18 March, 2013

Going to High School when 6% of students are shot in a year

Harper High School, and finding solutions to complex problems:

I think the two part episode This American Life recently released on Harper High School in the south side of Chicago is some of the best work they’ve ever done. Trying to understand the epidemic of gun violence in Chicago and its implications for children growing up in this violent environment, TAL placed three reporters in Harper for five months.
In the previous academic year, 29 current and recent students were shot. Eight were killed. And Harper’s student body is just over 500 students.....

The core problem Harper faces is that their students are going to school in a war zone. That war zone is the product of social forces far beyond the control of the hardworking and brave people at Harper: the flood of handguns in the neighborhood, gang rivalries that began with the drug trade and now center on multi-year patterns of vengeance and revenge. Epidemiologist Gary Slutkin suggests we consider the violence in Englewood as a disease, infecting those impacted by it and making them more likely to engage in violent behavior. Some of Slutkin’s critics argue his analysis ignores the larger socioeconomic problems – the drug trade and the violence it has helped engender are reflections on the lack of real economic opportunity for people of color who live on the South Side of Chicago.