Media Justice Blog

Stop the Violence: Program tackles gangs, guns

A Chicago program is working to get gangs and guns off the streets.

Tags: 10-15, 15-19, ABC local, church involvement, community involvement, CPS, drugs, gang violence, gun violence, hispaniclatino, june 2010, little village, male, parent involvement, pilsen, police involvement, youth voices

Students’ party brings sparkle — and hopes for peace — to Rogers Park

Last school year, several students on their way to school watched a teacher get carjacked. Fights are a constant, and kids often are chased. Sirens wail and shots ring out when they are home at night. The kids avoid Pottawattomie Park, just outside their school's front door, because of the gangs hanging out there. Recently, a woman was lurking around the school handing out fliers to the teen girls, trying to entice them into sex work, with a phone number to call.

But rather than fear their community, the teens are trying to change it. For the second year in a row, they are hosting a party with a straightforward and time-tested goal: peace. A student-organized party informally called the "peace event,'' will be held on the streets around the school and part of Pottawattomie Park on Saturday, and the students are hoping the whole neighborhood will come.


Tags: 10-15, 15-19, community involvement, CPS, female, female, gang violence, gun violence, Jordan elementary, North Side, rogers park, school violence, street violence, violence prevention, youth voices

Illinois Youth Town Hall focuses on reducing violence

The Illinois Youth Town Hall, co-sponsored by the Roosevelt Institute and the Leaders Investing For Equality campaign, attracted about 400 students from Chicago area universities and high schools, including 40 Northwestern students.

Tags: 10-15, 15-19, 19-24, academia involvement, Albany park, Chicago, community involvement, CPS, dyett high school, gang violence, government involvement, northwestern university, november 2009, roosevelt institute, the daily northwestern, youth voices

Chicago’s real crime story – City Journal

This past September, a cell-phone video of Chicago students beating a fellow teen to death coursed over
the airwaves and across the Internet. None of the news outlets that had admiringly reported on Obama’s
community-organizing efforts mentioned that the beating involved students from the very South Side
neighborhoods where the president had once worked. Obama’s connection to the area was suddenly lost
in the mists of time.

Tags: 10-15, 15-19, African American, carver high, chicago reader, church involvement, city journal, CPS, criminal charges, drugs, family violence, fatherlessness, fenger high school, gang violence, government involvement, gun violence, invisible boundaries, january 2010, male, murder, police involvement, poverty, robeson high school, roseland, school violence, sexual violence, south side, street violence, the ville, west side

Marcus on the Run

We start our series with Marcus, a 14-year-old boy who's struggling to graduate from grade school. Marcus is a pseudonym we're using to protect the young man's
identity.

Tags: 10-15, 848, African American, criminal charges, gang violence, january 2010, male, murder, NPR, police involvement, poverty, prison industrial complex, street violence, youth voices

student seriously wounded outside SW side high school

Outside school Tuesday, students said that though they feel safe at school, they cannot say the same for the streets around the building.
"It's like a war," said freshman Crystal Fernandez, 14.
Fernandez said police and security were increased Friday.
"On Friday, I was scared," she said. "We thought, yeah, there's going to be fighting but not (shooting).

Tags: 10-15, 15-19, chicago tribune, CPS, gun violence, hubbard high school, january 2010, male, police involvement, school violence, southwest side, street violence, youth voices

2 teens charged with beating 14-year-old

Two teens have been charged with beating a 14-year-old Chicago Public Schools student after a basketball game Thursday at Curie Metro High School, 4959 S. Archer. Two 17-year-old students attacked and severely beat the other boy, who was taken to Holy Cross Hospital, police said.

Tags: 10-15, 15-19, Chicago Sun Times, CPS, criminal charges, Curie Metro High School, january 2010, male, physical abuse, police involvement, school violence

Austin Weekly News | ‘It’s your child killing my child’

Kesia, as family and friends called her,
was inside the Beefee Restaurant on Lockwood and North
Avenue with a friend the evening of Aug. 28, 1993 when she
became the unintended victim of a gang-related drive-by shooting.

Tags: 10-15, African American, Austin, Austin Weekly News, Chicago, chicago tribune, community involvement, CPS, drugs, female, gang violence, gun violence, january 2010, male, murder, no arrest, north lawndale, oak park, south side, street violence, west garfield park, west side

Slain Chicago boy’s ex-baseball coach calls for new ways to stop violence

As the investigation continued into the shotgun slaying of an 11-year-old boy that left his father in critical condition, the youth's former baseball coach said he hopes the shootings will prompt new tactics in addressing violence.

Tags: 10-15, African American, Chicago, chicago tribune, CPS, december 2009, gang violence, government involvement, gun violence, male, murder, no arrest, police involvement, poverty, south side