'Gang Contracts' in Cicero and Berwyn Schools Raise Concerns About Criminalization of Youth

In the past, Los Angeles was a dangerous city fraught with gang wars. Lately, though, LA has become a safer city due to six changes enforced by the police cracking down on public violence and gangs.

For-profit companies are making good private schools available even to Africa’s poor. They can do it – and can do it on an enormous scale – by hiring neighborhood residents to teach, and scripting out every word of every lesson on an e-reader.

Blue Engine, which places recent college grads as full-time teaching assistants in New York City public schools, is helping poor students thrive in college. They focus on small teacher-student ratios, frequent feedback for teachers, and a concentration on 'gateway' courses associated with success in college.

Adolescent smoking remains a challenging health problem because of the allure of cigarette branding. Australia is piloting the transformation of cigarette packaging with a generic look that reduces the appeal of smoking. In Florida, the Truth campaign has exposed that cigarette companies targeted teenage consumers and, in response, created a set of new advertisements that presented the cigarette industry with transparency.

Crimes against LGBT citizens have gone underreported in many U.S. cities. Washington DC’s Gay and Lesbian Liason Unit has employed and trained LGBT officers to represent community members that they protect and serve. After the establishment of the GLLU, the number of reported crimes has increased, demonstrating the comfort and trust that the community has with law enforcement.

In Houston, TX, many individuals with mental illnesses cycled in and out of emergency care while arrested or incarcerated. Houston’s police department has decreased the number of incarcerated who have mental illness by opening a division to mental health called the Chronic Consumer Stabilization Unit. Now Milwaukee seeks to replicate Houston’s results.

Milwaukee County’s mental health system put more resources in expensive emergency care rather than invest in programs that offer continual care. As a result, Milwaukee County identifies nine solutions from other cities that have had success in repairing mental health systems. Solutions include the ending of reliance on emergency care, expand community support programs, change laws, and supportive housing.

After a policeman shot and killed a teenage African American, a community in Cincinnati blamed law enforcement for racial profiling and riots expanded throughout the city. With the help of the Department of Justice as a mediator, Cincinnati made policy changes. The city now has an African American Police Association that brings police officers in communication with representatives of communities.

The militarization of police forces in cases such as Ferguson, Missouri’s riots has led the state of Utah to question what can be done to prevent such an overuse of force from happening. Utah expanded upon a law passed by Democratic legislature in Maryland, which Utah’s ACLU reworked with some libertarians, to require the police to provide data about SWAT team usage. Utah’s success demonstrates that demilitarization bills passed with bipartisan support are not impossible.

Palm Beach County, Florida has many of the same social problems that Philadelphia has, including “gangs, drugs, and poverty.” However, their school system has managed to keep students safe by employing “safe-school case managers” who build relationships with students, and they offer a youth court that is a system run by students who peer-review cases of unrest. The initiatives in this county has prevented school violence from happening without metal detectors and just two police officers.