Hemani Mehta
Assistant Production Dramaturg
Grace Herman
Production Dramaturg
Welcome to your Notes From The Field Dramaturgy Resource!
You can use the menu to the left to navigate the content or just scroll through!
This is a live document where Hemani and I will continue to add resources as we work through this production. With that, please reach out if you need help finding information, are particularly curious about something, or if there is anything we can do to help support you dramaturgically. We will both be in rehearsal so please feel free to ask questions at any time, but if you don’t catch us you can always shoot me or Hemani and email, our emails are: gherman@luc.edu & hmehta3@luc.edu
Table of Contents
Anna Deavere Smith
Anna Deavere Smith is an actress, playwright, teacher, and author. She is credited with having created a new form of theater. Smith's work combines the journalistic technique of interviewing her subjects with the art of interpreting their words through performance.
Smith has created over fifteen one-person shows based on hundreds of interviews. Her play This Ghost of Slavery was recently featured in the Atlantic Magazine, making it one of only two plays published during the magazine’s 166 year history. Other plays authored by Smith include Notes from the Field about the school to prison pipeline, Let Me Down Easy, about health care; House Arrest, about the U.S. presidency and the press; and Twilight: Los Angeles, about the 1992 Los Angeles riots. Twilight was recently named one of the best plays of the last twenty-five years by The New York Times. In 2018, HBO premiered the film version of Notes from the Field. PBS has broadcast, Fires in the Mirror, Twilight and Let Me Down Easy.
President Obama awarded Smith the National Humanities Medal in 2013. She has been selected to give the 2024 Mellon Lectures at the National Gallery in Washington. She was selected in 2015 to give the Jefferson Lecture for the National Endowment for the Humanities, at the John F. Kennedy Center. Additional honors include the MacArthur Award, The Dorothy and Lillian Gish Prize for Achievement in the Arts, the George Polk Career Award in Journalism, the Dean’s Medal from the Stanford University Medical School, Obie Awards, and two Tony nominations. She was runner up for the Pulitzer Prize in Drama.
Smith is also an actress in popular culture, having been a part of such shows as Netflix’s Inventing Anna, ABC’s For the People and Black-ish. Previously, she appeared in Nurse Jackie and The West Wing. Films include The American President, Philadelphia, Ghosted and Rachel Getting Married.
Notes From the Field focuses on this "disturbing national trend wherein youth are funneled out of public schools and into the juvenile and criminal legal systems”
School-to-Prison Pipeline
Sources and Additional Resources
UMBC: Just what are ‘zero tolerance’ policies – and are they still common in America’s schools?
Vox: The school-to-prison pipeline, explained
ACLU: School-to-Prison Pipeline
Midwestern Marxist: Feeding the Prison Industrial Complex: School-to-Prison Pipeline
Justice Policy Institute: Education Under Arrest
American University: Who is Most Affected by the School-to-Prison Pipeline?
Sherrilyn Ifill
President and Director-Counsel | NAACP Legal Defense & Educational Fund, Inc. | Baltimore, MD
Sherrilyn Ifill is an American civil rights lawyer, nationally recognized as an expert on voting rights and judicial selection. She served as the seventh President and Director-Counsel of the NAACP Legal Defense Fund (LDF) from 2013 to 2022 and currently holds the title of President and Director-Counsel Emeritus. She has received numerous honors, including being named one of TIME Magazine's Women of the Year, the 2021 Spirit of Excellence Award by the American Bar Association, and the Brandeis Medal.
Glossary: “Big Bets”
-
“The rapid growth of homeownership and the rise of suburban communities helped drive the postwar economic boom. Suburban neighborhoods of single-family homes tore their way through the outskirts of cities… The new economic structures and suburban spaces of the postwar period produced perhaps as much inequality as affluence. Wealth created by the booming economy filtered through social structures with built-in privileges and prejudices. Just when many middle and lower class white American families began their journey of upward mobility by moving to the suburbs with the help of government spending and government programs such as the FHA and the GI Bill, many African Americans and other racial minorities found themselves systematically shut out.”
-
“Black communities in cities like Detroit, Chicago, Brooklyn, and Atlanta experienced “redlining,” the process by which banks and other organizations demarcated minority neighborhoods on a map with a red line. Doing so made visible the areas they believed were unfit for their services, denying black residents loans, housing, groceries, and other necessities of modern life.”
-
“The construction of modern multi-lane roads… was one essential factor in the development of suburbs in the 1950s. These roads made it easier for people to commute from the suburbs to urban areas, facilitating the suburban expansion and the rise of car-dependent lifestyles during that era.”
-
Noun
The amount by which something, especially a sum of money, is too small.
A lack or impairment in an ability or functional capacity
-
“The Ferguson Unrest and Ferguson Riots were a series of several riots and protest triggered by the fatal shooting of Michael Brown, an 18-year-old African American, in the city of Ferguson, Missouri, U.S. by Darren Wilson, a white police officer, on August 9th, 2014.”
-
Walter Lamar Scott, an unarmed Black man, was shoot and killed by Michael Thomas Slager, a white police officer, during a daytime traffic stop.
-
The Matrix is a 1999 science fiction action film that depicts. a dystopian future where humanity is unknowingly trapped inside the Matrix, a simulated reality that intelligent machines have created to distract humans.
-
This is a reference to The Matrix. In the films, taking the red pill allows someone to understand what is actually occurring outside the illusion created by the Matrix.
Glossary: “So This Is It”
-
Thurgood Marshall was a civil rights lawyer who used the courts to fight Jim Crow and dismantle segregation in the U.S. Marshall was a towering figure who became the nation's first Black United States Supreme Court Justice.
-
Landmark 1954 Supreme Court case that ruled that racially segregated public schools are unconstitutional.
-
“After Virginia's school-closing law was ruled unconstitutional in January 1959, the General Assembly repealed the compulsory school attendance law and gave the state's counties and cities the option of operating public schools—the “local option” allowed officials to choose to close public schools. Most localities, some after legal disputes, moved to integrate their school systems. That was not the case in Prince Edward County, however. Ordered by two courts on May 1, 1959, to integrate its schools, the county instead closed its entire public school system.”
-
Adjective: (of an attitude, habit, or belief) firmly established and difficult or unlikely to change; ingrained.
Ifill discussing investments, education, and prison industry.
Interview with Ifill from The Daily Show, discussing her background and affirmative action.
Sherrilyn Ifill addresses our broken democracy and the responsibility of the citizen. Longer speech example.
Investments in Prison Complex vs. Education
“While investing in prison education programs will require upfront funding, the long-term economic benefits for states and localities are considerable. For every dollar spent on prison education, taxpayers are estimated to save four to five dollars that would have been spent on incarceration."
“In 2012 alone, the United States spent nearly $81 billion on corrections. Spending on prisons and jails has increased at triple the rate of spending on Pre‐K‐12 public education in the last thirty years”
“According to data from the Bureau of Justice Statistics, the US spends an average of $31,286 per year on each inmate. In contrast, K-12 schools spend an average of $12,756 per student annually. This means the US spends more than double on each inmate than on each student.”
“A major reason for this disparity in spending appears to be the personnel necessary to run each institution. Each teacher in the U.S. typically handles 20.8 students, whereas one guard oversees only 5.3 prisoners.”
Kevin Moore
Videographer of the Freddie Gray Beating | Deli Worker | Baltimore, MD
Kevin Moore, a Baltimore deli worker, witnessed and filmed the arrest of Freddie Gray on April 30, 2015. Gray was detained for possession of a switchblade and Moore’s video shows him being handcuffed, pinned, and dragged into a police transport van.
Glossary
-
“Copwatch (also Cop Watch or Cop-Watch) is a network of typically autonomous activist organizations, focused in local areas in the United States, Canada, and Europe, that observe and document police activity looking for signs of police misconduct and brutality.”
-
Vertebrae are the small circular bones that form the spine of a human being or animal.
-
Your larynx is the top part of the passage that leads from your throat to your lungs and contains your vocal cords.
-
Leg shackles are physical restraints used on the ankles of a person to allow walking only with a restricted stride and to prevent running and effective physical resistance.
According to New Orleans polices rules, “An officer may use leg restraints on a suspect when they are or demonstrate the intent to actively resist, aggressively resist or aggravatedly resist a lawful detention or arrest”.
-
An enclosed motortruck used by police to carry prisoners.
-
“The Ferguson Unrest and Ferguson Riots were a series of several riots and protest triggered by the fatal shooting of Michael Brown, an 18-year-old African American, in the city of Ferguson, Missouri, U.S. by Darren Wilson, a white police officer, on August 9th, 2014.”
Interview, discussing Gray’s arrest & death.
Click here to watch clips from the Original Kevin Moore Interview
Moore in front of the mural where is interview took place.
Allen Bullock
Protester | Baltimore, MD
Allen Bullock was 18 years old at the time of Freddie Gray’s death. The young man participated in the Baltimore protests following Gray’s death. He gained national attention after being photographed smashing a police car window with a traffic cone. He turned himself in on misdemeanor charges yet faced a $500,000 bail– far higher than the bail amounts for the officers involved in Gray’s death, sparking widespread public outrage. Ultimately, he served six months in prison under a suspended sentence.
Allen Bullock made Headlines:
Huff Post: “A Year After Freddie Gray's Death, This Teen Is One Of The Few People Behind Bars”
While Baltimore waits for officers to stand trial in the Gray case, Allen Bullock is behind bars for damaging two police cars.
“At the height of the unrest in Baltimore last year, 18-year-old Allen Bullock climbed on top of a police cruiser, raised an orange traffic cone over his head and smashed it through the car's windshield. A crowd closed in around Bullock, with some joining in on the destruction. Photographers snapped images, quickly making Bullock's act of defiance a resounding symbol of the protests that rocked Charm City for a week in April.
Bullock, now 19, says he'd lost a friend a week earlier, when 25-year-old Freddie Gray suffered a fatal injury in police custody. He was “caught up in his own emotions,” his attorney, J. Wyndal Gordon, would later say after his client turned himself in to authorities under the advice of his parents.”
The Guardian: “Baltimore rioter turned himself in – but family can't afford $500,000 bail”
Allen Bullock’s mother and stepfather told him to surrender for smashing a police car, but they say authorities ‘are making an example of him – and it is not right’
“As parents we wanted Allen to do the right thing,” said Bobbi Smallwood, Bullock’s mother, who wept and dabbed her eyes. “He was dead wrong and he does need to be punished. But he wasn’t leading this riot. He hasn’t got that much power.”
“It is just so much money,” Smallwood, 43, said of the bail sum of $500,000. “Who could afford to pay that?” Hawkins said the total exceeded the bonds placed on some accused murderers in Baltimore. Smallwood added: “If they let him go he could at least save some money and pay them back for the damage he did.”
Jamal-Harrison Bryant
Pastor and Founder of Empowerment Temple AME Church | Baltimore, MD | Spoken at the funeral of Freddie Gray, April 27, 2015
Dr. Jamal-Harrison Bryant is a pastor, activist, and author. From his various platforms, he connects social justice with pastoral leadership. He is a former NAACP youth director and founder of the Empowerment Temple in Baltimore, an African Methodist Episcopal (AME) Church. On April 27, 2015, delivered the eulogy for Freddie Gray, ending with the civil rights slogan “No Justice, no peace”. Dr. Bryant has a bachelor's degree from Morehouse College, a Master's in Divinity from Duke University, and a doctorate from the Graduate Theological Foundation.
Listen to an audio recording of his full Freddie Gray Eulogy (this what the monologue in Notes From the Field is from).
Sermon - “Stop Cutting Yourself Short”
Second half of Freddie Gray’s Eulogy
40th Pastoral Anniversary Sermon - “It Won’t Take Long”
Glossary
-
Families United 4 Justice Network is a collection of those families impacted by police murder.
-
“On July 17, 2014, Eric Garner was killed on a Staten Island sidewalk after being placed in an NYPD-banned chokehold by Officer Daniel Pantaleo, during a false and illegal arrest while Eric pleaded "I can't breathe" eleven times.”
-
“Amadou Diallo was a 23-year-old Guinean immigrant living in New York City. He made his living as a sidewalk vendor, selling video cassettes, gloves, and socks. On February 4, 1999, he was shot and killed on his apartment stoop by four NYPD plainclothes officers who later claimed that they had mistaken Amadou for a rape suspect from a year earlier. The officers fired a total of 41 shots, striking him 19 times. Amadou was unarmed.”
-
“On Saturday night, two undercover police officers shot and killed 16-year-old Kimani Gray. According to the police account, the officers approached Gray when he “adjusted his waistband in what the police describe as a suspicious manner.” When the police asked him to “show his hands,” they claim Gray turned around and pointed a gun at the officers, who fired 11 rounds. The weapon police say belonged to Gray was not fired.”
-
“On June 14, 2012, Shantel Davis, a 23-year-old African-American woman, was fatally shot by New York City, New York Police Department (NYPD) officer Phil Atkins.”
-
“Graham died on February 2, 2012, at the age of 18, after being shot by a New York Police Department officer in his grandmother’s bathroom.”
-
“A 57-year-old Harlem woman preparing to leave for her longtime city government job died of a heart attack yesterday morning after police officers broke down her door and threw a concussion grenade into her apartment, the police commissioner said. They were acting on what appeared to be bad information about guns and drugs in the apartment.”
-
The Gospel of Luke tells of the origins, birth, ministry, death, resurrection, and ascension of Jesus.
-
A general statement: a statement about a group of people or things that is based on only a few people or things in that group. Generalization can lead to dangerous consequences.
-
These are major universities in Baltimore, Maryland.
-
Exelon is a Fortune 200 company and the nation’s largest energy delivery company, serving more than 10.5 million customers through six fully regulated transmission and distribution utilities.
-
Athleticwear brand
-
Baseball stadium in Baltimore, it is the ballpark of Major Leagues Baseball’s Baltimore Orioles. Commonly refereed to “Oriole Park at Camden Yards”
-
Football Stadium for the Baltimore Ravens
-
A hamlet is a human settlement that is smaller than a town or village.
-
The basic definition of redlining is “refuse (a loan or insurance) to someone because they live in an area deemed to be a poor financial risk.”
Yet the historical context and racial prejudices baked into this practice are important to understand. Watch the video linked here to learn more.
-
Gentrification is a process in which a neighborhood's character changes due to an influx of wealthier residents and investment. It can involve economic and demographic changes, such as higher incomes, education levels, and racial makeup.
-
A type of mass market beer with high alcohol content, most closely associated with North America.
-
Horseshoe Baltimore is an urban two-story casino, and the second largest casino in Maryland with a 122,000-square-foot gaming floor.
-
American Rapper, Link to Spotify
-
American Rapper, Link to Spotify
-
A civil rights lawyer who used the courts to fight Jim Crow and dismantle segregation in the U.S. Marshall was a towering figure who became the nation's first Black United States Supreme Court Justice.
-
An American politician who served as a U.S. Congressman affiliated with the Democratic Party representing the 7th congressional district of Maryland from January 3, 1971, to January 3, 1987. He was the first African American elected to Congress from Maryland.
-
“Kweisi Mfume (/kwaɪˈiːsi ʊmˈfuːmeɪ/ kwy-EE-see uum-FOO-may) is an American politician who is the U.S. representative for Maryland's 7th congressional district, first serving from 1987 to 1996 and again since 2020. A member of the Democratic Party, Mfume first left his seat to become the president and CEO of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP), a position he held from 1996 to 2004.”
-
To set apart to a sacred purpose or to religious use
Michael Tubbs
Councilman, Subsequently Mayor | Stockton, CA
Michael Tubbs is an American politician and a member of the Democratic Party. At time of his interview with the playwright, in 2015, Tubbs was a councilman in Stockton CA. In the following year, Tubb was elected mayor of Stockton, becoming the youngest Mayor of any major city in American history. Currently, he serves as a special adviser for economic mobility and opportunity for California Governor Gavin Newsome.
Former Stockton Mayor Michael Tubbs discusses affordability in California
Former Stockton Mayor Michael Tubbs talks 'The Deeper The Roots' - Long Form Interview
Trailer for “Stockton on My Mind” on HBO: The Story of Mayor Michael Tubbs
Glossary
-
Stockton is a city on the San Joaquin River, in California’s Central Valley.
-
When Tubb’s dicusses the lack of grocery stores in the district he is describing a food apartheid. Food apartheid is a term used to describe the systemic and intentional inequalities in food access that affect low-income communities and communities of color.
-
Stanford University is a private research university in Stanford California. It is known as one of the most prestigious and selective universities in the United States.
-
Nihilism is a philosophical ideal that originated in the 19th and 20th centuries that assets that everything is meaningless.
-
This is a compound word, let’s break it down:
Under: A lower level than
Caste: A social system that divides people into fixed groups based on factors like wealth, rank, or occupation.
So undercaste is a lower level social group.
-
Tupac poem who’s main theme is the resilience and triumph over adversity.
Did you hear about the rose that grew
from a crack in the concrete?
Proving nature's law is wrong it
learned to walk with out having feet.
Funny it seems, but by keeping its dreams,
it learned to breathe fresh air.
Long live the rose that grew from concrete
when no one else ever cared.
-
An American rapper and actor. He is regarded as one of the greatest and most influential rappers of all time and a prominent political activist for Black America. In addition to his music career, Tupac also wrote poetry and starred in movies.
-
Martin Luther King, Jr. was a Baptist minister and social activist who led the civil rights movement in the United States from the mid-1950s until his death by assassination in 1968. His leadership promoted nonviolent tactics and was fundamental to that movement’s success in ending legal segregation in the South and other parts of the United States.
-
Here are some statistics on violent crime in the US:
-
This refers to jobs in the private sector of the economy, meaning the part of the national economy that is not under direct government control. This includes banks, law firms, real estate, hospitality, etc.
Taos Proctor
Yurok Fisherman/Former Inmate | Yurok Tribal Reservation | Klamath, CA
Taos Proctor was a Yurok fisherman and former inmate who grew up and lived on the Yurok reservation in Klamath, CA. In 2021, he tragically passed away in a boating accident on the Klamath river.
Playwright discussing Taos:
“Taos Proctor was bigger than life. Performing him in my play "Notes From the Field" gave me the oomph I needed to get through all 19 characters in the show.
He was a fisherman. His boat turned over. His body was found at the mouth of the Klamath river on the Yurok Reservation @TheYurokTribe - right where the river meets the Pacific.
RIP dear Taos, I loved you so.” - Anna Deveare Smith posted to Instagram after Taos’ passing.
Glossary
-
The Yurok Tribe is currently the largest Native American Tribe in California, with more than 5,000 enrolled members. The Tribe provides numerous services to the local community and membership with its more than 200 employees. The Tribe’s major initiatives include: the Hoopa-Yurok Settlement Act, dam removal, natural resources protection, sustainable economic development enterprises and land acquisition.
-
The Klamath-Trinity River is the lifeline of the Yurok people because the majority of their food supply, like ney-puy (salmon), Kaa-ka (sturgeon), and kwor-ror (candlefish) comes from the river.
-
Redwood Elementary School is a K-8 community school serving a little more than 500 students. They have a diverse population, which includes a large Native American population, primarily local tribes; Tolowa, Yurok, and Karuk.
-
Elementary School near the Yurok Reservation
-
Middle School near the Yurok Reservation.
-
Correctional facility for young people who have broken the law. These institutions are a key factor in the school-to-prison pipeline.
-
Government officials keep tabs on individuals whom the courts have conditionally released to the community on probation, parole, or supervised release.
-
The CYA was the largest youth correctional system in the US, housing around 6,000 young adults in its 11 institutions and four forestry camps. It was closed in 2023 after widespread criticism of conditions at its youth prisons.
-
A California state prison for men, located north of San Francisco.
-
A maximum-security correctional facility located in Susanville, California.
-
A 640-acre minimum-to-maximum security state prison in Coalinga, Fresno County, California.
-
A male-only state prison in the city of Avenal, Kings County, California.
Do prisons actually work?
Studies have shown that prisons are not effective in preventing crime and can actually increase the likelihood of reoffending.
“While behind bars, people are often subjected to dangerous conditions, resulting in trauma. In addition, incarceration severs a person’s ties with family and support networks and causes them to lose their jobs and housing. Upon release, people with a criminal conviction face barriers to housing and employment. All of these factors make it difficult for people to move forward. A 2021 analysis of 116 studies found that prison time does not prevent people from reoffending and, in fact, can increase the likelihood that they will.”
“One of the major justifications for the rise of mass incarceration in the United States is that placing offenders behind bars reduces recidivism by teaching them that “crime does not pay.” This rationale is based on the view that custodial sanctions are uniquely painful and thus exact a higher cost than noncustodial sanctions. An alternative position, developed mainly by criminologists, is that imprisonment is not simply a “cost” but also a social experience that deepens illegal involvement. Using an evidence-based approach, we conclude that there is little evidence that prisons reduce recidivism and at least some evidence to suggest that they have a criminogenic effect.”
Judge Abby Abinanti
Chief Judge of the Yurok Tribe | San Francisco and Klamath, CA
Abby Abinanti has served as a judge in the Yurok Tribal Court since 1997 and as Chief Judge since 2007. She was the first Native American woman to be admitted to the State Bar of California and is the first Native American woman to serve as judicial officer in the state of California. Judge Abby has worked to incorporate Yurok culture into the justice system focusing on rehabilitation in a move away from a utterly punitive justice system.
Read More About Judge Abby:
Yurok Tribe's Chief Judge Abby Abinanti explains how their wellness court is different
Meet Judge Abby Abinanti: The 2024/25 Jack P. Blaney Award for Dialogue recipient
Glossary
-
Verb: To hit someone hard.
-
North American slang: to concede defeat.
-
Native American Tribe and County in the south of Oregon. Also, the name of the river that runs through the Yurok Reservation.
-
The release of an offender from detention, subject to a period of good behavior under supervision.
-
Correctional facility for young people who have broken the law. These institutions are a key factor in the school-to-prison pipeline.
-
“Research shows that when children have strong relationships with caring adults, they are more likely to be engaged at school and more motivated to succeed academically”
-
Medicaid is a joint federal and state program that helps cover medical costs for people with limited income and resources.
-
Research has shown that children in foster care are prescribed psychotropic medications disproportionately more than their nonfoster peers. Overall 8% of nonfoster care children are prescribed psychotropic medication compared to 35% of foster children.
Unnecessary psychotropic medications can lead to serious side effects mentally and physically including chronic diseases, organ damage, and suicidal thoughts.
Leticia De Santiago
Parent | Stockton, CA
Leticia De Santiago is a Salvadoran immigrant who has lived in the United States since 1968, moving to Stockton California in 1998. In 2017 she was inducted into the Mexican American Hall of Fame as Volunteer of the Year for her significant contributions to the advancement of San Joaquin’s Hispanic community. She created and runs a senior program that feeds, aids and entertains over 145 in Stockton on a daily basis.
Glossary
-
City in San Fransisco’s Bay Area.
-
County in Stockton California. It is an important agricultural area for California.
Sound Glossary (Geese!)
Tony Eady
Student Concerns Specialist | North Charleston High School | North Charleston, SC
Tony Eady is an educator with more than 20 years of experience and the boys’ varsity basketball coach for North Charleston High School. In early 2024, he was celebrated by WCBD for his 500th win as a coach.
Eady’s 500th Win Milestone
Glossary
-
Job Description: “Position provides support and counseling services to students; develops prevention and intervention strategies; assesses students and families; provides case management; monitors student progress; and makes referrals.”
-
Public High School a part of the Charleston County School District
-
A prison for people convicted of serious crimes.
-
A prison that houses dangerous prisoners and is designed to prevent them from escaping or harming others.
-
American serial killer who kidnapped, raped, and murdered dozens of young women and girls during the 1970s. He admitted to 30 murders and then was executed in 1989.
-
A disciplinary program that temporarily removes students from the rest of the student body for behavior issues. ISS has been used in schools since the 1970s.
-
As of 2022, almost 77% of schools have banned cellphone use in school. (An example of Zero-Tolerance polices)
Read here to learn about school rules regarding cell phone use across different states.
Amanda Ripley
Journalist | Washington, DC
Amanda Ripley is a New York Times bestselling author, a Washington Post contributing columnist, and the co-founder of Good Conflict, a media and training company that helps people reimagine and navigate conflict. Her work has been featured in publications such as The Atlantic, The Wall Street Journal, Slate, Harvard Business Review, and The Times of London. In the November 2016 issue of The Atlantic, she published the article “How America Outlawed Adolescence,” where she examines the arrests of Shakara and Niya Kenny and explores the broader implications of zero-tolerance policies in schools.
Niya Kenny
Spring Valley High School Student | Columbia, SC
Niya Kenny, an 18-year-old senior at Spring Valley High School, witnessed a violent altercation in her algebra classroom between a fellow student, Shakara, and School Resource Officer Ben Fields. Kenny attempted to intervene and record the incident on video. As a result, she was arrested for violating the school’s code of conduct. Since she was legally an adult, she was briefly sent to jail. Following the incident, she received widespread media attention, which led her to drop out of high school. Kenny later earned her GED and has since become a civil rights advocate.
Sari Muhonen
Teacher and Teacher Educators | University of Helsinki Teacher Training School | Helsinki, Finland
Dr. Sari Muhonen is a Finnish educator with extensive experience teaching all grade levels as both a classroom and music subject teacher. She is also involved in the Teacher Training Program at Helsinki University, where she educates future teachers. In 2024, Dr. Muhonen is contributing to the Finnish curriculum reform, having published peer-reviewed articles, textbooks, teacher guides, and other educational materials to support and enhance Finnish education.
Glossary
-
Helsinki, Finland’s southern capital, sits on a peninsula in the Gulf of Finland. It is a global design capital and is known for its natural beauty.
-
Finland has a population of 5,625,000 people and a geographic area of 130,689 square miles. This is a touch bigger than New Mexico.
-
“The Viikki Teacher Training School of the University of Helsinki is a school community that consists of comprehensive and general upper secondary schools, with learners from preschoolers to upper secondary school students and student teachers. As per our mission, the Viikki Teacher Training School is an inspiring and safe place to learn and work together. We also strive to take sustainable development into account in all our operations.”
-
A teaching attitude that involves genuine care and empathy for a student's learning and growth.
Denise Dodson
Inmate | Maryland Correctional Institution for Women Student | Goucher Prison Education Partnership | Jessup, MD
Denise Dodson is a former inmate who participated in Maryland’s Goucher Prison Education Program. At the time of the interview, she was serving a 23-year sentence for first-degree murder. The charges stemmed from an incident where her ex-boyfriend killed someone who had attempted to rape her. Although she did not commit the crime herself, she was held accountable and convicted. Dodson was released from prison in 2018.
Glossary
-
Maryland Correctional Institution for Women is a multi-level security prison operated by the Maryland Department of Public Safety and Correctional Services in Jessup, Maryland.
-
Barbaric means crude, uncivilized, or primitive.
-
Baltimore City Detention Center is a Maryland Department of Public Safety and Correctional Services state prison for men and women. It is located on 401 East Eager Street in downtown Baltimore, Maryland. It has been a state facility since July 1991.
-
“Parole is a conditional release from prison that allows an inmate to serve the remainder of their sentence in the community. In exchange for their early release the inmate agrees to follow certain rules and if these are broken they can be returned to prison.”
Dr. Victor Carrion
Psychiatrist | Director, Standard Early Stress Research Program | Stanford, CA
Dr. Victor Carrion is a Professor and Vice-Chair of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences at Stanford University and the Director of the Stanford Early Life Stress and Resilience Program. His research takes a multidisciplinary approach to studying the behavioral, academic, emotional, and biological effects of trauma. He is dedicated to developing and implementing effective new interventions for treating children who experience traumatic stress.
Frontiers in Medicine: Resilience - Victor Carrión, MD
Dr. Victor Carrión: How to Heal From Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD)
PBS NewsHour with Victor Carrion, MD
Glossary
-
ADHD stands for attention deficit hyperactivity disorder. It is a chronic condition that includes attention difficulty, hyperactivity, and impulsiveness. It is one of the most common mental disorders affecting children.
-
Medication used to treat ADHD.
-
Thorough assessment of a patient's medical conditions to guide treatment decisions.
-
Noun: difficulties; misfortune.
-
A mental health condition that can develop after experiencing or witnessing a traumatic event. Symptoms include:
Being easily startled.
Feeling tense, on guard, or on edge.
Having difficulty concentrating.
Having difficulty falling asleep or staying asleep.
Feeling irritable and having angry or aggressive outbursts.
Engaging in risky, reckless, or destructive behavior.
Steven Campos
Dishwasher/Former Inmate | Stockon, CA
Steven Campos is a former inmate who, at the time of his interview, worked as a dishwasher in Los Angeles, CA. Beyond this, no additional public information about him is available.
Glossary
-
“Multigenerational trauma experienced by a specific cultural, racial or ethnic group. It is related to major events that oppressed a particular group of people because of their status as oppressed, such as slavery, the Holocaust, forced migration, and the violent colonization of Native Americans.”
-
Concert Hall in Los Angeles, California
-
Excessive use of psychoactive drugs, such as alcohol, pain medications, or illegal drugs. It can lead to physical, social, or emotional harm.
-
-
The state-sanctioned execution of a person as punishment for a crime. It's also known as the death penalty or judicial homicide
Stephanie Williams
Emotional Support Teacher | Philadelphia, PA
Stephanie Williams is an educator who began her career as an emotional support teacher in the Philadelphia public school system. She later became the principal of Belmont Charter School.
Glossary
-
Elementary School in Philadelphia
-
“An emotional support teacher is a special education professional who helps students with their emotional and behavioral needs so they can succeed in school. They may also be called a behavior analyst or social-emotional learning (SEL) interventionist.”
-
Commonly referred to as a Baton, this is a club made of wood, rubber, plastic, or metal. It is carried as a defensive weapon by law enforcement officers, correctional staff, security guards, and military personnel.
-
This is a plan or program developed to ensure that a child with an identified disability who is attending an elementary or secondary educational institution receives specialized instruction and related services.
-
Mount Holyoke College is a private liberal arts historically women's college in South Hadley, Massachusetts, United States. It is the oldest member of the historic Seven Sisters colleges, a group of historically female colleges in the Northeastern United States.
-
Bipolar disorder (formerly called manic-depressive illness or manic depression) is a mental illness that causes unusual shifts in a person's mood, energy, activity levels, and concentration.
-
Adjective: ready to accept control or instruction; submissive.
James Baldwin
Author | From A Rap on Race - A conversation with Dr. Margaret Mead | 1971
James Baldwin was a writer and civil rights activist renowned for his essays, novels, plays, and poems. He was a highly influential public figure and orator, particularly during the civil rights movement in the United States.
Glossary
-
The global West refers to the countries of Western Europe, Northern America, and Australasia.
Bryan Stevenson
Executive Director, Equal Justice Initiative | Montgomery, AL
Bryan Stevenson is an acclaimed public interest lawyer who has dedicated his career to advocated for the poor, incarcerated, and condemned. He is the founder and executive director of the Equal Justice Initiative, a non-profit organization providing legal representation to prisoners who may have been wrongly convicted. Stevenson has played a pivotal role in achieving landmark U.S. Supreme Court decisions that prohibit sentencing children under 18 to death or life imprisonment without parole.
TED Talk: We need to talk about an injustice
Bryan Stevenson on WHY he fights for the incarcerated
The Power of Proximity with Bryan Stevenson
Glossary
-
A museum in Montgomery, Alabama, that displays the history of slavery and racism in America. This includes the enslavement of African-Americans, racial lynchings, segregation, and racial bias.
-
“The public killing of an individual who has not received any due process. These executions were often carried out by lawless mobs, though police officers did participate, under the pretext of justice. They were violent public acts that white people used to terrorize and control Black people in the 19th and 20th centuries, particularly in the South.”
-
“The legal term “genocide” refers to certain acts committed with the intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnic, racial, or religious group. Genocide is an international crime, according to the Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide (1948).”
-
In 2002, the Supreme Court held in Atkins v. Virginia that it would be cruel and unusual punishment to sentence people with intellectual disability to death. Deciding that it is unconstitutional to impose the death penalty upon individuals with intellectual disability.
-
Noun: obstinate or unreasonable attachment to a belief, opinion, or faction, in particular prejudice against a person or people based on their membership of a particular group.
Bree Newsom
Artist and Activist | Charleston, SC
Bree Newsome is an American filmmaker, activist, and speaker from Charlotte, North Carolina. She is best known for her act of civil disobedience on June 27, 2015, when she was arrested for climbing the South Carolina State House flagpole to remove the Confederate flag following the Charleston church massacre.
Bree Newsome Bass on tearing down a Confederate Flag, and what came next
Bree Newsome Bass: Why The Revolution in America Isn’t Over
"Complete Hypocrisy": Bree Newsome Bass on Biden Fighting Racism While Funding Gaza Genocide
Glossary
-
Ku Klux Klan commonly shortened to the KKK or the Klan is the name of the oldest and most infamous American white supremacist,a far-right hate group. It was founded in 1865 by six Confederate veterans at the end of the Civil War.
-
“Trayvon Martin, a 17-year-old, was fatally shot by a neighbor on February 26th, 2012, in Sanford, Florida. Trayvon was staying with his father and his father's fiancée in their gated community… A jury acquitted Travyon’s killer. His killer has continued to torment Travyon’s family, as if he has not caused them enough pain. In December 2019, Trayvon’s killer actually filed a frivolous lawsuit against the Martin family, seeking more than $100 million.”
-
The Freedom Riders were civil rights activists who rode buses through the segregated Southern United States in 1961 to protest bus terminal segregation.
-
Martin Luther King, Jr. was a Baptist minister and social activist who led the civil rights movement in the United States from the mid-1950s until his death by assassination in 1968. His leadership promoted nonviolent tactics and was fundamental to that movement’s success in ending the legal segregation in the South and other parts of the United States.
-
Malcolm X was an African American revolutionary, Muslim minister and human rights activist who was a prominent figure during the civil rights movement until his assassination in 1965. He articulated concepts of race pride and Black nationalism in the early 1960s.
-
“The Ferguson Unrest and Ferguson Riots were a series of several riots and protest triggered by the fatal shooting of Michael Brown, an 18-year-old African American, in the city of Ferguson, Missouri, U.S. by Darren Wilson, a white police officer, on August 9th, 2014.”
-
Rock Hill is the most populous city in York County, South Carolina, United States.
-
The displayed of this specific Confederate flag in South Carolina has had decades of contention since “South Carolina leaders raised the battle flag over the Statehouse dome in 1961 to mark the 100th anniversary of the Civil War and express official opposition to the civil rights movement, African American lawmakers led a fight to remove the flag. In 2000, it was moved to a 30-foot pole next to the Statehouse, near a statue of Benjamin Tillman, the South Carolina governor and U.S. senator who proudly described how he undermined post-Civil War Reconstruction by killing Black people who tried to vote in the 1800s.”
-
According to their website, “Greenpeace is a global network of independent campaigning organizations that use peaceful protest and creative confrontation to expose global environmental problems and promote solutions that are essential to a green, just, and joyful future.”
-
Noun: a member of a self-appointed group of citizens who undertake law enforcement in their community without legal authority, typically because the legal agencies are thought to be inadequate.
Congressman John Lewis
U.S. Representative (D-Georgia, 5th District) | Washington, D.C.
John Lewis was an American civil right activist and politician who served in the United States House of Representative for Georgia's 5th congressional district from 1987 until his passing in 2020. He was a key figure in the 1950s and 1960s Civil Rights movement, co-founding the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC) and leading pivotal events such as the Freedom Rides and the Selma Montgomery marches. He served seventeen terms in office and received numerous awards for his contributions, including the Presidential Medal of Freedom in 2012.
John Lewis talks about getting into ‘good trouble’ [at the NCC]
John Lewis Interview: Finding Hope in Challenging Times & Overcoming Hatred
John Lewis' Historic Speech at the March on Washington
Glossary
-
“On March 7, 1965, when then-25-year-old activist John Lewis led over 600 marchers across the Edmund Pettus Bridge in Selma, Alabama and faced brutal attacks by oncoming state troopers, footage of the violence collectively shocked the nation and galvanized the fight against racial injustice.”
-
“First Baptist Church on Ripley Street played a role in housing meetings to plan and organize the Montgomery Bus Boycott and Freedom Rides. The church was under siege by segregationists because it was used as a refuge to protect Freedom Riders evacuated from the Greyhound Bus Station.”
-
Ralph D. Abernathy was a Baptist minister and American civil rights activist who co-founded the Southern Christian Leadership Conference and was a close adviser to Martin Luther King Jr.
-
Martin Luther King, Jr. was a Baptist minister and social activist who led the civil rights movement in the United States from the mid-1950s until his death by assassination in 1968. His leadership promoted nonviolent tactics and was fundamental to that movement’s success in ending legal segregation in the South and other parts of the United States.
-
The Freedom Riders were civil rights activists who rode buses through the segregated Southern United States in 1961 to protest bus terminal segregation, John Lewis was a member of this group.
-
“On May 20, 1961, Freedom Riders traveling by bus through the South to challenge segregation laws were brutally attacked by a white mob at the Greyhound Station in downtown Montgomery, Alabama.”
-
Noun:
1. the restoration of friendly relations.
2. The action of making one view of belief compatible with another.