violence
Students digest a new plan at Lindblom
A Cl ass Ac t
24 Censored Lit 26 30 No more shame Having their say 32 A teen’s legacy
Working with the Hadiya Foundation
Book banning: Questioning teens’ rights
Revaluating the foster care system
CPS students find their voice
A south s ide sum m er
40 Urban entrepreneurs 43 Concrete reservations 48 Baseball on the rise 50 Pedal empowerment
COVER STORY
Blackstone Bicycle works to get kids off the streets
See why shoppers are being drawn South
A museum embraces the topic of public housing
South Side teams play ball against violence
Caution a ry t a les
A lifeline for teens C New crisis ‘hotline’ lets youth text in their problems
risis Text Line is an organization based in New York City that acts as a hotline for teens in crisis. Using text messaging as its medium, CTL’s main focus is aiding Avendah Watson teens who are dealJones College Prep ing with issues such as depression, bullying, eating disorders, suicidal thoughts and family issues. “It’s free, 24/7, nationwide for ages 13 to 25 experiencing any type of crisis. Whatever you need, 24/7, at your fingertips,” said Meg Rose, community engagement manager of Crisis Text Line. Crisis Text Line is the daughter of DoSomething.org, a nonprofit organization for “young people and social change.” DoSomething.org started using a text messaging service to inspire teens to do something with things that matter to them. It was very successful, with 1.4 millions teens texting a week.
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their pilot in 2013, the volume has been a lot more than they thought it would be. There have been more than 14,000 messages from teens in crisis, and more than 600,000 messages exchanged overall. There are organizations, similar to CTL, that specialize in reaching out to teens who have dealt with and are dealing with gruesome events; these organizations act as a type of “hotline” for teens that need assistance right away. However, their specialties are limited because they may provide services to people having a specific problem. “Some only do text counseling for eating disorders, rape or incest,” Rose continued. “Some are limited by region. What we aim to do is be as widely known as 911 for young people in crisis. What we think will be most helpful for people in crisis is to have one number to call.” As technology continues to develop, different ways of communication are progressing as well. The term “hotline” originally described the communica-
For those who are hesitant to reach out for help in person or on the phone, texting can be a great way to connect them with the support they need.” —Jen Chiou | Executive Director of CTL
Soon teens began to text the organization about serious problems. The most disturbing message came from a teen: “It’s my dad. He won’t stop raping me. He told me not to tell anyone. Are you there?” “They [DoSomething.org] worked to connect this girl to resources that she needed. They asked, ‘Why are teens texting us?’ They’re not a crisis support service. They decided to ‘do something,’” Rose said. CTL spent a year trying to raise the funding for the software they needed. So far, CTL has had positive, “overwhelming” results. After launching 6
tion between two parties over the phone when there is an emergency. However, CTL’s service not only provides immediate support from actual counselors using a form of communication that is popular among teens, but the text messages also provide data that can help improve the service the hotline provides. “SMS [short message service] is a different approach; text messages are shorter. People are more outspoken because texting is so anonymous and so mobile. We are developing what is the best practice. Text messages have a lot more data than in person or on the phone counseling,” Rose said. “It works to derive innovation
Photo courtesy of Crisis Text Line
Meg Rose, community engagement manager for Crisis Text Line. "It’s free, 24/7, nationwide for ages 13 to 25 experiencing any type of crisis . . ."
and insight for everyone who is in crisis. “We’re building the world’s largest database; there has never been this much data developed at scale,” Rose said. “It informs academic research: where should they prioritize money? In the past, they’ve been doing this one thing, and there are new things that are more important.” Despite the ideal methods of coping with stress and traumatizing events, such as telling teens to speak to a trusted friend or adult before making any decisions, there is a disconnect between whether teens should communicate or keep their problems to themselves. Or is it just a stigma that teens have against going to someone for help? “People are more outspoken because texting is so anonymous and so mobile,” Rose answered. “There shouldn’t be a
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stigma because getting support from trained and experienced counselors can prevent crises from getting out of hand.” Jen Chiou, executive director of CTL, also addressed the stigma. “We believe all young people should have access to a free, 24/7, emotional support and referrals via the medium they already use and trust: text. For those who are hesitant to reach out for help in person or on the phone, texting can be a great way to connect them with the support they need,” Chiou said. Jane, who wishes to remain anonymous, has dealt with bullying throughout grade school and physical abuse from a parent. She has been called names because of her dark complexion and because she was “heavier than a lot of the kids in her class” she was subjected to name-calling related to her weight. “I felt hurt because people that I was always nice to were the ones doing it,” Jane said. “I actually became a bully to other kids my freshman year of high school. At the time, I didn’t feel like I could get help. I felt telling someone would just make matters worse.” Jane was also physically abused by her mother and endured her mother’s degrading words that were meant to torment her. “She got so angry once she hit me and busted my lip,” she said. “I had school the next day and DCFS was called.” Despite the problems she was facing, she did not get the type of help that she thought would give her the support she needed. Jane tried to take advantage of organizations that behave similarly to Crisis Text Line but felt that they were not beneficial for her. “They really just asked how I felt,” she said. “They never really helped me with the recovering process.” Amy Yalcin, a junior at Jones College Prep, does not think organizations such as CTL are very beneficial for teens facing issues like bullying. “I think it’s best to handle these things on your own,” she said. “Being bullied is not an excuse to be weak and unable to help yourself; it’s a personal journey where you have to learn to be yourself re-
Photo by AVENDAH Watson Watson
Amy Yalcin, 17, a junior at Jones College Prep, doesn’t think Crisis Text Line can help with bullying issues. "You should be the one rooting for yourself," she says.
gardless of what people say to you. If you know yourself, what does it matter what other people say? Though I might not have had any extreme bullying experiences in my life, I do believe true character comes from making the most of what you do.” Although there are a lot of teens who need help right away, it is apparent that more has to be done to spread the news
about organizations that want to help those who desperately need support, whether it’s by using text messages or another tool. CTL is aiming to make their presence known to more teens, so that everyone can get the help they need. For teens seeking help, here is how to reach the Crisis Text Line: Text “Start” to 741-741. 7
Caution a ry t a les
The truth about sex ed CPS revamps its sex education policy for K–12 eople usually associate their kindergarten memories with nap times, storytelling and colorful blocks, but in Chicago Public Schools, Maria De Leon all of that is about to Von Steuben change. Metropolitan Science Center CPS has adopted a new sex education policy that states students from K-12 will be receiving sex education courses. This new policy was approved by the Chicago Board of Education in February 2013 and mandated January 2014. Under the old policy, sex education began in the fifth grade. CPS implemented this new policy to tackle something the majority of adults overlook: youth’s ignorance about sex. CPS hopes to better educate the students so they will be more aware about their environment, body and relationships. In 2001 George W. Bush’s administration enacted the No Child Left Behind Act. In addressing funding for sex education, this act stated: “None of the funds authorized
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Photo by Maria De Leon
under this Act shall be used to develop or distribute materials, or operate programs or courses of instruction directed at youth, that are designed to promote or encourage sexual activity, whether homosexual or heterosexual,” or “to provide sex education or HIV-prevention education in schools unless that instruction is age appropriate and includes the health benefits of abstinence.” The focus of the previous sex education policy was on one thing: abstinence. In a 2011 Fox News op-ed, family physician Anne Nolte wrote about the shortcomings of the sex education policy under the No Child Left Behind program. She described the policy as “the equivalent of placing a tiny Band-Aid on a gushing artery.” The sex education policy under NCLB, according to Nolte, was not doing enough to change youth’s sex statistics.
Chicago sex-ed facts: • In 2008, 32 of every 1,000 girls ages 10-19 gave birth. • In 2009, Cook County was reported to be No. 1 for gonorrhea and No. 2 for chlamydia in all of the U.S. • In 2011, more than a third of gonorrhea and chlamydia cases in Chicago were reported for 15- to 19-year-olds. • In 2012, 12 percent of CPS students also reported that their first sexual intercourse was before the age of 13.
Bianca Reid, a facilitator for Planned Parenthood of Illinois, is training CPS educators about how to teach students about sex under the new policy. 8
Sharmaine Mempin, a sophomore at Von Steuben Metropolitan Science Center, said that the NCLB sex ed policy has it flaws. “It’s awkward. The teachers make it [sex] seem like a sin and that we should never ever do it.” Phyllis Wooddell, a reading teacher at William G. Hibbard Elementary School, was chosen to be an instructor for the new policy. When asked about her thoughts on the new policy, she said that it is “long overdue.” The current policy is not designed for the bilingual, the poor or the disadvan-
Photo by Maria De Leon
Sharmaine Mempin (center), with friends Jenny Seberanis (left) and Francessca Barajas, says the old sex education policy made teens feel like sex was sinful.
taged, she said. “Hibbard students have a hard time with English so words like ejaculation, vas deferens, and fallopian tube make it difficult for them to formulate a sentence or question.” According to Wooddell, the sooner they start [learning], the better. “I learned everything I knew from my friends who knew as little as I did,” Bianca Reid said. “I was too scared to ask anyone else.” Reid, a facilitator for Planned Parenthood of Illinois, said that she felt insecure about her lack of knowledge of sex when she was younger. The new CPS policy allows young children to be more comfortable with talking to their parents, guardians or teachers about sex. Planned Parenthood is working with CPS to deliver the Teen Outreach Program, which incorporates the new policy. The goal of the new policy is to help educate young people about making healthy decisions, give them information about sex and sexuality and give them the resources they need to make the best decision for them. There are mixed feelings about the new policy. Mempin said. “The new policy will benefit the younger students because they know the true meaning of the words that they casually throw around.” Some parents, however, believe it will open doors that they would rather keep closed. In that case, parents can opt out. In the end, the parents have the last say on what their child can learn.
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Tweet or sleep
Photo by Eugene Nichols III
A teen’s affair with distractions keeps her awake ou wouldn’t expect a 15-year-old at Gary Comer College Prep to be going through this. But on the Far East Side of Chicago is Morgan Haley, a Eugene Nichols III teen who possibly Urban Prep could be sufferAcademies ing from insomnia. Each night, Morgan stays up for several hours being distracted by social media, television, etc. “It’s not as serious as insomnia,” Morgan says, but adds the sleep she is deprived of is unavoidable. “Losing sleep at night can affect people when making decisions, or trying to complete tasks,” says Mary Halsey Maddox, assistant professor of pediatric sleep medicine at the University of AlabamaBirmingham School of Medicine. And, according to Maddox, Morgan’s situation is normal. “Teenagers have a circadian rhythm that is naturally off track,” Maddox says. “The circadian rhythm is what tells people when to wake up or when to go to sleep. However, when teenagers spend too much time on phones and iPods, it affects their light exposure.” Indeed, Morgan’s case is not only normal, but more common that you think. According to a report from the Cleveland (Ohio) Clinic, 30 percent of children have sleep disturbances. Twenty percent of high school students say they have fallen asleep in class due to sleep deprivation, according to Palo Alto (Calif.) Medical Foundation. For Morgan, the lack of sleep has both benefits and drawbacks. On the plus side, when she’s wide awake, Morgan says she can complete her homework and catch up on other assignments. Thanks to the catnapping, she became something of an overachiever, maintaining a grade-
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point average of 3.5 with honors and AP courses. The negative effects normally show up the next day. After getting only two to three hours of sleep, Morgan says waking up can be difficult. “People think better, and feel better, when sleeping well,” says Allison Harvey, a professor of psychology at the University of California, Berkeley. She adds that “a well-rounded amount of sleep each night, even on weekends” is a good way to successfully make it through the day. But is it necessary? Neah Kearney, 15, a sophomore at the De La Salle Institute on the South Side, thinks so. In fact, she considers herself “the perfect sleeper.” Each night, Neah is in the bed by 9:30 p.m. and up by 5:10 a.m., getting more than seven hours of sleep every night. Still, her academic and social progress isn’t too far from Morgan’s. She maintains a GPA of 3.71 and takes Honors classes as well. “Although my grades can be a mirror reflection of my sleep, it has nothing to do with it. I go to bed at the same time each night just because of the fact that I’m sleepy, not that I’m trying to maintain good grades. I’ve stayed up longer than usual before and the next day I felt fine.” Therefore, will a teenager whose circadian rhythm appears on track with a decent amount of sleep be considered perfect? Maddox, says no. “A perfect amount of sleep results in nothing because there’s no such thing as the perfect amount of sleep,” Maddox says. As for Morgan, she believes her sleep pattern is fine and shouldn’t be treated. “I get to focus on schoolwork, I get to have peace of mind, and the negative effect isn’t that horrible anyway,” she says. But Maddox suggests that teenagers who want to change their sleep habits should work on their light exposure and the schedule in which they go to bed and wake up. If it’s necessary, they should
Morgan Haley, 15, a sophomore at Gary Comer College Prep, admits to being sleep deprived. "It’s not as serious as insomnia," she says.
seek assistance from a doctor. “However, one thing that teenagers can control affecting their circadian rhythm is their light exposure,” Maddox says, “which can be controlled by spending less time on electronics . . . or ordering glasses specifically meant for it.” Adds Maddox: “Make sure you go to sleep at the same time each night and wake up at the same time each morning.” Morgan and Neah aren’t too different. Therefore, if Morgan were to work on her light exposure and scheduling, she would have better results without any negative side effects, according to the doctor’s advice. 9
Cautiona ry t a les
Piling it on In some instances homework can be counterproductive
essica Bilea, a junior at Hubbard High School on the Southwest Side of Chicago, is sweating a workout that would rival most student athletes. But her workout is of a Nathan Cordero different sort. It is a Lane Tech homework load that College Prep includes three to four hours of biology, Spanish and precalculus. “I am quite a stressed-out child,” Bilea said. “[Homework] sucks and is a pain in the butt.” This is what she has to do to keep up her 3.8 GPA, she said. She plans to apply to the University of Michigan next year. The pressure and competition to get in is fierce. Sleepless nights and breaking dates to get the grades is the price she pays now to get into her top choice next year. Bilea is one of thousands of students across the country carrying heavy homework loads to get ahead academically. But some experts say that too much homework may not be the answer. In fact, if left unchecked, it may be hurting students’ performance and robbing them of the best years of their lives to make friends and explore. “If you’re that stressed, you’re not in a healthy frame of mind,” Lane Tech counselor Meredith Bantz said. “You’re not going to be your best self when you’re exhausted.” A study in 2006 by Duke University professor Harris Cooper showed that more than two hours of homework did not show higher achievement. His research concluded that there should be a
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Nathan Knudtson, a junior at Lane Tech, says often homework feels like "busy work." About a quarter of his assignments are causing him stress. 10-minute rule to avoid burnout. For each grade level students should commit to 10 minutes of homework a night adding an additional 10 minutes for each grade level. Under this philosophy, 1st graders should have 10 minutes of homework, 2nd graders should have 20 minutes of homework and 3rd graders should have 30 minutes of homework and so on. By the time a student is a senior he would have two hours of home-
Photo by Nathan cOrdero
work if their teachers collaboratively abide by the 10-minute rule. Not everyone agrees with this notion, though. Homework has been a longstanding tradition in America that many educators do not want to change. Hubbard student Bilea does want to change her homework load, however. Although she views homework as necessary, she feels it is a big factor contributing to her stress. It has also affected her
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social life. Last Christmas she was practicing caroling for her church but homework got in the way of her practice time. She does not want to choose between homework and her faith. Seth Johnson, once an advanced placement English teacher at Lane Tech, gave less homework than the typical AP teacher. Most AP teachers give homework that takes an hour or more. Johnson usually tried to give around 20 minutes of homework for his students. While he wanted his students to be challenged, he did not want to pile on too much. He said too much homework can break a student’s drive to learn and succeed. “I don’t want to be a part of the reason a student burns out,” Johnson said. Johnson thinks two hours of homework or less is ideal for students. Nathan Knudtson is a junior at Lane Tech. Like Bilea, his average school night is three to four hours of homework. Lane Tech is one of several selective enrollment schools in Chicago. Students there must meet high academic standards. He usually spends 30 minutes to an hour on each subject. Computer science and pre-calculus typically contribute to his sleep-deprived nights. “Sometimes [homework] just feels like busy work,” he said. He views about a quarter of his homework assignments as busy work affecting his sleep. On a good night, he gets six hours of sleep but most of the time less than that. The lack of sleep causes him to feel less efficient in class, he said. As a result of his loss of sleep, he occasionally falls asleep in class. Homework overload has caused Knudtson to have stressful moments, he said. One of his more recent breakdowns ended with him crying himself to sleep at 3 a.m. That night he was unable to finish all his homework. “I think homework should be given as a way to check the student’s understanding, not mandatory for a grade, so people who understand the material can work on other things,” Knudtson said.
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Homework should be given as a way to check the student’s understanding, not mandatory for a grade, so people who understand the material can work on other things." —Nathan Knudston | Student
“Here kids are more worried about making the grade rather than learning,” Knudtson said. Counselor Bantz has been practicing for seven years. She said that a lot of stress comes from high expectations. Those expectations sometimes come from the students themselves. Bantz described students sleep cycle as “vicious. “If you’re that stressed, you’re not in a healthy frame of mind. You’re not going to be your best self when you’re exhausted,” Bantz said. Bantz suggests a study hall to help alleviate some of the burden of homework. Johnson also agrees with the idea of adding study hall in more schools. That way students will not have to take as much work home. Andjela Bursac is also a junior at Lane Tech. As a sophomore, homework typically took about four to five hours for her to complete. Now in her junior year she has about three hours a night. European History normally accounts for a great deal of her homework. After completing European history, trigonometry and physics take their toll on her as well as
her other classes. Bursac is also a student athlete. She plays for the Lane Tech tennis team. During tennis season, her practices generally last until 6 p.m. She then heads home and arrives around 7. From there she dives straight into her homework. Bursac finishes up close to midnight and tries to get as much sleep as she can. Like Knudtson, on school nights, Bursac gets six hours of sleep at the most. Bursac recalls feeling overwhelmed the day of the girls tennis team city qualifier versus Northside College Prep. She had three tests and a lot of homework due the next day. She was unable to balance the two. “I probably didn’t do as well as I could have on the schoolwork. I was too focused on the [tennis] match,” Bursac said. Mark O’Brien is a licensed clinical professional counselor who works primarily with adolescents. He said students who feel overwhelmed by their workload are often short-tempered, agitated, lonely and sometimes isolated. Some students overstressed by their academic work make poor decisions, he said. Other students may resort to drugs and alcohol to cope. O’Brien suggests that students who are overwhelmed by homework should set realistic goals and schedule when they are going to do their work. He also recommends eating healthy, relaxing and exercising. Though students are not in control of how much homework they receive, they have to do what they can manage. 11
Caution ar y ta les
Social media
overload
Teens need a new diet—fasting from online activities he alarm goes off at 5:30 a.m. After a shower she checks her phone for notifications from Instagram. While being dropped off at school, she checks her phone again for Jessica Garner an alert from FaceChicago Talent book. When walking Development High School to the bus stop after school, she creates a post and “likes” a couple of pictures before catching the bus. By the time she goes to bed, she has exceeded the recommended hours of being on social media. This is the daily life of Chicago Bulls College Prep High School sophomore Chyanne Laldee. She is just one example of the type of teen some doctors are encouraging to go on a media diet. “I use my phone out of school and until I fall asleep,” 15-year-old Laldee said. “It helps me learn stuff for school [because] I use [my devices for] the Internet.” According to a 2013 study conducted by the Pew Internet and American Life Project, three out of every four teens visit sites like Facebook, Twitter and Instagram every day. The American Academy of Pediatrics has suggested that teens participate in a social media diet where they set a goal for themselves to take a break from online networks. The pledge to decrease activity has been brought to the public eye due to new social media websites that have become popular among teens. “One of my biggest complaints is [that] the kids have their heads in social media
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so much that it kind of consumes their lives,” said Cristina Gonzales, an English teacher at Chicago Talent Development High School. “They need to take a break because it’s a false reality that they live in. They’re living in Facebook and they live in Instagram, and they live in Twitter. They don’t live in the real world.” Teachers often have to stop class due to phones being pulled out and used, disrupting a lecture. “A lot of the drama I hear about starts with social media and they bring it to the classroom,” Gonzales said. She and many other teachers have
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or my iPod, I feel lost. They complete me and without it a big chunk of me is gone. I feel depressed without my technical devices.” Doctors are also finding a connection between obesity among teens and other physical and emotional issues associated with overexposure to social media. “Obese kids . . . part of it has to come with what they’re eating, but part of it has to do with the lack of exercise, and if you are sitting in front of a computer for six hours a day there’s no way you’re getting the exercise that you need,” said
If your whole world exists in the Internet, that can be really lonely. There have been studies through Facebook that shows people have compared their lives with others and people start to feel depressed about it.” —Lolita Alkureishi | Assistant professor of pediatrics
noticed that students can sometimes allow social media to affect their lives. Students like Aaliyah Culpepper, 15, and James Dale, 17, use their phones from sunrise to sundown. “I don’t want to go on a diet. I’m in love with social media,” Dale said. Smart phones like iPhone, Galaxy and BlackBerry have made social media easier to access without using a computer. The Pew Internet and American Life Project study shows 34 percent of teen girls go online using their cellphones, which is 10 percent more than boys. “I need all of my technical devices 24/7,” Culpepper said. “If I don’t have my phone
Lolita Alkureishi, assistant professor of pediatrics at the University of Chicago Department of Medicine. “[Media] is making kids a little bit more sedentary . . . sitting and not doing exercise. “Another thing is kids can feel isolated,” Alkureishi said. “If your whole world exists in the Internet, that can be really lonely. There have been studies through Facebook that show people have compared their lives with others and people start to feel depressed about it.” According to the Pew Internet and American Life Project, 61 percent of parents have rules about the Internet and have actually checked what their teens
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are doing online. Harold McGee, a father of two teen girls, is a part of that 61 percent. “I believe in a healthy media diet, but you must be selective, especially when it comes to social media,” McGee said. “It’s available, so you can be in control of exposing it to them and monitoring what they get into.” He believes kids should be exposed to media at the age of 7 or 8 within reason and enforces the media diet on his teens. Schools like Chicago Talent Development Charter High School and Chicago Academy for the Arts have started to create Facebook pages for their students to like and share. Teachers also have started to add social media into their classrooms and have even applied the social media diet to their students’ lives as assignments. Demetrio Maguigad, a strategic design director at creative developer LimeRed Studio and an adjunct faculty member in the marketing communication department at Columbia College, teaches social media and PR strategies. Maguigad makes his students participate in the social media diet. “When I do the social media fast, the first few days are the most difficult,” Maguigad said. “On the third day, some give up because they need the tool for their daily lives. Others realize, ‘Wow, social
media is really taking over my life.’ One student began painting more and organized an exhibit during her media fast because she became more cautious how it affected her and made her less productive.” Maguigad said he believes social media can sometimes be overwhelming. “Young people are depending more on the tools for what social norms are,” Maguigad said. “We become too dependent on these activities.” He compares social media tools to using a hammer. “People who use a hammer are building something, but we don’t rely on the hammer for everything like painting a wall or fixing a sink,” said Maguigad. “When we rely on it [social media] too much we become unproductive. In the future we’ll see a lot more tools that’ll make media less overwhelming. Social media becomes overwhelming when we can’t accomplish tasks or get things done or when we’re not educated enough to determine facts from fiction.” High school teacher Gonzales, however, decided to use social media in her classroom to reach and connect with her students. “I try to take social media and spin it positively in my classroom. I don’t mind when the kids follow me on Instagram
because I just post pictures of them,” Gonzales said. “It’s a way to build relationships with my students; it makes them think twice about what they post because they know their teacher is following them.” Try imagining life before social media, computers, tablets and cellphones with touch screens and apps. Maguigad remembers when these devices weren’t even available. “When I was a teen we didn’t have email or social media,” Maguigad said. “Life was slower because information wasn’t really available to us. Young people had to be more creative. “Social media has connected us to the globe; but it also put blinders on us. [Before social media] we were more engaged, and we didn’t have control. Now, I can control if I want to watch ‘Bob’s Burgers’ or not,” Maguigad said. “Or when I open my Spotify account I can pick any song I want. The two biggest things were: Things went a lot slower, and we didn’t have control of content.” Cristena Brown, 16, a sophomore at Jones College Prep, thinks she could do the media diet. “Sure, I can go on a media diet,” Brown said. “I use Instagram and Twitter, kind of, and I don’t really use Facebook . . . So I can [definitely] go a day without [social media].” 13
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In the
dark
Counseling can be an antidote to depression
ayra (whose name has been changed for this article), a freshman at Von Steuben High School, lives with a virtual cloud hanging over head. It’s depression, a serious medical illness that causes feelings of sadness and lack of interest. She wants help but isn’t Kaylin Roskens Von Steuben sure how to go about getHigh School ting it. The troubled teen said she often feels like she has nowhere to turn. “No teen wants to be the weird one,” she said.
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“So teens tend to keep everything inside.” And the number of children and teens in distress might be rising. Recent research published in Pediatrics examined psychosocial issues in thousands of children ages 4 to 15 during pediatric visits for common health concerns. The study found significant increases in reports of emotional problems, including depression and anxiety, between children studied in 1979 and those seen in 1996. According to suicide.org, approximately 20 percent of teens experience depression before they reach adulthood. Between 10 and 15 percent suffer from symptoms at any one time. A teen takes his or her own life every 100 minutes because of severe symptoms. What’s worse, only 30 percent of depressed teens are being treated for it, the site reported. The statistics are frightening. And for those untreated teens, the physical and emotional pain can be hell for them and their families. At Von Steuben High School, counselors offer a ray of hope for many students. Talk therapy and dance therapy are just a few of the ways school counselors help students express themselves and cope, said counselor Amanda Harris. She has observed the ugly side effects of teen depression, such as students cutting themselves to block out the pain. Other students may attempt to self-medicate with alcohol and drugs or purging. Depression can be caused by school, social status, bullying, sexual orientation, family life and family trauma such as death of a loved one or divorce, according to a recent health report “Understanding Depression” by the Harvard Medical School. Mayra says depression makes you feel numb, hopeless and unwanted. Because she felt this way, she pushed people away, and she didn’t spend as much time as she used to with her family. Harris also acknowledged that many Von Steuben students may need help
Symptoms of teen depression • Apathy • Sudden drop in grades and skipping school • Excessive weight loss or weight gain • Complaints of pains, including headaches, stomach aches or fatigue • Difficulty concentrating and memory loss • Difficulty making decisions • Excessive or inappropriate guilt • Irresponsible behavior, including forgetting obligations, being late for classes • Difficulty making decisions • Preoccupation with death and dying • Rebellious behavior • Sadness or a feeling of hopelessness • Staying awake at night and sleeping during the day Source: The Mayo Clinic for a variety of reasons but choose not to turn to school counseling. “The counselors try to make the students feel secure by going through small careful steps,” she said. They start with an invitation to join the program. “The students have to be willing to go through the program before we start anything else. It’s the most important part,” Harris said. Anyone who needs help and is suffering from depression can call a suicide prevention hotline: 1-800-273-TALK. It’s completely free, and the counselor there is always waiting for a call.
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The abuse spiral Battering affects victims’ pets, too
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hen a woman is being abused at home, chances are she isn’t the only victim. More than 60 percent of Susana Gonzalez women who were Benito Juarez abused reported that Community their pets were also Academy abused, according to the American Humane Association, a national organization committed to protecting children and animals from abuse and neglect. Often, women will refuse to leave their pets alone with the abuser and end up staying just to try and save the animal. In the end, they sometimes die along with the pet, experts say. “The abuser separates the victim from their support network, and sometimes that animal has been the only living being that has given them unconditional support,” says Tatiana Garrett, director of communications for the Anti-Cruelty Society. Nearly 25 percent to 40 percent of battered women are unable to escape abusive situations because they worry about what will happen to their pets or livestock should they leave, according to the American Humane Association. In 2012, there were 552 animal abuse cases reported in the United States, according to petabuse.com. The cases varied from beating, neglect, abandonment,
hoarding, fighting, torture, stabbing, theft, choking, burning, poisoning, throwing and shooting. Clara Kirk, founder of the women’s shelter Clara’s House on Chicago’s South Side, is familiar with cases in which men have battered women and their pets. “Nine times out of 10 if you find a household where a woman is battered, everybody is battered, including the children and the pets,” she says. “Nothing is respected when a man hits or verbally abuses a woman,” she says. “He may lock up the family’s cat or dog. The man might say, ‘You are paying too much attention to the dog. That means you don’t need me. Get rid of the animal.’” Kirk says. But escaping the abuse often means abandoning the pet, too. In Chicago there are no shelters that will allow victims to go in with a pet. There is limited space and barely enough room for the people, Garrett says. “You know there has to be a shelter out there that has a basement or a garage somewhere that we can help them in setting up a kennel,” she adds. Every state in the nation has laws prohibiting animal cruelty. However, Garrett says “a law is only as good as its enforcement.” Therefore, animals rely on us to report any type of animal abuse to save them. If someone witnesses any type of animal abuse, they can call 911 immediately. Documenting is an important thing to do.
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Nothing is respected when a man hits or verbally abuses a woman. . . He might say ‘you are paying too much attention to the dog’. . . " —Clara Kirk | Women’s shelter founder Take pictures, record the date, time and location of the crime, as well as a description of anyone else involved in the abuse (people and animals), experts say. An individual can make an anonymous call, but for a better chance of prosecution, it is best to testify if the case ever goes to trial, according to the Humane Society of the United States. The Anti-Cruelty Society provides for more than 500 cats and about 200 dogs. The organization also takes in other animals, such as rabbits and guinea pigs. “Good pet owners are compassionate and dedicated to taking care of their pets for the duration of the pet’s life. They don’t have the attitude that once they get bored or into something else that then they will ignore the pets,” Garrett says. The cost for adopting an adult cat is $60, a kitten $85, an adult dog $95 and a puppy $170 at the Anti-Cruelty Society in Chicago. For more information, visit anticruelty.org. 15
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Flunking up CPS students question whether they’re being passed along he growing graduation rates at Chicago Public Schools seem promising. According to its website, CPS graduated 19,905 of its 30,449 students spring 2013, a rate of 65.4 percent that Brandon Towns beat the predicted King College Prep rate of 63 percent. State records boosted that rate up to 68.5 percent. A study recently published by Illinois Issues, a publication from the University of Illinois Springfield, says 71 percent of Illinois students graduate high school statewide, but only a third actually earn a bachelor’s degree within six years. One reason for this is that failing students are being advanced into the next grade level in high school, according to the Illinois Policy Institute. And while they’re graduating, those students leave CPS unprepared for both college and life. A 15-year-old student from King College Prep, who asked not to be named in the story, says that he struggled with his math class his freshman year. The
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student received an “F” in his Algebra I class, which is a required class for freshmen, and was still passed along to the next grade level. Now a sophomore, the student said he feels that being advanced to the next grade level without being properly taught has hindered his education. “Although I’m happy that I made it to the next level in my education, I do feel cheated because I may have missed a concept that I may have needed in college,” he said. While many blame mandates like the No Child Left Behind Act for the poor preparation of students, this isn’t completely the reason for the premature advancement of students, although this theory is justified, according to Timothy Shanahan, a professor of curriculum and instruction at the University of Illinois at Chicago. “All we did was lower the fences,” Shanahan said in an interview with Illinois Issues. “We didn’t teach the kids how to climb them.” It’s the school’s choice whether to advance unprepared students. Some schools like Harlan Community Academy will hold students back if they fail a core class. But King College Prep is a bit different.
Terrell Anderson, 15, a student at King, failed numerous classes his freshman year and was told he would be kicked out of the school if he continued to fail in his classes. Despite these warning, Anderson was still promoted into his sophomore class. He continues to fail without any repercussions as a sophomore. “I feel used and misplaced because I asked for help, but that help isn’t directed to me, so I stopped asking for the help that I desperately need,” Anderson said. David Narain, newly installed principal at King College Prep, explained that although students may fail their class, it is their responsibility to attend summer school. “Sophomore classes at King are pre-determined whether students have failed or not,” Narain said. “It is up to the student to make up that class either by going to summer school or taking that class their senior year. If students don’t make up that class, then they will not earn that credit and will not graduate.” Although many students would be happy to graduate on time with their friends, Anderson isn’t one of them. “I can look like I know what I’m doing because I used to know what I was doing,” Anderson said.
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Joshua Dwyer, the director of education policy at the Illinois Policy Institute and a former teacher, says some schools in the CPS system are stuck in a culture of diminishing expectations. “Some schools have cultures where they don’t have high expectations for teachers or students,” he said. A reason behind this culture is that both students and teachers tend to give up when students struggle early on in their studies. Dwyer gives the example of students struggling to read by the third grade. Some teachers, Dwyer said, believe a student is beyond help if they cannot read by the third grade. Likewise, students who cannot read by the third grade are four times more likely to drop out due to low self-esteem and determination, Dwyer said. “How well a student reads by the third grade determines their academic future,” he said. “Sometimes, teachers identify
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How well a student reads by the third grade determines their academic future . . . Sometimes, teachers identify students as helpless and it looks bad for the teacher when the student cannot read by that grade." —Joshua Dwyer | Education policy director students as helpless and it looks bad for the teacher when the student cannot read by that grade,” Dwyer said. According to Dwyer, one way to solve this problem is to find the best remedial classes with high-performing teachers instead of keeping the students in the same environment where they failed. He also called for new policies to hire better teachers and retain students. Failing a student and forcing them to repeat that class in the same environment just sets the student up for more failure, Dwyer reasoned.
Another solution: Send high performing teachers to low performing schools. Samantha Sims, an English I teacher at King, believes that CPS should stop treating the system like a business, focusing less on graduation rates and more on actually preparing students for higher education. “If they’re going to be passed along, then what is the point of coming to school?” Sims said. “Other schools like King have tutoring and extra help after school. There is no reason for students to be passed along.” Photo by Brandon Towns
Terrell Anderson, 15, a student at King College Prep, failed numerous classes his freshmen year but was still promoted to a sophmore. "I asked for help . . . but I stopped asking." 17
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A good morning
start
Students reflect on breakfast changes at Lindblom
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s they enter the main doors at Lindblom Math and Science Academy, a selective enrollment high school located in Chicago’s Englewood neighborhood, students remove their bags and place any metal objects Suliyat Olagbenro in a small bin before Lindblom Math and walking through metal Science Academy detectors. Normally, the students then head to their classrooms or other areas, such as the library. Lately, though, students are presented with two tables baring multiple rows of brown and white paper bags. Like schools throughout the Chicago Public Schools system, Lindblom is going the extra mile to get students off on the right foot when it comes to nutrition—thus the concentrated focus on breakfast, the first meal of the day. “As a district, we understand that having the appropriate nutrients is important to students’ overall well-being and can have positive impacts on student achievement,” said Jamila Johnson, a CPS spokeswoman. “When students start the day off with a well-balanced breakfast, absenteeism, tardiness and nurse visits are drastically reduced.” Outside experts agree that breakfast is a boon for students starting their day. “Eating breakfast not only starts one’s metabolism, it also gets the metabolism working more efficiently throughout the day,” said Kate Merkle, a Chicago-area registered dietitian. “It’s food for the body and brain. Research shows it helps students perform better in school.” Like schools throughout CPS, Lindblom is participating in Breakfast in the Classroom. The federally backed program is in place at all CPS schools, which includes more than 400,000 students, Johnson said. You can learn more about CPS’ policy on Breakfast in the Classroom here. “CPS’ Breakfast in the Classroom program is part of a federally funded initiative aimed at giving kids from low-income families a healthier start to their day,” Johnson said. “CPS provides this program to all of its students.” According to the Breakfast in the Classroom website, “The approach is simple. Children eat together in the classroom, usually the homeroom, at the start of the school day. They en-
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As a district, we understand that having the appropriate nutrients is important to students’ overall well-being and can have positive impacts on student achievement." —Jamila Johnson | CPS spokeswoman
joy nutritionally well-balanced foods like breakfast wraps, yogurt, or fruit served directly in their classroom or grabbed from a cart in the hallway. Students then eat breakfast while the teacher takes attendance, collects homework or teaches a short lesson plan. In about 10 minutes, the meal is over and the school day continues. And so do the benefits of the breakfast in the classroom.” At Lindblom, that means that students no longer eat breakfast in the lunchroom on the fourth floor. They get it when they walk into the school and take it with them to class. “Hot breakfast in the white bags and cold in the brown,” Ava Bender, dining manager at Lindblom, advises the rush of high school students crowding the two tables. The white bags typically feature items such as mini pancakes; egg, cheese and sausage wraps; and breakfast corn dogs (sausage wrapped in what appears to be a pancake). The brown bags consist of items such as string cheese a whole-wheat bagel with cream cheese, and banana bread. All
Photo by Suliyat olagbenro
Walmer Saavedra, 16, prefers eating his breakfast leisurely in the lunchroom at Lindblom rather than carrying it around in a grab bag to class.
bags contain one fruit, sometimes an orange and others a banana, and all students have a choice between low-fat white or chocolate milk. Nutritionist Maribel Colon of the Chicago area addresses a challenging impediment to getting students to go for a healthier breakfast, no matter where it is served—a preference by many for junk foods high in sugar and/or fat. “The problem with those is that they calm them for a while,” Colon said. “But then the students will feel the crash after the rush, lack energy, experience fatigue, lack concentration, feel sluggish, bloated and hungrier.” But the results of the healthier bagged breakfast option are apparent at Lindblom. Now recycling bins overflow with empty grab-and-go breakfast bags instead of multiple, crumpled chip bags. Some students appreciate the differences. Gabriella Garcia, a 17-year-old junior, doesn’t eat breakfast at school but recognizes the effects of the grab-and-go breakfast bags on her peers. “I eat breakfast at home,” she said. “But I think the new thing they’re doing with breakfast is good. Good breakfast is a good way to start the day. I see people eating Flamin’ Hots and stuff, but now they eat better things for breakfast.” Other students, however, don’t completely agree with the new breakfast arrangements. Walmer Saavedra, a 16-yearold sophomore, preferred eating breakfast in the lunchroom. “Over there, they had syrup,” he said. “You could sit at tables and eat, and you don’t have to be rushing and taking your food to the classrooms.” Before the recent change, breakfast was served at Lindblom from 6 a.m. to 7:30 a.m. “I didn’t really go to eat breakfast before when it was being served in the lunchroom,” said Brenda Macias, a sophomore. “I have things I need to do before class, or I
Photo by Suliyat olagbenro
Gabriella Garcia, 17, eats her breakfast at home but likes the idea of the healthy grab-and-go breakfast at Lindblom.
get to school late, so no time for breakfast.” The Breakfast in the Classroom program acknowledges this familiar quandary on its website in explaining the program’s benefits: “Many school breakfast programs take place prior to the start of the school day. When the bus is late or the carpool’s caught in traffic, the opportunity for breakfast is missed. The result? Hungry kids and lost federal funding at the schools that need it most.” The low rate of students eating school breakfast at Lindblom underscored the inconvenience and ineffectiveness of the former system. Now even late students still have a chance to accept a free graband-go breakfast on their way to class, and busy students like Macias no longer have to decide between completing tasks before class and starting the day with a healthy breakfast. Bender is confident that the new way of distributing breakfast is here to stay, especially having seen direct evidence that more Lindblom students are eating the free school breakfast. “We will continue serving breakfast like this because kids don’t have time to come to the lunchroom in the morning,” Bender said. “So this way they can just grab the breakfast while coming in the door and head to wherever they need to go.” Since this story was reported, CPS announced in September 2014 it will provide free breakfast and lunch to all CPS students regardless of economic eligibility. 19
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Bullying hurts High school abuse can affect adult relationships, causing bitterness, fear of rejection and ‘loner’ mentality aurice Green says he will never forget the day he was pushed down the steps by a schoolmate when he was in the fifth grade. “My head hit every Shane Calvin step and by the time Chicago Vocational I hit the ground, I Career Academy was bleeding, and the pain was horrifying. I had to go to the hospital,” he said. Studies have shown that as many as one in four children are being bullied, and Green is part of the growing number. About 160,000 children miss school every day due to fears of bullying, according to the city of Chicago’s official website. Surveys from the National Institute of Child Health & Human Development show that between the sixth and 10th grades, 17 percent of children are being bullied weekly while 19 percent bully others weekly. Today Green, 15, is a freshman at Chicago Vocational Career Academy and is still being bullied. However, things have gotten better in the last four weeks. Though he still gets teased about being too quiet and is often called a “nerd,” no one has physically attacked him. Green simply wants the bullies to leave him alone. “Just because I have qualities you don’t like, doesn’t give you the right to be a bully. So get away from me, and know your place," Green said. Bullying can have a lifelong impact on victims, according to internationally recognized bullying expert Allan L. Beane, Ph.D., whose son was bullied in middle
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school and high school. “Adults who were bullied as children may be more likely to exhibit . . . recurring anger and bitterness —therefore, may have difficulty forming meaning relationships . . . may become bullies to avoid being mistreated again.” Beane said other effects of bullying include “difficulty trusting people . . . fear of rejection, avoidance. And caution in social situations—especially when meeting new people—causes a tendency to be a ‘loner.’” Bullying victims are less likely to take risks, for fear of being embarrassed or humiliated, and are unable to make
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The 2008—2009 School Crime Supplement showed that 6 percent of students in grades 6 through 12 experienced cyberbullying. Additionally, the 2011 Youth Risk Behavior Surveillance Survey showed that 16 percent of high school students faced cyberbullying. Marshall Smith** is a 27-year-old Hampton University graduate and public school teacher in Chicago who was bullied as a kid and is in therapy today because he sometimes feels powerless. “Being bullied took away my power. My power to trust people. I still have a fear of people. I can be very shy, the kind of
Just because I have qualities you don’t like, doesn’t give you the right to be a bully. So get away from me and know your place.” —Saurice Green | Student
friends. They also show a lack of confidence, Beane said. Bullying has taken a huge toll on America’s youth—from skipping school to and teen suicide. In September 2013, 12-year-old Rebecca Sedwick committed suicide after being chronically cyberbullied. According to ABC News, Sedwick’s mother, Tricia Norman, planned to sue “those responsible” for her death. The two girls who originally cyberbullied her were charged with cyberstalking in Sedwick’s death. Those charges were dropped. The Internet can be used to help people, but it can also be used to hurt them.
person who is afraid to look someone in the eye. I constantly look down when I talk to people. My sense of value is shaky. My confidence is not strong enough. Can I really do well on the job or in graduate school?” Smith said. Smith was teased as a child due to his skin complexion. “I was very lightskinned . . . I was always told, ‘You can’t do this, you can’t do that, because you’re white’. . . I started trying to fit in because I was ostracized.” When his parents picked him up from school, his peers even said he was adopted because his parents were darker than he was. Smith added: “Here I am today at 27
Che c k oCheck u t the o f or hi s story st o ryat:a t columbialinks.org out vi thed evideo fortthis
years old and I often lack confidence when I talk to women and also in my career goals.” Beane says childhood bullying can affect one’s self-esteem. “They see themselves as less than desirable.” Smith recalls his crush on a new student in the eighth grade. “I thought she was hot. She found me attractive. We started going out, and I was so happy to have a girlfriend. But the other students found out we were dating and they were talking bad about her and told her not to date me. By the end of that day, she was my ex. That hurt me a lot,” he said. A recent study published in the Journal of Pediatrics says there is a connection between psychosomatic problems and being bullied. This means that children who are bullied run the higher risk of mental problems.
Fifteen-year-old Green believes the story of the person being bullied is not being told enough so he will continue writing poems on anti-bullying to make sure his and every bullying target’s voice is heard. Smith, who plans to become an antibullying activist, said, “Bullying has a lasting effect. Often what happens in your childhood affects your adult life. By speaking out about bullying, I hope to be able to stop it, encourage others to fight back and know they have value.” “Being a victim of bullying does not define you.” Smith emphasized. “You are more than that. And that’s what I am working on. I am going to work through it, and so can you.”
**Names were changed in this story because subjects do not want to be identified.
Tips to combat bullying The site stopbullying.gov recommends that if one witnesses a bullying incident, he or she should get police help or medical attention immediately if: • A weapon is involved. • There are threats of serious physical injury. • There are threats of hate crimes, such as racism or homophobia. For more on bullying, visit stopbullying.gov, or thebullypolicesquad.com
Tips on putting an end to bullying The site stopbullying.gov recommends that if one witnesses a bullying incident, he or she should get police help or medical attention immediately if: * A weapon is involved. * There are threats of serious physical injury. * There are threats of hate crimes, such as racism or homophobia.
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on the streets The homeless: ‘No one chooses to be this miserable’ f you go to downtown Chicago, you will most likely encounter several homeless individuals sitting on street corners, sometimes next to stores frequented by the more Camille Warden affluent. Many people have learned to Lincoln Park High School ignore the homeless, their reasons being they don’t have the time or money to help every struggling individual. There also is a stigma when it comes to the homeless. Many people think that if someone lives on the street they are lazy, degenerates, criminals and druggies who not only chose to live in squalor but also deserve that fate. But according to the National Coalition for the Homeless, 40 percent of homeless men are veterans, 26 percent of America’s homeless suffer from mental illness and 15 percent are homeless due to having suffered from domestic abuse. Thirteen percent of homeless individuals are employed. These are people who deserve aid rather
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than scorn, executive director of the Chicago Help Initiative Douglas Fraser, says. He adds that the prime candidates for homelessness are those suffering from mental illness and addiction. Often, the homeless are people who may have not been clinically diagnosed but suffer from mental illness such as chronic depression, which undermines their capacity to keep a steady job. Fraser also says that 20 percent of people his organization serves have a college education. “Everybody has flaws, everyone does, and some of us have flaws that don’t affect our chances but some do,” Fraser says. But those flaws are perceived incorrectly by many, Fraser says, which leads to misconceptions about the homeless, ranging from abusing charitable organizations to receiving free goods and services. “No one chooses to be this unhappy,” Fraser says. Take, for example, free meals. Fraser says that a person could technically get a free meal every day of the week through the various organizations. But to procure these meals, they would have to travel across the city and wait in line for hours. Other services like shelters have long waitlists and often require participa-
tion in religious ceremonies. Some have stringent rules such as the separation of friends and family. What about housing and employment? The city’s housing program has a two-year mandatory wait, says Fraser. Also, getting housing and jobs independently is hard for someone who is homeless. There’s a lack of access to phones, mostly because the homeless are often robbed or without secure storage space. Both require papers and identification, which many people don’t have; most times, they need every cent to survive. They can’t even afford a state ID, Fraser says. Lastly, being homeless tends to make individuals depressed and pessimistic about their options. All this leads Fraser to believe that the most useful resource for the homeless is individual case management. A case manager has the resources to find housing and job opportunities for their clients and will be able to see their clients through their desperation and desolation. In the end, Fraser stresses that the homeless are not just city pollution or some abstract concept, but human beings who have fallen on hard times. “We’re dealing with complete people here,” he says. Tashauna Jones, 33, a mother of three from Milwaukee, found herself in such a situation. Tashauna came to Chicago four years ago to take care of her mother. But when she arrived, Tashauna discovered that “things [had] changed,” she says. Tashauna’s mother threw her and her children out on the street. At first, she lived with a church member before moving to a shelter where she and her children were not content. Tashauna says the shelter’s staff forced her and her children to
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sleep in one room, gave them no privacy, and was generally rude and demeaning. She was trapped, she remembers, wanting to lash out but unable to do so for fear that her children would end up on the streets, the last thing she wanted. “Homeless people already feel like they’re the bottom of someone’s shoe,” Tashauna says. But the staff paled in comparison to the stigma she felt. Her children were teased at school — “They would be known as the shelter kids at school,” she adds. Even acknowledging her situation was daunting. “The hardest part was saying it,” Tashauna says. “When you’re homeless, people look at you like you’re nothing.” It’s a reputation that Tashauna has worked hard to overcome by keeping herself and her children clean and respectable. She also never gave up. In 2010, a little more than a year after becoming homeless, she was directed to the Primo Center on the city’s West Side. While in Primo’s transitional housing program, Tashauna started helping out by sorting donations and doing other odd jobs for petty cash. By 2011, she was helping to run Primo’s summer camp. Nowadays, Tashauna is on the Primo payroll, working in the day care/development center. She qualified for transition
housing at a building in the North Lawndale neighborhood, where she lives now. Her children have been accepted into a Big Brothers Big Sisters program based in Chicago. Her eldest son, Javionce, 13, plays blues guitar and hopes to attend Lincoln Park High School next fall. They plan to move to a new low-income housing location in the Woodlawn neighborhood. When it comes to finding a way to treat the city’s issues with homelessness, Tashauna and Fraser are on the same page. “Mental [health] resources,” Tashauna says. “Some people develop a lot of mental illness . . . they develop depression. They develop schizophrenia. Some of them already have it; it just got worse.” And the most essential component for finding those resources? A case manager. Case managers have the stability and resources to get jobs, housing, and mental help for their clients. Tashauna says that once those resources were provided to her at the Primo Center, her life changed for the better. “The whole Primo Center family has been very supportive of me,” she says. “It’s been a rough, rough, rough, rocky road.” The Chicago Help Initiative also provides a variety of services to improve the lives of homeless individuals, including a
Photo by Camille warden
Tashauna Jones, 33, struggled to pull herself and her three children out of homelessness. "It’s been a rough, rough, rough, rocky road."
weekly sit-down meal for 165 people. The Initiative also provides literacy tutoring and health services such a vaccination, consultation and mental health services. A caring case manager who helps individuals and families to gain financial independence and personal confidence could be the first step toward reducing homelessness in Chicago. The psychological and practical value of a mentor cannot be overstated. Says Tashauna: a mentor is “someone to coach you on life all over again.” 23
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A teen’s legacy Hadiya’s Foundation works to help troubled young men in Chicago athaniel Pendleton says he and his wife, Cleopatra Cowley-Pendleton, want “to save as many lives as we possibly can” through Hadiya's Foundation. Leoncya Ngoma “We’re just trying Northside to make a difference, CollegePrep saving other kids,” Pendleton tells Columbia Links in an exclusive interview. “Pretty much, prevent these kids from killing each other. We want zero gun violence.” They recently started the foundation “to stop the youth from killing each other and give them, or teach them, a respect for life,” Pendleton says. The Pendletons’ daughter, 15-year-old Hadiya Pendleton, was shot and killed on Jan. 29, 2013 while hanging out with friends in a South Side park after having finished her final exams. She had recently performed at President Obama’s second inauguration in Washington, D.C. She was a sophomore at King College Prep High School, an honor student, a band majorette, and an older sister to Nathaniel Pendleton Jr. She dreamed of attending Northwestern University and one day becoming a pharmacist, a doctor or a journalist. First lady Michelle Obama attended Hadiya's funeral and later said during a speech on gun violence: "Let me tell you, it is hard to know what to say to a room full of teenagers who are about to bury their best friend. But I started by telling them that Hadiya was clearly on her way to doing something truly worthy with her life. I told them that there is a reason that we're here on this earth, that each of us has a mission in this world, and I urged them to use their lives to give meaning to Hadiya's life."
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In his 2013 State of the Union Address speech urging attendees to vote for tougher gun laws, President Obama mentioned Hadiya: “Just three weeks ago, she was here, in Washington, with her classmates, performing for her country at my inauguration. And a week later, she was shot and killed in a Chicago park after school, just a mile away from my house." Danetria Hudson, Hadiya’s friend who was with her at the park, remembers how Hadiya died. She told the Chicago Tribune: “It did not feel real when it happened. It felt like a really bad dream. I was like, can I please wake up?” These were her thoughts as she held Hadiya’s head in her lap as she lay bleeding. Hadiya’s father says working with troubled young men through the foundation has forced him to understand what is lacking in the youths’ lives that lead them to violence and gangs. “It allowed me to get to know them, understand what they need. They like getting the attention that they need. It’s about what they may need as young men. I’ve gotten to know some of them, and have them look up to me as a mentor, and give them advice on life. We want to try and provide them with mentors, get them jobs, so they can have something to look forward to.” Pendleton hopes to show them an alternative to street violence. “The whole thing is that these kids need to know somebody cares. Just getting through to them, making sure that what I’m saying to them is getting through, where other people may not be able to do the same. By my story, they’ll be able to listen to me more; because they know that I’ve suffered a loss and they’ve probably suffered a loss, too. They would be more prone to listen to what I have to say. So they can have a better respect for life.” Elena Quintana, Ph.D., at the Adler
Photo courtesy of Hadiya’s Foundation
Hadiya Pendleton enjoyed the festivities at President Obama’s inauguration in 2013. She was shot and killed several weeks later in her hometown of Chicago.
School of Professional Psychology in Chicago, is aware of Hadiya’s Foundation and is optimistic that the violence can be stopped. “There’s lots that can be done to stop the killing. First off, kids under 18 are not the most violent group. Those between 1828 are far more likely to kill and be killed than children and teens,” she says. “Some programs show that once you connect potentially violent people with caring support and resources, they stop being violent. “Yes, more after-school programs help. Better schools are awesome. Working with a ‘trauma-informed’ orientation is really important. This means having an empathic orientation to understand that hurt people hurt people. And we must not withdraw care and support—on the contrary, we need to concentrate therapeutic interventions on those who need them most,” Quintana adds. Pendleton’s father sends out a message to today’s youth urging them to respect and value life. “Learn to appreciate life. Start socializing with each other. Just know that they’re people, they’re real and once they’re gone, they’re gone and you can’t bring them back.”
columbialinks.org or the first time in 20 years, Chicago Public Schools is mandating that physical education is a required subject and that high school students will have to take daily classes for Michelle Navarro Eric Solorio Academy all four of their high High School school years. The new ruling will also triple the amount of time elementary school students spend exercising. The Chicago Board of Education voted at its Jan. 22, 2014 meeting to adopt the new physical education policy (as well as an arts education plan). CPS will leverage $21.5 million in TIF surplus funds to hire teachers. But not all high school students are jumping for joy over the PE change. In fact, some feel the new requirement would be a drag on their academics. Others, though, see it as a plus—and a way to get needed exercise. School district officials see the move as a win all around. “Arts and physical education are fundamentally important to a child, ensuring that students in every area of the city have access to a well-rounded education,” said CPS CEO Barbara Byrd-Bennett on the school district’s website. The city’s public school system serves 400,000 students in 658 schools and is the nation’s third-largest school district. With the new policy, which started with the 2014 school year, 472 elementary schools and 106 high schools are going to be under the new PE rule. Elementary school children will have a minimum of 30 minutes per day of physical education and high schoolers will have to participate in daily PE class that averages about 42 minutes a day. Coach Matthew Earlenbaugh, physical education teacher at Eric Solorio Academy High School, agrees with CPS. “I think it’s important that all kids get daily physical education, and with this new policy every kid has the chance to get that daily physical education,” he said. “This teaches kids how to work together and problem solve.” According to the U.S. Department of
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Bouncing back Gym is now a requirement for K-12, but will students play ball?
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Kevin Rodriguez (standing) spots Frank Staszel in the Eric Solorio weight room. Both sophmores favor the new PE policy.
Health and Human Services 2008 Physical Activity Guidelines for Americans, “regular physical activity in childhood and adolescence improves strength and endurance, helps build healthy bones and muscles, helps control weight, reduces anxiety and stress, increases self-esteem, and may improve blood pressure and cholesterol levels.” Another governmental agency has a similar take of the advantages of physical education. “The percentage of children aged 6–11 years in the United States who were obese increased from 7 percent in 1980 to nearly 18 percent in 2012. Similarly, the percentage of adolescents aged 12–19 years who were obese increased from 5 percent to nearly 21 percent over the same period,” according to The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Still, some students can’t help but think about how the new policy will also affect their academic schedules. Omar Sanchez, a student at Solorio, wants to be an engineer. Next school year, he will not be able to take the Intro to Engineering class he wants to because of the new PE (or gym class, as some refer to it) policy. “I think the reason they (CPS) are doing this is because of child obesity. I think we (high school students) are old enough
to take care of ourselves,” Sanchez said. “I was going to take an Advanced Placement class, but couldn’t because I have to take PE.” There are reportedly plenty of good reasons students should take extracurricular and advanced placement classes. College admissions counselors have said publicly that they love to see any extra classes students have taken. AP classes offer students a chance to earn college credit—and, thereby, save on college costs—and boost students’ grade-point average. At the same time, 16-year-old Frank Staszel, also a Solorio student, strongly believes that this PE policy is a great way for students to become more intelligent. “Healthy body means a healthy mind,” Staszel said. “People need to take their health more seriously and if they don’t do it at a young age, then when will they?” On the other hand, Karina Barraza, a 4.0 GPA student at the same South Side high school, looks more at the academic side of the coin. “I think it’s good that elementary students have to have PE. However, as high school students, we all carry more of a responsibility, so having to take PE as another class doesn’t give us much of an opportunity to take other classes that will help us.” 25
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Open books,
closed minds Book banning: A necessary precaution or a stripping of teens’ rights?
n early 2013, CPS banned the book “Persepolis,” a graphic novel by Marjane Satrapi, from all its classrooms and libraries because of its sexuKyra Henderson ally explicit conThornwood tent and lascivious High School nature. Most CPS students, and a few parents, disagreed with the decision. The banning caused so much controversy that there was even a pro-“Persepolis,” protest held in Chicago. One CPS student, Levi Todd from Lane Tech High School, strongly disagreed with CPS’ decision and in turn developed a banned-books only book club at his school called 451 Degrees. “I honestly thought it was a joke,” said Todd. “One of our members told me passing in the hallway about the ban . . . Then our teachers started talking about it, and I realized that it wasn’t a joke at all.” The high school senior said all it took to create this unique book club was the principal’s permission, 10 signatures from students showing interest in the club and a few posters within the school’s hallways.
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“It really was that simple,” Todd said. “We didn’t have any problems.” Book banning started in the early 17th Century and has been around a long time. It was often used by repressive governing bodies to control thinking and to keep citizens in the dark. Today, in this country, it is often used as a regulation that prevents students and underaged children from reading books that adults would call “unsuitable” or “sexually explicit” or offensive. Every year, the American Library Association (ALA) compiles a list of books that have been banned or challenged throughout the world. Although some adults may see it as a small restriction, opponents of book banning feel that it strips adolescents of their rights to read what they want. With about 30 club members ranging from grades 7 to 12, 451 Degrees has made headlines on CNN’s website and the Huffington Post. The club has also received the Intellectual Freedom Award from the ALA. “We were blown away by the Intellectual Freedom Award from the ALA,” said Todd. “We had someone reach out to us soon after the protest saying they had nominated us, but we never heard back
from them, so we thought [that] we didn’t get the nomination.” It wasn’t until the summer of 2013 that members of 451 Degrees were invited to the American Library Association’s Annual Conference to participate on a panel about censorship in the digital age. A couple of weeks later, they were notified that they were in fact receiving the award. “We were incredibly honored to be given the award, and it was really great knowing that someone aside from our club truly understood the harmful effects that censorship has on our society. Not only did they understand these consequences, but they were also holding up those who fight against the oppression,” said Todd. Todd said that he plans to start another organization similar to 451 Degrees when he attends college in the fall of 2014. “I do think that 451 Degrees has a lot of potential. I never could have imagined the positive feedback we received within our city, our state, our country, and even globally, and with that kind of support, I do believe that we could succeed as a larger organization, and potentially have a greater impact.” Andrew Medlar, assistant commissioner for collections at the Harold Washing-
columbialinks.org ton branch of Chicago Public Library, is in charge of the book selection process there. “When evaluating and selecting materials to place in the teen sections of the library, I look for content that has a blend of literary quality and developmental appropriateness, and I find that most material being published has a combination of these strengths to varying degrees,” he said. “I support, both professionally and personally, the American Library Association’s Freedom to Read policy. In my view, everyone has the right to read what they want to read, not read what they don’t want to read, and to express their opinion about what they do or do not want to read,” said Medlar. “I [also] believe that every institution that provides book access to its users has the right to determine its own policies regarding that access,” Medlar said. Medlar enjoys the fact that young people are taking time out to discuss literature. Besides the book “Persepolis,” Medlar says he has many favorites that are on the banned list such as “Captain Underpants,” “The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian,” “The Hunger Games,” “Looking for Alaska,” “The Perks of Being a Wallflower,” “Bone” series, “To Kill a Mockingbird” and “Gossip Girl.” For about 20 years (1990-2009), the American Library Association has compiled statistics (which they’ve plotted on a graph) for all initiators, reasons and institutions regarding banned and challenged books. According to ALA Challenge Database, the top three institutions where the banning takes place are schools, school libraries and public libraries. Sexual explicitness, offensive language, age group inappropriateness, violence and other objections are among the top five reasons for book banning. The top three initiators for banned books are parents, administrators and library patrons. Teachers were one of the lowest initiators within the database, and some are not big fans of book banning. Maria Brown, a freshman English and AP English teacher for a junior class at Thornwood High School in South Holland, does not agree with the policy of book banning.
“I am 100 percent against book banning of works of literature,” said Brown. “It runs the risk of creating a culture of ill-informed people who willingly acquiesce, with no questioning or researching or reading, to ideologies that are ‘told’ to them.” “There is much to be gained from reading all kinds of literature,” said Brown. “I believe that there is truth in understanding others’ perspectives, and much of the time, literature is one of the only ways to glean unbiased honest feelings and understandings about others’ lives and cultures that are different from my own.” Brown states that she has had her students read material from books that are on the ALA banned-books list. “The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn,” “The Scarlet Letter” and “The Catcher in the Rye” are all books that have been banned that I have, at one time or another, very unabashedly, taught in my high school curriculum.” Brown says she enjoys how Lane Tech students are protesting against their civil liberties being taken away. “They understand that banning books in schools, where many students do their most reading, limits access to other cultures, ideas, worldviews, etc.,” said Brown.
Photo by Kyra Henderson
Levi Todd, a senior at Lane Tech, is president of the school book club 451 Degrees. "We were blown away by the Intellectual Freedom Award from the ALA."
Leslie Perkins, a junior at Thornwood High School, has never been restricted from reading a book. “In general I feel as though it’s a bad thing because books are such an important part of our culture and learning. I think it’d be better for people to learn from an education resource [such as] a book rather than the media or television . . . that might give them false information,” he said. To find more information about Banned and Challenged books, visit www.ala.org/bbooks
Photo by Kyra Henderson
High school members of the book club 451 Degrees at a weekly meeting at Lane Tech. 27
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Playing for change Outside funding sources save arts programming at one CPS school nergy overflows the room as the drumline performs its piece. The most outstanding instrument is the heart-pounding bass drum that shakes the walls. The strength and precision in each Natalie Phillips hit is typically played EPIC Academy by a male drummer. Kytyra Jackson, 17, who rapidly bangs a bass drum, flies in the face of this convention. She didn’t let traditional gender roles stand in her way. “I feel as if I am the heart of the song,” Kytyra says. “I just like standing out from all of the other instruments.” Thanks to external sources that take up the financial slack from city, state and federal agencies, EPIC Academy, where Kytyra is a junior, is able to provide extracurricular arts programs, such as the drumline at EPIC Academy. It calls itself The Four Layer Players. Support from organizations such as Urban Gateways has allowed students like Kytyra to explore artistic opportunities. Urban Gateways, which has provided arts programming for Chicago youth for more than five decades, also supports visual arts, modeling and an anime club at EPIC Academy, a charter school in Chicago’s Bush neighborhood. Without the nonprofit’s support, Kytyra wouldn’t have the opportunity to challenge stereotypes within the arts. “Art is important in school because it gives me time to express myself while learning,” Kytyra says. Art in the academic environment enhances student learning and character development, according to Kelly Christiel, program associate at Urban Gateways. “Creativity matters and art should be a priority just like any other subject,” Christiel says. “Art helps address and shape the whole student by improving academic
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performance, improving decision-making skills, creating opportunities for cultural awareness and building esteem and selfawareness. There are tons of benefits.” Even Eric Delli Bovi, executive director of Urban Gateways, can personally attest to the positive impact the arts have on urban youth. “I know the arts have affected my life in so many positive ways, and I even built a career out of my passion for the arts,” Delli Bovi says. “The arts can bring enthusiasm and excitement to learning, especially for students who are not interested or inspired through other subjects.” According to The Arts and Achievement in At-Risk Youth: Findings from Four Longitudinal Studies, a 2009 National Endowment for the Arts report, the impact of arts education continues beyond high school. Some of the findings include: • 71 percent of students with high arts exposure attended college following high school; • 48 percent of students with low arts exposure attended college following high school; • 39 percent of students with high arts exposure attended a 4 year college; • 17 percent of students with low arts exposure attended a 4 year college. While the drumline group at EPIC Academy found financial support through Urban Gateways, the school maintains its academic music program with grants from the federal government and other sources. John Lydon, a 10th grade music teacher at EPIC Academy, has seen extensive growth in his students in music literacy. “At the beginning of the year, students could only tell me that they liked a song because ‘the beat goes hard,’” Lydon says. “Now they are able to describe the music and break it down by timbre, texture and even compose and play pieces. By the end of the school year, I hope to give the skills needed to continue to be music practitioners.”
Photo by Natalie phillips
Kytyra Jackson, 17, a member of the EPIC Academy Four Layer Players drumline, plays bass.
Lydon teaches his students how to read and write music and play drums and piano. “Arts education is about creating wellrounded, holistic people,” Lydon says. “You get to understand and find appreciation of different art forms. Michael Riendeau, a teaching musician, works as the drumline instructor to EPIC Academy students. His goal is to teach and encourage a passion in the arts. When asked about the importance of arts education, Riendeau says, “Arts education is all about relating to people in the community and finding the joy of being a better human being through the art form.” Intelligence is too often measured through standardized tests and other rigid academic measurements, suggests Riendeau. Protecting and maximizing a student’s passions in such environments isn’t always easy. “It’s a challenge,” Riendeau says. From the beginning of drumline about three years ago, Riendeau has seen the passion and attitude towards drumming change in his students. “Students have a total level of comfortability around the instrument,” he says. “When you initially learn to play an instrument it’s really fun; you don’t really practice much, but it’s a lot of fun. But then, as you acquire more experience, you start to realize that it actually becomes a lot of work.” When students learn to balance work, passion and self-expression through the arts, they meet with success, he says.
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Legal entrapment What can go wrong when a teen is tried as an adult? hicago attorney Mark Almanza, a volunteer at the First Defense Legal Aid that provides free, 24hour legal representation to people in Luis Barrera- Chicago Police DeGonzalez partment custody, Social Justice High School says many juvenile delinquents don’t comprehend the impact of being tried as adults. “I’ve had many youth who aren’t able to understand the consequences, even when they are in court. They understand their responsibilities of appearing in court and basic things like that, but they don’t understand what kind of consequence it is going to have on the rest of their life, how much it is going to change their life,” he says. Almanza has witnessed the tragedy of juveniles being tried as adults. He recalls defending one juvenile in court. ”I think he was 18, 19 by the time we went to trial. It had been pending for a couple of years when he was a juvenile. During trial you normally want the client, the defendant engaged in listening and participating in the case . . . He was just drawing a picture during the case, so it was surprising. I didn’t understand it at all,” he says. When youth sit through a trial that has lasted years, they just want it to be over. They want it to be over even more when they don’t know what’s going on, Almanza explains. “If you are a 17-year-old charged with a felony, you are going to have a conviction in which you can’t get a job anymore for the rest of your life and that’s a lot longer than if you’re a 35-year-old,” Almanza says. “If you’re 35 and live to be 70 that’s 35 years with a felony conviction. If you’re 17 and live to be 70 that’s 53 years with having a felony conviction. The point is that stigma, that label, never goes away. It’s permanent.”
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According to Policies and Procedures of the Illinois Juvenile Justice System, youth can be automatically transferred to adult court if they are “15 years of age or older at the time of the alleged crime and are alleged to have committed first degree murder, aggravated criminal sexual assault, aggravated battery with a firearm where the juvenile personally discharged the firearm, armed robbery committed with a firearm, or aggravated vehicular hijacking committed with a firearm.” A 13-year-old can also end up in adult court if the offense is “first degree murder committed during the course of aggravated criminal sexual assault, criminal sexual assault, or aggravated kidnapping.” After being tried as an adult, all crimes from then on will be in trial in criminal court and not in juvenile court, according
Photo courtesy of the Adler School of Professional Psychology
Psychologist Elena Quintana is an avid restorative justice advocate and executive director of the Institute on Public Safety and Social Justice at the Adler School of Professional Psychology in Chicago.
to Policies and Procedures of the Illinois Juvenile Justice System. Elena Quintana, a psychologist who is an avid restorative justice advocate and executive director of the Institute on Public Safety and Social Justice at Adler School of Professional Psychology in Chicago, says, “If they have a background and commit another ‘serious crime’ 15 and 16-year-olds are automatically tried as adults for serious crimes such as murder, rape, and armed robbery. I do think these crimes are reprehensible and demand action. However, the kind of action most commonly meted out is . . . counter to scientific facts regarding brain development.” The UCLA report titled, “The Impact of Prosecuting Youth in the Adult Criminal Justice System,” says “66 percent of youth processed in adult criminal court had at least one psychiatric disorder and 43 percent had two or more types of disorders.” Quintana notes: “Children, particularly those that have endured complex trauma due to things such as witnessing violence, enduring physical, emotional, or sexual abuse, having an incarcerated parent or being raised by someone who is abusing substances or is mentally ill, have serious challenges when it comes to impulse and anger control. When we detain them, and withhold community structure and support such as education, caring adult guidance and proper nutrition (as few detention facilities offer), we actually curtail their potential positive human development, rather than support positive transformation and skill building. “ “Trying children as adults is a losing proposition. We ruin families, weaken communities, and destroy futures of young people and their children or future children,” she adds. According to Almanza: “Fabric doesn’t become stronger by pulling out the threads. "When the threads are the young adults ... all you’re doing is taking these people out. They don’t stay in jail forever. They serve their time and come back to the community but they’re not coming back to the community with anything to give. They don’t have any skills, they don’t have any training. They have very, very few skills with very little opportunity to get a job. It absolutely weakens the community.” 29
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No more shame Hollywood and the media undermine positive stories about the foster care system t seems that Hollywood just figured out that families come in all shapes, sizes and forms. In recent years, foster children have been featured in movies like “The Side” and Naheige Lewis Blind Bloom Trail “America” as well as High School on the ABC family drama “The Fosters.” But many times, those portrayals can skew toward the negative. The acclaimed movie “The Blind Side," which chronicles the early years of real-life NFL player Michael Oher, is a sad story of a gentle giant with no family and a penchant for football. In the Lifetime movie “America,” the eponymously named title character is a young biracial man who struggles to fight stigma as an unwanted child in the harsh world of foster care. Both movies tell the stories of young men of color who come from broken homes, have no father and a drug-addicted mother. And while one is true and the other fictional, both promote a stereotypical image of foster children, one of despair, depression and sometimes criminality.
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tertainment,” Whiting says. “Personally, I feel like people who don’t have any experience with children in care shouldn’t be allowed to make assumptions about them. Foster children are more than kids who come from bad homes. They are people, too. They are more than just kids with drugged-out mothers and absent fathers.” Whiting, who also serves as manager for UCAN’s Diermeier Future Leaders Now program, has been a foster parent herself since 1996. Before that, her family took a foster child who Whiting came to love like a brother. “To me, he wasn’t a child,” she says. “He was just my brother and it made sense.” Though films like “The Blind Side” provide a touching rags-to-riches story, is it the norm? According to the Adoption and Foster Care Analysis and Reporting System (AFCARS) Fiscal 2012 Report, 52 percent of the population of kids in care were male. Only 22 percent of that group were black. “I am a bit shocked at the proportion of the numbers. Honestly, I thought they would be higher than that,” says Rheba Misters, a youth specialist with UCAN. “It seems to me that all I ever see in movies or on TV is that foster kids are black. I see some Latinos, but almost always are
Foster children are more than kids who come from bad homes. They are people, too. They are more than just kids with drugged-out mothers and absent fathers.” —Mary Whiting | Foster licensing specialist Why do these images continue to play on the big screen, asks Mary Whiting, foster parent and foster licensing specialist with the Chicago-based Uhlich Children’s Advantage Network (UCAN), who considers such stories fiction at the cost of accuracy. “I think that it’s all en-
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they are of color.” A former foster child herself, Misters has worked within UCAN since being phased out of the Transistional Living Program (TLP) in 2008. The program allows clients to live independently but still offers assistance to them in the form
Photo by Mary Whiting
Rheba Misters, a former foster child herself, now works for a foster care agency and raises four children, three of which are foster children.
of therapy and routine check-ins. Now 25, Misters is the mother of four children, three of whom are foster children. “It’s hard balancing my job and my duties as a mother, but I wouldn’t have it any other way,” she says. “I like to think my experiences as both a foster child and as graduate of the program is helping me to be a good mother, one that I never really did have.” Despite the challenges she grew up with and still faces, Misters continues to strive forward and debunk the stigma around foster children. She most recently participated in UCAN’s Carnival of Caring, a one-day intensive collection of workshops created to inform and expose the truths about the foster care system and highlight UCAN programs. The real question is, why are kids in care viewed in such a negative light? Irene Clements, a foster care consultant and president of the Minneapolis-based National Foster Parent Association (NFPA), blames the stigma on occasional observers who focus more on the symptoms and less on the subject. “I certainly do believe kids in foster care get a raw deal in the media,” says Clem-
columbialinks.org ents. “They are incredible children and youth who, through no fault of their own, have experienced traumas that most of us will never face. The problem is that people look at their behaviors and assume they are bad children. They do not understand that they are only acting out the fears and mistrusts they have for adults.” Clements should know, having been a licensed foster parent for 27 years. During that time, she has fostered 127 children and adopted four. Her drive to help traumatized children came in her early 20s, when two of her foster children were killed by their mother’s boyfriends, even after Clement reported instances of physical and sexual abuse from the assailants. Clements went on to devote her life to serving, protecting and advocating for kids in care. “I, along with my husband and children, were changed forever from that experience, so my passion runs deep,” she says. When asked why the media would want to portray such unattractive and harmful stories, Clements replies quickly. “When something does go wrong for a child/youth in foster care or by a caregiver, such as a foster parent or relative caregiver, that makes great press because the more gross [a story], the more [media outlets] can make something sound better and they like that they get more attention,” she says. Instead, Clements would rather media outlets and production companies shift their focus and highlight the positives that come from foster care. “[Children in foster care] are resilient and strong and worthy of a future full of promise,” she adds. “I believe that youth in care are not allowed the normalcy of other children.” Clements hopes to talk directly with reporters, editors, publishers, TV and movie producers to help them better understand the foster care system and the children and families and caseworkers who work so hard to find safe, nurturing and permanent families for those entering the system. “For those that may not find that before they age out of care, [we want to] find and connect them with a safe, nurturing and caring adult to commit to them as a mentor and friend,” Clements says. “In the end, that’s all that these kids really need.”
Photo courtesy of Naheige Lewis
My life in foster care s a young man who has been in the foster care system since age 6, this idea about the misconceptions about foster care really resonated with me. When it was presented to me, it only made sense that I take it, incorporating the truths that I knew and my own experiences. Similar to Michael Oher in “The Blind Side” and the fictional character America in the Lifetime movie “America,” I too came from a broken home. As the oldest child, my mother had me at the age of 17, the result of a high school fling. By the age of 25, she had five beautiful, boisterous boys, all from different men. My father, who was only a year my mother’s senior, was present very rarely in my life, up until age 6. After that I never saw him again. Young, beautiful and completely overwhelmed, my mother decided the best she could do for my brothers—Shannon, Shaun, Joel, Julian, and me—was to put us in a home where we could be properly looked after and cared for. At age 9, after being through four different homes and schools, the system decided it would be best to separate my siblings and me, so they did. My youngest brothers, Joel and Julian, were kept together and adopted. Shaun, the middle child, was also adopted. As for Shannon and me, being older and more difficult, we were put in group homes in late 2006. I stayed four years, as it was hard for older boys to get placed; Shannon stayed nearly six. In 2010, I was placed in my current home, with the people I call my parents, Ricky and Cynthia Johnson, pictured with me above. As foster parents for the last 20 years, they were well aware of what my life had been like and what I needed in a home. The Johnsons welcomed me and loved me as if I were their own, in addition to their own children, Donya and Jeanice, and grandchildren
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Carlos and Cynthia, who were the same age as me. During that time my mother also had another child, Caleb, who was immediately taken and put into care as well, soon to be adopted. During these last four years, my life has changed rapidly. I see four of my six brothers nearly every week, when we all get together for dinner. Slowly and surely, we are all getting a relationship with one another. Unlike myself, none of my brothers are in contact with any of our biological family. My maternal grandmother has forged a bond during these last years, and I call her nearly every day. Unfortunately, my father or any of my brothers’ fathers have yet to contact any of us. Last year, my mother had her last child, Chase Matthew, who was too placed in a home. My mother is only allowed to visit me and the two youngest boys due to certain rights being taken away. At this writing, I haven’t seen her for several months, as she is currently getting treatment and assistance for her bipolar disorder. Despite all that has happened in my life, I do not consider myself an unfortunate child in any way—in fact, quite the opposite. With counseling and my passion for writing, I was able to find my way out, my muse and make it into something positive. I like to think of myself as a role model for my brothers, for kids in foster care. I find myself to be incredibly blessed to have a beautiful home, a family that loves me and the relationships with my siblings that some foster children do not have. All of these experiences have made me an improved version of myself. Life as a foster child is hard, but it can be overcome. Like Michael Oher in “America,” I overcame my struggles, and I want to make sure that the world knows that there is more to children in the system. –Naheige Lewis 31
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Having their say arent and teacher organizations are common in Chicago. The Chicago Teachers’ Union represents Chicago Public School teachers and their rights. Tonyisha Harris Whitney Young The Local School Magnet High Council represents School parents and voices their opinions about the system. Chicago, however, lacks an organization for the students. Students can voice concerns to their school’s administration through student councils, but they are limited to their school only. Students’ hands are often tied when it comes to fixing problems that their school’s administration has the power over. That’s precisely why the Student Advisory Council was created, officials say. “The Student Advisory Council (SAC) was created to give students a voice and an important [role] to make an impact on their CEO’s decision,” says Winnie Lui, a council representative from Whitney Young Magnet High School in the West Loop. Started in 2013 by CPS Chief Executive Officer Barbara Byrd-Bennett, the council allows students to voice their concerns to CPS through representatives. Bennett hopes to form a bridge of communication between CPS and the students, a bridge students previously only dreamed of. A by-product of the strike “Think about the kids.” That was the plea CTU, CPS and parents lobbed at each other during the 2012 teachers’ strike. And arguments for the teachers’ strike often were based around the effects CPS’ changes would have on the students. A larger class size would decrease the interpersonal connection in the classroom, especially with a cut in staff. Budget cuts would leave teachers without adequate supplies to educate their students proper-
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CPS gives students a voice through their own council
ly. Closing poor-performing schools would hurt the children attending them, children affected by poverty and crime. “The mission of CPS is to educate children. We looked at the services the students deserve and determined they were not being given them, including proper staffing, teachers, curriculum and courses — PE, art, summer schools — and books,” said Michael J. Harrington, CTU’s director of union operations. CPS countered that the teachers’ strike was keeping students out of school, preventing the education process, and that the teachers were more concerned about their salaries. Many students supported the teachers, traveling downtown to participate in rallies. But the students themselves were not involved in the argument, even though the outcome would impact them the most. The strike ended after a week-and-a-half, with the CTU members ratifying the new three-year contract that would give teachers a 17.9 percent raise in October 2012. Teachers and students were happy with the deal, ecstatic that the strike was over, and ready to get back into the all-too familiar school environment. Then CPS sprung another surprise. On Nov. 8, 2013, CEO Byrd-Bennett announced the creation of the Student Advi-
sory Council the first council to work with CPS made up of only high school students. A CPS spokesperson said that the council’s formation is in no way related to the strike. It doesn’t matter, says Liu, who believes that the SAC should’ve been created sooner. “The students are the ones affected the most by [CPS decisions], so it’s important that we can share our point of view.” In an ironic twist, students are some of the best people to communicate concerns to CPS many having spent most of their lives in the school system. Students can explain favorable solutions because they have experiences with the problem. “The SAC has a big influence [on CPS decisions] because we are constantly researching and bringing problems to CPS’ attention that they often don’t notice,” Lui says. First class The inaugural council is made up of 20 high school juniors from all around Chicago. Tamara Prather, strategic project manager in the Office of the CEO, explained that Byrd-Bennett wanted students who were passionate, could work in teams and represented the diversity of Chicago’s districts, school types, gender and ethnicities. Juniors were ideal because they have three years of experience with CPS high schools. The atmosphere before the interview was tense. Anxious possible representatives floated around the room meeting new people or sat quietly waiting for their turn. Photo courtesy of Chicago Public Schools
The CPS Student Advisory Council during a 2014 meeting. Whitney Young student Sanel Mehmedovic (pictured front; see sidebar), passed away in April 2014.
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SAC member Sanel Mehmedovic, 1997-2014, left lasting legacy hroughout his life, Sanel Mehmedovic was a happy and caring person who strived to accomplish his goals and encourage others. He had such a jovial personality that if he suffered, his friends have said, they never knew. The Whitney Young High School student died in April 2014, just a few months after being named to the CPS’ Student Advisory Council. Sanel was a very active teenager and was deeply involved with the community. On Saturdays, Sanel would travel to La Rabida Children’s Hospital, where he had been treated as a patient, and hang out with the current patients. “I think they can identify with him because he’s young like they are . . . in a wheelchair, and they feel comfortable with him,” said Michelle Armand, a child-life specialist at La Rabida. Sanel, who was diagnosed with spinal muscular atrophy type 2, knew what the children were going through and he
aimed to help them make it through their struggle. He started a garden at the hospital, regularly tending to a tomato plant there. His love for nature and helping other kids like him led him to create Sanel’s Project at Whitney Young. The project’s mission is to bring joy to disabled patients through the environment. Members create terrariums—glass structures that house a low-maintenance plant and a nearly self-sustaining environment— and give them to the children. Terrariums would be designed to fit the needs of the patient and developed to connect the patient with a member. Sanel’s Project will continue in his honor. Sanel had dreams of going to college and double majoring in business management and nuclear medicine. Not only was he taking advanced science classes, but he was accepted into one of Stanford University’s science research programs.
Growing up, Sanel’s physical limitations made those goals difficult. His parents, war-refugees from Bosnia, are both deaf. His parents and his two older sisters communicated through sign language. With Sanel’s limited use of his hand, he learned to communicate with his parents through facial expression. The Student Advisory Council was his latest achievement. “Sanel stepped off the page, even with his application. We couldn’t help but fall in love with him. Sanel probably wouldn’t want us to be sad because he was always positive. We miss him and he will be thought of often,” said Tamara Prather, who is a manager of strategic projects for the CPS. Many summed up Sanel this way: He left a deep imprint on those who came in contact with him, teaching them that people can control their lives, have a positive outlook and make every moment count.
“I was really happy that I got in,” says Lui. “It’s exciting to meet with students . . . and go beyond the issues in my own school [to] think of CPS as a whole.” While Lui and her fellow representatives are working to make CPS better, they are receiving valuable skills to use in the future. Representatives have to be social. Through the council they not only improve their public speaking skills but also learn how to deal with authority figures. The representatives gain experience researching extensively on an issue because they have to present it to Byrd-Bennett and, in the future, CPS subcommittees. In the process, they make connections. It also looks great on a college application. “The SAC is really significant,” says Myetie Hamilton, deputy chief of staff to the CEO. “It carries a high level of importance. It provides students with opportunities for growth, leadership ability, opportunities to interface with different leadership heads and broaden their minds for the future.” In the few months that the council has been around, the representatives have started work on several projects, including making adjustments to the student code of conduct, school safety and resources in
school. Hamilton says that Mayor Rahm Emanuel plans to meet with the council members. High hopes, low expectations Student councils at individual schools are run by dedicated, passionate and social students who connect with the student body. At Whitney Young, divisions elect peers to represent them at the meetings. The representatives can run to be executive board members. The student council listens to the student body and advocates for the changes. Student council members have spent years, sometimes, becoming familiar with the students and their needs. “[The SAC] selected students based on who applied, but these students don’t report back to the school necessarily,” said Jennifer Virnich, a science teacher and the student council coordinator at Whitney Young. Applicants did not need to be a part of a student council or student-body government, but did have to show that they have done some service to their school. Still, adds Virnich, “They’re asking about student’s opinions, but they’re not getting it from the student body of that school. The representative should’ve been from the
student council at the school.” Whitney Young senior Jeremy Burton thinks the advisory council is a good idea to give students a voice but “it’s not going to help much. [CPS] needs a lot more than an advisory council made up of kids.” CTU representative Jay Rehak says the union is excited to work with the student organization on future collaborations. “We would be very much for that. Students are the most important people in the building,” says Rehak, a Whitney Young English teacher. “We want them to be empowered like their families. We want to hear from them.” The advisory council has the support of the teachers, CPS and the parents. A student organization is long overdue for Chicago. Students always have information to share and their own opinions about how to better their education. No one knows how much the SAC can accomplish in its first year, but the group is off to a good start. “[Five years from now] I see the council full of bright and talented students from all over Chicago, making CPS better,” Lui says. “I hope the council will continue to help students reach their potential and encourage students to be confident in what they believe in.”
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Power moms?
Studies show challenges for women who are sole providers ne of the most demanding jobs in the world is being a single working mother, according to a 2013 national survey by the Pew Research Center. From managing Stephanie harried schedules to Tinsley St. Ignatius dealing with outside College Prep societal influences, maintaining discipline, navigating educational systems, balancing finances and teaching morals and values, many working single mothers today find parenting difficult to balance. “Sometimes I never feel truly in control because I always feel like I’m rushing. There’s never enough time in the day,” said Heather Prendergast, a physician at the University of Illinois Hospital in Chicago, the mother of two teenagers. Some 8.6 million women (63 percent) are single mothers compared to 5.1 million married mothers (37 percent), according to the 2013 Pew survey. Almost half (47 percent) make up the U.S. labor force. They are also more likely to be younger, African-American or Hispanic, and less likely to have a college degree. But a growing trend is rising—single, well-educated moms with high incomes upwards of $50,000 who are facing the challenges with an intricate network of resources including friends, relatives, church, associations and extended caregivers that allow them to stretch their time and capabilities to keep their families strong, the survey found. Here are three moms who are among this growing trend. Meet Heather Prendergast, M.D. On a typical morning, Heather Prendergast, M.D., is up sipping her first cup of coffee by 4 a.m. She runs through a routine of meditation and light exercises before scanning the morning papers, emails, phone texts and mentally scripting her day. Those are her quiet moments before
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Photo by Stephanie Tinsley
Barbara Klein, a criminal attorney in Chicago, enjoys a laugh with daughter Alana Bourgeois, a junior at Whtney Young Magnet High School.
the rush to get her two children, Miles, 16, and Morgan, 14, out the door to school. Mornings are the roughest part of the day, she said. “I wake them up an hour before it’s time to get up for class because there’s times when I’m ready to walk out the door and Miles is still walking around in his pajamas,” she said. She and daughter Morgan share a laugh, but time management is a serious business in this household. By 7 a.m., the Prendergast bunch is out the door, sometimes without time to make a hearty breakfast they often enjoy on leisure days. She drops them off to different schools when her schedule permits. Other times, she depends on her ex-husband and other parents to help out. After school drop-offs, Prendergast moves into her work day, training medical school residents and managing the health care of her patients.
In between calls, she breaks to chauffeur Morgan to ballet classes, then drops off Miles to basketball practice before circling back to the hospital to finish up her rounds, which may last until 9 p.m. The family’s activity-packed schedule doesn’t leave much time for home cooking, Prendergast acknowledged. They turn eating out into a bonding moment to catch up on each other’s day. “I don’t think I would plan that much in a day,” Morgan said. “I know she has to go to work and pick us up, and sometimes we have after school activities. I still wish she would plan her day more around us so we wouldn’t have to depend on our friend so much.” Prendergast said she is intentionally working to free up her work schedule to make more time for her children, but she also is driven by her passion for being a physician. Daughter Morgan said she
columbialinks.org would like to follow in mom’s footsteps— without the hurried schedule. “I try to stress to her that there’s no way that I would put up with all the craziness in my life if I didn’t love what I did,” Prendergast said. “I tell her that I don’t want her to do this for me . . . She has to really love it . . . I work this hard because I also want my children to have a comfortable life.” Meet Barbara Klein, attorney Barb Klein is a criminal attorney in Chicago and the sole caretaker of Alana Bourgeois, a junior at Whitney Young High School. Since she is self-employed, Klein deals with perhaps even more stresses than the average criminal lawyer working 9 to 5. "My workload varies day to day since I’m self-employed,” she said. “Some days I’m in court so I’ll have to be [at the courthouse]by 9 a.m., and I could be there anywhere from an hour to all day if I have a trial or a hearing, so each day is really quite different." Unlike many single moms, her new role came as a complete surprise. On Dec. 4, 2011, Klein’s husband, Adam, passed away, leaving her without the love of her life and without an extra hand. Though it’s hard for Klein to juggle motherhood and work as a self-employed lawyer, it doesn’t stop her from powering through. "The cases I do are very personal and emotional; sometimes I don’t feel well. Photo by Stephanie Tinsley
Heather Prendergast, a doctor at UIC Hospital, with her daughter, Morgan, an eighth grader at Francis Xavier Ward.
During those times, Alana will have to help me with some of the housework. But it’s still very stressful. Since I’m selfemployed, there may not be a salary every month, so some months we’re doing really well financially, and then sometimes we aren’t . . . I’m learning to adjust to that, too." Taking the stress out on the kids is not uncommon for many working mothers. Klein went through a similar situation with her own mother. Her mom worked full time as a medical technologist and ran her father’s medical office as well. Barb said her mother was absent most of her childhood. That left an impression on Klein to spend more quality time with her kids. "I just resented my mother so much [for not giving her that time], I tried not to make those kinds of mistakes. She took all her stress out by yelling at me,” she said. “Something I try to do with Alana is to let the child know what the work is, what the stresses are so they can understand,” Klein said. “She knows that if I am a bit demanding or impatient with her—in the back of her mind—she knows why that is and it makes things a little less harsh. I think having a working mom kind of forces the child to mature a little faster about certain things." Meet Kreszentia Snyder, psychologist Kreszentia Snyder is a psychologist at City Haven practice in Chicago, and a mother of three. Though she deals with some patients who suffer from the stress of juggling everything in the household, Synder shares their journey. With 17-year-old daughter Kyilah going off to college soon; 12-year-old daughter Nina, and her 5-month-old son Alexander pulling varied schedules, Snyder said keeping up with their interests sometimes takes its toll. Snyder said she didn’t always have the support from her mother to push her toward her goals, but she never let that stop her. This time around, she wants her children to believe that they can achieve whatever they want to do. Echoing other single working moms, Snyder said that she sacrifices some activities to complete work. Still, she compensates by making time with her children special. That’s as good as it gets, she said.
Household trends, based on U.S. 2010 Census • 40% of all households in the U.S with children under the age of 18 include mothers who are either the sole or the primary source of income for the family. • 63% of the women who are the primary source of income in their households (8.6 million) are single mothers. • The number of growth for both groups is readily increasing, which is said to be due to the increasing presence of women in the workplace. • As of 2010, 47% of the U.S. labor force was made up of women. • Although 79% of Americans say that women should not return to traditional roles in the household, about half of the surveyors (51%) said that children would be better off if a mother stayed at home and didn’t hold a job—only 8% said the same about fathers. • The total family income is higher when the mother, not the father, is the primary breadwinner. In 2011, the median family income was nearly $80,000 for couples in which wife is the primary breadwinner, about $2,000 more than it was for couples in which husband is the primary breadwinner, and $10,000 more than for couples in which spouses’ income is the same. • The income gap between the two groups is quite large. The median total family income of married mothers who earn more than their husbands was nearly $80,000 in 2011, well above the national median of $57,100 for all families with children, and nearly four times the $23,000 median for families led by a single mother. Source: Pew Research Center 35
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Boss, not
‘bossy’ Does label discourage girls from taking on leadership roles?
he Ban Bossy campaign was founded by Facebook’s Chief Operating Officer Sheryl Sandberg to open the eyes of today’s society on women and Jovana Vajagic their true roles in Rickover Naval leadership. Sandberg Academy defines “bossy” as “a word that is symbolic of systemic discouragement of girls to lead.” She bases this definition on personal experiences that she has had growing up: “I was called bossy when I was in 9th grade,” Sandberg recalled. “My teacher took my best friend Mindy aside and she said, ‘You shouldn’t be friends with Sheryl. She’s bossy.’ And that hurt.” The campaign addresses the word “bossy” and focuses on completely eliminating that word from the minds and mouths of those who don’t understand what a female leader is truly made of. Females who are clearly bosses in all aspects of society around the world are constantly being disrespected because of the
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simple fact that they’re equally successful or more successful than men. With the Ban Bossy campaign, female leaders can finally stand up and say "I’m not bossy; I am the boss". The Ban Bossy Campaign can fully present women in leadership and help them gain the respect that they completely deserve.
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this same experience and Ban Bossy is designed to avoid this from happening to any other female. Women have been fighting for equal treatment amongst women and men since the 1800’s and are still, to this day, treated differently than men, according to an historical essay presented by the United
I have been called bossy but personally it’s insignificant because I know I’m doing my job. You have to learn how to separate work from gossip or anything similar to that.” —Sophia Romero | Student
The dictionary definition of the word “bossy” is defined as someone who is overly authoritative or domineering. “Bossy” is what women are being called everyday when put in a position of authority and most often discourages women who aspire to become a leader. On the other hand, men in leadership are often described as a confident leader who are widely respected. Many girls have had
States House of Representatives. This discrimination occurs in various areas in society, like in the workforce, in politics and in the military. The preceding areas have one thing in common: they each have available leadership positions. Before even considering the unequal treatment between male and female leaders in today’s society, one must consider the statistics of working and leading women in general.
columbialinks.org According to The Representation Project, only 3 percent of Fortune 500 CEOs are women. Men overpower women in the occupation of leadership positions drastically, as explained by The Representation Project which says that men occupy 80 to 95 percent of top decision-making positions. Ban Bossy has and continues to open the minds and eyes of people who can’t believe yet are now facing the unfortunate truth of discrimination between genders and how they’re portrayed in a leadership position. Double standards don’t only affect grown working women but it also affects the female youth of today. As a teenage student at Rickover Naval Academy, Sofia Romero is a chief who’s an outstanding leader responsible for commanding a company of about 80 students. She expressed how being a leader has given her the confidence to do her job and to do it without constantly worrying about what others think of her and her leadership skills. “I have been called bossy but personally it’s insignificant because I know I’m doing my job. You have to learn how to sepa-
rate work from gossip or anything similar to that.” Romero also said that she believes that there’s still a double standard in today because “women were the first to create them. In this day and generation, nothing is going to change toward the women’s movement because there will always be that group of women that don’t care about respect or being degraded, and for that sole reason women will be looked down upon until that group is gone.” Obviously, Romero understands that females still have a long way to go in order to earn full respect as a whole gender; however, she also understands the major significance of being a female leader: “The significance to me personally would be that I could do the same thing anybody else in school could do gender wise.” Females like Chief Romero deserve respect as leaders and demand that the double standard be snapped out of existence — for good. The double standard is obvious to Baker. “Male leaders are typically treated with more respect than female leaders. Women have to jump through more hoops than men do to be taken seriously as a leader. We have to pass ‘tests’ to gain re-
spect whereas men are simply given the respect.” She, like many other females, doesn’t understand why respect is so divided between males and females. “The strength of a woman’s word and her actions are always in question (not sure why though, sorry).” Imagine if Oprah Winfrey or Hillary Clinton didn’t achieve their role in today’s society because of the existing double standard. What if female bosses like Rear Admiral Annie B. Andrews, who recently assumed the command of Navy Recruiting Command, or Barbara Bryd Bennett, the CEO of the Chicago Public Schools didn’t step up and stand out as assertive yet successful? Young girls would have no one to look up to when their hearts are conflicted with their dream to be successful leaders and the difficulty of earning this success as a female leader. These strong, admirable women prove to the world that success is possible no matter what gender you are. The Ban Bossy campaign puts a well-deserved spotlight on these types of leaders while also removing the double standard that exists in today’s society.
Sheryl Sandberg (left), Oprah Winfrey (middle) and Hillary Clinton are three success stories that reverse the negativty that comes with being a female boss. 37
A South Side S ummer
Traumatized teens
Photo by Shelby Joyner
Gun violence scars survivors who have lost friends
Diane Latiker, founder of Kids Off the Block in Roseland, stands in front of the memorial to teens who have died of gun violence.
eens all over have a hard time, but teens in Chicago’s inner-city neighborhoods have it especially hard. Diane Latiker, founder and Shelby Joyner president of Kids Lindblom Math and Off the Block, said Science Academy teens in Chicago experience post-traumatic stress disorder similar to that of soldiers who have fought in Afghanistan. You can see the distress of black boys in Roseland on a regular basis, she said. “If you watch them walk down the street, they are constantly doing this,” she said, demonstrating by continually jerking her head to the side, “[at] every car [that] comes by.”
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For good reason. Gunfire in Chicago has become so commonplace that it is on the nightly news and even made national news when over the July 4, 2014 weekend, 82 people were shot. The Chicago Tribune’s website crime.chicagotribune. com tracks crime in the Chicago area. While this may seem like big news, it is old news to Latiker, 54. She started KOB 11 years ago when she noticed the rapid growth in gun violence in her neighborhood. Latiker launched KOB when her mother encouraged her to start something for the kids because she saw the kids liked and respected Latiker. On Friday nights Latiker would invite their parents in to watch the kids perform. “That’s what got me right there. I looked into those parents’ eyes and they were smiling and
clapping,” Latiker said. From that day on, Latiker has had more than 200 students involved in activities at KOB. When teens lose a friend, they accept it and that is one of the worst things they can do, according to Latiker. When teens accept that it is OK for them to lose friends to gun violence, they feel it is “normal” for it to happen when it is not. Alex Del Toro knows teen trauma in more ways than one. He has experienced gun violence, was and still is a victim of gun violence, and now he counsels teens who are experiencing the same thing. Joining a gang at age 8, Del Toro has witnessed more than one friend die due to gun violence. “I witnessed my first homicide when I was around 7,” he said. After that, gun violence became part of
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the life Del Toro grew used to. Trauma comes with the territory he says and you can’t expect for it not to happen. While growing up in the Humboldt Park neighborhood, the gang life was Del Toro’s life. He had been shot in the shoulder and back, witnessed shootings, and had friends of gang members who did the shooting. He felt that he was placed in the world to be in a gang and die. “Every time I survived the summer I felt lucky," he said. After being in a gang for 16 years, Del Toro realized that the gang life was not for him. He is now a man of the Bible and a minister. With his experiences, he teaches teens that being in a gang is not the answer. As the program director who works at the Logan Square and Humboldt Park branches of the YMCA of Metropolitan Chicago’s Youth Safety and Violence Prevention initiative, Del Toro shows them that it remains traumatizing to him to this day. He offers many programs such as open gym and many summer programs to help the kids get rid of their “I don’t care attitude.” In some extreme cases of trauma, YSVP provides professional counseling. Still living in the Humboldt Park neigh-
borhood, Del Toro can hear gunshots ringing throughout the community. Just a couple of days ago there were two murders just down the street from him. “I can’t even let my kids play outside,” he said. Thomas Canaday, 16, a junior at King College Prep, lost a friend to gun violence this year. “It felt like I lost my brother,” he said. Thomas lost his friend a couple days after July 4 when more than 80 people were shot. After his friend was shot and killed, Thomas was mad and wanted retaliation. By surrounding himself with good people, he soon realized that would not get him anywhere. To cope with his loss, Thomas said he focused on other things that made him happy, such as going to the mall and hanging with good people. Unlike many teenagers, Thomas did not turn to drugs to help him cope. “That’s not for me,” he said. He felt that drugs would not get rid of the aching pain he felt. Thomas’ calm attitude helped others mourn the death of their friend in a nonviolent way. Trauma is a serious emotion that will take over those who have experienced
Photo by Shelby Joyner
Alex Del Toro, program director of Youth Safety and Violence Prevention program at the YMCA Logan Square/ Humboldt Park: “I can’t even let my kids play outside.”
it and are still experiencing it. It is universal, from toddlers to teens to adults. It does not matter whether they experienced it after being on the battlefield or on Chicago’s mean streets. “Trauma is trauma,” Del Toro said. For more on Diane Latiker’s mission for Kids Off the Block, see Jasmine Moore’s story at columbialinks.org
Photo by Shelby Joyner
Outside the Kids Off the Block memorial in Roseland. According to Diane Latiker, you can see the distress on young men’s faces. 39
A South Side S um m er
COVER STORY
Photos by Louis Foglia
PEDAL empowerment
Blackstone Bicycle works to get kids off streets and focused on their futures
n Chicago’s Woodlawn neighborhood, where crime, drugs and gangs remain a serious plight, Blackstone Bicycle Works, a bike shop that also provides outreach Christian programs for kids, Thorsberg positively influences Northside Preparatory youth and betters High School their communities. For years, Woodlawn and its surrounding neighborhoods have been making headlines for its shootings, drug busts and robberies. Despite numerous community improvement programs and initiatives, according to the Chicago Tribune, which runs a neighborhood crime website, Woodlawn ranks in the top half of 77 Chicago neighborhoods in violent, property and quality of life crimes. Jake Ament is a program officer of the Woodlawn branch at Local Initiative Support Corp., an organization that works toward the development of business, education and health in various Chicago neighborhoods. He finds the lack of opportunities for youth to be a glaring problem and a factor in the
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neighborhood’s negativity. “There are a lot of things that are difficult for youth. You have to travel a long way to find business and places to go or get together with your friends. It changes what you’re familiar with that might be both a difficult and dangerous thing,” Ament said. Stephanie Robinson, representative of the Broader Urban Involvement and Leadership Development program in Chicago, said peer pressure and the desire to fit in are leading to gang involvement, violence and unnoticed bullying in the community. However, the wide range of ongoing struggles in and around Woodlawn today do not make it a special, or hopeless, case. In fact, as Ament put it: “There’s a large mix of challenges and great things that are happening at the same time. Woodlawn is no different than any other community.” Nonetheless, the amount of organizations focusing on youth outreach and interaction is still lacking. “Having more leaders in the community, and more mentoring programs, would really make a difference,” said Robinson. Blackstone Bicycle Works remedies that through various after-school pro-
grams. It has become an advocate in its community, making a positive impact on the lives of Chicago youth. The organization educates young students about bike safety and repair skills, as well as providing them with mechanical knowledge and job experience. Since it reopened in 2004 after a 2001 fire, Blackstone has motivated its kids to focus their energy on benefitting the community, their friends, and themselves. "The main goal of the program is to get kids more engaged with bicycles, take them outside the environment in which they’re used to, and help them explore different options . . . things they can do with their lives besides the things everybody else is doing,” said Jamel Triggs, youth mentor and instructor at Blackstone. Blackstone also offers an Earn-A-Bike program, which rewards youth who spend more than 24 hours working and learning at the shop with their own twowheeler to take home. “The goal is to have them take ownership and say, ‘This is my bike, I earned it. I did the 24 hours, and this is my bike,’ ” he said. Educationally, Blackstone continues to motivate and provide the kids with
Che c k o u t the vi d e o f or t hi s s t or y a t columbialinks.org the tools they need to succeed in school, instilling in them homework first, then play. By teaching them these positive habits, Blackstone has sent numerous kids to college, helping them out with any fees they may have. During the school year, for students of all ages, University of Chicago students are brought in to tutor and help with homework. Blackstone Bicycle Works, begun in 1994, is located at 6100 S. Blackstone Ave. near the university campus and was subsequently adopted by the board of the Experimental Station, remaining in partnership with the Resource Center, a leader in recycling. Triggs said he believes that the continuation and growth of Blackstone’s welcoming and diverse culture will help to combat crime in the community. “Now everybody’s friends with each other, and once they grow up they don’t have to worry about all the gang-related activity that’s been happening, because these kids know each other. They trust each other,” he said. Operating as a retail and resale bike
shop in addition to providing for these kids, Blackstone is constantly buzzing, both inside and out. Whether it be loading or unloading bikes, fixing them up, or scavenging for extra parts, no matter what time of day, it is sure to be busy. However, to Blackstone mentors like Triggs, it is all worth it. “The most rewarding for us is when you get that one individual kid who comes in and doesn’t have many friends, and they blossom into something that’s positive.” Having grown up as a kid through the Blackstone program, Triggs knows firsthand how it can shape and positively influence someone. Now, as a youth mentor and instructor, a position he himself developed through dedication towards the kids, Triggs finds himself back with the shop, mentors, and youth that he loves. “I care about these kids like they’re my kids. It’s my service to them. They know that I’m here for each and every one of them. That is my job. That is my purpose.” According to Ament, programs like Blackstone are exactly what the commu-
Photo by james foster
Jamel Triggs, youth mentor and instructor at Blackstone: “The goal is to have them [youth] take ownership and say, ‘This is my bike, I earned it.’”
nity needs. “Just to have an opportunity for youth to by James Foster get out, and interact in aPhoto safe space, is a very positive thing.”
Photo by Christian Thorsberg
Inside the Blackstone Bicycle Works, students work and maneuver in a maze of bicycles. 41
A South Side S umm er
A fireman saves lives and fixes bikes
Photo courtesy of DLR Group
At 39th Street and Wabash Avenue, Kirkland Flowers operates FITCH (Firefighters/Paramedics in the Community Helping) out of the Engine 16 fire station repairing, building and giving out bicycles to countless Chicago youth.
n the small workroom of a South Christian Side firehouse, a biThorsberg Northside cycle is born—and Preparatory swapped for a high High School honors report card. Kirkland Flowers, an energetic and bighearted Chicago firefighter, has spent more than 20 years stationed at Engine 16, motivating neighborhood youth to stay in school. Previously located at 40th and Dearborn streets in the heart of the Robert Taylor Homes, Engine 16 was known throughout the city as one of Chicago’s busiest houses, and among the toughest places to work. As Kirkland Flowers describes, it was a rough part of town. He said: “11,000 people lived within two blocks of the firehouse and 70 percent of them were kids.” Often from single-family homes, countless youth would hang in or around the firehouse, unable to read or write, severely lacking proper education. “The firemen became surrogate parents to these kids,” said Flowers. Knowing that the situation had become out of hand, firefighter Flowers took innovative action. “I told the kids that if they stayed in school for a full marking period, got good grades and weren’t absent or tardy, then we would give them each a bike. The next day, 50 or 60 kids came into the firehouse
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with their report cards.” Their enthusiasm encouraged Flowers. “I knew that we could make a real impact.” In 1992, the firefighters of Engine 16 started FITCH (Firefighters/Paramedics in the Community Helping), hoping to expand and develop this new idea. Soon, 20 to 30 kids a day from around the city were showing up with their grades in hand. Quickly, however, a problem arose— where to get the bikes. Flowers asked Chicago firefighters and residents to bring in old, used and new bikes or bike parts to the firehouse basement. There, he examined what he had and then built and refurbished bikes to present to the kids. The program grew, working better than expected. “The kids who used to hang around the firehouse were never seen again [once they got the bicycles],” he said. Since FITCH has started, the Robert Taylor Homes have been torn down, and many of the kids have moved away. However, that hasn’t stopped Flowers and FITCH from giving out between 1,200 and 1,300 bikes per year. “That’s another 12 to 13 hundred kids per year who are on high honor roll,” Flowers said proudly. In addition to the immediate impact Flowers’ work has made, FITCH has also helped students by “keeping them informed of the benefits of education, and the realities of what happens without
one,” while assisting them in reaching their long-term educational goals. “We have helped many kids graduate from college,” said Flowers. “We provide them with welfare, clothing and help with assignments. In one instance, we even raised $1,500 for a student to pay for his books.” During the Christmas season, Flowers delivers more than 60 new bikes to “kids who have nothing, and don’t get any other presents.” Flowers recently reached a partnership with Schwinn, a major bike manufacturer that donates more than 1,000 new bikes annually to FITCH. Flowers has also set up reward programs with 30 Chicago schools on the South and West Sides of the city, though Flowers works with all kids, regardless of where they are from. “If a kid came to me from Poland with his report card, I’d give him a bike,” he said. Flowers believes FITCH has benefited both the kids and the neighborhood, influencing them in positive and productive ways. “Our whole community knows us, appreciates what we do, and responds to our work well. They donate to us, and lots of people help out.” Today, the program continues to go strong. Nine-hundred bikes were given out in May alone, with many others still on their way. Busier than ever, Flowers feels that no matter what he gives out, he receives much more in return. “I love watching (the kids) grow up, develop and learn. Seeing them come back as adults to thank me, having received a good education, not in jail, making positive decisions and moving in the right direction . . . I feel that is the most rewarding.” Just under two years ago, Engine 16 moved a block away to 39th Street and Wabash Avenue. In the new building, Flowers has his own work area where he teaches kids how to fix and restore bikes. His most recent project involves refurbishing and distributing more than a dozen bikes to a West Side Little League team. Despite retiring in three years, he doesn’t see himself ever leaving FITCH. “Even when I leave the fire department, I’ll be back here with the bike program.” Flowers loves his kids, and undoubtedly, his kids love him.
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Urban entrepreneurs South Side boutiques bring hip-hop brands to teens hen you think of the South Side of Chicago with a hip-hop or urban flavor, then rappers Common, Chance the Rapper Ari Slaughter and Kanye easily pop South Shore into your mind. The International South Side is home to these iconic entertainers and freshfashion fellas. But where to go on the South Side to get the stylish, urban look these homeboys and others wear? It could be like searching for a diamond in the rough, but there are some hip-hop, urban-wear retail gems on that populous side of town. The South Side does have some spots to snag such gear as Billionaire Boys Club apparel, True Religion jeans and some fresh kicks to set the ‘fit off. This side of town may put on the map some fave pizza joints, sandwich shops and soul food restaurants, but it’s not really known for having urban fashion store options like the city’s downtown and North Side. The hip-hop and urban fashion industry is a $17 billion one, according to the numbers-gathering and crunching website Statistic Brain. People who live on the South Side often have to leave the area to find the clothing, shoes and accessories they like, taking a huge chunk of that multibillion-dollar pie to other parts of town. But in comes entrepreneurs like Keeland Payne, co-owner of Jimmi Skouls, 8126 S. Stony Island Ave. “We are trying to be a specialized boutique, to prevent customers from staying downtown, [or in] Hyde Park, Orland and Northbrook. We want them to come to the South Side to know that we do have comparable prices and quality goods. It’s quite challenging but worth it,” said Payne. He and his brother own the store, located along a bustling small-business retail strip near the South Shore, Chatham and Avalon communities. “We try to be abreast when we go to dif-
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ferent stores. We try to stay two steps ahead on fashion and bring something different and unique that other stores don’t have at all. We want to be exclusive,” said Payne. His Jimmi Skouls shop carries top brands in shoes, shirts, jeans and more, with prices right where the niche shoppers expect them to be: shirts from $20 to $100 or more; sneakers and denim on price point at up to $200 and $300, respectively. “It’s just like a lifestyle. Urban wear is different trends and lifestyles that kids like to wear to express themselves,” Payne noted. In the early 2000s, an era of premium denim, pristine—and pricey—sneakers, watches with giant faces, team athletic wear, form-fitting dresses and blingblingbling, rappers and singers began establishing their own brands. Today, several artists have popular clothing brands that some consumers fall for: producer Pharrell with Billionaire Boys Club, mogul and rapper Jay-Z with Rocawear, rapper Lil Wayne with Trukfit.
Photo by Ari Slaughter
Some of the apparel displayed inside Dez DeMe House of Style.
Photo by Ari Slaughter
Del and Menia Jones are the owners of the South Side boutique Dez DeMe House of Style. "We get most of our fashions from L.A.," Del said.
These brands and others are finding their way to the South Side and in boutiques that are closer to shoppers’ homes. In fact, Del Jones and his wife, Menia, had “the community” in mind when they opened Dez DeMe House of Style in the Wrightwood neighborhood on Chicago’s Southwest Side. The small boutique carries urban wear brands, including Giorgio Armani. Del said they were inspired to open the store at 8245 S. Kedzie Ave., after Menia quickly went through a wad of cash while shopping one day—way outside of the South Side area they lived in. He said the spree drained his wallet but left him with an “ah-ha!” moment that turned into a store nestled in a strip mall. Walk into Dez DeMe—named for the couple’s three children—and dazzling shoes and clothes immediately jump out at you. Del embraces the fashion industry and owning a trendy store. “It’s very unique. It’s different. You meet a lot of new people. You [discover] different fashions and different likes. You find out a lot about yourself," he said. “We get most of our fashions from LA ... which is one of the main urban style cities.” Del considers the terms “urban” and “hip-hop” to be 'limiting' but he said he is pleased that his store could be an option for those consumers—right on the South Side. 43
A South S ide Summer
A bad rap
on rap Violent messages can be damaging, especially for urban youth
ince June 1, 2014 there have been 96 homicides in Chicago and a majority of them have taken place on the South Side, the birthplace of drill music, a hip-hop sub-genre Miles Littleton where the lyrics are Jones College Prep more violent and aggressive. (The Chicago Tribune’s website crime.chicagotribune.com tracks crime in the Chicago area.) Sharon Cooper, a pediatrician at the Southern Regional Area Health Education Center in North Carolina, said adolescents still have a developing prefrontal cortex of the brain, which means some teens will try to mimic people they admire. They tend to believe things that are not true, or not morally just, according to Cooper. Most of today’s mainstream hip-hop lyrics consist of strong underlying messages of violence, misogyny and con-
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sumerism. Chief Keef, a native of Chicago’s South Side and well-known rapper, uses all three of these elements in his songs and could possibly be imposing these behaviors onto Chicago’s youth. “Hip-hop has the potential to have positive and negative messages, and unfortunately [hip-hop] music provides a very consistent negative message,” Cooper said. In just the hook of one of Keef ’s songs, “Citgo,” he raps: “All these b****** know I get dough/pop a n***** soul like crisco/ I’m smoking on the gas like Citgo/fat a** on my b**** though/big rims on my whips though.” He frequently raps about societal taboos, which can affect social interactions among youth, some reports say. “College students who prefer rap and heavy metal music report more hostile attitudes than students who prefer other styles of music such as country, alternative, dance/soul, or adult contemporary,” according to a study titled, “Differences in Aggression, Attitudes Toward Women, and Distrust as Reflected in Popular
Chance the Rapper of Chicago says Michael Jackson, Kanye West and Common have influenced his music.
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Despite the negativity surrounding rap music during this day and age, there can be positive effects from listening to hiphop. The chapter titled The Effects of Violent Music on Children and Adolescents from the book “Media Violence and Children” by psychologist Douglas Gentile, said teenagers tend to create a companionship when they are able to bond over similar music interests, specifically hip-hop. During social gatherings, hip-hop music can provide a communal discussion and can also inspire dancing. Hip-hop can also help teens establish an identity, according to the book. Cooper acknowledged that hip-hop can help youth establish themselves in their communities, but she said regardless of the type of influence rap has on an individual, minorities are more susceptible to follow the trends hip-hop can create. “Latinos and African-Americans watch more television than any other racial group in the United States,” Cooper said. “They are absorbing—listening, hearing, and believing—more hours of music.”
Rapper ‘Greedi Phresh’ works on his first mixtape "Press Start": "You don’t go and play ‘Grand Theft Auto’ and . . . shoot and drive and run over people. You should be able to feel that way about music."
Music Preferences,” published by The Journal of Media Psychology in 2001. One of the most popular types of hiphop music, drill music, was born out of the violence that occurs in Chicago. Drill portrays gang life and is told by people who live in the violence daily. Some of the recent and most notable hip-hop artists, such as Lil’ Durk and Chance the Rapper, have dealt with the city’s violence firsthand. Despite growing up with similar lives, their music differs tremendously. Greedi Phresh, originally from the south suburb of Harvey, uses unique sounds and lyrics in his music. Phresh has been heavily influenced by Chicago rappers such as Kanye West and Common. Even though some of his favorite
rappers did not promote negativity the same way drill music does, he said he did listen to hip-hop artists who did. His life was not molded by gangsta rap, despite his tendency to listen to it. “You don’t go and play ‘Grand Theft Auto’ [an action-adventure video game] and go out and shoot and drive and run over people,” Phresh said. “You should be able to feel that way about music.” Phresh blames negative behaviors and ideas on the environment people are forced to grow up in. Phresh said that drill rappers learn their negative behaviors from their surroundings and what they witness is displayed in their lyrics. “Some people learn it from the lyrics, and some people learn it from the streets,” he said.
Sharon Cooper, a pediatrician at the Southern Regional Health Education Center in North Carolina. “Hip-hop has the potential to have positive and negative messages, and unfortunately [hiphop] music provides a very consistent negative message,” 45
A South Side S ummer
Sound of
SILENCE Some schools eliminate or ignore music education programs COMMENTARY
Photo by KIERSTEN LOFTON
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hen children are given gifts, usually are the latest gadgets or a few outfits that seem to be trending. Has anyone ever considered music? Kiersten Lofton The lack of music Chicago Academy education in the city for the Arts of Chicago is tremendous. Nevertheless, our city fails to realize that cutting the time for a musical education and replacing it with academic classes isn’t benefiting children. A study conducted in 2007 by Nature Neuroscience revealed that students who were involved in high-quality music programs scored higher on standardized tests. Their brain stem’s sensitivity to speech sounds was also enhanced. Chicago Public Schools had a budget issue that caused them to close more than 50 schools at the end of the 2012-2013 school year. This budget issue also caused many schools to lose their arts education programs. So not only did students have to completely shift where they attended school, but they possibly had to sacrifice some of the programs they enjoyed as well. Where does this leave those students? Without all of the programs that students enjoy, one being music, students will be more likely to lose interest in school. “The Role of Fine and Performing Arts in High School Dropout Prevention,” a study published in 1990 by Florida State University’s Center for Music Research, showed that high school students who considered dropping out of school decided they wouldn’t just so they could have the opportunity to participate in the arts. Now, that many Chicago students don’t have a successful arts programs in their schools, will the student dropout rate increase? When Chicago musician Tommy Sklut, co-founder of Sklut and Weston School of Music, was asked what effect music has on a child’s life, he said: “Music gives children something to do. It keeps them off the streets and prevents them from joining gangs. Personally, I think music can help you escape from family problems, school issues, or whatever else you’re dealing with. Music can help develop the
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columbialinks.org brain, and cause students to be more independent and well-raised.” We as a city are always talking about ways to prevent the high crime or school dropout rates, and music itself is a great solution. Sklut believes that music can help children deal with emotions and give them a more well-rounded education overall. With these two characteristics, the amount of crime and school dropout rates could easily decrease in number. If our schools do not offer sufficient arts education programs, parents and communities will have to step up. They could step up by forming petitions, bringing the issue to PTA meetings, or even trying to find non-profit organizations that may be interested in coming to their schools to provide musical instruction to students. Pam Shortall, community engagement manager of the Chicago Children’s Choir (CCC), said that the CCC instructs children all around Chicago. The CCC works with about 70 schools a year to bring after-school choir programs to students. The students are able to perform nationally and internationally, in various forums (television, concert halls, etc.). Founded in 1956, the CCC has performed for/with numerous dignitaries and celebrities such as President Barack Obama, Beyoncé Knowles, Nelson Mandela and Yo-Yo Ma. The Chicago Children’s Choir never ceases to serve Chicago children with a
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Photo courtesy of Tommy Sklut
Tommy Sklut, musician and co-founder of Sklut and Weston School of Music: “Music gives children something to do. It keeps them off the streets and prevents them from joining gangs.”
ing able to focus on one thing for at least 20 minutes and being able to associate with children and adults. Next, consider what your budget will allow you to spend on a quality music education and find an organization that fits your budget and needs. Some wonderful and affordable music organizations for Chicago youth are Merit School of Music, The Hyde Park Youth Symphony, The Chicago Park District, Guitar Center, Snow City Arts and Old
I think music can help you escape from family problems, school issues, or whatever else you’re dealing with. Music can help develop the brain, and cause students to be more indepedent and well-raised."
jects like math and English. Music is the body’s sixth sense. Fahrenbach believes that there is a lack of music mainly because the value of a musical education is not made known. He thinks that more teacher training at the undergraduate level would improve the quality of music education. Fahrenbach is also a part of the CPS Arts Education Advisory Committee. “Music, it simply puts all the puzzlepieces together,” said Sklut. The only puzzle piece that is missing now is having it offered in all Chicago schools. Photo by DAVE ADAMS
—Tommy Sklut | Founder of Sklut and Weston School of Music successful musical education. If we could get more organizations like the CCC to instruct our children in such a professional manner, the lack of musical education would easily decrease. However, in the case that families have to seek a musical education outside of school, they should follow these steps. First, they should look for signs of readiness in the child. Those signs include be-
Town School of Folk Music. A few other resources to help find music programs that would appeal to teens would be: takelessons.com, musiclessons. com, privatelessons.com. Jason Fahrenbach, music technology teacher at Walt Disney Magnet School, believes music is highly equal to academics. Fahrenbach said that music can help you out in life just as much as other sub-
Pam Shortall, community engagement manager of the Chicago Children’s Choir, works with about 70 schools a year to bring after-school choir programs to students. 47
A South S ide Sum m er
Concrete
reservations
Chicago museum embraces the legacy of public housing
Photo courtesy of National Public Housing Museum
National Public Housing Museum is set to open in 2015 in the last of Chicago’s Jane Addams homes.
ublic housing has often been looked at through a glass darkly. Dr. Timuel Black, 95, is a civil rights activist, author and a walking Chicago Jon Nacionales Jones College Prep history encyclopedia. He chronicled the development of the image of public housing in Chicago today. Black said overcrowding led to a decrease in available jobs, so mothers had to apply for welfare. However, if a male over 19 lived with them, they could not get welfare. Men began to leave homes, and families fell apart. “The older boys, 16 and 17, began to get recruited into gangs. The drugs began to come into the neighborhood. And they could sell and make money, pay the rent for mama.” Crime rates went up and this became the image of public housing. The people who live in public hous-
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ing—an approximately 1.08 million households—are frequently stereotyped against this backdrop. Even after the tearing down of high-rises such as Cabrini-Green and Stateway Gardens and the building of mixed-income housing, many assume those who come from public housing are a detriment to society. Chicago’s upcoming National Public Housing Museum is working to shatter that image. Todd Palmer, director of the museum, said: "The mission of the National Public Housing Museum is to dispel stereotypes and stigma that have grown up around the American experience in public housing. We do that primarily through storytelling." The museum, expected to open in fall 2015 at 1332 W. Taylor St. in the last of the Jane Addams Homes, has been collecting stories from people who live and have lived in public housing to document experiences that have shaped the communities and families of public housing. The exhibits at the museum will prove that subsidized housing communities
are not just crime and grime. Videos, old photographs and artifacts from families who have lived in public housing paint the picture of a vibrant, tight-knit community. The people supported each other and often held fashion shows, basketball games, youth field trips and other events, enriching the lives of the families that lived there. The telling of these stories stimulates discussion among the public. This not only causes people to look at public housing differently, but also look for solutions to problems that public housing actually faces. The museum is not only in the business of storytelling. The museum also holds a youth program for students ages 14-21 who live in Chicago public housing. It is called the Youth Advisory Council. Camille Acker, programs and development associate, heads the YAC. “One goal is for there to be some development of the youth in leadership, in future goals, [and] in team-building,” Acker said. The YAC also acts as a positive outlet for the youth. The council has gone on college tours,
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learned about the history of public housing and has had opportunities to work with the museum and its exhibits. This year they will travel to Detroit to visit colleges and learn about the city’s condition. In the past, the group has gone to Ohio, Indiana and Kentucky. The YAC will also create a student-led documentary, funded by Kickstarter, about violence in Chicago. Salyndrea Jones, 20, has been with the program since its inception in 2010 and is the president of the Youth Advisory Council. Jones is a senior at Columbia College, studying film and directing. “This program has really [been] helping me grow as a person,” she said. As the president, Jones has become a mentor to many of the students. She has seen many students learn and develop skills beneficial to them. The museum has recently started an internship program for college students and Jones is one of them. As an intern, she works on appeals for grants for the museum and prepares presentations, among other
things. The internship program has also helped her with writing her resume; she is getting ready to apply for internships at news stations such as ABC 7 and NBC 5. Working for the museum is close to home for Jones because she grew up in public housing. She carries several fond memories with her that go against the notion of public housing as distressed communities. Jones lived in the Stateway Gardens public housing units in Bronzeville before they were torn down in 2007 by the Chicago Housing Authority. Jones recalls a very neighborly community, where tenants were always willing to lend a helping hand. The community would also organize events. “Living in Stateway, we used to have back-to-school parties every year. We used to go on trips, like to the zoo, for Halloween we used to go to the zoo. We had Valentine’s Day parties,” said Jones. Many of the community gatherings would take place at the community
center, which came down along with the original high-rises. Although the new Park Boulevard housing units have replaced Stateway, a new community center has yet to be built. According to Jones, the new units are nicer, but the community feeling is gone. These units are called mixed-income; some residents may include lawyers, doctors and other middle-class professionals, but mixed-income housing carries class friction with it. Jones lives in the same building as lawyers who won’t talk to her because of her family’s economic standing. Jones’ story is just one the museum seeks to collect and tell. Many who have lived in public housing lead very successful lives today. Barbra Streisand, Jay Z and members of Earth, Wind and Fire are just a few examples. If all goes as planned, the exhibition of these stories at the National Public Housing Museum will open the public’s eye to the whole story and a bigger picture of public housing.
Photo by Jon Nacionales
Todd Palmer, director of the National Public Housing Museum, at the 2014 Bud Biliken Parade. 49
A South Side S ummer
Baseball
on the rise
In the midst of violence, South Side teams are working for change
Photo by Kaitlin hetterscheidt
Members of the Jackie Robinson West Little League team, national champions, can play until they are 17 but often transition to another program to continue playing baseball.
ollowing one of the most violent July 4 weekends in Chicago, there is a beacon of hope coming from the South Side in the form of Little League Leagues Dakota Shepard baseball. Ogden International such as Jackie RobSchool of Chicago inson West and professionally owned youth programs such as the White Sox ACE (Amateur City Elite) program and the Cubs RBI (Reviving Baseball in Inner Cities) League are trying to keep kids off the street and get them onto the playing field. But at the same time, professional baseball has seen a big drop in African-American participation. What’s more: Baseball in Chicago is facing an uphill battle as it’s hard to compete with the legacies of basketball’s Michael Jordan and football’s Walter Payton. Additionally, attracting inner-city kids to
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baseball has become difficult. “Basketball became the dominant sport when Michael Jordan came to Chicago,” said Michael Clifton, Simeon Career Academy baseball coach. “Some people think baseball is boring.” According to an ESPN.com commentary in April 2014 by senior writer Howard Bryant, the “disturbing, declining numbers of black participation” at the professional level has dropped down to 7.8. Compare that to the 1980s when black players made up about 20 percent of Major League Baseball, according to the Society for American Baseball Research. At a widely reported press conference in Indianapolis April 2014, ESPN columnist Michael Wilbon, who grew up on Chicago’s South Side, said, “That’s not a math problem. That’s a Michael Jordan problem.” Wilbon alluded to the idea that baseball isn’t viewed by young black athletes as the cool sport it once was. Adding to the
problem is that many professional players are being recruited from other countries, sometimes to escape poverty. One issue that may draw young South Side boys away from baseball is the allure of joining a gang. Clifton, who is also a police officer, began coaching in 1983. He said that kids who aren’t in an organized sport have the potential to get involved in negative things, which is why he started coaching. “[I am] giving back to younger kids as older guys gave back to me as I was a young athlete coming up,” Clifton said. It appears, for at least some young black boys on the city’s South Side, baseball is showing them a better life. Take, for instance, the Jackie Robinson West Little League team, which has built a legacy with dramatic success. In 2014 the team became national Little League World Series champions but ultimately lost the world title to a team from South Korea. Still, the team was welcomed home to a massive celebration that brought out
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more than 10,000 people to Chicago’s Grant Park. For a long time JRW has been deemed the best in the team’s section by consistently winning the district and sectional tournaments on their way to the Little League World Series. Even though Jackie Robinson West continues to allow kids to play until they are 17, players usually transition into another program if they choose to continue to play baseball. One of those programs is the Chicago White Sox ACE program. “It’s not just all baseball,” said 15-yearold Roderick Anderson, a former JRW player and current White Sox ACE player. “I have something to do besides hang out with people I shouldn’t be hanging out with . . . it keeps me out of trouble.” He also talked about how the program puts him in front of colleges that could possibly provide him with financial assistance, but it’s something he needs to earn himself. “We give you the direction necessary for you to earn a scholarship,” White Sox ACE coach Kevin Coe said. “Whether you’re going to do what it takes it to earn that scholarship or not, that’s up to you.” Education is the key to the program, because players like Anderson must keep up their grades if they’re going to be allowed to play. Aside from the focus on education and athletics, the program hopes to get kids off the streets and put them on a path to do something more constructive with their adult lives. For example, the White Sox ACE program has former players Ro Coleman and Corey Ray playing in the College World Series. Additionally, Darius Day, who played for JRW, Simeon Career Academy and the White Sox ACE program, was recently drafted to the Texas Rangers in the 26th round. Coe said Chicago baseball can be a great way to combat the negativity that many of these communities face, but the numbers have dropped since he was a kid. “When we played at the Little League tournament at Jackie Robinson there were probably eight to 10 teams that participated in the tournament, and that’s district wide. This year there were only three teams,” Coe said.
Photo by Dakota Shepard
White Sox Ace Coach Kevin Coe stands in front of White Sox Championship mural. “We give you the direction necessary for you to earn a scholarship.” 51
A South S ide Summer
Desert
in the city A proud community without a major grocer fights back yme and Tyra Anderson live in the South Shore neighborhood, where the closing of the Dominick’s store last year left the neighborhood with only one grocery Cecelia Morrow store. Some residents Whitney M. Young say this has not been Magnet High School enough to fulfill the needs of the community. Although the young cousins live near the Jewel Osco on the far southwest side of the community, to get there, Tyme says, “people who live around the Dominick’s have a disadvantage because they do have to travel a little further to the Jewel to get fresh food.” The loss of Dominick’s has put South Shore in jeopardy of becoming a food des-
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Photo by Cecelia Morrow
Corner stores are often used by residents as a replacement for grocery stores but many don’t offer the full range of fresh products.
ert, meaning many neighborhood residents may have to travel outside of their community to access a grocery store. The Jewel at 75th Street and Stony Island Avenue may be too far for many to travel, especially on public transportation. Other stores, such as Save-A-Lot and Aldi, are nearby but residents say these don’t offer a range of fresh products. Attorney Jeanette Foreman, along with Yvette Moyo, from the Real Men Cook fatherhood initiative, are working with local groups to attract key businesses, like major grocers, back to South Shore.
Photo by Kevin Obomanu
The South Shore Cultural Center was a potential site for the Obama Library. 52
Foreman, a South Side resident, says, “In this community, solutions are often about self-help.” She says organizations like the Black United Fund of Illinois and the Planning Coalition are helping residents fight to keep grocers, jobs and money close to home. Foreman points to an example “in nearby Hyde Park, which has a Treasure Island and a Hyde Park Produce store, which offers fresh, reasonably price food.” She says she drives there to shop, but there is a down side for her neighborhood. “I go and spend my money in a community that
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Photo by Cecelia Morrow
Interior of the vacant Dominick’s: “[Grocery stores] orchestrated their abandonment of the black community,” says Naomi Davis, president and founder of Blacks In Green, a national network that targets African-American community development.
is not hiring the people that live immediately around me. That means that the jobs that I would expect local businesses to be able to create – not happening.” Other communities that previously had Dominick’s stores, which closed around the Chicagoland area last year, have seen their stores replaced by other major grocery stores, such as Jewel, Mariano’s and Whole Foods. But the South Shore store remains empty. South Shore in 2009 had 48,000 residents and $251 million of buying power, according to the South Shore Chamber of Commerce. But Foreman says negative stereotypes about crime and poverty on the South Side hurt the area’s reputation. “People are afraid to come into our community,” she says. Tyra Anderson agrees. “There are good people and good things happening, but it’s just that the bad parts that [are] being acknowledged.” South Shore hasn’t always been this way. “It was a bustling area,” says Yvette Moyo, whose family moved to the area in 1964, when South Shore was a predominantly white and Jewish neighborhood. But she says that as the ethnic demographics of the community changed, a lot of places closed. Losing businesses such as Dominick’s has hurt the area’s economy. As noted by Foreman, “people don’t spend [money] in the community because you can’t.” The grocery chain’s closure also could negatively affect the health of residents who cannot easily access fresh produce
or meat. Some residents may turn to local stores such as Save-A-Lot and Food 4 Less, which may have a smaller freshfood selection than a retailer like Dominick’s. Others may choose less healthy alternatives, such as corner stores and liquor stores, for convenient shopping. At a time when obesity levels are rising in America, this is not good news for South Shore. “[Grocery stores] orchestrated their abandonment of the black community,” says Naomi Davis, president and founder of Blacks In Green, a national network that targets African-American community development. Davis notes that there are also disparities in education, health resources, housing and other businesses in African-American communities. She and Blacks In Green work to help neighborhoods become more self-sufficient so that they can create their own solutions and resources. However, many still have a long way to go in terms of education and awareness. Davis says, “The leading aisles of the average grocery store is full of —generally unhealthy things to consider, and the problem is not, ‘Do we have a Dominick’s or a Jewel or a Mariano’s or a Whole Foods?’ The question is, ‘What is the culture around eating well?’ ” Residents hope to fill the space left by Dominick’s with another grocery chain, but so far, nothing is reportedly on the horizon. Students from South Shore International High School, including Tyme and Tyra Anderson, have worked with the
Photo by Cecelia Morrow
Yvette Moyo, a longtime resident and community activist, is the publisher of the new South Shore Current magazine.
Black United Fund’s Summer Youth Program in the Planning Coalition’s journalism program to spread news about food deserts through social media. Tyme said their next step may be to “write to [Jewel Osco] to see if they could come here and fill in where Dominick’s was, or maybe Whole Foods.” For now, the Planning Coalition, of which Foreman and Moyo are a part, has been working to promote the positive aspects of South Shore. They plan to keep telling positive stories about the area and helping residents voice their concerns. Foreman says, “ [the] first step is to unify the community” because “changing minds is the first thing you’ve got to do.” 53
A South S ide Sum m er
Toxic dust
Local residents and activists speak out against petcoke, an environmental hazard lga Bautista, residents are displeased with the City a mother of of Chicago for not acting immediately two daughters against KCBX, the company that stores and leader of the petcoke from refineries like BP, in orthe Southeast Side der to protect the health of the people. Ald. Coalition to Ban Ed Burke (14th) and Ald. John Pope (10th) Petcoke, fears that proposed a ban of KCBX, but it didn’t pass. her children are beThe Southeast Environmental Task ing contaminated as Force and residents marched in April they go to and from 2014 to push officials to pay attention to Enia Gregory Providence St. Mel school, which is half the petcoke issue and enforce stricter High School a mile from open laws in protection of the people. Many piles of petcoke on 100th Street. have signed petitions to have the company “We see the petcoke constantly coming removed from the area for better air qualin and out of the neighborhood,” she said. ity in the communities. When strong winds pass, dust from open On March 13, 2014, Mayor Rahm Emanpiles blow into homes and onto houses or uel set regulations for Koch Industries, cars. Residue is left behind and it’s not parent company of KCBX, to follow. easy to remove. “It’s sticky and I need These regulations, including building to sweep and mop every day,” Bautista storage to enclose the petcoke within two stated. years, would decrease the amount of dust Petroleum coke—aka petcoke—is a by- emissions from entering neighborhoods. product of oil refining and looks identi- “KCBX has invested tens of millions of cal to coal. It’s used for fuel in cement dollars to improve the facilities and inkilns and power plants. Also, in its different forms, it can contain high or low levels of sulfur along with metals. This material has prevented families and neighbors from enjoying outdoor activities. They are advised to stay inside by the City of Chicago to prevent dust getting onto and into their bodies. “Families would fill their pools at night and in the morning the pool would have black grime in it,” said Tom Shepard, executive director Photo courtesy of Olga Bautista of the Southeast Environmental Olga Bautista, pictured with her two daughters, Task Force. is trying to ban petcoke, which is stored near Community organizations and their neighborhood.
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stall state-of-the-art dust suppression systems,” stated Matt Butterfield, public affairs rep for Koch Industries. The suppression system includes water canyons, weather monitors, spray bars for conveyors and a wheel washing station, states an article from KCBX. “We respect our neighbors and we want to address their concerns and make sure our operations remain compliant with all rules and regulations,” Butterfield stated. Asked if dust emissions were decreasing due to the suppression, Bautista said no. Petcoke is still brought in open barges, trains and trucks. July 25, KCBX asked the City of Chicago to extend the time frame to enclose open piles of petcoke to four years and a height change for piles to be 45 feet instead of 30 feet. If the city doesn’t comply, the Koch Brothers plan to file a lawsuit. Activists fear a longer period of open piles will cause lung damage, cancer and respiratory problems for younger children and adults. “This is our home and our community, we aren’t the problem—BP and KCBX are. We are fighting to protect our families.” said Bautista. Since this story was reported during the summer of 2014, KCBX announced in December that it will build a $120 million storage shed along the Calumet River and surround it with a grassy field in an attempt to make the site more attractive to neighbors and is seeking an extension beyond the 2016 deadline imposed by the Emanuel administration. Community activists still want the company to leave town. So does Emanuel, according to reports.
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A 24-7 kind of guy Principal keeps school’s gym open for students, community
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ahalia Jackson Elementary School, located on the South Side of Chicago, was almost shut down in 2012 due to poor funding and Sydney Furlow being deemed undeLincoln Park rutilized. High School Now Robert Hubbird is focusing on using the school to benefit the safety of his students by being a round-the-clock principal. Hubbird, 34, keeps the school gymnasium open after school hours and during the summer for the students and young men of the community to keep them safe and off the streets. “The kids need to know that there are people who believe in their ability to transform,” Hubbird said. When asked why he cares about the kids he works with, Hubbird, a South Side native, said he has to “pay it forward.” The main focus of Hubbird and the staff at Mahalia Jackson is to keep the students safe. The school is in an area that is gang-ridden and very dangerous for the members of the community, especially children in the neighborhood who are vulnerable and defenseless. “I feel unsafe walking in my neighborhood. Each block has a new gang and you have to watch where you walk so you don’t get shot,” said recent Mahalia Jackson graduate Ledonta Brown, 14. One of the main concerns of many adults living on the South Side is keeping their children off of the street as much as possible. Creating a safe haven and a much-needed “neutral ground” at school is a very important factor in saving lives, according to Candice Evans, 33, a teacher at Mahalia Jackson. Evans, a longtime resident of the Englewood neighborhood, when asked about the troubles that students face today, she simply said, “They are lost and without a sense of community.”
Evans also said she thinks creating a safe spot for students is important because children need to be “nurtured and grounded because we don’t know what happens when they leave here and go home.” Principal Hubbird also believes in helping the youth of the community overall, not only the students that attend Mahalia Jackson Elementary. This is why the gymnasium is open to young men on the weekends. Like Evans said: “The more we can control the environment and the input the more control we have over the output.” Here the young men have mentors that speak to them before they play basketball about the dangers of falling into the traps that their society makes available to them such as drug activity or gang involvement. “We are not trying to tell them how to run their life. We want to put them in a position to choose to better their own life,” Hubbird said. The most recent speakers at the school were Joseph Gant, Judge Link, Terrence James and Arthur Drake, all of whom spent more than 20 years in prison and are now successful business owners. The four men have changed their lives for the better and now they want to help young men who have the potential to follow the same path they did. When talking to the adolescents, one of the main points they wanted to get across was the young men needed to “understand the world is yours.” The mentors also wanted to show the young men that even though they may have made mistakes in the past they can make a better life for themselves because as James said, “Only you can put limitations on your life.” The 16- to 25-year-old males that visit the gym on the weekends are considered the age group with “the biggest need,” according to Hubbird. The attendees all have various reasons for being there. For example, some are there for assistance with finding and applying for a job or for college, while some just need to get off of
Photo by Sydney Furlow
Principal Robert Hubbird, 34, of Mahalia Jackson Elementary School, keeps the gym open during the summer and after school hours to keep his students off the street.
the streets. During the summer, academic enrichment classes were held at the school and after attending a class, the students could use the gymnasium to play basketball until the afternoon. While at the school, the students in the summer enrichment classes were served breakfast and lunch. The use of the school over the summer gave the students a safe space to spend the day. During the course of the summer programs many other extracurricular opportunities were available at the school. “I would rather be at the school where there is security than at home where I feel alone,” Brown said when asked where and why he feels the safest. With the collective efforts of the community, Principal Hubbird, staff at Mahalia Jackson, students and the youth of the community are well on their way to having a guaranteed safe haven. (This reporter’s mother is a schoolteacher at Mahalia Jackson Elementary School.) 55
A South Side Sum m er
The dish on DIVY V
Bike stalls absent in neighborhoods south of 58th Street; bankruptcy blamed
Photo by Edwin Saquimux
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he city of Chicago has devoted lots of time to help bicycling become a primary form of commuting for many residents. Over the past few years the Edwin Saquimux Chicago DepartVon Steuben Metropolitan ment of TransportaScience Center tion has added more protected bike lanes than ever, and even started the Divvy bike rental program to help widen that appeal. These changes mean more bikers have been seen more frequently on the roads of Chicago; however, the city’s South Side seems to be getting the short end of the stick as very few new protected bike lanes are in the works for that area. Additionally, no Divvy stations currently exist south of 58th Street, leaving close to a third of the city without access to the program. 56
Columbia Links contacted CDOT via email to comment on this issue, but the agency did not respond in time for this story. But, the Active Transportation Alliance (ATA), a nonprofit organization that works closely with the city to improve conditions for bicycling, was able to talk about the future of Divvy and new bike lanes on the South Side. Maggie Melin, ATA’s Go Bronzeville project coordinator, said the city is planning to build new Divvy stations, but she also says simply installing more stations may not be enough to encourage biking on the South Side. “People there would often tell me that biking wasn’t part of their culture. They didn’t bike so they felt more comfortable in their car and felt safer,” said Melin. These issues have also been echoed from Bill Depenbrock, a volunteer at the Bronzeville Bike Box. The Bike Box is an old shipping container that’s been turned into a bike repair shop. Depenbrock works with kids and adults with repair-
ing and hosting local bike riding events. He said one of the biggest problems on the South Side is the lack of bike shops. “Another thing with bike shops, people on the South Side don’t have a bike culture because there are no bike shops acting as a beacon,” said Depenbrock. He believes that bike shops are the ideal place for an area to start building a biking culture. Julie Hochstadter, with the Chainlink bike blog, said she’s hoping for some other changes from the city, which could help spur interest in biking in more areas of the city. “First would be to lift some of the bans on when you can put bikes on the CTA and the Metra. Adding additional protected bike lanes [and] hopefully, building the first barrier protected bike lanes,” said Hochstadter. However, with very few bike shops and few Divvy stations on the South Side, it is very hard to build that culture. “The main issue we have with Divvy
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on the streets. “Some streets don’t have bike lanes like State Street and it’s easy for me to get hit, which almost happened a couple of times with a lot of taxi cabs. It’s not completely unsafe. It just depends on the drivers you’re around,” said 16-year-old Kenyatta Land, who bikes on the South Side and lives in the South Loop neighborhood. Land also has mentioned seeing a lot of bikers on routes he takes when he is out biking. He estimates on any day he’ll see about 100 bikers and he believes the city has been taking the right steps to improve the biking community. Land said,
however, that he wishes that the city would make biking safer for everyone. Land started biking because he wanted a better form of commuting. At the time all his friends were biking so he wanted to hop on the trend as well. Land has also given Divvy positive feedback on adding new rental station bikes for people to use now. “I’ve never used a Divvy bike but my parents have. I think it is a pretty cool organization. I also heard that Divvy doesn’t have good bikes. I heard they are pretty slow— but . . . they should keep going with it,” said Land.
Photo by Edwin Saquimux
Julie Hochstadter, with The Chainlink, an online bike blog, hopes for changes from the city, such as lifting bans on where you can put bikes on the CTA and the Metra, which could help spur interest in biking in more areas of the city.
working in economically marginalized neighborhoods is that people can’t use it,” said Depenbrock. He said many people living in poor communities may not have credit cards, which are needed to check out a Divvy bike from a station. Adding to the problem is that Mayor Emanuel’s plan to add 175 new Divvy stations as far south 75th street is being pushed until spring 2015 because of the bankruptcy of a company that supplied equipment to a Divvy contractor, according the city’s Department of Transportation. While a bike culture may be lacking on the city’s South Side, bicycling has been gaining popularity in the city at large over the past decade. According to the latest U.S. Census more than 19,000 people bike regularly in Chicago, up 13 percent from 2011— 2012. Even Mayor Emanuel announced earlier this year that the city has reached its halfway point of installing 100 miles of new protected bike lanes by 2015. Since 2011, protected bike lanes have doubled and protected bike lanes have reduced all traffic crashes by 34 percent, according to the city’s website. At least one teenage Chicago biker said he feels relatively safe out when biking
Photo by Edwin Saquimux
A volunteer at the Bronzeville Bike Box, a combination bicycle repair shop and bike tour headquarters at 51st Street and Calumet Avenue. 5777
Mov ie R evie ws
‘The Central Park Five’ Not rated | 119 minutes Directed by Ken Burns, Sarah Burns and David McMahon he Central Park Five" zooms in on life in the almost bankrupt New York City of 1989. We see two different realities: the haves and the havenots. Portrayed is a city with immense Solomon Davis wealth coming in, Marist High School and, at the same time, racial tensions and violence persist. "The Central Park Five" opens by showing an understaffed police department that faces about five murders a day, trains littered with graffiti, streets filled with trash and beggars or the homeless walking every street. Growing up in Harlem in the Schomburg Plaza projects, five teens have their lives going for them; a happy group of kids who like to dance, play basketball and watch music videos on MTV. April 19, 1989 turns out to be a night that they could have never imagined. Senseless acts of terror and violence in Central Park lead to an investigation into the brutal rape of a white female jogger who is found the following morning. What happens to Antron McCray, Kevin Richardson, Yusef Salaam, Raymond Santana and Kharey Wise, the kids arrested for the crime, is often referred to in the film as a "Proxy War" in which these kids of color are thrown into a war of racial politics and are the proxies for the agenda of others. Crack cocaine begins flowing into the city and all of a sudden teens begin to have guns and money. The same community being blamed is also suffering the most from the crack cocaine explosion. The black community is under siege with black and brown youth facing a mentality that no one cared if
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Scene from “ The Central Park Five”: The guilty verdict was destined from the beginning.
they lived or died. As they navigate this process and truly understand what it means and what is in store for them, the five teens remain optimistic. Always with the thought that the truth will emerge, that everything would be OK. The teens not only maintain their innocence during trial and after but they do not once let the negatives overwhelm their positive outlook. But, the guilty verdict handed down was pretty much destined from the beginning. The police, prosecutors, media and the public had all aligned against them, leading a troubled case to land a trial, with no physical evidence and no eyewitness accounts, only the inconsistent confessions of the teens in which they implicate each other. As Kharey Wise puts it, "She’s using me against me." In prison Wise comes across a man who, after that encounter, starts to talk and let people know that Wise is in prison for the crime that he committed. Eventually, an investigation is launched, in which the confessions are looked at again and found to be inconsistent with each other, and investigators come across DNA evidence that backs up the man’s story finally bringing about what the "Central Park Five" were optimistic of since the beginning. The film is made up primarily of things before their trial and conviction; the film combines footage and audio and interviews of now with then, mixing in different perspectives of many as to what was going on in that period with different journalist, historians, and politicians. "The Central Park Five" resonates because some of the same injustices and inequities play out today. The police depart-
ment, prosecutors and the courts in this instance fail those they should be protecting and the poor and under-served don’t know their legal rights or the law. The film drives this home quite well by making the audience think about how these problems persist. In fact, the dominant faces we see of the legal system at work are the prosecutors and their teams. Little is made of the defense lawyers for the five teens; it’s as if the five boys were trying to defend themselves against an army of conspirators that had already found them guilty. The film shows the injustice that the Central Park Five faced, but don’t provide the voice of the defense team, giving the impression that the five teens were defenseless against those who sought to convict them. It would have been interesting to hear what they had to say about the cases. Incoherent and inconsistent confessions and the constant proclamation of innocence before and after the convictions should have revealed that something was awry. The documentary goes about recounting the events but, in the midst of driving home the point it wishes to impress upon the audience, fails to show the whole picture, leaving out the words or actions of the defense, giving the overwhelming impression that these teens from Schomburg Plaza happened to be at the wrong place at the wrong time, and got pulled into a mess beyond their control. In Its quest to drive home that message or to make that impression "The Central Park Five" gets ahead of itself, leaving you without that other side or voice even if the underlying messages are still relevant.
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‘Dark Girls’ Not rated | 75 minutes Directed by Bill Duke and D. Channsin Berry don’t like to be called black because I’m not black," comments a young AfricanAmerican girl at the beginning of "Dark Girls." The film is a documentary explorTonyisha Harris ing colorism and the Whitney Young Magnet High perceptions darkerSchool skinned women face not only in America but around the world. After the heartbreaking remark made by the young girl, a slideshow of AfricanAmerican women is shown, accompanied by soft piano music. The music creates a suspenseful atmosphere as the pictures explore the origins of colorism: slavery. Experts delve into the problems of how whites made blacks feel inferior. But instead of focusing mainly on how whites despised blacks, the film takes viewers into blacks being divided against their own race because of how dark their skin was. Accompanied by explanations, pictures from the time of slavery show how the slaves were divided. Slaves who were a lighter color worked in the house but darker slaves worked in the fields. Slaves wanted to be in the house. They wanted to pass the "Paper Bag Test"; if they were lighter than a paper bag they were as close to looking white as they could be. Bill Duke and D. Channsin Berry do a great job of keeping the spotlight on col-
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A scene from"Dark Girls": This documentary explores colorism around the world.
orism, a prejudice carried sometimes unconsciously. They prove this by filming a test with a 4-year-old black girl. She is shown pictures of the same girl, with her skin lightened in one and darkened in another. When asked who is the smartest and prettiest, she picks the lightest girl, and when asked who the dumbest and ugliest girl is she picks the darkest one. Duke doesn’t just show how people are prejudiced against their own race because of skin tone, but makes a connection to how these females feel about themselves. That 4-year-old girl is only a little bit lighter than the darkest girl she thought was dumb and ugly. Is that how she will grow to see herself? The film uses adolescents and young kids to reinforce the idea that colorism and low self-esteem begin when we are young. In a scene early in the film, we hear the sound of water being run for a bath and see bleach being poured into the tub after a black teenage girl explains that she hated her color to the point she’d beg her mom to pour bleach in the water. Duke interviews women about their feelings, asking dark-skinned women how they feel about themselves. He also inter-
Duke doesn't just show how people are prejudiced against their own race because of skin tone, but makes a connection to how these females feel about themselves.”
views men on the subject of dark-skinned women. Some of the males interviewed came off as ignorant; it makes me wonder why the director chose to keep these interviews in the film. The interviews are in support of dating dark-skinned women, but the way the males present their reasoning does not help the cause. However, the male opinion helps balance the film so it isn’t just females ‘bickering’. You might expect the film to be focused only on African Americans, so it is shocking when a Korean-American woman shares her story. She explains that she grew up in Hollywood, Calif., and was considered light, but when she moved to Korea everyone was pale and she was the dark one. But Duke and Berry fail to present a light-skinned woman in defense of darkskinned women. The film does show white or light-skinned women saying they like tans because it makes them feel pretty and hides imperfections, which shows that some girls want to be dark. The film could’ve added more stories from them or what they’ve seen happen to a darkskinned female. Duke and Berry do accomplish a cheery tone, with dark-skinned women finding acceptance within themselves or from others, the others often being white males or people from other countries. The film suggests that one way to end colorism is to teach children at a young age to be comfortable and proud of their skin; skin color doesn’t define them. 59
EMMY-NOMINATED FACULTY Columbia College Chicago offers more than 100 programs in the fine, performing, media and communication arts, taught by faculty who are leaders in creative practice. Michael Fry—Internet and mobile media storyteller, The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air writer, Cricket Wireless webisode co-creator—brings his experience pushing the boundaries of television into the classroom every day.
Michael Fry TV Writer/Producer
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