Week 5, Blog #2 Youth & Digital Access

Growing up our household was computer-less. I remember thinking that we would never have a computer. The cost of one was around $5000 during my elementary schooling. With the declining costs of computer equipment in recent years the importance of income has been somewhat reduced but it remains the most important factor for material access because total computer and Internet access costs (peripherals, printing costs, software, subscriptions and connection costs) barely diminish. In poor countries lack of income remains the decisive barrier (Films Media Group, 1999). After the past few weeks of this class and reading about the economic plight of a majority of the world’s population, I can imagine that being part of the techno-age is low on the priorities of underdeveloped countries.

Prior to physical access comes the wish to have a computer and to be connected to the Internet. Many of those who remain at the ‘wrong’ side of the digital divide have motivational problems. With regard to digital technology it appears that there are not only ‘have-nots’, but also ‘want-nots’ (van Dijk, 2006). I think this gap is probably declining as older generations pass on. But I can remember a time when some people felt technology was evil, even going so far as to consider the internet being part of devil worship.

Seeing the children with four computers to a classroom and not having the ability to fulfill class assignments, I can understand the “virtual ghetto” described in the film (Films Media Group, 1999). B. Keith Fulton Director of Technology for the National Urban League discussed the subtle divide between computers being used as a tool to develop thought. In this scenario he purposed that the schools within affluent communities were teaching their students mental stimuli that will allow them to be business owners and leaders (Films Media Group, 1999). He discussed group work and hands on activities that utilize discovery. While on the other hand he described children in impoverished school district were being led by the computers and taught in a drill type mode. I know that schools are barely achieving funding. Perhaps group work is the solution to few computers.

Omar Wasow Tech. Correspondent for MSNBC brought up a valid point. He stated that it’s a troubling notion to place computer literacy above literacy. Teaching children the ability to manipulate a machine does not replace providing them with an education (Films Media Group, 1999). Technology is a tool but it is not the fundamental core involved in the edification of a student. He further added that computers are only as useful as you are able to make good decisions.

APA Reference: 
van Dijk, J. A. G. M. (2006). Digital divide research, achievements and shortcomings. Poetics, 34(4-5), 221-235.

Films Media Group (1999).  Virtual Equality: The Information Revolution and the Inner City.  Films On Demand. Web. 01 July 2011.<http://digital.films.com.ezproxy1.lib.asu.edu/PortalPlaylists.aspx?aid=15249&xtid=9330>.

Youth and Tensions in Education-Fostering Digital Innovation or Digital Narcissism?, Week 5, Blog #1

I was not familiar with the 2007 Miss Teen USA pageant incident involving Lauren Caitlin Upton. So, I took it upon myself to find the YouTube snippet. One word, Wow! At least she’s pretty, as my boyfriend would say. I was shocked. Not only that this occurred but also that she would state that America needed to help other countries such as South Africa and Asia with education.  What a great example of how highly educated our privileged students of the United States are.  

I don’t feel that the digital age has created this evil economic superpower that is controlling our teen agers. Every generation has its share of under achievers and over achievers.  According to Mark Bauerlein, studies show that young people today can’t read and understand complex documents, write grammatically correct prose, or calculate such simple things as the cost of office supplies. They don’t know how to balance a checkbook or pay a bill. If they can find the United States on the map, they can’t locate Egypt or Iraq. They can’t name their elected officials, or list the freedoms protected by the First Amendment. They don’t read for pleasure and they spend next to no time on homework (90 percent of high school students spend less than an hour a day on homework, college students not much more than that) (O'Connor, 2009).

I can appreciate Mr. Bauerlein’s viewpoint but he doesn’t state exact numbers. What segment or percentage of Americans is this applicable to and even he it is a high number does the percentage differentiate substantially enough before the digital age became dominate to determine that technology is the United States ultimate demise in a global economy ? I know he’s an educator, but he seems frustrated. In the interview he stated that his students act like their running General Motors, checking their texts and blackberry’s, face booking instead of reading (Bauerlein, 2008).  In the words of my generation, he sounds like a “hata.” I would insert LOL after that but it’s not grammatically correct prose. I whole heartedly agree that in the age of no child left behind that there are indeed children and adults for that matter that are or have been left behind. But I’m a bit bothered by Mr. Bauerlein’s assumptions that if you don’t know the Venetian Republic of Late or Early Renaissance that you are lazy and ignorant (Bauerlein, 2008).  

In a recent study of high-end computers and reputable learning software placed into libraries in economically diverse communities, it was found that well-off parents accompanied their children to the library and mentored them to read at or above their reading levels, to challenge themselves, and to sustain their engagement with particular learning activities, and to do so in re-active and strategic ways. Less-well-off families engaged much less in such mentoring, and consequently, their children gain less school-based knowledge from digital media and print literacy, read less well, are more passive in their activities, have less of a foundation to build on, and, thus, fall further and further behind. In contrast, the more-well-off students progressively build on their achievements. In this way, digital media — much like print literacy — can make “the rich richer and the poor poorer” (Gee, 2008)

That would mean that it’s not technology causing the barrier between education and the “dumbing down” of our society but rather poor parenting skills.  Based on the above study its how effective or dare I say technologically savvy the adult mentor is in guiding the child into a direction that facilitates learning in our multi-media driven age.  Which Mr. Bauerlein does bring up that his colleagues are too concerned about being relevant instead of teaching what he considers the “classics” (Bauerlein, 2008). Yet, I reject the idea that we cannot better ourselves through social media outlets. Having the ability to learn about others I believe is just as important as reading To Kill a Mockingbird. When it was published, To Kill a Mockingbird, was not only an engaging literary work but it was also relevant for its time. Now time has moved on to a younger generation. I don’t think it’s just the teenagers with the ego (Bauerlein, 2008). My thoughts are that people like Mr. Bauerline reflect a generation that wants to feel that their era is also of importance. I agree that it is. All works leading up to this decade have contributed to civilization as we know it today. And as a people we will continue to facilitate forward thinking and new ideas. I imagine Mr. Bauerline’s conflict is that he doesn’t want his learning to be for naught in a digital revolution moving at the technological speed of light.  

APA Reference: 

O'Connor, E. (2009). The dumbest generation: How the digital age stupefies young Americans and jeopardizes our future (or, don't trust anyone under 30), by Mark Bauerlein. New york: Jeremy P. Tarcher/penguin, 2008, 24.95 hardbound. Academic Questions, 22(2), 234-239. 

Gee, J. P. (2008). Getting over the slump: Innovation strategies to promote children's learning. The Joan Ganz Cooney Center. Retrieved August 3, 2009, from www.joanganzcooneycenter.org

Bauerlein, Mark (2008) - Young Americans are the Dumbest Generation. Retrieved July 30, 2011, from .

Week 5, Blog #3 Reflection

1)    

      

      What were some of your initial expectations about this class?  How were your initial expectations confirmed or how did they change over the course of the semester?

I knew that the class would involve youth topics but since this is my first justice class I wasn’t really sure how the class would be oriented. I was pleasantly surprised, shocked, and disturbed by the information that I was exposed to. It was necessary though. I feel really informed and appreciate the amount of work needed for completion of this course.  I know if I earn an A in this class I worked for it!

Given the various topics we've covered in the class, explain what you think is the most pressing issue facing youth today. Why is this particular issue such a major one? 

It’s difficult because there are so many issues facing today’s youth. One’s struggle is not less important than the others.  The issue that bothered me most significantly was the overall poverty that is taking place in South East Asia and Africa. It affects so many facets of the economy and causes them to have to make choices that many of us in developed countries don’t have a second thought about.  I’m glad to know that there are some organizations in place but it affects billions of people. It’s an overwhelming task.

Going back to the initial blog post question:(how old is 15?) How has your understanding of youth development changed (if at all)?  What ideas have been confirmed for you?  What ideas were new? 

I had no idea about the child soldiers in Uganda. I was unaware of the sex trafficking statistics in not only other countries but our own. My understanding has drastically opened into a new realm of child suffering. It’s almost difficult to sleep at night knowing the injustices facing children. I’d gather to say that this course could be titled “Youth and Injustice”.  I still believe that there is a maturation that faces children going through adult circumstances but nevertheless they are indeed children. Then after reading about 19 year old killers, I’ve begun to broaden my ideal of what age adulthood really may begin at? I’m feeling that even though children are resilient they are in fact still children.

Feel free to post any other observations, comments, questions suggestions, etc. about the various topics we've covered on your blogs!

The topics are really timely and woven well together. I think that everyone going into a field where children are the primary population (regardless of major) should take this class.  It’s indeed very well-rounded and the information is not only astounding but enthralling to say the least.

Just a side note…There were only four questions. The numbering listed 1, 2, 3, and 5.  Thank you. 

Week 4, Blog #2 Youth and Gang Violence

Steve Levitt is incredibly funny and really delivered a great presentation. His discussion on why being in a gang and selling drugs for a gang is the worse job in America really made sense in correlation with the article.  Mr. Levitt described that in the early eighties prior to the implementation of crack cocaine there was no way to make large sums of money belonging to a street gang. (TED Talks, 2010). Of all male gang members, only a third had a high school diploma and about the same number were working. The rate of high school graduation for female gang members was about the same as male gang members.  Almost all of the young women were mothers (88%) by their early 20s, with about 58% on welfare (Krohn, Thornberry, 2007).

Gang membership remained a significant predictor of ever having been incarcerated and the percentage of income from illegal sources. Since gang members are typically more involved in delinquent activities than non-gang members, it is reasonable to expect that being a member of a gang during adolescence will be associated with disrupted transitions from adolescence to adulthood and, ultimately,will adversely impact life chances (Krohn, Thornberry, 2007). 

The life-course perspective recognizes that as people move along trajectories, they make (or fail to make) transitions such as completing their education, getting married, or finding a job. The success in making those transitions, for example, in completing one’s education, is likely to have a significant impact on life chances. Disruption in or failure to complete major transitions will adversely affect subsequent development (Krohn, Thornberry, 2007). When the article discussed life transitions and behavior initiated during adolescence can have important consequences for successful entry into adult roles and responsibilities it was self evident that the delinquent activities hindered gang members from creating the paths necessary in order to obtain any type of substantial employment later on in life.

According to the research presented in the article, half of the male (50.4%) and two-thirds of the female gang members (66.0%) report being members of the gang for one year or less. In contrast, only 21.6% of the boys and 5.0% of the girls report being a gang member for 3 or 4 years (Krohn, Thornberry, 2007). Mr. Levine made the statement that members join gangs believing that if they stay and do everything the gang wants them to do they will move up to the top of the ranks. According to Mr. Levine prior to street gangs becoming involved in the drug trade people would join gangs and leaves after a certain amount of time. So now with the injection of the drug trade the same gang leaders who helmed the ushering in of crack cocaine are now still the same gang leaders over the organization 20 to 30 years later.

So with all these grime statistics the question is asked what is attracting these children to gang life. Studies of gang proliferation report that between 1980 and 1990 there was a dramatic increase in the number of large cities (100,000 population or more) that reported gang problems, increasing from 15% prior to 1980 to 70% by 1990.  I would concur that this correlates with the crack epidemic. At the height of the media’s “glamorization” of gang life as Mr. Levitt puts it, a rise in gang affiliation occurred.  

What’s incredibly interesting to me was the fact that the life of the drug lord was only that, glamorized. In reality the gold chains were plated and the cars were leased, all in order to stage or set up the young 13-15 year old being sold a dream of gang life. The money wasn’t that big. The death statistics can never add up to the dollars made and the incarcerated lives of young men are now the empty shells of what they once thought so promising.

TED Talks."Steven Levitt analyzes crack economics." Feb 2004. Online Video Clip. Accessed on July 27 2010.

Krohn, M. D., & Thornberry, T. P. (2007). Longitudinal perspectives on adolescent street gangs. In The long view of crime: A synthesis of longitudinal research. (pp. 128-60). New York: Springer.

Week 4, Blog #5 Gang Intervention Efforts

Glen Mills School Director Sam Ferrainola runs a boarding school type intuition for youth that would have been placed in a juvenile detention center. Through a multi-targeted approach that meets the children where they are at he is able to at the very least reform the students and in some instances create a measurable outcome in the lives of these otherwise troubled youth.

Of course the first thing that struck me was the school’s aesthetics. The campus is beautiful. It’s definitely not the type of place you assume convicted juvenile offenders would be. Also, I was surprised to hear the students say to each other that they felt the staff was there to help them.  By not having the locks and bars Glen Mills has been able to accomplish something that juvenile detention centers will never be able to, and that’s build trust.

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, National Center for Injury Prevention and Control, Division of Violence Prevention states that the most effective programs include several types of interventions and strategies that complement one another (Centers for Disease, 2009). Glen Mills incorporates this approach by utilizing humane treatment, high technology educational opportunities, and rehabilitation through positive peer pressure all working together to create an environment for change (Glen Mills Gang: Arrested Without Locks and Bars, 2000). 

Glen Mills really took a unique approach towards it students. Understanding that a population of its offenders coming in came from gang life they were able to utilize that concept to address their needs. Students adhere to strict rules of behavior using a system of peer monitoring. Students earn points for appropriate behavior and reporting infractions, eventually becoming accepted in the Bulls Club, which functions like a positive gang (Glen Mills Gang: Arrested Without Locks and Bars, 2000). I think that’s a fantastic idea and really makes a lot of sense.

At the highly profitable Glen Mills School, Director Sam Ferrainola relies on a capitalist system to provide for the school's expenses, including comprehensive staff benefits and student programs.  Director Sam Ferrainola hopes to see more institutions using his approach with juvenile offenders without the use of locks and bars but to date the Glen Mills School remains the only educational institution of its kind (Glen Mills Gang: Arrested Without Locks and Bars, 2000). I don’t understand why no one else has bothered to use this school as a model. I know that the critics state the school is hard on their students mentally but their success rate is astounding and I can’t see how this model is psychologically worse than placing a child behind lock and key in a juvenile detention center.  

  

"Glen Mills Gang: Arrested Without Locks and Bars." Films on Demand. Web. 24 Jun 2011. .

Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, National Center for Injury Prevention and Control, Division of Violence Prevention, (2009). Youth violence: best practices of youth violence prevention — a sourcebook for community action Atlanta, GA: Retrieved from http://www.cdc.gov/violenceprevention/pub/YV_bestpractices.html

Week 4, Blog #4 Globalization and International Gangs

I grew up in several neighborhoods between Seattle and California that were riddled with the effects of gangs. Gangs can be very enticing. The money, the danger and excitement can be almost intoxicating to certain youths. I can understand the global dynamics involved to families that are displaced and without hope. I don’t know what the answer to resolving this issue would be either. The article points out that when the formal economy falters, the informal steps in (Hagedorn, 2005).
The criminal economy has been estimated by the UN as grossing more than $400 billion annually, which would make it the largest market in the world, including oil (Hagedorn, 2005). Urban areas are flooded with populations living in poverty. Gangs have become sophisticated criminally based businesses that offer its members an opportunity to become entrepreneurs amidst a failing economy.
The strengthening of cultural identities by men and women is a central method of resistance to marginalization. Whereas fundamentalist religion and nationalism have been adopted by many gang members, hip-hop culture and its “gangsta rap” variant also provide powerful resistance identities and influence millions. Media corporations are promoting gangsta rap to run up profits by shamelessly exploiting and “merchandizing the rhymes of violence” (Hagedorn (2005).
It’s as though simultaneously as gangsta rap was being promoted to the spatial concentration of ethnic minorities—often people of African descent—in the poorest areas of old cities that in the 1990s, in the United States, the law and order trend targeted those same alienated and jobless African American youths, resulting in an unprecedented expansion of prison building. America’s prisons, at least 50% Black in a country where African Americans make up about 12% of the population, can be seen as but another device for control of the “social dynamite” of the ghetto (Hagedorn, 2005).
A lot of the areas that used to be gang affiliated with large numbers of members strewn throughout the streets have gone through gentrification. Hagedorn stated that lands coveted by the wealthy must be “cleansed” of the criminal, the violent, and the “other” (Hagedorn, 2005). I don’t mean to sound like a conspiracist but the elevation of gangs through the media, subsequent locking up of those influenced by that lifestyle through gangsta rap seems like a hand well played.
On the other hand, Institutionalized gangs are more than a crime problem. Many are deeply involved with politics, real estate, religion, and community organizations and cannot be easily destroyed by suppression or repression of the drug economy (Hagedorn, 2005). In societies without opportunity in order to survive family members may decide that gangs are the only way to go. It reminds me of the tough choices that families have to make in South East Asia regarding their children working or going to school. It is a global condition that is not easily remedied.
Hagedorn (2005). The global impact of gangs. Journal of Contemporary Criminal Justice, 21(2), 153-169.

Week 4, Blog #3 Generational Gang Membership

Armando Frias, a migrant farm worker at one point of his life, tells the story of entering gang life with a sense of pride. He and fellow members rallied together to become a unit in the midst of the farm workers struggle. Although the UFW leader Cesar Chavez characterized his movement with non-violence the gangs of Salinas chose other methods to accomplish their goals.
From Armando’s retelling there was a sense of belonging, comradery, and gangs allowed the displaced farm workers to not feel like outsiders. The gang that Armando Frias joined was not the gang that his son “Lil Mondo” joined. The gangs may have the same name but the purpose of the gang at the point of entry for Lil Mondo was far more complex from the point of entry for his father Armando Senior.
Another issue that struck me was when Lil Mondo began telling the story of killing a man at age nineteen. He was willing to forfeit his whole life at that age because he “believed in the cause” (Nuestra Familia, Our Family, 2006). What is the cause? What makes a nineteen year old kill another man because he feels he is expected to in order to defend the cause?
According to the Center for Investigative Reporting, “The Cause” is the secret guiding philosophy professed by Norteños to defend and support each other and their Nuestra Familia brethren in prison. The underlying values of The Cause are usually taught to young Norteños by experienced elders (Center for Investigative Reporting, 2011).
The biggest shock for me in the film was when we learn that the order for Lil Mondo to kill the gang drop-out came from an FBI informant (Nuestra Familia, Our Family, 2006). Lil Mondo did state that he understood that what he did was wrong, but he felt that he was carrying out the commands of his leader. To find out your leader is behind enemy lines per se has to be devastating. It doesn’t mean he shouldn’t have to do the time for the killing, but you know his eyes were opened to the fact that he was loyal to someone that did not return that loyalty. To add insult to injury that person is free with $52,000 from the federal government really rubs salt in the wound.
Armando discussed breaking his parole in order to spend time with his son in prison (Nuestra Familia, Our Family, 2006). He knew that his son was there because of the choices he had made at his son’s age. The generational gang activity for this family may be broken. Because Armando is able to see that he led his son down this road. As well his son Lil Mondo understands that The Cause he believed in was false they both will be able to raise Lil Mondo’s son to understand that violence and gang activity can lead you behind prison or dead.
Epi Cortina a former captain of the NF discussed “educating” the soldiers. Willie Stokes-Ramirez, one of the members Epi Cortina taught, described with a feeling of empowerment that upon learning the Norteños laws that he felt he was “going to do something for his raza” or his people (Nuestra Familia, Our Family, 2006). I found this part interesting because Epi Cortina describes teaching the members about Aztec society, basic education, and skills to make weaponry and then how to rob a bank and kill people. My perception of this is that they took these kids and built a sense of pride in them. Created a cause that they are meant to be something and do something in life. Yet, at this point instead of drawing a positive path for them to follow they were instructed in criminal activity.

"Nuestra Familia, Our Family." (2006) Films on Demand. Web. 27 Jun 2011. .

Center for Investigative Reporting, Initials. (2011, June 27). Gangs glossary. Retrieved from http://www.nuestrafamiliaourfamily.org/pages/glossary.html