It was a shameful day as the Chicago Board of Education voted to close 50 schools (the single largest mass closing of schools in the nation’s history)…

Sidewalk outside of CPS Headquarters (Chicago, 5/22/13) – photo by Sarah Jane Rhee

There’s a young man named Brian Stirgus who has spent countless hours organizing to keep CPS schools open over the past few months. He’s 17 and a high school senior graduating in just a few short weeks. Brian is a leader with Chicago Students Organizing to Save Our Schools (CSOSOS) which is a youth-led group established to fight against the school closures. You can listen to him eloquently explain the damage that closings will cause for students and to their communities here.

After the Board voted, several members of CSOSOS and their allies gathered for a candelight vigil and press conference outside of CPS Headquarters. As someone who graduated from one of the elementary schools set to close, when Brian spoke, it was with tears streaming down his face:

“They have failed us again. What’s next?” he asked. He added: “It’s like they want to wipe my race out of existence.”

Brian and Chuy (Chicago, 5/22/13) – photo by Sarah Jane Rhee

This photograph of Brian, taken by my friend Sarah Jane Rhee, is seared in my mind and so are his words. Young people have had their eyes opened to the corrupt politics in this city. I don’t know Brian personally though I know dozens of other incredible young people just like him in this city. Some of those young people have also been involved in fighting for education justice. It is for this reason that I am not despairing tonight despite the Chicago Board of Education’s shameful vote. There were tears today but there was also a resolve to continue to fight.

I believe in the creativity and the resilience of the young people in this city. I do. We are not making their path into adulthood any easier. Yet in spite of our detrimental policymaking, Chicago’s youth are by and large making their way through the obstacle course. Some are falling down and we are duty bound to reach out our hand to them. But I am consistently amazed that so many of our youth remain optimistic about the future. So tonight, I’ll take my cue from them and will keep moving forward in the struggle for education and social justice.

For those who are looking for ways to keep fighting, I suggest that you get involved in advocating for an elected school board. We also need to start organizing now to ensure that Rahm Emanuel is a one-term Mayor. Tomorrow, the Chicago Teacher’s Union is organizing an informational event for those who want to learn how to register voters. We have work to do.

As Brian finished his comments, he was embraced by his peers and allies in a group hug.

photo by Sarah Jane Rhee (Chicago, 5/22/13)

This image too is permanently imprinted in my mind. La lucha continua!

I try as much as possible to document activism & resistance by youth in Chicago on this blog. I do this because I am profoundly committed to the idea of youth leadership development and voice. I am co-founder of the Chicago Freedom School and these issues are central to our mission. I also see the activism of youth in this city as critical to prison abolition.

Anyway, today over 100 people gathered on the Southside of Chicago on 61st & Cottage Grove as part of an event organized by youth from FLY (who I’ve referenced several time on the blog) and members of Chicago Students Organizing to Save Our Schools (CSOSOS).

The Chicago Tribune reported on the event:

The protesters [sic] staged a “die-in” about 4:45 p.m. on South Cottage Grove Avenue at East 62st Street to make the case that school closures will force displaced students to cross gang lines. The protesters wore mock blood-stained shirts as they blocked traffic at the intersection before being arrested. Goldenberg said.

The protest was intended “to demonstrate to Mayor (Rahm) Emanuel the loss of life that he will be responsible for if he and his appointed school board go through with the proposed closures,” the group said in a press release.

DNAinfo Chicago offered more details:

Matt Ginsberg-Jaeckle, an organizer with Southside Together Organizing for Power, and others called the event — in which students blocked traffic in the intersection of 61st Street and Cottage Grove Avenue — a “die-in.”

Students wore mock-bloody clothes in an effort to show the effect they believe school closings will have: more violence and death for the young students forced to cross new gang territories.

“The message is that school closings are killing people,” Ginsberg-Jaeckle said. “Everyone knows what will happen when these kids start crossing these gang lines.”

The students laid down in the intersection, blocking traffic for several minutes before being taken away by police after refusing to leave, witnesses said.

Police could not confirm immediately confirm any arrests but said the protest was “peaceful.”

According to witnesses at the scene, the students were led away in handcuffs.

Kelly High School teacher William Lamme said two of his students were arrested in the protest.

“They wanted to do something to show how they feel,” said Lamme, a Kelly social studies teacher. “Mayor [Rahm] Emanuel is certainly creating a school for young activists.”

Nearly 100 activists, parents and students were at the event, initially arranged by parents from Fiske and Sexton elementary schools. Sexton is slated to close and merge its students into Fiske.

“We have to make our voices louder and our actions stronger,” said Lamme, who came to support his students. “This is civics 101.”

Here is a brief video of a student whose school is targeted for closure speaking the importance of keeping it open:

As per usual, the amazing and intrepid movement photographer, Sarah Jane Rhee was on the scene to document the student resistance. She posted her terrific photographs on Facebook. I share some of them below.

by Sarah Jane Rhee (5/15/13) – Vigil to Stop School Closings

by Sarah Jane Rhee (5/15/13) – Vigil to Stop School Closings

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“Emaciated and frail, more than 100 men lie on concrete floors of freezing, solitary cells in Guantánamo, silently starving themselves to death.

Stripped of all possessions, even basics such as a sleeping mat or soap, they lie listlessly as guards periodically bang on the steel doors and shout at them to move an arm or leg to prove they are still conscious.”

These are the opening words of an article that I read last weekend about Guantanamo prison hunger strikers. I felt sick to my stomach as I continued to read but made myself do it anyway.

Then I came across an article about Willie Manning’s impending execution in Mississippi:

“Mississippi is still scheduled to execute a convicted murderer Tuesday despite a lack of physical evidence tying him to the crime and a new admission from the Department of Justice that the forensic investigation was severely flawed.

Willie Jerome Manning, a 44-year-old African-American man, has been in prison for almost 20 years after being convicted for the 1992 kidnapping and murder of Jon Steckler and Tiffany Miller, two white college students in Mississippi.”

At the last minute, a court granted Mr. Manning a temporary stay of execution. I took a deep breath and exhaled conscious of the fact that his state-sanctioned murder was only postponed for the time being.

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I wrote about the fact that Chicago students were organizing a boycott on April 24th. Yesterday, students from various Chicago high schools boycotted the second day of standardized testing (PSAE). They were protesting the role of testing as a factor in school closing decisions. Instead of going to school, students showed up at CPS Headquarters to make themselves heard.

Robeson High School student, Brian Stirgis, explained the reason for the protest: “We’re under-resourced, over-tested, and we’re fed up with the policies that are put in place by CPS officials.”

photo by Sarah Jane Rhee (4/24/13)

photo by Sarah Jane Rhee (4/24/13)

Laura McCauley reporting for Common Dreams wrote that “Over 300 students from over 25 different Chicago public schools ” boycotted PSAE testing yesterday.

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This weekend, I was privileged to participate in an event about the promise and pitfalls of youth-driven digital media. I joined the panel at the last minute when one previously scheduled speaker fell ill.

When I got home, I checked Twitter and saw the following video produced by Chicago Students Organizing to Save Our Schools (CSOSOS – @ChiStudentsOrg) announcing their April 24th boycott.

You can also listen to 17 year old high school senior Brian Stirgus talk on Power92 about the impact of the school closures and about their planned protest this Wednesday. The traditional media has also covered the students’ efforts here.

I am so heartened to see that young people across Chicago continue to organize for social justice. It’s exciting that they are using digital media to help mobilize and engage others in their struggles. We should hope that these protests grow because this would signal that young people remain idealistic and retain some hope. I submit that the moment when these protests cease is when we should deeply worry. Young people who have no hope that their actions can impact positive change become nihilistic. Thank God that our youth in Chicago continue to believe in their own power to affect change.

I so wish that I could join in their action this Wednesday but I am organizing another event that conflicts. If you are a parent or guardian, I hope that you will support these young people by encouraging your own children to participate in the boycott. I hope that you will also show up as an adult ally to support these youth.

All of the information about Wednesday’s boycott is below. Please spread the word to others about this action. You can learn more at CSOSOS’s Facebook page and Tumblr.

Whatever happened to the Manifesto? I think that young organizers should bring it back or at the very least start creating more lists of demands…

I was invited to attend a meeting a few weeks ago by a group of young organizers who are interested in taking action to address the epidemic of mass incarceration. It is always tricky for older organizers to participate in such meetings. It is hard to know when to speak up and when to stay quiet. I mostly bit my tongue. I wanted to respect their process but when the meeting ended, I did pull a couple of the young organizers aside to offer some suggestions for how to improve their meetings. I asked if they had already developed a list of their wants and demands. They said no. They had spent several meetings already discussing their “shared values” and agreeing to “their process.” I asked if they were surprised that they had lost quite a few members since their launch. They told me that building community among themselves was crucially important. I agreed and said that there is also value though in people gathering to discuss what they want and to plan a strategy & program to achieve it. It’s a balance that many never achieve.

In the 1930s, local youth began to get more involved in protest movements. This was particularly true for Southern youth who gathered in regional assemblies to articulate demands and network. In Opportunity magazine (a publication of the Urban League), Edward Strong reported on one such gathering of black youth that took place in Tennessee in 1938. Below is the position paper of the May 1938 Southern Negro Youth Conference.

In Chattanooga, Tennessee, last month, 500 young colored men and women met in the second all-Southern Negro Youth Conference. They came to express their wants and desires — to plan a new design for living — and in the program that they adopted all their hopes and aspirations for a brighter future were reflected.

What is the aim of young Negroes of the South today? What do they want? How do they propose to move ahead? The delegates answered these questions simply and unanimously.

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On my bad days, I like to remember that we have a generation of young people who are as committed to social justice as any who have come before. In Chicago, young people are mobilizing against Rahm Emanuel’s announced school closures; the largest in this nation’s history.

Sara Johnson, a senior at Roosevelt High School and a student leader with Chicago Students Organizing to Save Our Schools, explained the coalition’s demands:

As usual, my friend, the intrepid & gifted Sarah Jane Rhee was on the scene of the student protest documenting the action. We, in Chicago, are blessed that Sarah lives here and that she is so generous with her photography skills. You can see all of Sarah’s photographs from yesterday’s student protest here. Her caption for the photos reads:

“On Monday, March 25, 2013, the first day of spring break for many CPS schools, Chicago Students Organizing to Save Our Schools held a press conference at CPS Headquarters calling on the mayor and CPS to abandon its plan to shutter 50+ schools. They made three specific demands, which were detailed in an oversized letter to Mayor Rahm Emanuel: 1) an immediate moratorium on ALL school closings; 2) TIF funding to be reformed and the funds to be used for CPS schools; and 3) an elected school board. From the press conference, the students and allies marched two blocks north to City Hall and crowded into the mayor’s 5th floor office, where they demanded to meet with Rahm. The mayor’s office sent out a representative who received the oversized letter with demands to take to the mayor. The students employed the people’s mic (i.e. “mic check!”) to relay their message to the press that was present and chanted “We’ll be back!” as an indication that this, their first action, would not be their last.”

Below are a few wonderful photographs documenting yesterday’s student protest:

by Sarah Jane Rhee (3/25/13)

by Sarah Jane Rhee (3/25/13)

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A few months ago, I wrote about the killing of Rekia Boyd by an off-duty Chicago Police officer. This week Antonio Cross’s trial will begin. He was charged with misdemeanor aggravated assault in an incident where off-duty detective Dante Servin shot him, another person, and killed Rekia Boyd. Servin claimed that Cross had a gun. A gun was never recovered at the scene. As we wait for the trial to begin on January 10th, I wanted to revisit the police brutality that women of color experience.

As I mentioned in my post about Rekia Boyd back in April, this is not something that we hear very much about. I have written about my personal struggle to take state violence against women of color as seriously as I do when it is directed against black men in particular. As a way to overcome my own internalized oppression, I am committed to underscore more current and historical examples of state violence against women of color on the blog this year.

I’ll kick off this series with an excellent video titled “Our Forgotten Voices: From History to Herstory” about the impact of current stop and frisk policies on young women of color. The video was created by young women from the Sadie Nash Leadership Project. They describe its purpose as follows:

Growing media attention and activist work have been dedicated to the criminalization of men of color by the justice system and the NYPD’s policy of Stop and Frisk… We acknowledge and validate these experiences but would like to shed light on womyn’s perspectives because womyn are diversely affected by the culture of policing and surveillance by the NYPD, which has grown increasingly sexist, racist, classist, homophobic, and transphobic through the Stop and Frisk policy and abuse of power. We do not feel safe. Through this film we are calling allies and survivors of all identities to work together to enact change, not only in our cities but our justice system as a whole.

Please take five minutes to watch the young women’s video:

After struggling for days to figure out how to post this terrific youth-created documentary, it’s finally up at Vimeo. I wrote about Nina and Keely’s film here.

The Chicago Taskforce on Violence against Girls and Young Women is thrilled to share with you the latest Occasional Paper, by C. Angel Torres and Naima Paz of the Young Women’s Empowerment Project! The paper looks at the organization’s Bad Encounter Line, which they describe like this:

The Bad Encounter Line (BEL) is a way to report bad experiences you have had with institutions such as police, the health care system, public aid, DCFS, CPS, etc. In our research we noticed so many girls and transgender girls reporting bad encounters from systems that are set in place to help them. So we wondered is the same happening to boys as well; so we expanded the BEL to reach them as well, and as we have been receiving data we have learned that these systems are affecting all genders. Based off the BEL, we started a task force for street based youth and wrote a Bill of Rights that we want non-profits to sign so they have to be accountable to us and can’t get away with denying us help.

The paper is available for downloading – along with the Bill of Rights that YWEP members developed – on the Taskforce website.

The Taskforce thanks the Young Women’s Empowerment Project for their powerful and important work, and for their willingness to share it with us through the Taskforce. Everyone is encouraged to read what the young people from YWEP have to say about this issue, why it matters, and how they are taking concrete steps to address it.

Stay tuned for the next two papers, to be released this fall, both featuring youth voices….. The first, by youth and adult allies at the CRIME Teens Project in Bronzeville, describes their approach to addressing bullying, cyberbullying and teen dating violence. The second, by youth leader Tiara Epps of Beyondmedia Education, will be in the form of a video diary, and will share her learnings from the Chain of Change project.

If you are interested in submitting an abstract for the Taskforce’s next round of Occasional Papers, please email chitaskforce@gmail.com.