I am blessed to live in a place like Chicago. We are a city where people are constantly struggling and fighting against injustice. The young people of Chicago are particularly inspiring. I am lucky to contribute in large and small ways to their efforts.

A group of youth from Fearless Leading by the Youth (who I’ve written about before on this blog) are continuing their amazing work to close the Cook County Juvenile Temporary Detention Center (JTDC) through the Audy Home Campaign. The young people define their work as follows:

The Audy Home Campaign is a campaign to develop the leadership of youth impacted by juvenile incarceration to close the Audy Home (JTDC) and replace it with alternative programs in the different neighborhoods where youth are getting locked up.

The Audy Home Campaign is pressing for restorative justice to be employed as a tool for diverting cases out of the detention center and to offer alternatives to incarceration for youth.

This summer, FLY produced a short video describing their campaign and sharing the results of their participatory action research project. The young people describe the video in their own words:

This video explains how the County is planning on closing the juvenile detention center. The County currently spends $2.5M each year locking up youth from Woodlawn and surrounding areas. The video explores what youth in Woodlawn are getting locked up for, what programs are out there for our youth, and our vision for how the money currently being spent locking up youth could be reinvested to help these youth reach their full potential.

I am proud to say that a couple of members from FLY attended a juvenile justice data training that I facilitated last October and shared what they learned with their peers. The results of the skills that they acquired can be found in the excellent written report (PDF) that they produced about their research. When people ask me why I am so committed to sharing data with community members (including youth), I will point them to the incredible example of the work produced by FLY.

We who live in Chicago are indebted to these young activists and organizers for their advocacy and their commitment to a more just world. If you are in Chicago tonight, I am co-organizing a discussion about youth confinement at the Gage Gallery that features young people speaking about their experiences. It should be an enlightening and I hope galvanizing discussion. Information about the event is here.