"It is a War Zone out here!"

Project 43 is off to a great start! Participants arrived excited and eager for the commencement of the weekend. Maybe a little too excited...








After socializing through an ice cream sundae mixer, all 45 UNITE members took to the "streets" to begin their overall project of making a Public Service Announcement and familiarize themselves to the area of Auburn Gresham. The large mass of "outsiders" attracted a lot of attention as we trekked down 79th street at nine o'clock on a Friday evening. The community response was varied... Some residents were thrilled to have teachers coming to their community and were eager to get on camera! Others simply gave us the cold shoulder (literally cold... it was 17 degrees outside!) And one woman showed a little too much concern for our group... telling us we were "crazy" to be out at night in "THIS" community! Auburn Gresham "is a war zone out here" and we should not be walking the streets at night and even escorted us back to our headquarters... A few policeman also shared her overall concern as they stopped various members of our group and asked us if we "were lost."




Upon returning to St. Sabina Bowman Center, the participants had their first heart-to-heart circle debrief about the varied reactions by the Auburn Gresham community members. For most, the experience tonight was simply an pump of "urbanneeds medicine" into their social justice thirsty veins. We will need more of this mix to fuel us for the remaining time of the 43 hours.

After an introspective look at some CPS individual high school drop out rates, stories from CPS dropouts, discussing our own high school Alma maters, and our own communities, the Project 43 troops seemed even more focused to get to the bottom of how the dropout rate impacts the community. No one even knew it was already midnight!

Late night team building closed the night for some... but many are still awake writing letters to educational reformers, working on their PSAs, and discussing urban education.


Something has brought these 45 UNITE members here together in Chicago... it definitely is not the nice winter weather we are sacrificing ourselves too... maybe it is the love for our future students, maybe it is a deep burning inside ourselves that tell us we were fortunate to graduate from high school and know that not everyone has that opportunity...

As the group continues to bond and grow, so will our desire to push past all the obstacles standing between us and the reasons that 43% of Chicago students never receive their high school diploma...