Olivia
Melendez
Period
4 APL+C
Social
Change Proposal Final Rough Draft
Throughout
my career as an inner-city magnet school student, I took for granted the tools
that were always at my disposal which guided me in the right direction, the
most influential of this being the teachers and administrators who were always
there for me, who I confided in, who I respected, and who respected me. Once my
friends, also in the magnet program, graduated and went off into our local high
schools, many kids who had once been the best and the brightest began to lose their
spark. Many got involved with drugs, and many were bounced from school to
school as if “How to Get Expelled” were a new elective. Kids who once took
pride in being handed their Honor Roll certificate every trimester now looked
forward to passing by the skin of their teeth to the next class. There is
something disgustingly wrong with this, and it made me think: What is the flaw in
the system?
Well, as it turns out, teenagers are
highly impressionable. Eighth graders cling to the latest trend like their
lives depend on it, and everything you say to them carries weight. From my
experiences, I’d say twelve to fourteen years old is when what is said carries the most weight.
It also turns out that there were 15
murders per 100,000 people in 2012 after a rash of gun violence in Bridgeport,
and at least 15 sets of gangs operate in Bridgeport[1].
In fact, Bridgeport has been initiated into the 25 Most Dangerous Cities in
America[2]
club, an extra curricular I don’t feel is making too positive an impression on
our already impressionable youth.
So, what do we do about this? Well, as of
now we have great programs and organizations within Bridgeport, like the YMCA
and the Cardinal Shehan Center, which do a solid job of giving their
participants a constructive environment in which they can participate. But with
staggering murder rates and an unfortunate 66.3 percent of the 2012 graduating
class of Bridgeport actually graduating, we need a more aggressive program that
gets kids right when it matters, that is, the transition from middle to high
school. This is a time in which kids really find their personality and friend
groups, which can either put them on the right track, or unfortunately, like
many others, the wrong.
My idea is to establish a program within
these organizations that will act as a sort of mentor system for the kids of
the mentioned ages. These teenagers will be partnered up with volunteers who
are upper high school age, college age, adults- anyone who can offer positive
guidance and support, and also be willing to extend some possible personal
experience in the trials and tribulations of growing up faced with adversity-
and exchange contact information, arrange meetings, or whatever system feels
most comfortable for the mentee, in which they will build a positive
relationship where they feel comfortable seeking advice and guidance in
navigating the decisions a teen is faced with in developing themselves in one
of America’s most dangerous cities.
Such a program would be extremely
beneficial for those kids who don’t have access to positive adult figures in
their personal lives, or even teachers like I did. They can now have someone
who they feel comfortable considering their confidant, and by encouraging
successful high school upperclassmen and college age young adults to volunteer
as the mentors, teens will be more responsive, as they feel more of a
connection to someone who has recently been through what they are facing and
who they can more closely relate to. This will result in kids wanting to
willingly participate in the program, rather than being forced.
By adopting such a system, our local
organizations aimed at bettering the lives of our youth would see a plethora of
success stories. I know personally that if some of my close friends had had
such an opportunity available to them going into high school, then they
wouldn’t have the questionable future they now have almost graduating. Kids can
build relationships which will help them to stay on the right track, and having
someone to seek help from when navigating through the confusing transition to
becoming a young adult can make or break an individuals situation, as I’ve come
to find out is essential through my own personal experience with the
transition.
So rather than uniting as a community to accept
our new titles as among the “Most Dangerous Cities” or other less than
flattering names, lets come together to give our youth the tools they need to
contribute to turning that name into “Most Safe City”, or “City With the Most
Opportunity”. I propose our local youth organizations adapt this idea of a
mentoring system and see the need for it. Because really, I would much rather
the next generation of our community to be known for 15 out of every 100,000
going out into the greater world as positive representations of Bridgeport,
contributing new ideas that began to fester when they sought out someone to
guide them while they were young, rather than the current 15 per every 100,000
people being murdered because they lacked the guidance to sustain a positive
output.
To be sent to the local newspapers for
(hopefully) publishing
