Restorative Justice discussion – May 24th

Back in November, the Taskforce held an introductory circle, led by Ora Schub of Community Justice for Youth Institute, for our members to learn more about restorative justice.  There was so much enthusiasm after this event that we decided to hold a more in-depth follow-up session.

The Taskforce is partnering with Rape Victim Advocates & Community Justice for Youth Institute for this next dialogue.  This will be a 5-hour event on the afternoon & evening of May 24, in which we will set values for our discussion through a circle process; learn more about restorative justice practices; and discuss their applicability to cases of sexual and dating violence against girls & young women.

Space for this event is very limited and it’s already filling up!  If you’re interested in learning more, please email chitaskforce@gmail.com.

EDITED 3-27-11 TO ADD:  This event is at capacity – if you are interested in being placed on the waiting list, please email chitaskforce@gmail.com.  Thanks!

 

Chicago LGBT youth resource guide

Lara Brooks at the Broadway Youth Center has shared this great resource guide for LGBT youth in Chicago.  It includes community organizing groups that engage LGBT youth as leaders; resources that provide support in dealing with the criminal legal system; street outreach, housing and drop-in programs; and a syringe exchange program.

The Broadway Youth Center is one of the groups featured on our website and online report, for their work to engage transgender young women through TWISTA.  If you’d like to read more about their services, here is a guide to what BYC does.

So often, young people don’t know where to turn for help, and adults at our agencies don’t know what to suggest.  The Taskforce wants to help connect all of our work, to make Chicago safer for young people.  If your program has created similar resource guides that you would like to share, please email us at chitaskforce@gmail.com.

 

Kudos to the students at Dickinson College

A big shout-out to the students at Dickinson College, who have staged a sit-in to demand changes to the school’s sexual assault policies, and who are continuing their protest until additional concessions are made.

The actions started on Wednesday, when  300 students marched to the President’s Office and staged a sit-in.  Their efforts have already had an impact.  Local CBS news from Carlisle, Pennsylvania reports that “the protests have convinced the administration to include reports of sexual violence on the school’s text alert system.”  But to their credit, the students are refusing to end the sit-in until the remaining demands are met. Jezebel, quoting from student representatives, reports that these include:

1. Full transparency of the sexual misconduct policy process
2. The Department of Public Safety must send red alerts to the whole campus when sexual assault or rape is reported
3. A stronger administrative stance against sexual assault and rape
4. Expulsion must be the protocol for students found guilty of rape and sexual assault
5. Focus on creating a proactive education-based sexual violence prevention program
6. Specific plans and dates for concrete changes

The students’ commitment to collective action, their focus on raising consciousness and awareness around the issue, and their concrete recommendations for the university are all critical elements to their success.  It is exactly these kinds of efforts that will have a real impact on the issue of sexual violence.

This coverage by ABC news includes video and images of the protests, and you can hear directly from the students about their efforts:  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1n041H6NP48

 

How you can support the Taskforce

With the website going up, we’re getting a lot of questions about how people can get involved and volunteer at the Taskforce.  Thanks to everyone who has reached out to us!  For those who are wondering how to support our work, here are some areas where we could use help:

Blog about our report: One quick way to support our work is to spread the word about our online report (www.chitaskforce.org).  Is there a particular section that you found interesting?  Something that struck you, or points to the need for the work your group is doing?  Or something that wasn’t said in the report, that you’d want to add?  Blogging about it is a great way to make your voice heard while also supporting our work.  And we might even re-post on this site!

Help develop our Media Toolkit: This year, the Taskforce is going to be producing a Media Toolkit, to provide recommendations for how the press should cover the issue of violence against girls and young women.  Producing the toolkit is going to involve:

• Doing a media analysis, to identify to what extent, and how, the press currently covers the issue
• Facilitating focus groups with young people, to identify youth concerns about media coverage
• Developing recommendations, and the components of a Toolkit

If you’d like to get involved in any of these steps, please email me at chitaskforce@gmail.com; I’ll let you know when our first planning meeting is set.

Help research Teen Dating Violence curricula:  This fall, the Taskforce is going to be bringing together groups that provide teen dating violence workshops, to identify best practices and share strategies of what works and what doesn’t.  In preparation for these conversations, we could use help in gathering research on the topic of best practices in teen dating violence education.  If you’re interested in helping us with research, let me know (again, at chitaskforce@gmail.com).

Make a financial contribution (of any amount) to the Taskforce to cover costs including food, supplies, printing, and web hosting.  Please make checks payable to the Chicago Freedom School and send to 719 S. State Street # 3N, Chicago, IL 60605, and specify that your support is for the Taskforce.  Or you can donate through our facebook cause.

Many thanks, again, for all the interest in supporting our work!

 

Website is live! Check out the Taskforce report

We are excited to announce the launch of the Taskforce website and online report, with our recommendations on how to end violence against girls and young women in Chicago!  We invite you to visit the website at www.chitaskforce.org.

Based on Roundtable discussions and surveys of dozens of organizations from across Chicago the website is a roadmap for the Taskforce’s action steps to end violence against girls and young women.  We’ll be meeting with public officials, issuing a Media Toolkit, and holding workshops around innovative approaches to end violence against girls — and we welcome you to get involved!

UNDERSTANDING VIOLENCE AGAINST GIRLS:  The website looks at 5 interrelated forms of violence against girls and young women:

• Teen dating violence
• Sexual violence
• Violence & education
• Reproductive Justice & Violence
• Violence & criminalization

For each, it offers concrete data about violence against girls, and identified issues & needs in the field.  The Taskforce is committed to highlighting great work happening across the city as well, and for each section you can read about organizations that are doing innovative work.

POLICY RECOMMENDATIONS ENDORSED BY 40 ORGANIZATIONS: A highlight of the website is a set of recommendations for Chicago Public Schools, Cook County, and the State of Illinois, as well as organizations, foundations and researchers.  These recommendations have been endorsed by 40 organizations, representing youth groups, domestic violence and sexual assault groups, city and statewide agencies, policy organizations, and more.  They will serve as the basis for our work in the coming year, as we advocate to make Chicago safer for girls and young women.

TOOLS & RESOURCES:  The website offers tools & resources that groups can use in their own work.  Our resource page includes data sheets, reports and curricula, all free for downloading.  And our Occasional Papers series offers evaluations of innovative programs, and evaluation tools that organizations can access.

Our thanks to all of the volunteers who supported this work, and to the foundations that funded the development of the website: the Field Foundation of Illinois & the Verizon Foundation!

 

Taskforce selects next Occasional Papers

We are happy to announce that the Taskforce has chosen our next round of Occasional Papers, to be released in July.  The Occasional Papers seek to offer relevant, practical, and useful information about the realities and impact of violence in the lives of young women and girls, innovative programming and approaches, and concrete tools that communities can use to end violence.

We are especially excited that all 3 of the papers will be written or co-written by girls and young women!

The papers feature the work of three organizations that engage young people as leaders to end systemic and interpersonal violence:

• Tiara Epps, Beyondmedia Education, The Chain of Change Project
• Rachel Kibblesmith & youth leaders, CRIME Teens Project, Replacing Trauma & Violence with Youth-Directed Compassion, Respect, Inspiration, Motivation, and Empathy.
• Young Women’s Empowerment Project, The Bad Encounter Line

Congratulations to all of the authors!

 

If you’re wondering what the mayoral candidates think about our recommendations….

For one thing, you won’t get an answer from Rahm Emanuel or Gery Chico, both of whom declined the invitation to participate in a candidate’s forum on violence against women, girls and LGBTQ youth.  The forum was held last night, co-sponsored by several of our partner organizations – Chicago Metropolitan Battered Women’s Network, Rape Victim Advocates, Center on Halsted and CAASE – as well as the Chicago Foundation for Women.

Once you were able to get past the odd terms used for the LGBTQ community — Carol Moseley Braun referred to “nontraditional people”, and William “Dock” Walls insisted he was referring instead to panhandlers when he used the phrase “people with unusual lifestyles” — there was some useful information on how they feel about our recommendations to end violence against girls.

WHAT THEY THINK ABOUT PREVENTION EDUCATION

One of the Taskforce recommendations is for Chicago Public Schools, and the candidates were asked if they support it:

“The CPS policy on Dating Violence (08-0625-P02) currently does not set requirements for dating or sexual violence prevention education, but states that teachers “may” access lesson plans and partner with local anti-violence organizations. This should be changed to a requirement.”

So what did they have to say?

Miguel del Valle was the first to answer, and he said: “Absolutely.”  He added that the Board of Education needs to adopt the policy, and make sure the topics will be addressed in an “appropriate manner.”  Asked to define this further, he said he meant in the appropriate classes, and with a range of methods from counseling, to group discussions, to traditional classroom work.  He stressed the need for a mechanism to ensure discussion and student participation.

William “Dock” Walls agreed that this was necessary and said that he saw it as part of civics education.  Putting aside the more specific discussion of teen dating and sexual violence, he spoke at length about the need for civics education, to build stronger citizens who will “understand boundaries.”

Carol Moseley Braun felt the issue was “more complicated.”  She stressed that there is a lack of school nurses at Chicago Public Schools, with 1 nurse for every 725 students, and that remedying this should instead be the focus.  She referred to the “uphill battle” to get sex education in our schools, and felt that making education on these issues mandatory would be making it a “poison pill.”  Her answer instead is to restore the proper number of nurses at schools, and make the teen dating violence and sexual violence curriculum part of comprehensive sex ed – with an option for families to have their children “opt out” if they are opposed to the classes.

Patricia Van Pelt Watkins agreed with the recommendation, and spoke of the need for subjects to be interrelated.  “If you put the students in a room and give them a dose, they won’t absorb it.  It needs to be part of their lifestyle, so it sticks with them.”  She also stressed professional development and in service learning for staff.

Rahm Emanuel and Gery Chico declined the invitation to attend the candidates’ forum to discuss these issues.

A SPLIT ON THEIR APPROACH TO BULLYING

When the Taskforce discussed bullying in our Roundtable discussion, the organizations unanimously agreed that implementing anti-bullying legislation need to be tied to restorative justice practices.  Our goal is not to have young people kicked out of school or criminalized.  Our goal is safety.  Here’s our recommendation:

The Task force supports implementation of the Illinois Safe Schools Act and encourages the implementation of Restorative Justice practices to curtail bullying in schools, when appropriate, rather than criminalization of young people. We understand that the organizations that proposed and advocated for this Act share these values.

So I listened carefully when the candidates were asked how they would implement anti-bullying legislation in Chicago Public Schools.

Now, here the candidates split.  Miguel del Valle and Patricia Van Pelt Watkins both committed to the use of restorative justice practices.

On the other hand, Carol Moseley Braun and William “Dock” Walls both committed to using zero tolerance policies.  Here’s a quote from Walls:  “Zero tolerance with absolute certainty has to be the mandate of Chicago Public Schools.”

Rahm Emanuel and Gery Chico declined the invitation to attend the candidates’ forum to discuss these issues.

The Taskforce does not endorse any particular candidate; we are committed to making sure the public is informed about these issues.  Wherever you stand on these issues, we urge you to go out and vote, and have your voice be heard!

 

Is the teen dating violence curriculum relevant for youth?

This month is Teen Dating Violence Awareness Month. We at the Taskforce have been talking a lot lately about how we need to change our discourse around teen dating violence if we are going to make it at all relevant for young people. 

Last week we spoke about this at a DVACC meeting – that’s the Domestic Violence Advocacy Coordinating Council, a project of the Mayor’s Office on Domestic Violence.  As we write about it for our website, and as we begin to plan a Chicago gathering to reconsider the standard curricula, we wanted to share some more anecdotal thoughts here.

One of the girls in a group that Mariame was running at a middle school on the Westside of Chicago shared an anecdote that is particularly instructive. Angela was an 8th grade student who was extremely bright and outgoing. She explained that a prevention specialist came to her class to discuss the issue of date rape. She took issue with the workshop facilitator’s contention that ‘no always means no’ with respect to having sex. In fact, Angela’s peers in discussing the session during their lunch break decided that

“no sometimes means ‘convince me.’”

Rather than recoil at Angela’s words, instead of becoming defensive and devoting ourselves to getting her to “see the light,” we who work with girls like her, need to take a long look in the mirror as we seek to understand where she is coming from. We need to as the youth say: “keep it real!”

We do not intend to minimize or to gloss over the very real risks that are sometimes present in teen girls’ relationships and sexual lives. Rather our goal here is to open up another front for our consideration as adults who work with young people.

We have been thinking a lot about Angela lately. We have been thinking about the black and white edicts that we present to teens in our prevention programs. It turns out that things are much more complex and complicated than we may imagine. The meanings that we attribute to certain behaviors and actions may not mirror the realities of some girls’ lives. How do we talk about consent and date rape in a way that has meaning for Angela and her friends?

This is a question that we plan to wrestle with later this year as we convene a working conference to share ideas and best practices for developing more relevant teen dating violence curricula in the 21st century. Keep your eyes and ears open for an announcement about the event!

 

Just for fun… a preview of sorts

Mariame and I have been working like crazy to get the website up – and we’re so close!  I’ve been looking for a way to share a preview of it – and this morning created this word cloud from the main page.  Clicking on the image on the left will take you to the full sized word cloud.

The website is looking great and it’ll be up at by the end of the month.  Tons of useful data, tools, innovative models and concrete recommendations for systems change…. stay tuned!

 

Take action to support Tiawanda Moore!

The Taskforce is asking our friends to take action in the case of Tiawanda Moore, a young woman in Chicago who has accused a police officer of sexual harassment, and has herself been charged with recording police officers on her Blackberry.  Here’s what we know.

Tiawanda Moore, whose trial is tentatively scheduled for Feb. 7 in Cook County Criminal Court, is accused of using her Blackberry to record two Internal Affairs investigators who spoke to her inside Police Headquarters while she filed a sexual harassment complaint last August against another police officer.

On January 22, the New Times featured her case as well as that of Chris Drew as they are both facing up to 15 years in prison for taping police officers.
Quoting from the New York Times:

Ms. Moore’s case is more complicated and “disturbing,” said her lawyer, Robert W. Johnson, who is representing her pro bono.

Ms. Moore lived with her boyfriend at the time of the incident and theirs was a stormy relationship, filled with fights and visits by the police, Mr. Johnson said. Last July, the boyfriend called the police and said he wanted Ms. Moore out of his house. But by the time the police arrived, Mr. Johnson said, the couple had calmed down. Still, one of the officers talked to Ms. Moore upstairs while his partner interviewed the boyfriend.

On Aug. 18, Ms. Moore and her boyfriend went to Police Headquarters to file a complaint with Internal Affairs about the officer who had talked to her alone. Ms. Moore said the officer had fondled her and left his personal telephone number, which she handed over to the investigators.

Ms. Moore said the investigators tried to talk her out of filing a complaint, saying the officer had a good record and that they could “guarantee” that he would not bother her again.

“They keep giving her the run-around, basically trying to discourage her from making a report,” Mr. Johnson said. “Finally, she decides to record them on her cellphone to show how they’re not helping her.”

The investigators discovered that she was recording them and she was arrested and charged with two counts of eavesdropping, Mr. Johnson said. But he added that the law contains a crucial exception. If citizens have “reasonable suspicion” that a crime is about to be committed against them, they may obtain evidence by recording it.

“I contend that the Internal Affairs investigators were committing the crime of official misconduct in preventing her from filing a complaint,” Mr. Johnson said. “She’s young. She had no idea what she was getting into when she went in there to make a simple complaint. It’s just a shame when the people watching the cops aren’t up to it.”

Days later, accompanied by Mr. Johnson, Ms. Moore returned to Internal Affairs and was able to file a full complaint. There is a continuing investigation of Ms. Moore’s charges against the officer, a Police Department spokesman said.

Meanwhile, Ms. Moore is in Cook County Jail after another domestic dispute with her boyfriend, Mr. Johnson said.

In a tearful telephone interview from jail, Ms. Moore said that when she went to Internal Affairs she was only trying to make sure no other women suffered at the hands of the officer.

“I’m scared,” she said. “I don’t know what’s going to happen now. I don’t want to be in jail. I want to make my parents happy and proud of me.”

Our Call to Action:
1. Read the entire New York Times article here.
2. Complete our petition at change.org.
3. E-mail us at chitaskforce@gmail.com if you are interested in potentially attending Tiawanda’s trial.  We will let you know once the trail date is confirmed.