Blog

By Austin Koeller, August 28, 2020, The Independent. Experts say research shows Black girls are more likely to face disciplinary disparities in the public school setting, and something needs to be done about it. On Thursday night, the YWCA of Grand Island hosted a virtual screening of the documentary film “Pushout: The Criminalization of Black Girls in Schools.” Based on the book by Monique Morris, the documentary examined the disparities Black girls faced and shared personal stories from...

By Don Thompson, August SACRAMENTO, Calif. (AP) — California lawmakers are setting up a task force to study and make recommendations for reparations to African Americans, particularly the descendants of slaves, as the nation struggles again with civil rights and unrest following the latest shooting of a Black man by police. The state Senate supported creating the nine-member commission on a bipartisan 33-3 vote Saturday. The measure returns to the Assembly for a final vote before lawmakers...

If you missed The League of Extraordinary People's first Town Hall, or would like to watch it again, it is available here ! Health and Wellness Town Hall: Adverse Childhood Experiences 101 Class How ACEs Impact the Black, Brown, Indigenous, and other Communities of Color This event will be led by Alfred White. Alfred is the founder of The League of Extraordinary People. After nearly 40 years experiencing homelessness, Alfred swallowed a 1/4 ounce of crack cocaine in 2004 and nearly died. He...

By Kim DeGiulio, and Dane Kelly, August 6, 2020, ClickonDetroit. DETROIT – During this period, many parents of color have had tough conversations with their children. For some, that conversation is even trickier as their children are living with autism. Some parents have banded together to help keep their children safe. Camille Proctor learned that her son Ari had autism in 2008 and immediately sought out support groups to help guide her . “There were no support groups that could identify...

By Christian Drake, August 4, 2020, NYT. My son is 4 years old. He is funny and charming and naughty in the most delightful ways possible. He is the perfect host, making sure we understand and enjoy every part of his world. Recently, he has been waiting for a letter from his best friend at school — they have been writing back and forth to stay connected during the quarantine. As we walk down the driveway to the mailbox, he stops without my asking at the exact place where the driveway apron...

Going out to buy groceries, going out for a walk, driving your kid back home from school. For most people these activities are normal, everyday things with little to no excitement, as they should be. Unfortunately, getting food, exercising, and supporting my son’s education have been a little more out of the ordinary for me. You see, I am a Mexican Indigenous man, brown skin, shaved head. My ethnicity and physical appearance are by no means unusual, especially in the part of the country...

By Yael Meshulam, July 19, 2020, The Dad. There are certain things we know about raising kids. We know roughly how much to feed them ( one million snacks per day ), how much they need to sleep, we know to take them to the doctor when they get sick – but there is so much about raising kids that we genuinely don’t know. Sure, we can do our best to set good examples, but there is no textbook way to help kids grow into strong, resilient, confident, kind, adults. Since there is no one concrete...

By Ashraf Khalil, July 23, 2020, The Associated Press. WASHINGTON — The Trump administration said Thursday that it is revoking an Obama-era housing regulation designed to eliminate racial disparities in the suburbs, a move that fair housing advocates have decried as an election year stunt designed to manipulate the fears of white voters. In a tweet addressed to “The Suburban Housewives of America,” President Donald Trump made his intended audience clear. “Biden will destroy your neighborhood...

By Deekshita Ramanarayan, July 21, 2020, New Security Beat. “The past months have been profoundly difficult for our nation, and for Black communities in particular,” said Representative Lauren Underwood (D-IL-14) at a recent March of Dimes event on the impact of structural racism on maternal health. COVID-19 has highlighted health outcome inequity caused by race and racism. Though Black people constitute 13 percent of the U.S. population, the CDC estimates they represent over 30 percent of...

I was fairly new to the study of plant medicine when I was introduced to herbalist Sade Musa, who leads the community education and healing project Roots of Resistance . Part of my commitment to self-care and reducing harm meant getting in touch with Mother Earth and learning to seek her out in moments of overwhelm, but it was frustrating that most of the traditions I was being introduced to were European or repackaged indigenous practices. I was starting to feel like the only way to get in...

Once in a generation, if we are lucky, someone comes about who in every aspect of their being models for us how to do that, how to be that — how to place love at the center, the center that holds solid as all around it breaks, the solid place that becomes the fort of what is unbreakable in us and the fulcrum of change. Among those rare, miraculous few was John Lewis (February 21, 1940–July 17, 2020), who began his life by preaching to the chickens at his parents’ farm in southern Alabama and...

Over the next few days, I am going to provide a little food for thought about the loss of cultural identity that has profoundly impacted Africans across the Diaspora. Remember that the descendants of the Trans-Atlantic Slave Trade that live off of the Continent, are perhaps the only collective in the world that does not know their origin. We are African, but Africa is a continent of fifty-four countries with thousands of different cultures and dialects. Today’s micro-discussion is on...