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Lesson 2: A Framework for Action

Lesson 2: A Framework for ActionOVERVIEW In this lesson, students will read published articles about GC student projects, first exploring them to get a sense of what students have done and might have learned through their GC experiences, then analyzing them according to GC’s framework for action, the Advocacy Hourglass.

OBJECTIVESBy the end of this lesson, students will have...

Created a set of guidelines to promote a safe and democratic classroom community Analyzed examples of community change projects utilizing the Advocacy Hourglass

framework for action

AGENDA Do Now: GC Learning Goals (7 minutes) Classroom Constitution (8 minutes) Article Analysis (10 minutes) Advocacy Hourglass (10 minutes) Story Sharing (10 minutes) Exit Ticket (5 minutes)

MATERIALS Student handbooks Poster paper for “Classroom Constitution” Advocacy Hourglass poster, with blanks for terms to be written in Printed labels for each term of the Advocacy Hourglass (can also write in instead) Printed copies of “Community Issue Interviews” page (1 per student), if you’d rather

students don’t tear them out from their handbooks Markers

PREPARATION BEFORE CLASS Title one piece of poster paper, “Classroom Constitution” Create one label for each term of the Advocacy Hourglass, to be taped to the board (or

can write in, live) Determine which of the articles offered at the back of this lesson (and printed in the

Student Handbooks) you will assign to your students, read through it, and be prepared to tell students which page they can find it on in their handbooks;

o O r (recommended) find your own local examples of student-driven action. Print copies (1 per student) if it is a news article, or pre-load if it is a video story

Design and bring in a poster of the Advocacy Hourglass or find a space on the board to draw it

Consider reviewing and editing the language of the “Learning Goals” for middle, English Language Learner, or special education students - if you’re a Democracy Coach, ask your teacher about this.

Print out copies of “Community Issue Interviews” page (1 per student), if you’d rather students don’t tear them out from their handbooks

ASSESSMENT RESOURCES

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Lesson 2: A Framework for Action Reference the Assessment Portfolio for assessments aligned to Lesson 2

REFERENCESN/A

GETTING STARTED Do Now: GC Learning Goals (7 minutes) Ask students to take four minutes to look at ‘Generation Citizen’s Learning Goals’ on page 4 in the Student Handbook and to circle the FOUR statements that they feel are most true about themselves, then answer the reflection questions at the bottom of the page.

Debrief: Point out that these learning goals, which they’ll be working towards throughout the semester, are aligned to support to their heads, hands, and hearts with the tools they need to be successful leading community change projects out in their future worlds.

Explain the learning goals focused on ‘head’ represent the knowledge needed in order to make change in a community, like who their government leaders are. Learning goals focused on ‘hands’ involve the skills they need to develop in order to make change, like knowing how to speak persuasively. Learning goals focused on ‘heart’ involve the beliefs they need to have in order to become civic leaders, like that they have the power to make change.

Offer an example of your own responses to the Do Now, and ask 2-3 students to share their responses to questions about their strengths and areas for growth.

Short on time?Set a timer for 4 minutes to allow students to review and respond to the learning goals. Then, set the timer for 1 minute and instruct students to turn and talk to the person sitting next to them to share their responses. Then move to the next activity.

Framing: Explain that today will focus on learning exactly how they can make change and a process for doing so. They’ll be exploring what other GC students have done in the past and learning about GC’s basic framework for driving community change.

DURING CLASS Classroom Constitution (8 minutes) Explain that in this class, during this process, you’re going to be co-creating a democratic community that allows all voices to be heard. Ask if anyone can define “democracy,” and write all ideas on the board. After brainstorming the definition, ask one student to look up the definition in the Glossary at the back of their handbook, and add this definition to the board.

TIP: If students are unfamiliar with the structure of a “Do Now” as an immediate activity to kick-start the lesson when they get into class, introduce that here and explain that this quick activity will be a routine which they’ll follow during every GC period.

GLOSSARY TERM:Democracy: A government in which power is with the people and is used by them directly, or indirectly through elected officials.Sample Sentence: We all have the chance to make our

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Lesson 2: A Framework for Action

Short on time?Ask for a volunteer to look up the word “democracy” in the glossary. While that student is looking, invite others to share their own ideas about what the word means.

Explain that today they will create a ‘Classroom Constitution.’ Just like the U.S. Constitution that outlines the fundamental laws and principles we live by, this will be a set of principals or guidelines that all members of this classroom will follow each day during GC.

Pose to students the questions: How can we create a classroom environment that looks like a

democracy? o Probing question if stuck: Think about a country that does not

have a democracy. Are those citizens asked to participate and have a voice? What do we as citizens of a democracy ‘get to do’ that other may not elsewhere?

How must we treat each other and behave? o Probing question if stuck: Reflect on last class when we did the

Four Corners Activity. What were some of the really positive ways you all interacted during that discussion?

Give students one minute to think, and then invite suggestions for the class to adopt while they’re collaborating together this semester. Write these, or use a student scribe, on poster paper to be referenced moving forward with the title “Our Democratic Classroom” at the top.

Suggested norms include: Everyone has a voice and should express their ideas Everyone should be a part of decision making Everyone should listen to each other - Take turns talking (“One mic”) Question and debate each other to bring about new and improved

ideas Participate and allow others to do the same (“Step up, step back”) Assume best intentions in each other’s comments Use “both/and” thinking to build on each others’ ideas

Encourage students to refer to their Classroom Constitution throughout the program and to applaud their peers and themselves when they see these norms in action. They can also add to it if new ideas arise in future classes.

Article Analysis (10 minutes)Inform students that they will now be seeing some of the incredible things past GC classes have worked on in order to begin their thinking about what they might do for their GC project.

Appoint students to or have them break out into groups of four, and assign to each group one article about a GC class. Each group should read their assigned story together and discuss the reflection questions on page 5.

Reflection questions: What issue did the class care about (or what was one issue, if several),

and why?

community better by actively participating in our democracy.

TIP: If your classroom has already created a class contract or set ground rules, don’t recreate the wheel! Instead, see if students would like to add anything to their list with the fact in mind that they are creating a democratic classroom.

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Lesson 2: A Framework for Action Were students “successful?” Why do you say that? What knowledge or skills might students have developed while

working on this project?

After five minutes, solicit at least one response to the reflection questions from each group. Acknowledge especially their differing definitions of “success.” Emphasize that success might mean accomplishing your class’ overall goal but that real change takes time, and success might also mean accomplishing smaller objectives along the way. In your mind, success is students ending the program knowing how to be effective change agents for issues that matter to them personally.

Short on time?Break students into reading groups, but choose just one article to have the class read and reflect on together.

Advocacy Hourglass (10 minutes)Explain that GC has created a framework to help guide them in their growth as strategic change makers. It’s called the Advocacy Hourglass. Have students refer to the definition of advocacy in the glossary of their handbooks.

Explain that the Advocacy Hourglass organizes for advocates, or those who advocate for issues, the process of constructing an effective action plan, and that’s the process they’ll be following in GC.

Ask volunteers to look at the hourglass on page 6 of their Student Handbook. They will notice a word-bank at the bottom.

Ask students to unscramble the order of the words in the word-bank and put them in order of which word goes with which definition in the Advocacy Hourglass. As students unscramble the words, write or tape a poster of the correct label in sequence on the board. Students should write in the name of each step in the hourglass section next to its definition.

Community Issues: A range of public problems impacting a population

Focus Issue: The specific community issue you will address through collaboration with your peers and your community

Root Cause: A main reason why a problem exists Goal: What you are trying to do or achieve Targets: Influencers and decision makers who can help accomplish a

goal Tactics: Actions that are planned and used to achieve a goal

Invite students to take 5 minutes and return to their stories and to work to identify each part of the Advocacy Hourglass in the GC project they read about. They may now know the correct answers for every level, so they

GLOSSARY TERM:Advocacy: The act of championing a causeSample Sentence:The sixth grade learned about advocacy when they petitioned for and received a new salad bar.

SAMPLE LANGUAGE: In Generation Citizen, you will choose a problem that you care about and use advocacy to help solve it. Advocacy allows anyone, student or adult, to make change in our democracy.

TIP:An Answer Key for facilitators for each article can be found on the last page of this lesson.

WORD BANK

Targets, Root Cause, Goal, Community Issues, Tactics, Focus Issue

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Lesson 2: A Framework for Actionshould take their best guesses and identify questions they still have which you’ll explore and answer throughout the coming weeks. They should record their answers in on page 6 the student handbook in the “My article story” boxes.

Story Sharing (10 minutes)After students reviewed and analyzed their stories, give each group 2 minutes to present their story to the class. Help students fill in any missing or confusing parts of their Hourglass and answer their identified questions. Record (or have students record) the different Hourglasses on the board so students can clearly see a variety of example projects.

Explain that you hope these stories help them understand the process and also show them the true power youth have in helping to make meaningful change in their communities.

The class will have a ‘master’ Advocacy Hourglass that they will fill out together throughout the semester. Have students turn to page 1 in the front of their handbook. Next class they will be filling out their first stage – the community issues they care most about.

WRAPPING UPRequired Homework for Next Lesson: Foreshadow that in the next lesson, students will actually start working through the Hourglass themselves, beginning with brainstorming issues affecting them and their community. To do that, for homework they’ll need to reflect on issues that matter to them and to interview at least three community members to get a broader sense of important local public issues. Emphasize that they’re seeking to get a better sense of what’s important for people in their local community – the school, neighborhood, city, or potentially state. National issues might be top of mind, but the class will be digging into a local topic this semester.

Review students’ note taking template for interviews on pages 13-14 of their handbooks and have students tear out the template to complete for homework (unless you printed extra copies).

Exit Ticket (5 minutes)On a separate sheet of paper, students should answer the following prompts.

Draw the Advocacy Hourglass without looking at your handbook. How many levels can you name or define?

Short on time?Skip the exit ticket activity. Instead, simply have students jot down the names of 2-3 people they plan to speak with at the top of their Interview Worksheets, to make sure they are planning for their homework.

Article Analysis – Advocacy Hourglass Answer Key

Lowell High Class Aims to Make City, Homes Safer With Gun Buyback

TIP: If there’s time, have students practice interviewing one another before they go out to lead interviews in the community.

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Lesson 2: A Framework for ActionEvent: page 7 in Student Handbook

o Focus Issue: Community safety in Lowell, Massachusetts o Root Cause: Excess guns kept in people’s homes o Goal: To create a gun buyback program with the city’s police

departmento Targets: Lowell Police Superintendent Bill Taylor, Rev. Katherine

Adams, community partners, police departmento Tactics: Raised awareness about and organized the gun buyback

event

Student Veto Housing Moratorium and Win Big: page 8 in Student Handbooko Focus Issue: Homelessness and lack of affordable housing in the

Mission district of San Franciscoo Root Cause: Too many city regulations on building new housingo Goal: To lobby against the housing moratorium o Targets: Supervisor David Campos, Sam Moss, Board of Supervisorso Tactics: Wrote letters, held a meeting

Give Students a Voice So They Can Improve Their Own School: page 9 in Student Handbooko Focus Issue: High suspension rate at E-Cubed Academy in

Providenceo Root Cause: Students getting suspended for low-level offenses (zero-

tolerance)o Goal: Start a peer jury systemo Targets: Principal (Ms Winkfield), studentso Tactics: Developed a research paper, process and forms and present

to principal

Bushwick Students Give City’s Street Cleanliness Scorecards an Incomplete: page 10 in Student Handbooko Focus Issue: Street cleanliness in New York Cityo Root Cause: The litter scorecard system is outdated (measures litter

differently in different neighborhoods)o Goal: Convince city officials to update the litter scorecard systemo Targets: The sanitation department, director of the mayor’s office of

operations, city council member Antonio Reynosoo Tactics: Conducted research, testified at a hearing, lobbied for policy

change

These Students Fought SB4 – And Now They’re Getting Ready for What Comes Next: page 11 in Student Handbooko Focus Issue: Fear of deportation for immigrants in Austin, Texaso Root Cause: The state’s proposed ban on sanctuary citieso Goal: Lobby against Senate Bill 4 (SB4), which would ban sanctuary

cities in Texaso Targets: Texas State Senate, Governor, other community

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Lesson 2: A Framework for Actionorganizations

o Tactics: Organized phone banks, reached out on social media

Oklahoma City High School Seeks Help to Save Programs From Budget Cuts: page 12 in Student Handbooko Focus Issue: Loss of school programs like art, drama and musico Root Cause: Cuts to the state’s budget for educationo Goal: Lobby the State Legislature to prevent further cuts to Oklahoma

school budgetso Targets: State legislators o Tactics: Wrote an op-ed, made calls to their legislators, and circulated

a petition; sent an email to their local news channel

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Lesson 2: Student Handbook Pages

StudentHandbookPage 4

Do Now: Generation Citizen Learning GoalsCircle the FOUR statements that you feel are most true about yourself, then answer the reflection questions at the bottom of the page.

YOUR VOICE!A. Which statement do you want to learn more about, develop, or improve?

B. What do you think are most important for citizens in a community to have?

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Article AnalysisRead a story about student-driven action. Work together to answer the questions below.

Article Name: ______________________________________________________________________

Article Date: _____________________________

Location (where did the story take place?): ________________________________________

1. What issue did the class care about (or what was one issue, if several), and why?

2. Were students “successful?” Why do you say that?

3. What knowledge or skills might students have developed while working on this project?27


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My article story:

Definition:

Word (from WORD BANK):

WORD BANK Targets Root Cause GoalCommunity Issues Tactics Focus Issue

The Advocacy Hourglas

sA

Framework for

Action

Review the levels of the hourglass by writing in the correct terms below. Then, analyze your

story of student-led action and describe

their action plan in the boxes at

right. (Note that your

article might not give you the answers

for every level. Take your best

shot.)

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Lowell High Students Aim to Make City, Homes Safer With Gun Buyback Event

By Amaris Castillo on May 10, 2017

LOWELL -- The students in Jessica Lander's U.S. history/English Language Learners class at Lowell High School researched and worked diligently on this project for months, and now it's only days away. What began as an idea on how to address the issue of community safety has grown into a gun buyback event being held this Saturday.

"Safer Homes, Safer Community: Gift Cards for Guns" is a city-wide initiative led by the class with houses of worship throughout Lowell, non-profit and regional partners. As part of this weekend's event, members of the public can drop off unwanted guns to Lowell police and members of the Middlesex Sheriff's Office from 10 a.m. until 3 p.m. at Community Christian Fellowship, 105 Princeton Blvd., Lowell. No questions will be asked, no ID is required, and only law-enforcement officials will handle the intake of weapons, according to organizers.

"Our purpose is to help make safer homes and safer communities," said Julian Viviescas, 17, during a recent sit-down interview with The Sun. "We’re helping teenagers, kids, and women and children to not get hurt by a gun in their homes." The students had identified an excess of guns in homes as the root cause of their issue.

Viviescas, of Lowell, said he has distant relatives in Colombia who have been affected by gun violence. He is excited that their goal of establishing a gun buyback program with the city’s Police Department is becoming a reality.

Phuc Nguyen, 19, said their class would also like to use the tactic of spreading awareness of unwanted guns in the city. "We don't take all the people's guns -- it's guns that they don't want ... and that helps decrease crime.We have a lot of partners, like houses of faith," she said, adding that the class' many community partners have helped spread the word.

First Congregational Church of Billerica is one such partner. Rev. Katherine Adams, its pastor, told The Sun this week

that she was excited to see this initiative come from the high school."Our message is a message of peace," Adams said, adding that this would help reduce violence in the community. "We're just blessed to be able to be a part of this."

Mustafa Kareem, another student, said those who turn in guns will be awarded gift cards for each firearm they turn into public safety officers on the day of the event. According to the release, gift cards offered range up to $200 per person. For those who cannot attend the event, gift cards will be honored if pickups are scheduled during the week leading up the May 13.

"Sometimes we, teenagers, have a lot of problems in school and sometimes we think to commit suicide or do something," said student Luiz de Brida. "If we have a gun at home, maybe something can happen. It's easier to commit suicide, so it's something that we really care about and kids maybe going to play with a gun can maybe hurt themselves or their brother."

The gun buyback event stems from the class' relationship with Generation Citizen, a national organization aimed at making sure students receive an effective action civics education.

"Very quickly it became clear that students were really, really interested in addressing gun violence and how it related to mental health and child safety," said Landers, adding that her students last fall brainstormed on what to focus on for the project that aims to create change in the city of Lowell.

Lowell Police Superintendent Bill Taylor, in a written statement, said he is sure the students' efforts will help make Lowell a safer community.

"I commend the Lowell High students for their civic-minded initiative to get unwanted firearms out of homes and off the streets of Lowell," Taylor said.

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http://www.lowellsun.com/news/ci_30978388/lowell-high-class-aims-make-city-homes-safer

Students Veto Housing Moratorium Plan and Win BigBy Beza Beneberu on May 17, 2015

At a Civics Day hosted by the non-profit organization Generation Citizen, high school students from John O’Connell High School in San Francisco argued that District Supervisor David Campos’ push for a housing moratorium [a halt to building new housing] in the Mission District was all wrong. And it won them an award.

The high school students said their knowledge of economics came in handy when they promoted an affordable housing plan to address their issue of homelessness and lack of housing for low-income members of the community.

The students presented their action plan and emphasized that the root cause of the issue was city restrictions that prevented building new housing. Their goal (through a better understanding of the housing market) was to lobby against the housing moratorium to prevent it from passing at the Board of Supervisors, in favor of reducing city restrictions to be able to build new affordable housing.

“We learned about things like supply and demand, and elasticity,” said 17-year-old student Aeris Velasco. Students also met with Sam Moss, the executive director of a local housing nonprofit, who also disagreed with the moratorium because it would reduce housing supply.

Students used tactics like writing letters and hosting a meeting with Supervisor David Campos in their classroom. Their ideas included raising the height limit for housing units in the Mission, pushing for the city to buy abandoned buildings to refurbish into affordable housing , and to increase the 7% minimum affordable housing requirement for new developments.

Velasco added that when Supervisor Campos came to their class to speak and they asked him how the

moratorium would help with affordable housing, they were not satisfied with his response.

“Time is crucial,” said Velasco, “And a moratorium is just a waste of time. [Campos] said if the moratorium went through, then the plan would come after.” But the students agreed that if the moratorium continued for two years, as his proposal suggested, it would only put them two years behind on a solution to affordable housing.

That was the reasoning, along with their comprehensive plan, that earned the group the “Grassroots Change” award presented by Generation Citizen founder Scott Warren.

“Certain topics – housing – you can’t fix that in one semester, the city hasn’t been able to fix housing in years,” said Jessica Rojas, a volunteer for the students at John O’Connell High School. Rojas said it’s just about understanding what’s happening and speaking up about solutions they think could work. “They know their neighborhood is changing, but they didn’t understand the specifics. Now, they’re looking at it from an economic perspective.”

David Moren, Bay Area Executive Director for Generation Citizen said the students’ presentations are less about the finished product.

“It’s not whether they caught a fish or not, it’s did they learn how to fish?”

http://missionlocal.org/2015/05/students-veto-campos-moratorium-plan-and-win-big/?utm_source=dlvr.it&utm_medium=twitter

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StudentHandbookPage 8Give Students a Voice So

They Can Improve Their Own SchoolBy Julia Steiny on March 25, 2015

Regina Winkfield, Principal of E-Cubed Academy in Providence, went into a minor tailspin when district budget cuts eliminated her Student Resource Officer (SRO). Of course, SROs are a double-edged sword. As police officers carrying guns, they’re sworn to arrest anyone on school campus who is engaged in illegal doings, including fighting. SROs contributed to America’s soaring suspension and expulsion rates. But even if her SRO wasn’t a great solution, Winkfield wondered how she’d cope with the rough student behavior besetting her urban high school without that help.

The answer to that question turned out to be the kids themselves. While learning about civic engagement and advocacy, E-Cubed students found their “voice.” As Junior Roxanne says, “everyone is getting along better because we have more voice now. We’re empowered to talk to the adults.”

In the fall of 2013, when her students began the Generation Citizen program in class and were debating an issue to tackle, Ms. Winkfield encouraged the students to focus on the issue of the school's high suspension rate. The kids’ did, and their research found that in 2011-2012, their small school of fewer than 400 students had nearly 300 suspensions, or an average of 1.65 suspensions every day – the third highest rate in the district.

I spoke with a group of these newly-engaged citizens about their accomplishments. Now a University of Rhode Island student, Garren Jansezian took time off his spring break to talk with his younger colleagues about their impact on the school. “We wanted to know what the reasons were for those suspensions. Was there a cycle of delinquency? Were the problems of home being carried into the school? We wanted to work on a system that would help [troubled]

students stay in school, but be accountable to themselves and the community.”

Furthermore, after surveying their fellow students, they found the root cause of the issue was that many had been suspended, mostly for petty vandalism, class disruptions, or tardiness. The students read articles about other schools using restorative justice and peer mediation programs. The students settled on the goal of starting a peer jury system designed to interrupt the zero-tolerance approach put in the district’s Code of Conduct. They used tactics like developing a research paper, a process, and several forms.

With their respectful voices and advocacy skills, they presented the idea to the principal, the faculty, and their fellow students. They got the green light, but more impressively, 30 students applied to be peer jurors.

Angela, now a senior, took one of the first cases. “A student had talked back to a teacher. We all knew he’d done what he’d done. Guilt was already determined. But then the student was allowed to tell his side of the story. We determined that the offense was not so severe that he should go to Ms. Winkfield for suspension. Then we told him what he had to do to make it right. At the end he said thank you. I liked helping my peers not get suspended.”

In another case, a kid who trashed the bathroom avoided suspension by working with the janitor to get it cleaned up. Yes, he was reluctant and resentful at first, but he sucked it up and let himself be held accountable. As Jansezian says, “Second chances are powerful things.”

Winfield concludes, “We needed a shift. It’s easy to suspend a student, but it’s a lot harder to change a

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mindset. For the students, it’s not about snitching, it’s about working together.”

Diana, a senior, says, “My mindset changed. I look at people who do bad things over and over again, people I used to think of as bad. Now I think, what’s happening to them that they’re getting in trouble?”

Fatoumata, a Junior, says: “Voice is everything. No matter how small, your voice has a deep meaning.”

http://www.educationnews.org/k-12-schools/give-students-a-voice-so-they-can-improve-their-own-school/

Bushwick Students Give City's Street Cleanliness Scorecards An Incomplete By Casey Tolan on March 10, 2015 Walk down a typical street in Greenwich Village or SoHo in New York City, and it's likely to be clean of debris and garbage — in fact, there's a 93 percent chance the sidewalk is "acceptably clean," according to city records.

Now walk down a typical street in Bushwick. According to the City, it's not all that different — there's an 89 percent chance that the sidewalk is clean. To some young Bushwick residents, that's a finding that doesn't match reality.

Fed up with having to walk around discarded soda bottles, plastic bags, and dog droppings on their way to and from school, a class of seniors at Bushwick's Academy of Urban Planning, a high school, decided to focus on the issue of street cleanliness. And they are pushing city officials to take notice.

Students found that the root cause of the issue is the litter scorecard system. Each month, employees from the Mayor's Office of Operations observe a sample of streets in every city neighborhood and rate them on cleanliness, assigning scores. A 1.0 means perfectly clean, and a 3.0 means a lot of litter. "Acceptably clean" is anything below a 1.5. Percentages of acceptably clean streets are reported and help the Sanitation Department decide its street-cleaning policies.

The rubric for making the determination of clean or unclean, based on example photos, hasn't changed since the scorecard program began in 1974. These days, a vast majority of city streets and sidewalks are rated acceptably clean, which critics say prevents sanitation department

crews from prioritizing neighborhoods that actually have a lot of litter.

In Brooklyn Community Board 4, which covers Bushwick, 89.5 percent of streets were scored acceptably clean in November. "We live here, and we saw that it's not true," said Jorge Santamaria, an Academy of Urban Planning student. "There's a lot of garbage on the street."

Santamaria and his classmates in Mr. Ortiz's third-period class decided to do something about it. They requested the specific scores for their district, and took photos of litter-covered streets that the city claimed were clean.

In one report, "Manhattan was scored with a 2, us with a 1.5," Santamaria said of ratings suggesting Bushwick had cleaner streets. "Whenever I go to Manhattan, it's not dirty at all. We think we should get more resources for street cleaning." "I think our community should be as clean as Manhattan," added student Maritza Zeron.

City officials say the litter scorecard system provides valuable data on street and sidewalk cleanliness. The fact that the rubric hasn't changed shows how dramatically average cleanliness has improved, they say, from roughly 70 percent acceptably clean in the 1970s to over 90 percent clean now.

"With a program's history as long as ours, we understand the importance of providing our City stakeholders and the public with useful information that impacts the cleanliness of our neighborhoods," said Mindy Tarlow, the director of the Mayor's Office of Operations.

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But the student’s goal is to see action on the part of the City to raise standards of what is considered acceptably clean. That might include tactics like testifying at a City Council hearing or a lobbying for a change in policy at the Office of Operations.

City Council Member Antonio Reynoso, who chairs the council's Sanitation Committee, represents part of Bushwick, and can influence policy changes, met with

Castellano earlier this month to discuss the students' research.

"In order to make our community cleaner, we need our whole community involved, not just our class," said student Kimberly Goris. "Our community is our home, it represents us — it's our identity."

http://gothamgazette.com/index.php/government/5611-bushwick-students-give-citys-street-cleanliness-scorecards-an-incomplete

These Students Fought SB4 – And Now They’re Getting Ready for What Comes NextBy Jamie Fuller on June 20, 2017

At Paredes Middle School in Austin, Texas, teacher Nancy Cox’s students have been thinking about the issue of fear of deportation for undocumented immigrants in their community. The nonprofit Generation Citizen set up shop in the U.S. history teacher’s classroom, offering students a crash course in civics by letting them pick an issue and showing how they could get involved locally, despite not being old enough to cast a ballot.

The students identified one root cause of their issue as the state’s proposed ban on sanctuary cities. Sanctuary cities protect undocumented immigrants by refusing to have their local law enforcement cooperate with federal immigration agents (Immigration and Customs Enforcement, or ICE).

The Texas state senate first passed Senate Bill 4 (SB4), a ban on sanctuary cities, in February. The law — which would allow law enforcement to ask anyone about their immigration status at a traffic stop or during any other police interaction, and penalize any elected official or higher-up who might try to stop them — could have an intense effect on schools and universities.

The Paredes students’ goal was to fight against the bill, and prevent it from being signed into law. They spent months working on tactics like organizing phone banks and reaching out on social media to stop the bill from passing.SB4 passed anyway, and was signed by Governor Greg Abbott in May. The policy battle has now relocated to the courts, as the ACLU and many cities across the state have sued Texas to block the law.

Of course, plenty of undocumented families held concerns about their immigration status well before SB4 was introduced. They’ve been afraid of deportation since November, and will continue to be afraid regardless of whether the law is blocked by the courts. Montserrat Garibay of Education Austin, a teacher’s union, said that they “received calls from teachers” on the day after the November 2016 election saying that their students were “overwhelmingly asking” questions like, “We heard Trump won, what’s going to happen to my mom? My mom says we need to go back.”

Elementary and high schools are exempted from the directives laid out in SB4 — the Supreme Court case Plyler v. Doe protects access to free education for all students, regardless of immigration status. But although safe in schools, younger undocumented students or citizens with undocumented parents could still be affected by SB4. Many parents have already stopped driving their kids to school for fear of being stopped. And nothing would prevent police officers from targeting teenagers as soon as they leave school. “If you’re a high school student,” Thomas Saenz, president of the Mexican American Legal Defense and Education Fund, told MTV News, “you won’t know in advance if a police officer who decides you’re jaywalking will ask questions about immigration or not.”

Higher education, however, is not exempted from SB4’s directives — which means that law enforcement could have the power to go on college campuses and ask students about their immigration status. Undocumented

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students off-campus worry that they could be stopped by police on the way to class for something like a broken taillight, asked about their immigration status, and end up deported. Many also worry that undocumented students might stop reporting crimes on campus, afraid they might be racially profiled while merely telling the authorities that they witnessed a crime.

Cox’s students, who go to a school where “if they’re not undocumented, they know someone who is,” were

devastated after SB4 passed. But the semester after the election served as a useful lesson that movements are rarely victorious after launching a single volley, and that one loss doesn’t necessarily constitute a failure, but a part in a much longer battle.

http://www.mtv.com/news/3021673/these-students-fought-sb4-and-now-theyre-getting-ready-for-what-comes-next/

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Oklahoma City High School Seeks Help to Save Programs From Budget Cuts By Lacey Lett on April 4, 2017

OKLAHOMA CITY - It's a waiting game at this point.School districts across the state are waiting to find out what cuts could be in their future.

Now, a group of students who are doing Generation Citizen in their class is taking matters into their own hands to try and protect their school activities from being on the chopping block.

Students at Southeast High School identified the loss of school programs like drama, art and music as their focus issue. And they learned that massive cuts to the state’s budget for education are the main root cause of the problem.

"A lot of people don't understand what the students and the families are going through when we say budget cuts. And, the budget cuts do affect the society and the community as a whole,” said Joseph Al-Batati, a senior at Southeast High School.

A group of students at Southeast High School sent NewsChannel 4 an email, asking Oklahomans to hear their voices.

Al-Batati loved drama class, saying it helped him overcome stage fright. However, the program was cut this year. "They force us to try new things, to get out of our comfort zone and to push ourselves. If we don't learn that at an early age, it's a lot harder to pick up later on,” Al-Batati said.

For the teenagers here, a robotics competition is an expense they have to fund on their own."We were supposed to go to a national robotics tournament, but some of the funding fell through, so we weren't able to go so we've been trying to fundraise on our own,” said Jordan Ramirez, a senior at Southeast High School.

Last spring, $30 million was cut from Oklahoma City Public Schools' budget. Now, the district could be hit with another $10 million cut.

"We're still waiting for the next wave of cuts. What's going to come? Where else can we cut? We've already, we're at the bare minimum at this point,” said Mylissa Hall, principal for Southeast High School.

The students’ goal is to lobby their State Legislature to prevent further cuts to Oklahoma school budgets. Their tactics include writing an op-ed, making calls to their legislators, and circulating a petition.

In the meantime, private donors are now providing many of the resources for the school. One art teacher said his annual budget dropped 30 percent to $1,300 a year for school supplies.

"We had a teacher leave an art show on Friday to see if he could get free paper so the kids could keep their program, so we're looking at the community to give us things so we can sustain," Hall said.

"I just try to do the best I can with what I have,” said Rajah Kennedy, the school's band teacher.Kennedy said 17 students are currently sharing four music books.

In fact, anything new in the classroom was from a donation, and it means a lot to the students."Without music, I don't think I'd be as happy. Yeah, music makes me happy," said Charles Watson, a high school senior.

This coming year, Southeast will cut four positions.There's a fundraising concert featuring students and professionals playing together Friday in the school auditorium.

The proceeds will go back to fund music at Southeast.

http://kfor.com/2017/04/04/oklahoma-city-high-school-seeking-help-to-save-programs-from-budget-cuts/

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http://kfor.com/2017/03/20/several-schools-in-oklahoma-city-may-close-due-to-budget-crisis/

http://kfor.com/2016/07/12/oklahoma-city-school-officials-releasing-new-details-on-massive-budget-cuts/

http://kfor.com/2016/07/12/oklahoma-city-school-officials-releasing-new-details-on-massive-budget-cuts/

Lesson 2: Student Handbook PagesCommunity Issue Interviews

Interview Template

Talk to people to figure out their perspective on what could be improved in your local (school, neighborhood, city, or perhaps state) community! Interview at least three people with different levels of familiarity to you and different ages, jobs, family situations, and roles in your community.

EXAMPLE: Name Carolyn Merriweather Description Librarian, fifties, mother of college kids What issues do you think are the most pressing to solve in our community? Curfew rules, public transit dependability

Why? People are trying to get to jobs and school, can’t do so without reliable transit and a good night’s sleep. Schedules have been getting worse recently.

Do you know if there’s any work being done to address these issues? There was a community meeting a few weeks ago held at the church. Organized by the District 9 Council.

PERSON 1

Name Description

What issues do you think are the most pressing to solve in our local community?

Why?

Do you know if there’s any work being done to address these issues?

PERSON 2

Name Description


Why?


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PERSON 3

Name Description


Why?


PERSON 4 (Optional)

Name Description


Why?


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