Food drives around Chicago continue a tradition of revolutionaries feeding the community

Denver Public Schools’ Community Hubs provide wide-ranging support for students and their families, from language classes and GED programs for parents learning English to food pantries, financial education courses, and mobile medical appointments. The hubs have served more than 4,000 families since launching in 2022, with roughly 600 migrant families being served this year.

Detroit Public Schools is tackling chronic absenteeism by addressing the underlying reasons students are absent. Attendance agents work with families to address their needs and connect them to necessary resources like food, transportation, and school supplies.

Low-income communities of color have less access to nature, they experience "nature deprivation" at a rate three times higher than white people. Regular access to the outdoors improves respiratory health, physical fitness, cognitive functioning, and psychological well-being. The Freetown Farm was conceived as a place where all people can experience nature. Its exposing young people of all backgrounds to nature. Through its year-long internship program learned how to plant food, among other things.

Twenty high school students enrolled in Territory, an urban design nonprofit, produced a zine and their own quality of life report for West Austin, where many of the students live. The students conducted interviews, surveys, and gathered community input to create the report. It includes sections on public safety, youth empowerment, and mental health.

Twelve Honolulu high school students, who had only ever met online, used social media to organize a Black Lives Matter protest that drew over 10,000 people. The teens used online forums to communicate about their goals for the protest and also to provide details to the public regarding the march's route, reminders to wear masks, remain peaceful, and abide by city laws. The teens also enlisted the support of established organizations to provide volunteers and bring hand sanitizer, water bottles, face masks, and bullhorns. The result was an entirely peaceful and emotionally stirring protest march and rally.

The U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) has effectively responded to the Covid-19 crisis by quickly helping existing programs provide food aid to families. School lunch programs rapidly moved from providing hot food to children who qualify to a to-go style menu for all children under 18 and offers grocery money to families who can’t pick up food. The USDA also expanded SNAP with increased monthly allowances and options for online shopping. There have been administrative difficulties coordinating aid so quickly that has caused delays to some families getting the food they need.

In low-income districts, the school nurse is often a family’s first health care provider, and the role at places like Wildwood High School and Glenwood Avenue School has expanded to provide everything from warm coats and food donations for children and their families living in hunger.

From state to state, officials are grappling with how to improve how children experience the criminal justice system. The process is highly variable – each state varies on the age that children can go to court, and a child’s race also plays a large role in how they’re treated by everyone from law enforcement to judges. States like Massachusetts are trying to pass laws that take a more holistic, transparent approach to juvenile justice, and organizations like their Juvenile Detention Alternatives Initiative are helping parents recognize their power in the system.

Play Cousins Collective helps Black youth build self-confidence and celebrate their identity and culture through hands-on activities, community building and access to free educational programs and therapy. Over 1,700 youth and families participated in the program last year.

After organizers at Alternatives to Violence of the Palouse heard that local high school students were in need of prom essentials, the organization started a prom pop-up shop. Students can pick out dresses, suits, shoes, jewelry, and handbags for free. All of the stocked items are brand new or barely used donations from the community.