Walking through downtown Chicago it’s hard not to notice that President Obama is a native son. There are pictures in the windows, banners that hang from street posts for whole blocks, and among the people there is a heightened sense of opportunity and possibility. Yet, on the south side of the city, there is the sense that this sense of possibility has not and will not penetrate the everyday reality of young people who make their way to school, stray on the corner, and who live with the statistics.
Seated in a barbershop days after the Inauguration, a group of black men straddling 40, apparently out of work or without steady employment, took measure of what this meant for them. What’s your excuse now? What are you gonna do? There was a sense that even if the problems haven’t changed, their response to it should. With the recent election the ceiling of possibilities has shifted, but the question lingers, what are we going to do to raise the floor?
At The Young People’s Project, we operate between possibility (aspiration mode) and street level reality (survival mode). Our innovation is Math Literacy Work–young people organizing themselves to learn pieces of math and share it. We’ve inherited this work from the Algebra Project and have begun to broaden the frame for our work from Math Literacy to Literacy Work. More so then ever, young people need to develop multiple literacies and have the creativity, flexibility and imagination to put what they know to use, to not only be employable, but to be prepared to be among the changemakers and innovators who are helping to shape our future.
And so you can imagine high school students in a gymnasium playing math games with elementary students, or young people using spoken word and poetry to help children read and write, or young people using digital media to conduct research and share stories and create platforms for communication, or teaching other young people how to build and program robots to perform functions, or college students working with programmers to teach high school students how to create video games that become tools for learning about math, science and culture.
We think of this as learning and teaching, and as the pretext for young people leading and organizing. Young people who have invested in learning and teaching have extended themselves into their neighborhoods and communities, hosting NeighborCircles, organizing community conversations about quality education, transforming dormant space into environments for learning and sharing, and, in the case of the Baltimore Algebra Project, advocating in the streets and in the halls of local government for institutional change and accountability.
In order to raise the floor of success, achievement, and possibility for all children we need to invest in young people to work the solution. The investment in young people to do literacy work, will yield more in the short and long term, greater social and economic returns than current methods of working the problem, and stands in direct opposition to the trend over the last two decades to invest in the failure of students. Each one teach ten, or for those shopping for a social and economic bargain, ten for the price of one.
Omo……. you nailed it directly on the head!
So wonderful to read this. Inch by inch, step by step, we are finding ways to make ‘learning’ appealing to children and young beings. To learn as you teach is such a perfect formula. And to involve older children with younger children helps to keep innocence and goodwill alive. It’s a return to the ‘village’ style of growing and socializing.
Beautiful, Omo. Thanks.
I definitely agree with Omo that in order to create lasting solutions for issues pertaining to our youth we have to let them be part of the solution. Many youth based initiatives that are supposed to help youth are built and carried out without their voices included in the planning process, and then people are left scratching their heads wondering why the programs that they spent so much time building did not work as well as they wanted to.
I would love to help in creating an open dialogue that let’s young people into the process of building solutions for their own success. My company Inquisitive’s Pearl Marketing Insight, iqpearl.com, specializes in meeting young people where they are so that their voices are a part of the solutions that are supposed to reach them and help them for the better.
Hello Omo,
Thank you for your insightful political analysis about these pivotal days and times. I use the word pivotal with intention because, to me, it feels like a time for new possiblities. Many things remain the same but a few critical things have changed. Your blog hints at a most critical one….that of our looking and listening for an “opening”.
Most profound social changes in history have appeared to come about suddenly although the tilling of the soil out of which they grew had been in preparation for decades maybe centuries. When the time came the forces that ushered in change were like an epidemic that compelled people (usually just a few at first) to think, act and be different.
I put forth the possibility that our expectations and intentions for ourselves may at this time be our most potent sources of power. The energy that will feed and nuture our minds, bodies and spirits in the times to come is available to us if we can just see clearly enough to tap into it. The work of the Algebra Project continues to be a place where our expectations of ourselves, of one another, and of the institutions that impact upon us can be thoughtfully shaped and formed…and from time to time ushered in as the new day.
I write this in part as an act of eccouragement to you…encouragement to your heart and spirit. But mostly I write this, as a commitment to look at you and to listen to you and other young shapers of our times so that I can know of, contribute to and share with others your/our expectations and intentions.
avis
The success of our hard work as practitioners and educators– more importantly, as adults– is solidified, even legitimized, by the success/happiness of our students. When our young people witness and own a transformation in themselves, they become the most powerful vehicles of social change and then our work becomes more interconnected to their families and immediate neighborhoods. From program to barber shop to play grounds and streets. This is how a program, cause or vision becomes reality and how we become more impactful role models. It’s important for me to see my young people as alliances and colleagues on many levels and this article resonates that to me. Thank you.
Thank you for writing this insightful article. Although you focus on the problems in Chicago, your message pertains to urban, poor, and mostly black America. Thank you for reminding us that each one of us is capable of creating a miracle in someone’s life. Keep rising Omo.
It is so very easy to spot the problems and not so difficult to brainstorm solutions, but finding great working models can be tricky. And here is one. Thank you!
My own community is largely made up of recent immigrants. It includes a community college, a few high schools and many intermediate and elementary schools all withing a 3 mile radius. Initially I worked in this community as a Kindergarten teacher. I noticed the Kindergarten students who came in with “math sense” and the parents who had much higher levels of math knowledge than I do (as a person educated in a run of the mill U.S. school). I couldn’t help wonder, “Why don’t we take advantage of this wealth of knowledge that walks in the door everyday?”
I now teach in the junior college and I ask the same question. About half of the English Language Learners in my class come in with a solid understanding of Pre- Algebra and Algebra. The other half will have to take remedial course work to get up to speed. Why don’t we see these students as an immense asset?
Why not empower students to become math tutors(particularly when they are stuck in the trenches of remedial English)? And why not encourage a relationship with our least prepared students (those educated in our own highschools sadly have the lowest retention and graduation rates from the community college).
There is no model in place here for peer tuturing, but there is certainly fertile ground for such a project. I’m thinking a collaboration of the Veterans Program, Young Mens initiative, ELL programs, and maybe trade programs that use math knowledge (electrician, med tech).
Any thoughts for 11104, NY? Have you seen any other Math programs which value the math knowledge of recent immigrants? I think this is an under utilized resource. Any and all suggestions welcome! – L