2012-2013

An Interview with Jessica Wolff

On March 8th, our group spoke to one of the members at Campaign for Educational Equity named Jessica Wolff. The Campaign for Educational Equity is an organization that helps impoverished children to get the same/equal services as more privileged children. Jessica says that “this country does public education pretty well, but where our country serves…

Volunteering at Coalition for the Homeless Food Van

On March 7th, the Child Poverty had the amazing opportunity to go volunteer with the Coalition for the Homeless van program. Coalition for the Homeless sends multiple vans to all five boroughs to give out food to people living in poverty who can’t afford to buy meals. These trucks are full of soups, oranges, milk,…

An Interview with Bonnie Greaves

On March 6th, my group and I talked to a woman named Bonnie Greaves who is a volunteer at the Citizens’ Committee for Children. This organization’s goal is to “educate and mobilize New Yorkers to make the city a better place for children”. This organization doesn’t help children directly, but they promote solutions to make…

Volunteer Work at Room To Grow

On February 23, the Child Poverty Group had the opportunity to volunteer at an amazing organization called Room to Grow. Room to Grow is an organization that provides clothing (from sizes 0 months to 5 years) and toys to families who can’t afford to buy them. Multiple families depend on Room to Grow to help…

Playing Squash At Street Squash!

On February 22nd, my group and I went to Street Squash an organization that tutors and teaches squash to children from 6th to 12th grade. My group sat in on a sixth grade class to see how it worked. They were reading a popular book, City of Embers. It is about a slightly corrupt society…

Producer Lauren Mucciolo Came to Speak With Us About Her Movie!

On February 11th, the Child Poverty group had guest speaker Lauren Mucciolo come speak with our grade. Lauren Mucciolo is the producer of an amazing documentary called “Poor Kids”. This documentary aired on PBS Frontline about a month ago that takes place in the eyes of three kids who have lived in poverty almost all…

Women Moving Millions Communtity Update Call Sit-In

At 2:45 February 5th, we arrived at the main headquarters of Women Moving Millions. Women Moving Millions is a worldwide organization that works to reach out to women in order to help them succeed in business and to help found companies with women CEO’s. WMM is also world wide organization supporting women in business in the…

Youth Demand: Not Sometime

Youth Demand End Gun Violence. We are four eighth graders from New York who are trying to end gun violence in America. We need to speak up because this is our future and we do not want to grow up in a place of death and chaos. End gun violence now!! Sign our petition: http://signon.org/sign/youth-demand-e… Follow…

Youth Demand: Now

Youth Demand End Gun Violence. We are four eighth graders from New York who are trying to end gun violence in America. We need to speak up because this is our future and we do not want to grow up in a place of death and chaos. End gun violence now!! Sign our petition: http://signon.org/sign/youth-demand-e… Follow…

Youth Demand: Youth Is

Youth Demand End Gun Violence. We are four eighth graders from New York who are trying to end gun violence in America. We need to speak up because this is our future and we do not want to grow up in a place of death and chaos. End gun violence now. Follow us on Twitter: https://twitter.com/DemandVoice and…

Youth Demand: End

Youth Demand End Gun Violence. We are four eighth graders from New York who are trying to end gun violence in America. We need to speak up because this is our future and we do not want to grow up in a place of death and chaos. End gun violence now. Follow us on Twitter: https://twitter.com/DemandVoice and…

Interview at District Attorney’s Office

By Julia N. Last Wednesday at 11AM we visited the Brooklyn District Attorney’s office for an interview with three employees in the Crime Prevention Division. Sadie’s contact, Frank Laghezza, let us speak with him along with his colleagues, Mary Hughes and Teri Fabi, about their work. Mary Hughes is the Confidential Assistant District Attorney. She…

Housing Plus Solutions-The Drew House

By Sadie On January 24th, my social justice group visited an ATI which stands for Alternative to Incarceration. This ATI was a place where mothers can serve jail/prison time but they don’t have to be separated from their children. It is part of Housing Plus Solutions and is the only program in the country of…

Sign our petition

Click here. PETITION STATEMENT: We, today’s youth, demand a ban on assault weapons, an increase in microstamping, an end to the loopholes in existing gun laws, and tighter gun registration requirements. By doing so we will be saving lives like yours and mine.

Juvenile In Justice Art Exhibit

By Julia N. Today we went to the a gallery with Richard Ross’ exhibit called “Juvenile In Justice.” We say many graphic pictures of the conditions that these youths have to live in. It was disgusting and moving to see the cells and read the quotes from the people who were photographed. All of the…

New Projects!

Yesterday, January 15th, my Social Justice Group (No Sugar Added) went to visit Wat-aah! again about upcoming projects. Right now we are going to start researching on energy and sports drinks. Each one of us are going to research an energy/sports drink. I am going to research RedBull, Isiah Monster, Bella Gatorade, Sofia Mellow and…

FLOW: For Love Of Water

On, Thursday, January 10, and Friday January 11, my social Justice Group and I watched FLOW, For Love Of Water. To start, it is an amazing movie and I recommend you to watch it, you will learn a lot. Next, the movie is about water, and how we should be using it for a resource…

Emotional Creatures Play

For our fourth fieldwork, we saw one of the last showings of the play Emotional Creature, which focuses on the issues of young women, both here and around the world. We saw it on January 10th, 2013 at the Signature Theater. The play showed snippets from the lives of various young women, from America to…

Emotional Creature Performance

On January 10th, my group and the other Women’s Rights group went to a broadway performance called “Emotional Creature”. Emotional Creature was about the broad topic of a teenage girls life, and showing the audience many different scenarios of what girls go through. We saw scenarios of rape, physical abuse, body image/eating disorders, boys, hormones…

New York City-The Safest City in America

Our teacher, Sarah sent us this article about how more police on the streets reduces crime. Read the article to find out more! http://www.nytimes.com/2013/01/26/nyregion/police-have-done-more-than-prisons-to-cut-crime-in-new-york.html?emc=eta1&_r=0

Steve Liss Interview

On Tuesday December 4 , my social justice group and I had a video conference with the chairman of American Poverty, Steve Liss. We discussed what American Poverty does to help impoverished families and people by protests and rallies along with artwork andphotographs of first hand poverty that they put on exhibit. We discussed when…

Interview with Judge Clark Richardson and Lawyers for Children

People Met: Judge Clark Richardson and Three social workers from Lawyers For Children Date: December 19, 2012 Author: Jessica Our second fieldwork was a very interesting and intriguing experience for myself and my group. We sat down at Manhattan family court to view various different child abuse/neglect cases. The goal of this fieldwork was to…

Fieldwork #3: Interview w/ Juan De La Cruz (12/5/12)

On December 5, 2012, my group and I went to an interview with Juan Dei La Cruz. Mr. Cruz is the director of the food branch of Coalition for the Homeless. My group and I took the subway to 129 Fulton St. to meet with the director. We asked him questions we had prepared before, and recorded…

Interview with Amber Hollibaugh, CEO of Queers for Economic Justice, Fieldwork 5

This is the recording of the interview our group conducted with Amber Hollibaugh, CEO of Queers for Economic Justice: https://docs.google.com/file/d/0B8vK2I3Y7cbjWTI2MV95N08tbk0/edit?usp=sharing On Thursday, December 13, my group, the LGBTQ Group, interviewed Amber Hollibaugh, the executive director of Queers for Economic Justice (QEJ). QEJ formed during the Clinton administration to stand up for poor LGBTQ people. QEJ…

Interview with Patricia McCormick

On December 13th, my group and I had a 30 minute interview with the author of Sold, Cut and Never Fall Down, Patricia McCormick. Sold is book about a poor girl who is stuck struggling from Sexual Abuse in India. Our main focus was on the novel Sold and how sexual trafficking connects to Domestic…

Clifton Budd and DeMaria Law Firm Interview

On Wednesday, December 12, we went to visit the Clifton Budd and DeMaria, LLP Law Firm at 420 Lexington Ave, Suite 420. We left Little Red at 9:30 and my mom drove us there by car. Our interview starts at 10:00. We get there five minutes early and go up. We wait for him and…

Viewing of Ken Burns’ “Central Park Five”

By Julia N. On December 12, at around 5 o’clock in the evening, we went to Lauren’s house to watch Ken Burns’ documentary on the Central Park Five. The Central Park Five were a group of boys (four black, one Latino) who were arrested for the rape and severe attack of a white female jogger…

Interview with Carol Granum from STEPS

On December 12th my group and I had an Interview with Carol Granum. Carol, leads the program STEPS. STEPS is a program for teen domestic violence offenders. STEPS is an alternative rather than going to jail. The program has existed for 25 years. The students are STEPS are expected to come to class once a…

St. John’s Bread and Life 12/11/12

Last week, we went to St. John’s Bread and Life. On the way there, we got a little bit lost because we did not have clear directions telling us how to get there. When we finally got off the train, a man and a woman who seemed to be married were asking people for directions.…

Interview With Colin Goddard, Virgin Tech Shooting Survivor

On December 10th 2012 my gun violence group and I Skyped a survivor of the Virginia Tech Shooting, who is working with the Brady Campaign, Colin Goddard. The ultimate goal of this fieldwork was to hear his story if possible, as well as learning from someone from the Brady Campaign and getting as much information…

Field Work #3 Blog Post-Court Case

On December 6, my group and I went to the Criminal Court in Brooklyn, to view domestic violence court dates. We sat in the jury box and observed the cases at hand. I learned that if a defender in a domestic violence case does not plead guilty to a domestic violence action they have to…

Interview with Elizabeth Webster from The Innocence Project

On Wednesday December 5th my group conducted an interview with Elizabeth Webster. Liz works in the communications department at The Innocence Project. The Innocence Project was the organization that I had decided to take charge of for our projects. Towards the beginning of the year I started doing research on the Innocence Project. My first…

Housing Works – Charles King, December 5, 2012

https://docs.google.com/file/d/0B8vK2I3Y7cbjUkFielRBd1l4M0E/edit?usp=sharing This is a recording of Charles King’s talk-in with the grade on December 5, 2012. On December 5th, 2012, Charles King the CEO and cofounder of Housing Works came to the eighth grade. He had talked about his experiences growing up, how HIV/AIDS has an effect on his life, about Housing Works, and how…

Interview with Jordyn Lexton on Drive Change

By Julia N. On Monday, December 3 we (the youth incarceration group) interviewed Jordyn Lexton on her new organization called Drive Change. Ms. Lexton is a former English teacher at Rikers Island. She became interested in the topic of youth incarceration while taking a theater class during her senior year at Wesleyan. The class was…

Interview with the Third Wave Foundation’s Andrea Flynn

On Thursday november 29th we interviewed Andrea Flynn, a chair member of the Third Wave foundation. The Third Wave Foundation was founded by Dawn Martin, Rebecca Walker, Amy Richards and Katharine Gun. The Third Wave Foundation earned its name form the three waves of feminism. The first wave was in the early 1900’s when women…

Interview with Michelle Kaminsky and Farah Rodriguez

On Thursday, November 29 my group and I went to the DA’s office in Brooklyn. We interviewed multiple people and what their job is at the office. First we met with Michelle Kaminsky who is a domestic violence attorney. We had worked with Michelle before and had another discussion with her. One person we interviewed…

Go Project Tour!

On Saturday my Poverty Social Justice Group and I embarked on a field work to LREI where we would work with the Go Project. We mainly went there for a orientation to the organization so we can learn more about what they do. We listened in on some classes and i particularly listened to a…

The start of our concert project

On Monday, November 19th our SJ group went to WAT-AAH again. Our goal while we were there was to When we were there Christine Widga (Director of marketing) wanted us to start our project for the concert coming up the next week. At the event our group will have a booth and have posters. All…

Long Island Wins

http://www.longislandwins.com This is an organization headquartered in Long Island, who is fighting for the rights of undocumented youth immigrants in the U.S.

Child Abuse Field Work with CAPP

On November 14, I had a social justice interview with three women who work at an organization called Prevent Child Abuse. My group asked them questions about child abuse and the organization they work for, then they put on a puppet show that they show to third graders, mostly in public schools. The goal of…

Child Poverty Group goes to the ITLP Fundraiser

On Monday, November 12th my group went to a fundraiser for ITLP, the International Theatre and Literacy Project. This organization works with students in incredibly poor communities in Tanzania and South Africa. They do workshops with them to teach them playwriting. This year, the students wrote and performed a play about being heard. They had…

First Fieldwork with Wat-aah: Introduction Visit

Hi, this is Sarah. On Monday, November 12th, my social justice group and I were given the opportunity to visit the Wat-aah offices. Wat-aah is a company that we have been communicating with. It was beyond exciting to visit. They focus on health and they want to prevent childhood obesity by stopping all the kids…

Cradle to Prison Pipeline-Phone Interview with Ilana Brunner

By Sadie On Sunday November 11th, we had an interview scheduled to talk to Ilana Brunner who works in the Washington D.C. office of Congressman Robert “Bobby” Scott. Mr. Scott is working on a legislative called the PROMISE Act. PROMISE stands for Prison Reduction through Opportunities, Mentoring, Intervention, Support and Education. Pennsylvania invested 60 million…

The Gender Gap Film Screening

For our first fieldwork, we went to a movie screening called Women’s Voices: The Gender Gap, which was about women’s rights. It took place on October 25, 2012. It showed a movie made during the Reagan era about women’s opinions on politics and related topics, and was followed by a panel presentation that talked about…

Youth Demand

We are four eighth graders from New York City who believe it is time for youth to take a stand against gun violence for the sake of our future. President Obama said Newtown could have been any town. We believe him. Kids should not be afraid to go to school, walk home alone, or lose…

Child Poverty: Break the Cycle

Hello people who are viewing our blog! We are a group of eighth graders at LREI: Little Red School House and Elisabeth Irwin High School. The Child Poverty group and 36 other students in our grade are going off into the world to work on behalf of human rights. Child Poverty affects so many people…

Throwing Stones at the Glass Ceiling

8th Grade Social Justice Group Fighting For Gender Equality In The Work Space And Elsewhere. Hello! We are the Gender Equality Social Justice Group. We are three group members, Isabel, Ayden, and Noah. We are 8th Graders from Little Red Schoolhouse and Elisabeth Irwin High School. Our main focus is eliminating gender inequality in the…

Immigration Nation

We are eighth graders from LREI School (Little Red Schoolhouse + Elisabeth Irwin High School) in Greenwich Village, NYC. Our grade is embarking on a social justice project in which we focus on civil/human rights issues of our interest. Our group chose immigration as our topic. We are focusing on the rights of the undocumented…

No Place for Kids: Youth Incarceration in America

Hello! We are the Youth Incarceration group. We are working raise awareness on the many issues that affect incriminated youths 18 and under. Some of these issue include racial profiling, inability to get jobs, and being charged as adults. New York is the only state that automatically sentences 16 year-olds as adults.

Stop The Abuse

Hello all, we are the child abuse social justice group made up of five eighth graders from LREI (Little Red Elizabeth Irwin) Jessica, Lucy, Amalia, Sam and August. We chose the topic of child abuse because we felt that this topic is a huge problem in society that goes unrecognized by so many. Our group’s…

No Sugar Added

Hi! We are five eighth graders in New York City from Little Red School House and Elizabeth Irwin High School. As a part of a year-long social justice project, our grade has been focusing on Human and Civil Rights. We have chosen to focus on health and nutrition issues. Our group’s goal, No Sugar Added,…

The Bullying Effect

The Bullying Effect Group wants to teach you about how LGBTQ (Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender, Queer/Questioning) youth bullying may have an impact on LGBTQ peoples’ lives. In our society, we are expected to follow a certain characteristic depending on our biological sex. This causes people who don’t conform to these unsaid norms to be discriminated…

Love Shouldn’t Hurt – Domestic Violence Issues

Hello, we are Justine, Charlotte, and Pilar and we are eighth graders at LREI in New York City. Our class this year is doing a project called Social Justice. Our group is focusing in the topic of Domestic Violence. The reason we choose this issue is because we feel strongly and we want to do…

Poverty in America

We are doing our part to help end poverty for the 43 million Americans that have to suffer below the poverty line. Our group goal is to raise awareness for the poverty that is unseen by most. Other countries look at America like a plethora of wealth but that isn’t the case. Over 40 million…

Starve Out Hunger in NYC!

In NYC today 1.3 million New Yorkers have to and need to rely on food pantries and soup kitchens. In NYC 400,000 people are pained from moderate or severe hunger -118,000 of them are children. We as a group want to help stop hunger, or at least cut down on the number of those starving…