N.Y.’s Clever New Park Will Weather Epic Storms and Rising Seas, Wired
In sharp contrast to New York City’s towering skyscrapers, several large, berm-like structures rise on nearby Governors Island. These unique, tree-, shrub- and grass-covered mounds not only provide green space to residents of the nearby concrete jungle, but they also have a more surprising purpose: to protect the Big Apple from rising sea levels and destructive superstorms.
11,431 Rape Kits Were Collected and Forgotten in Detroit. This Is the Story of One of Them, Elle
More than 80,000 cases pass through Wayne County, Mich., prosecutor Kym Worthy’s office each year. Despite that crushing caseload — and a bankrupt Motor City — Worthy, a sexual assault victim herself, put together a plan to process the backlog of more than 10,000 untested rape kits found in the county’s crime lab warehouse.
A New Argument for More Diverse Classrooms, The Atlantic
As a child, U.S. Education Secretary, John King, attended racially- and socioeconomically-diverse public schools. Today as an adult, he’s advocating that all American schoolchildren have access to the same thing. Why? A fully integrated educational system benefits all students — affluent and low-income alike.
MORE: This Proven Method Is How You Reduce Sexual Assault on College Campuses
Tag: low-income families
Renewable Energy’s Role Model, The Written Word Brings Life to the Homeless and More
Guess Which State Towers Over All the Others on Wind Energy?, onEarth
In a state known for caucuses and cornfields, renewable energy has taken root. More than 30 percent of Iowa’s in-state electricity generation already comes from wind — and it’s only going to increase, thanks to a new wind farm housing a turbine that’s taller than the Washington Monument.
Using Literature as a Force for Good Among Austin’s Homeless Population, CityLab
Barry Maxwell, a former resident of the Austin Resource Center for the Homeless, is paying it forward. As founder of Street Lit, he collects donated books and provides a creative writing class (participants write short stories, poetry, blog posts) to create a sense of community among those living on the streets.
Choosing a School for my Daughter in a Segregated City, New York Times Magazine
More than 60 years after the monumental Brown vs. Board of Education court ruling, New York City public schools remain some of the most racially- and economically-divided in the country. So where does a middle-class African-American family enroll their daughter: A segregated, low-income public school or a “good” public or private one?
A Problematic Industry Joins the Climate Change Movement, Much-Needed Health Care Reaches the Latino Community and More
U.S. Agricultural Secretary Thinks Farmers Can Help Solve Global Warming, Scientific American
Those that work the land inflict some of the worst harm on it. But as a recent report reveals, members of the agriculture community — farmers, ranchers, foresters — are beginning to change their planet-damaging ways. As they reform what they grow and how they grow it means that farmers soon could cease being one of the largest emitters of greenhouse gas pollution.
Students Fill a Gap in Mental Health Care for Immigrants, NPR
For immigrants in need of mental health care, a lack of documentation or insurance often means illnesses remain untreated. Across the nation, understaffed health clinics and universities are joining forces to improve access to services for depression, anxiety and more. Through these partnerships, Master’s and Ph.D. students play a vital role in treating mental illness in the Latino community.
Vermont Becomes First State to Require Drug Makers to Justify Price Hikes, STAT News
Last year, the pharmaceutical industry got a bad rap when Martin Shkreli hiked up the price of an HIV drug by more than 5,000 percent. In response, the Green Mountain state passed a law holding drug companies accountable for price increases. Could this move stunt medical innovation or will it protect citizens from unreasonable costs?
How Do You Overcome the Persistent Problem of Finding and Retaining Teachers?
For much of the last decade, Jennifer Moses and her husband Ron Beller leapt across the pond, from America to Britain and back, picking up the best from each culture. Both former Goldman Sachs employees, the two transitioned into education — in London, Moses participated in the creation of a charter school equivalent (known there as academies), while Beller took a role advising New York City school chancellor Joel Klein in restructuring public education during the Bloomberg administration.
Back in the U.S. today, in Contra Costa and Solano counties in the Bay Area, Moses and Beller founded a growing charter school network, Caliber Schools, a growing network of “second-generation” charter schools. Instead of top-down administration, unrelenting intensity and constant cramming for tests to get into college, Caliber focuses on fostering curiosity, joy and the deeper learning skills to succeed in college. NationSwell spoke to Moses about the challenges and opportunities of the American public school system.
What’s the best advice you have ever been given on leadership?
I’m still learning, but I would think the best advice is that people can only take feedback in bite-sized morsels. And that has to affect how you interact with anyone who works with you or for you. Honestly, it’s so profound it’s really changed me, because it’s not actionable if it’s not bite-sized.
What’s on your nightstand?
I’m reading “War and Peace.” I set myself that objective for the year. I’m about 300 pages in, and it’s gonna be a long one.
What innovations in your field are you most excited about right now?
I am excited about technology, even though it’s very early days in a bunch of ways. I think that technology enables personalization and data-driven decision-making. And I think that those are really, really, really important to helping each and every student achieve his or her best. I can honestly tell you that there’s a ton of education software out there; none of it’s very good. There’s a ton of student information systems, but it’s super early days. It’s not like I can point to anything and say this is really great, but it is transforming education and what we can do and how we can target individuals. I just don’t see how you can have a top school without technology. I’m excited about it as a tool, but by the way, I don’t think we can replace teachers with technology, but we can leverage teachers with technology.
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What’s your biggest need right now?
I know this is going to sound sad, but we really need to raise some money. We have to build buildings because the district won’t provide us with facilities. They move us around every year; we have to fight them all the time, and it really holds back what we’re doing. There’s a law called Prop 39 in California, which says that districts have to offer charter schools equivalent facilities. They don’t really want to do that, and the law doesn’t have a lot of teeth. So you have to fight them, you have to drag parents up to school board meetings and negotiate. In Richmond, we have 600 kids in about 36 portables [temporary buildings], and we’re gonna be there again next year when we have 800 kids. When it rains, kids have to run outside in the rain. We don’t have a gym, there isn’t a library. Last year when we opened, we didn’t even have adequate bathrooms; we didn’t have water.
I think we [also] need human capital. Talent is the biggest issue: finding and retaining teachers. Part of that is economic: we basically have to operate on public financing, because that’s what sustainable and scaleable and frankly, a way to show districts that this can make them better. But I think trying to figure out ways to give teachers a sense of their value and importance beyond monetary would be really, really helpful…whether it’s providing them with a discounted ticket to a baseball game or some recognition. We’ve even been talking about telling teachers to board the airplane first, like veterans. We’re trying to think of ways we can honor the sacrifice people are making to do this job. It’s really hard and it doesn’t pay.
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What inspires you?
I have a really passionate belief that the current system is unfair, and that these kids deserve the same kinds of opportunities my own kids have. The fact that they’re a different color or their parents don’t make a lot of money is not a good reason for them not to have opportunity. I just think it’s an injustice, and it’s profound.
What’s your perfect day?
I like to spend time with my husband. I like to go for a run. I love a great meal, and I love going to a baseball game or maybe the theater — in the sunshine. Today’s a perfect day out here.
What’s your proudest accomplishment?
My family. I have a wonderful husband I adore and three fabulous kids. That’s the hardest stuff.
What don’t most people know about you that they should?
I used to be a dancer when I was young. I only dance very rarely now. I took a class recently. It’s been so long, it’s really hard at this stage. I really love it though, because I hate gyms.
To learn more about the NationSwell Council, click here.
This interview has been edited and condensed.
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How One School System Is Fighting Back Against the Achievement Gap, A Better Way to Help the Homeless and More
What Are Massachusetts Public Schools Doing Right? The Atlantic
The Bay State may be tops when it comes to reading and math, but officials aren’t resting on their laurels. Instead, they’re directing resources towards Massachusetts’s achievement gap, which remains stubbornly high. Can a focus on social-emotional learning and childhood trauma bring disadvantaged students up to the same level as their more affluent peers?
Give Directly to the Homeless Through a New Sharing Economy App, Fast Co.Exist
Known as the “City of Goodwill,” Seattle is living up to its moniker. Thanks to one tech entrepreneur and an advocate for the homeless, residents can now use the WeCount app to donate unwanted items (think: blankets, coats, sleeping bags) directly to those most in need. With homelessness an ongoing problem in many urban areas, let’s hope this technology spreads across the country — fast.
What If Mental Health First Aid Were as Widespread as CPR? New York City’s Planning to Do It, Yes! Magazine
Often, law enforcement encounter people suffering from mental illness, yet many haven’t received the education necessary to recognize and provide assistance (instead of arrest). In response, the New York Police Department is joining forces with the National Council for Behavioral Health to provide 250,000 first responders with mental health first aid training. The ultimate goal? To prevent suicide, which currently takes 40,000 lives each year.
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The Surprisingly Simple Way to Improve Child Development, A State Protects Its Residents From Contaminated Water and More
To Help Kids Thrive, Coach Their Parents, New York Times
When it comes to nurturing healthy, successful children, the focus is usually on improving education and nutrition. But research proves it’s much more basic than that; coaching parents to create loving, stable environments at home has the biggest impact of all.
The Flint of California, Politico
The poisonous drinking water in Flint, Mich., dominates the news headlines, but contamination is a problem numerous low-income communities face. With a landmark bill, California law now protects citizens’ need of H20, declaring that everyone has the right to “safe, clean, affordable and accessible water adequate for human consumption, cooking and sanitary purposes.”
How to Clean Up the Dirtiest Vehicles on the Road, CityLab
Individuals can lessen their carbon footprint by opting to drive a Prius or Tesla instead of a gas-guzzling SUV. But to really reduce the greenhouse gas created by transportation in the U.S., those pumping out the most emissions — buses and medium- and heavy-duty trucks — must green up.
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Through the Power of Music, These Homeless Mothers Create a Lasting Bond With Their Children
Earlier this winter at Siena House, a homeless shelter for young mothers in the South Bronx, Crystal spoke softly to her five kids. “This song is for you,” she said, and began crooning a lullaby she wrote (along with the musician Daniel Levy), titled “You’re the Reason Why.”
Accompanied by a guitar and violin, she sang, “You’re the reason why I smile. You’re the reason why I sing. You’re the reason I’m alive. You’re my all, my everything.” In delicate couplets, Crystal expressed a mother’s love for her children — sentiments we often associate with a woman leaning over a crib in a baby’s bedroom, not new moms passing through homeless shelters, jails, housing projects and adult education programs who are barely able to hold their families together.
Since 2011, the Lullaby Project, a Carnegie Hall program (part of its larger Musical Connections initiative) that takes music’s transformative power outside gilded concert halls and into neglected communities throughout New York City and across the nation, has paired more than 300 homeless or incarcerated mothers with professional musicians to create a musical experience for their child. Over three sessions, new and expectant moms write, compose and record a short lullaby for their newborns. For young women who may have experienced their own difficult childhood, the project is a chance to give a name to all the raw emotions that come with motherhood: the regrets from their own lives, the bright wishes for their children and, most importantly, the bottomless affection welling up in these new mothers’ hearts.
The Lullaby Project is not simply a chance for a mom to pen something lasting and meaningful; the song also creates a vital bond that’s key for the child’s development, says Dr. Dennie Palmer Wolf, a researcher evaluating the project. Singing a lullaby helps to create a secure attachment between mother and child, which studies have shown often leads to exploration, better social relations and emotional well-being in later life, Wolf says. Carnegie Hall’s Lullaby Project is one of the few programs that encourages that broader neonatal development, rather than society’s limited emphasis on preventing infant mortality or disease.
“When we fund maternal and infant healthcare, it’s chiefly in a disease framework: ‘How do you keep mothers from smoking, drinking, or having soda? How do you ensure that kids, postnatally, get vaccinations?’ Those are epidemiological issues. What we don’t pay any attention to, yet is no less critical, is the other side of prenatal and postnatal care: ‘How do we say to young mothers who are maybe on their own, maybe pregnant in neighborhoods that are not particularly safe or in the shelter system, that you are about to be a mother? How do we tell them you are an agent in charge of your own and this baby’s growth and development?’” Wolf asks. This initiative, she adds, is “building young people to do the job they are about to engage in.”
For a generation of children, despite all the turbulence of growing up in poverty, falling asleep in mom’s arms suddenly sounds much sweeter.
MORE: How Texting Can Improve the Health of Babies Born to Low-Income Mothers
Rutgers University Admits Unlikely Student Body, Journalists Use Reporting to Urge Politicians to Act and More
A University That Prioritizes the Students Who Are Often Ignored, The Atlantic
Traditionally, America’s colleges seek to attract the best and brightest to their hallowed halls. Committed to cultivating local talent regardless of status, New Jersey’s Rutgers University is bucking that trend, recruiting low-income, public-school graduates with mediocre GPAs and test scores — the very students that other schools shun.
A Plan to Flood San Francisco With News on Homelessness, New York Times
Can journalists advocate for a cause while remaining unbiased in their reporting? Next month, writers and editors from 30 Bay Area media outlets plan to do just that while collaborating on coverage focused on San Francisco’s homeless problem. The goal: To serve as a catalyst for solutions to the seemingly intractable problem.
This City Is Giving Away Super-Fast Internet to Poor Students, CNN Money
No longer are the poorest families in Chattanooga, Tenn., forced to visit a fast-food restaurant so their children can access the Internet needed to complete their homework. Two new programs are bringing citizens online in the Southern city, where 22.5 percent of the population lives in poverty.
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Thanks to This Man’s Vision, 22,000 People Are No Longer Living in Poverty
A native San Franciscan, Daniel Lurie has witnessed his hometown change as two tech bubbles inflated, introducing “tremendous wealth” and sometimes crowding out those living, by contrast, in “tremendous poverty.” The son of Brian Lurie, a rabbi and head of the Jewish Community Foundation for 17 years, and stepson of Peter Haas, one-time head of Levi’s and renowned gift-giver, Lurie has philanthropy in his blood. In 2005, not yet 30 years old, he co-founded the Tipping Point Community to harness the money swelling the coffers of tech companies and other businesses, distributing more than $100 million directly to the Bay Area’s most effective nonprofits and social enterprises.
Rather than “building institutions” — libraries, universities and hospitals — this new generation of donors wants to see their charity have a measurable impact. As a result, their methods and tools have improved. NationSwell spoke with the man who’s educating members of the Bay Area about how to best share their riches.
What’s the best advice you have ever been given on leadership?
I live by the motto that you hire the best people. You surround yourself with people that are smarter than you, that hire people that are incredibly competent and you let them run. No one can do this work alone.
What’s currently on your nightstand?
“Between the World and Me” [by Ta-Nehisi Coates]. We’ve talking a lot about race and class and power here at Tipping Point, and I think there’s probably no more important book out there than that one.
What innovations in your field are you most excited about right now?
In our T Lab program, we’re providing funding to high-performing, established organizations for research and development, which is definitely something new for our sector.
What do you wish someone had told you when you started the Tipping Point Community?
That my job would never be over. I mean, I knew it, but what’s great is that it’s also what’s needed to be inspired each and every day. We live at this nexus of great wealth and privilege here in the Bay Area as well as great poverty. It can be daunting, the chasm, but when you get to meet people who are wealthy and are really committed to these issues, that gets you fired up. And when you get to meet executive directors or clients on the ground doing the hard work every day, that also gets you fired up, despite the fact that the numbers are still overwhelming for those who live in poverty. It’s easy to feel overwhelmed, but it’s also easy to get inspired.
Who is the most inspirational person you’ve encountered?
The first one that comes to mind is Martha Ryan, who runs the Homeless Prenatal Program. She’s been doing this work for 27 years, and she’s always evolving and innovating. She’s tireless. She always humbles me. Homelessness is an extraordinary tough issue. It’s obviously top of mind for everybody, and here’s a woman who’s been tackling it for almost three decades. She’s still going strong and more committed than ever.
How do you try to communicate that inspiration to others?
I don’t think it’s that hard at our organization. We hire great people that are committed to our mission. I think they understand the daunting task that our partner organizations — 45 groups — are working on each and every day. Knowing that we are supporting such excellent work and such difficult work, I think, motivates our staff. And when they do get daunted, overwhelmed and a feeling of helplessness and hopelessness, I can always point them to a Martha Ryan or Sam Cobbs at First Place for Youth who always gives us hope and always can tell us a story of success.
Last year, our groups at Tipping Point, we moved 22,000 people out of poverty concretely. That’s an amazing number, and one that, if we have a rough day, we can point to. It’s pretty easy to look around our portfolio of organizations and find inspiration.
What’s your biggest need right now?
We need people not to turn away from the problems of our time. In the Bay Area right now, I’d say it’s homelessness. I’m into three decades of seeing this problem in San Francisco, and I’m seeing more mentally ill living on the streets and encampments and tent cities popping up. We’re seeing our brothers and sisters and children not only living on the streets, but dying on the streets. We just had a police shooting of a homeless man here in the Mission District, and we had a homeless guy stab a California Highway Patrol officer the week of Super Bowl under an overpass. It’s not safe any longer — not only for people walking down the street, but it’s also not safe for those that are homeless. It’s not okay for us to treat our brothers and sisters this way. It’s not humane. And this isn’t just San Francisco: it’s New York, Seattle, L.A., Dallas.
It feels intractable, and I would just say it’s not. I’m not saying we can solve it overnight, but if we have the political will and we use our various resources at our disposal, then change can happen. I would ask people to get engaged. It’s pretty easy to give up and throw your hands in the air and say, “This problem is too big. It’s unsolvable.” The more people that believe that we can change this, the more likely it is that we do.
What don’t most people know about you that they should?
I don’t like to sit around strategizing and planning for very long. I’d rather try something and fail than plan something for a long time. I’m probably oriented towards action, rather than planning.
To learn more about the NationSwell Council, click here.
This interview has been edited and condensed.
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Allergy-Friendly Food Is Expensive. This Pantry Feeds Families That Can’t Afford Special Diets
At just 12 months of age, Emily Brown’s daughter was diagnosed with allergies to peanuts, eggs, dairy, wheat and soy. Because allergy-friendly food can cost two to four times the price of regular food, Brown’s family quickly became overwhelmed by its ever-increasing grocery budget.
Neither the federal nutrition program Women, Infant & Children (WIC) nor a local food pantry provided any financial relief to Brown since few of the available food products were safe for her daughter to eat. After meeting Amy Goode at a food-allergy support group, the two mothers launched the Food Equality Initiative, aiming to make food that’s safe to those with allergies more affordable and accessible to those in need. In 2015, the inspirational duo opened Renewed Health, the country’s very first allergy-friendly food pantry. In just a year, it’s provided assistance to more than 70 clients and has distributed more than 12,350 pounds of allergy-friendly food.
Watch the video above to learn how the pantry provides a safety net to low- and middle-income people with food allergies or Celiac disease.