Chicago Youth Violence
With the start of a new school year comes the news of violence against Chicago youth, in particular, the brutal murder of Fenger High School student Derrion Albert. Ongoing violence in Chicago has seen an unprecedented number of young victims, and the surprising number of children killed has not gone unnoticed among the city’s residents.
On Tuesday, November 3, activists, community members, and students packed the Harris School’s Quiet Study Area for the Violence Amongst Chicago Youth Panel. The event was organized by the Harris School’s Center for Human Potential and Public Policy and student groups Education Policy Interest Coalition and Leaders in Child and Family Policy, in partnership with Education Pioneers Chicago, a national organization focused on urban education issues. The five panelists—Talmadge D. Betts, Ameena Mathews, Phillip Jackson, Jens Ludwig, and David O. Stovall—were tasked with addressing the near impossible: explain and fix the epidemic of violence among school-age children in Chicago.
The first question got to the heart of the issue, asking the experts to weigh in on the origin of this violence and whether a proactive solution was possible.
David Stovall, an assistant professor of policy studies in the College of Education at UIC, was the first to answer. He noted that violence in Chicago was an “old but complex problem,” but what “sensationalizes it is the celluloid nature of it.” He took the specific example of Derrion Albert and pointed to school consolidation that led to the incident, arguing that the rivalry between Fenger High School students and former Carver students was not unique and had a 25-year history. The decision of Chicago Public Schools (CPS) to close schools and mix students with differing neighborhood associations and “street organizations” operates on “the assumption that those [children] are disposable,” said Stovel.
This sentiment was echoed by Talmadge Betts, the senior program officer for the Black United Fund of Illinois and program director of CONNNECTS @ South Shore (a coalition of over 40 organizations dedicated to reducing violence in the South Shore neighborhood), who added, “youth have been greatly devalued by society… and [are] acting like youth who’ve been devalued.” Phillip Jackson, Black Star Project founder who had an extensive tenure with CPS, agreed and argued that, with the current condition of area public schools, “[these children] are going to be destroyed regardless.”
Ameena Mathews, an Englewood-based violence interrupter for CeaseFire, highlighted the wider causes and context of violence. She pointed to role of families in conflict and the historical roots of neighborhood rivalries, comparing the spread of violence to a pandemic and stressing the community’s stake in solving the problem. Betts added that high rates of domestic violence reveal that these children are being exposed to violence in the home and may be acting out some of this trauma while at school.
Offering a wider scope, Jens Ludwig, the McCormick Foundation Professor of Social Service Administration, Law, and Public Policy in the School of Social Service Administration and the Harris School and director of the University’s Crime Lab, compared violence rates across cities, noting that homicides are far more common in the United States than in Western Europe. As a possible partial solution, he suggested tighter gun policies to take guns out of the equation. He also noted that compared to other large cities in the United States, Chicago has higher rates of violence, which prompts him to ask what New York City is doing right that Chicago could learn from.
Jackson, however, rejected direct conflict intervention, public demonstrations, and broad policy initiatives as incapable of producing a long-term solution. He instead suggested one-on-one approaches such as mentoring and early education. Ludwig stated further that research has shown the effectiveness of both early childhood education and high school mentoring programs.
The panel then turned to the second, and last, topic: what the panelists were specifically doing to quell school violence. Although sometimes or frequently frustrated by dealing with the challenges of dealing with Chicago’s school system and politics, the speakers are actively involved. They discussed their efforts with community-based organizations that specialized in coalition building, violence intervention, and providing services for children outside of school. Stovall, who teaches social studies at the Little Village Lawndale Social Justice High School, pushes his students toward college and strives to make his lessons relevant because “I want my students to return to my classroom tomorrow… I want them to replace me.”
- Vriti Jain
Contact Information
Communications Office
Phone: 773-702-7681
