During one of the presentations at this year’s American Public Health Association conference, researchers and activists gathered to discuss violence as a contagion. They argued that violence requires the same public health approaches that are used to fight diseases. Youth ALIVE! agrees. Their approach
After a young Oakland mother was shot in front of her kids, one of her first visitors was Youth ALIVE! intervention specialist Rafael Vasquez. Soon after, Youth Alive!’s Clinical Director and Counselor, Nicky MacCallum, diagnosed her with PTSD. This young mother’s story and an investigation into the epidemic of traumatic stress in America’s violent inner cities are featured in “Black America’s Invisible Crisis” in the October 2014 issue of Essence magazine.
Read more about the life-changing work we’re doing with Teens on Target.
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Youth ALIVE!’s Caught in the Crossfire client Jean Eason, Intervention Specialist Ray Estrada and Executive Director, Anne Marks were featured on NBC News. The story aired March 4, 2014.
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By Scott Johnson Oakland Tribune
This is an excerpt from reporter Scott Johnson’s blog, which focuses on the impact of violence and trauma on the community. Go to www.oaklandeffect.com for updates on his reporting.
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By SHOSHANA WALTER JAN. 7, 2012
Five-year-old Gabriel Martinez Jr. died Dec. 30, shot as he played under a streetlight near his father’s taco truck on an East Oakland street corner. He was the third young child killed in Oakland since August, the 110th homicide of 2011, and the 199th juvenile shooting victim of more than 2,000 people who were victims of gun violence in an especially bloody year in an increasingly violent city.
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By SHOSHANA WALTER
DEC. 17, 2011
Gunshots cracked the air on a sunny morning as two men led a group of high school teachers on a tour of a violent area of West Oakland. As the teachers fled to safety, the local guides hurried to the chaotic scene on the nearby corner of 13th and Peralta Streets.
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By Amina Waheed
Posted November 29, 2011 11:07 am
Over 22 years ago, Deane Calhoun sat in a meeting that would forever change her life and the lives of thousands of Oakland teens. In 1989, Calhoun, then a public health worker, listened in horror as Bruce Kennedy, a teacher at what was once known as Castlemont High School in East Oakland, told her and a group of other school district and city council officials that students had been caught playing Russian roulette in the locker room. In another instance, Kennedy said, a kid pulled out a gun on the school bus.
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Marianne Williams, a Teens on Target Youth Leader, wrote this poem for Youth ALIVE! She performed it at Youth ALIVE!’s 20th Anniversary Celebration on November 10, 2011.
