Youth Today
Youth Voices
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7.5KMy ESL Journey: For Every Dark Night, There’s a Brighter Day
When I was 8 years old, my mom decided it was best for our family to move to this country: her, my...
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2.1KShooting for the Moon, Taking My Place Among the Stars
Anyone who truly knows me knows I'm not a very emotional person. They'll know I don't like expressing how I feel or...
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4.7KTeachers, Be Understanding With Your Students Who May Be Homeless
Sixth grade can be a tough time for pretty much anybody. It doesn’t help when your parents divorce right before the beginning...
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3.8KSchool Relationships Helped Me Harness Power of Perseverance to Learn English, Use My Voice
I came to the United States two years ago, absolutely terrified of speaking in English. I was depressed because I had left...
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4.4KA Thousand Cries For Help That Go Unanswered
My life seemed like something right out of a horror flick — and my mother — well, she could have won an...
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2.1KHIV Tried Me. It Lost: My First Year In College
“The pediatrician said you need to come to the office immediately,” my mom quivered over the phone. Hearing “immediately” commanded my heart...
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3.8K
Berkeley Bound
I remember the paralyzing fear I felt when I realized I was never going home to my father again. I would never...
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4.3KArt As Resilience and Another Form of Therapy
I worked at earning credits while I was inside juvenile hall, and in 2016 when I was released into placement in, I...
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3.3KLeft Behind
I wake up in the morning. It's too quiet for my taste. As I walk through the house I start getting flashbacks.
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1.6KBathroom Bills and Trans Youth
As a queer Jewish teenager, I have the uncommon privilege of having relationships with people between 20 and 50 years older than...
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4.0KI Used to Love America: How a Racist Jail System Changed Me
I spent my 18th birthday incarcerated, and saw many of my peers do the same. Our formative years formed within the confines...
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3.3KMake My President Black Again
It wasn’t until I had gotten locked up at the age of 18 that I began to willingly learn and deeply care...
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1.9KConnection, Support Helps Us Build Our Youth Movement
That is why dismantling young people’s oppression in the era of Trump is one of our fundamental objectives.
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3.3KA Year of VISTA Service: Five Lessons for Nonprofit Practitioners and Other Service Members
Derek Moore and Nicole Smith completed their AmeriCorps VISTA service this week. During their year of service, they supported the launch of...
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3.6KIncarcerated Youth and Their Families: Human Just Like Everyone Else
Watching my brother go to jail opened my eyes to the fact that I want to help and work with youth who...
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2.1KA World Without Obama Is Like a World Without My Mom
It’s the end of an era, and the start of a new one. On Friday, Barack Obama, my first president, is now...
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1.8KLive on Washington: The Evolution of a Teen-Curated Festival, and Why It’s Important
It’s late spring, 2012, and 15 teenagers sit around a rectangular table on the second floor of the Neutral Zone, Ann Arbor’s...
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2.4KPull Up One More Chair For Youth
Young people’s lived experience speak to viable solutions that policymakers might otherwise never come upon. The best first step for anyone looking...
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3.4KRemaking a Life: Inside and Out
I had been accused of a serious crime at the age of 17, and because the courts wanted to charge me as...
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6.5KSailing through Memory
My mind is somewhat of a junkyard, full of twisted metal and lost souls, and I sweat as I run from demons...
