 My name is Molly Martin and I'm the Director of New America Indianapolis. In today's edition of Inside Out Youth Lead Policy in the Heartland, we're going to be focusing on gun violence and most importantly how we can make conversations and policies responding to gun violence more centered on healing and more trauma informed. And as always we're going to look to our youth leaders in the community to do that. And so I want to begin by thanking and welcoming our partners at Voices here in Indianapolis, a policy advocacy and youth serving support group that provides a number of services in school and out of school to help all sorts of young leaders especially those who are systems involved become better advocates and better voices for themselves and for their communities. And so today we're going to take some time to hear from these young leaders and their colleagues at Voices about ways that conversations about gun violence can focus in a more nuanced way on healing especially for Black and Brown families. And at New America as always we like to begin conversations that talk a little bit about race by acknowledging Black and Brown lives matter. We shouldn't have conversations about Black and Brown folks and their communities without to them and without leadership from them. And we hope that you'll join us in the chat, ask your questions, and join us in this conversation in a respectful way. So thank you again for being here. Let's jump right in to set a little bit of the stage before I go to our guests. If you're joining us from across the country and you're not familiar with Indianapolis, it's a large city and you might think of Indiana and think simply of small places. But as we know gun violence affects places large and small. And in Indianapolis we are having a disproportionate problem with gun violence to our population. I think all of our panelists on the screen know that you woke up on say Monday morning and saw eight shootings over the weekend. Thankfully, none of those folks died, but we've lost quite a few neighbors in the last few years to gun violence. We also know that murder in Indianapolis is at a record rate. And what we don't always talk about on the news is who is left behind, either when someone loses their life or is simply affected by gun violence, by gun charges, and we're going to hear a little bit more about that today. And so I'd like to start by introducing our colleagues and voices and our co-hosts in this series, which we call Youth America. Erin Green, who is the Director of Straight Outreach at Voices, and Keir Wright, who is the Executive Director and the Founder of Voices. I'd also like to point out that we have some very special guests. We have four young leaders from across Indianapolis joining us today. And I'm going to look at my notes to make sure I get names and ages. So forgive me, gentlemen. We have Jaylin, who is 17. Jaylin achieved his GED at 16. And I have tried to take that test before to see what it's like, and it's really hard. So good for you, Jaylin. He's been looking for employment because he's interested in kind of pursuing what's next. Tyrus is 15, and he's completing his schooling online. He has aspirations to become an entrepreneur. So I hope that some folks out there in the audience, I know we have some from the entrepreneur community, could give us some advice there. We have Darian, who is 16, and he's also completing his schooling right now. He wants to be successful. He's looking for a path forward, looking for ideas. He also really enjoys spending time with his brothers. And then we have Dantarius, last but not least, he is 15. And I know we have some folks watching who know about this. He is interested in going into real estate. So I want to thank them for being here. And I want to honor the fact that we have young people showing up for a difficult conversation and for a conversation that talks about some very painful moments. And so I appreciate that. And I want to make sure as you ask questions in the chat, please know that we can leave questions unanswered. So please help us out with that. So I want to turn first to Erin Green. So Erin, you're the director of street outreach at Voices. And I want to share with our audience, what does that mean? What does that look like for Voices? And why do you do the work that you do? So the director of street outreach, I put together, so we have a barbershop initiative where it's twofold. So we'll pay for haircuts in the community for youth. And then we have a mental health aspect to it where we invite people to come in to a closed space for black and brown communities. The barbershop is sometimes our first form of therapy. That's where you go, you get your hair cut, you talk to your barber, you ask for advice. Even my mom has walked into a barber shop and told the barber, hey, he's tripping. And then they'll hold me accountable for whatever I was doing. And so we're doing a lot of different mental health meetings where we're bringing people together to talk about hard conversations like what we're doing today. And the reason I do the work, my father was murdered when I was 17 by a 17-year-old. And so me getting in this work kind of allows me to reverse that. I can work with the 17-year-old to teach different skills so that those conflicts don't happen. But I can also assist with those types of interactions never with the youth that I serve. So that's kind of why I do the work. Thank you, Erin. I'm so sorry about the loss of your father. Thank you for the work that you do. I appreciate it. Thank you. Kia, we talked before on this series about why voices, why you founded it. What is the unique opportunity for a group like Voices when gun violence is spiking in your home community? I don't know if it's necessarily unique, but I think the thing that we do well is building the relationships. We spend a lot of time with these young men Monday through Friday, almost 40 hours a week. And through the relationships that are built is when we learn about the repositions, when we learn about their just basic needs. And so I think that helps to strengthen our program. We design all of our services around their experiences. And so that has helped us at least try to identify and understand what's going on in the neighborhoods that they are living in and how we can respond better. Thank you, Kia. Well, now on to our special guests, the young leaders we have with us. And Jalen, I'm going to start with you. Can you say a little bit more about why you joined today? What made you want to talk about this topic? Or maybe you didn't and maybe someone told you you had to. But why are you here today? I'm here today because Erin wanted me to come talk about the topic and I can't talk about the topic. Wonderful. We're so glad you're here. You know, I'm going to ask the same question of all of our panelists. Tyrus, why are you here today? Is there anything special you want to make sure you share? No, it's not really anything special. I'm here today. You know, Erin wanted me to be here. Excellent. Erin, you have a lot of influence. I'm going to send you out the next time I need something done. Don, Terry, Cinderian, same question. Because it's an important issue to speak on. And I agree with him, too, because it is important. So it's obviously incredibly important. And I think I spend a lot of time with people who make public policy, right, who make the rules and regulations that we live by. And too often, people as young as the four of you are not at the table for that. Voices is trying to solve that problem through their youth leadership efforts and through the work that Erin does. And so, Tyrus, I'm going to start with you. If someone, if you knew someone was watching, whether it was the mayor, the governor, or someone who's going to make the rules that impact your life, and you knew that you had a moment here to tell them something about what it is like to be your age in Indianapolis with this level of violence that we're experiencing right now, what would you want them to know? I mean, I don't really know, but like, yeah, I don't know. Can I jump in real quick, Miley? Dirk, yeah. So we were talking earlier today, right? And we were going over some of the questions, you know, and I said, you know, we might talk about why kids are carrying guns. Can you talk about? Yeah, I would carry guns because like everybody got guns, right? Like, it might not be legal or illegal, but like, you got a gun, you go through the safety, there's no gun. Yeah, that makes a lot of sense. So safety, and it's awfully hard to be the person who's not carrying one. To Kia's point, you know, Jalen coming over to you, why do you think people in the community are carrying guns, especially someone as young as the four of you, your peers? Like, it's more of a people want to be safe. A lot of people got guns, a lot of young people got guns. You know, people like people my age tend to have like differences with other people, my age and stuff. So like, you just want to have a gun. And then like, when you get a gun, you just feel better. So a lot of people don't have guns to protect themselves, be safe, stuff like that. And I'll try just with a follow up question. So Jalen, you talk a lot about, you know, the different things that are going on. For some youth, is it life and death without the gun? Yes, it is life and death without. A lot of people, it's a lot of stuff going on in Vietnam, as you all know. So a lot of people feel like if they don't have a gun, they could go outside and die and not make it home the next time and not see their family again. And Jalen and Aaron staying in that box on my screen, the safety concern is real. Do you think the safety concern is also because folks have seen it again and again, older relatives, generations before them? Yeah, absolutely. And I think with anybody who has experienced the amount of trauma that all of us have experienced, being honest, it creates that what if, or if I walk outside, what will happen? You know what I mean? And if I've always grown up seeing people die or be shot, which is normalizing our community because how many times it happens, but it's a very traumatic thing to even have to think about on a daily basis. I mean, my dad was killed when I was 17. That's something I've thought about every day since I was 17. So that's why I understand where they come from when they say like, okay, Mr. Aaron, if I put this gun down, who's going to be there to protect me? Mm-hmm. That makes a lot of sense. Darian, would you add anything? Do you agree? Any other reasons? About folks having guns? Well, yeah, because like some, like the reason why they have guns, because like some of them don't have jobs, they don't have none. They just want to be hustling. Yeah. They just want money. They want to go get on their own, or something like that. And some of them will be having like oppositions. So they just be aware. Yeah. Like if let's say like somebody got a gun, if they put the gun down, but they like into it, somebody that got a gun with who like how they're going to protect themselves. And I'm hearing a lot of the same themes. So protection, life and death, evidence that safety is not in their hands. And maybe especially if they don't have a weapon. And then I like the point you just made, Darian, that also people need a way out. And maybe the hustle is the way out and guns are a big part of that. So I'd ask all of you. Sometimes it gets lost that conditions that have been created in these neighborhoods are out of these kids hands, right? And they are growing up. I think Aaron touched on it a little bit and conditions that weren't the same, you know, even for me, I just turned 40 this year. And so growing up in Lawrence township in the nineties is completely different than what it was, than what it is now. And it's not as easy to tell a kid to put a gun down if we're not fixing and kind of addressing the reasons that they feel that lack of safety. You know, even Darian just kind of hit on unemployment is the highest in some of these areas, you know, that there's a high concentration of black and brown residents. And when you are literally figuring out how to eat your next meal from moment to moment, where you're going to lay your head, it creates this environment that is shaking to begin with. And so everybody feels like they are in survival mode. And I just wanted to make sure that we kind of lift that up, that it's not just a reaction to, oh, I'm walking outside and I need a gun or I'm choosing to hustle. There are a lot of, you know, things in these communities that were there before these kids were even born, that they are just learning how to navigate the best way that they can. Yeah, I'm so glad you pointed that out. We say root causes. You said it at the beginning, and we talk about it a lot. So poverty, food, jobs, infrastructure, whether or not it's easy to get a bus or drive a car to where you need to get. And Indianapolis is a huge city for folks who are watching at home. It's almost 400 square miles. It is not an easy place to navigate to get things like food and jobs and cars and rides and to have consistency. So money talks in a place that large, money talks all over America. And Kea, you hit right on it. So I'm going to ask our young men here, when you think about the conditions that might make someone you know desperate enough, or just, it just feels right, you know, to have a weapon, to have that protection, to need to strive and hustle. And you could, you could wave a magic wand to get rid of something, some problem in your neighborhood, some problem in Indianapolis that you think is making things harder on folks who maybe don't have money, folks who don't have supports, certainly folks who are experiencing racism. What's one thing that you would do with your magic wand? What's one big problem, root cause you'd get rid of? And Kea and Erin, you know, feel free to jump in too. I'm going to say guns because the reason why, because everybody dying off like nowadays, everybody dying off of guns and stuff. So I just want them to take the guns away. Take the guns. Okay. Jump in anytime. Jalen, you look like maybe you have something? Yeah. I think I make equal opportunities for everybody. Sure. Equal opportunities for money and jobs and food, getting ahead. Okay. That makes a lot of sense. Another thing I was going to say is like the murders and stuff because like people wasn't dying as much and people wasn't dying every day. They probably, people wouldn't feel like they need guns and stuff like that. Sure. Tyrus, do you have something to add? No, no problem. I wonder if he said in his neighborhood addiction seems to be one of the leading causes. He's being shy right now. That's okay. I mean addiction is a huge problem in all over America, certainly in Indianapolis. So when you think about places like Indy, you think about Midwestern cities that are pretty big, that are pretty diverse. You have lots of different races of people. You also have a lot of poverty problems. So like St. Louis, Detroit, Indy, certainly a lot of smaller folks or smaller places. Chicago certainly struggles with this. We see an unfortunate trend, right? We see things happen a lot to black and brown people and to people who don't have as much money. Do you ever get frustrated? This is to everyone on the screen. When you turn on the news and they talk about guns and violence and the implication is that it's a black or brown problem. Erin, I see you nodding. Yeah, absolutely. Especially here, and I'm sure it's the same all over the country, but there's a narrative push that honestly, when you look at the news, if you watch the news long enough, you'll think black and brown people are just savages. That's all they show is the negative aspects of somebody being killed or impoverished areas going through certain things that weren't created just because we were put there. It's unfortunate because it sucks the hope from people. It's like, oh, yeah, there's another murder. But there's not like the same amount of positivity being shown also. So yeah, you may have something happen on one side of town, but I mean, think about voices. We do this every day. We come in and do great work every day. And not saying that we need to be on the news every day, but we got to compound some of that negativity. And it's always black males, literally. And it's never the same. It will make you feel like nobody else is dying out here. And that's not the truth when you look at the numbers. And I will just add, we hear the narrative of black on black crime all the time. And it drives me up a wall. Crime is proximity. You kill who you live around. And crime is committed against who you. It's always proximity. But forcing that black on black crime narrative reinforces what Erin was just talking about, that there aren't anything positive happening in our neighborhoods. And we see through our kids the amazing things that's going on. We are seeing folks getting educated in our communities. They're organizing all of these wonderful things, the wonderful stories that can counter that narrative, doesn't get the clips, doesn't get the lights. And so we talk to our boys all the time. What does that do? Does that numb you further? Because this is all you see. You don't see any other kind of representation of you. So that's something that we definitely talk about a lot here. That's a great point. And I like that point, especially in the context of the root causes. We know that the narrative disproportionately represents Black victims and maybe Black actors. But to your point, crime is proximity. That's so important, Kia. But also in America, systems have been built to ensure that Black wages are lower and Brown wages in some cases are lower. To ensure that there is not the same economic opportunity. Jalen talked about equal opportunity to ensure that housing and food and jobs and transportation are inherently harder and are disproportionately less available. And when those things are harder, that drives violence. Not anything about a group of people. And even just when we talk about the social-emotional aspect of it, the devaluing of life is very prevalent in Black and Brown communities. That can even go as far back as to red light, where Black communities were deemed not as valued as white communities by design. And so when we think about the psyche and the messages over generations of devaluing life, we look at their neighborhoods that they're going through. There aren't grocery stores, there aren't fresh produce, but there's a liquor store on every corner. Where are resources in terms of funding for the city and state? Where are they allocated? It's not going to mental health addiction and things like that, but we are increasing police officers. So where is the value and what are we really trying to rebuild? I think it's the crux of it. I think when we look at our communities also, we talk about gentrification. Right now in Indianapolis, you're watching these amazing homes rebuilt. You're watching new businesses, which would, in turn, if I'm young, oh, yeah, it's about to get nicer around here. But they're not understanding that actually, no, you're about to have to move because the price of living is going to go up there. You're not going to be able to afford it. So now my mom has to work third shift job where she can't even spend time with me anymore because we got to make ends meet to live somewhere clear across where I'm not even comfortable. You know what I mean? So it's a lot that plays into everything that's happening that is completely out of our control. But it happens to our neighborhoods, our communities. And then we end up being looked at as a problem when we're not in those spaces to make these decisions. And to your point with the neighborhoods and new industries and things like that coming in, the identity of the people are not being centered in that. So it's almost erasing the culture and identity of some of these historic neighborhoods. No, we can look at Indiana Avenue and what's happened over there. It's such rich in culture and history, especially black history. And a lot of the things that have occurred did not center that necessarily. And so what does that again do to the psyche of people living in those communities? Jaylin, did you have something to add? Yes. One thing I wanted to say was a lot of people, like on the violence part or whatever, a lot of people made mistakes as they were younger or whatever. So like people could have caught, like somebody could have caught a case or whatever and like not a day out, they could be on like a good, trying to be on a good path or whatever. But like people don't want to get them jobs or whatever because they fell in or they got this type of charge or whatever. It's a great point. So that's a great point. That's a really good point. And I think we got asked in the chat by Brenda, what are things that could be done to make people feel safer? Well, certainly having what you need to survive in terms of food and shelter makes you feel safer and being able to get that job. So Brenda, I would say, but I'm going to ask my panel, looking at policies like ban the box. For those of you who aren't familiar where you don't have to disclose your criminal justice involvement on a job application. Efforts like helping to reduce certain constrictions and certain structures in criminal, what they saw kind of criminal oversight, right? Or corrections or probation. We certainly have a system in this country that is not designed to allow you to stumble very often, especially if you don't have resources or your skin is a certain color. So I'm going to ask our young friends here, who do you know that has not gotten a job for a reason that struck you as really unfair? You don't have to name them. But do you know someone who didn't get a job and you thought, oh, they did that because they made a mistake when they were 11. They made a mistake when they were 13. Yeah, I know somebody that didn't have no job and he was like stuck into the streets. So. Right, without that job. No luck. Tyrus, you look like maybe you have someone to add. Oh, just one second. Kia, I think you're on on mute. Could you add that first? He had mentioned, I don't know why he's being so shy right now. Somebody in his family had was not able to get a job until seven years after they go to after person or after person. Was it because of the him being in person that he wasn't able to get a job or was because of his job? And then once he got out because of that mistake on his record, he wasn't able to get employment for a while. So how did we survive in the meantime? Was it rely on some families that like under the table type work? Okay, sure. Under the table work, which is honorable. And in a country where we have things like credit scores and credit histories, you can get further and further behind the more years you're not involved in some of these these formal things. Erin, I saw you nodding a little bit. Did you have did you and Jalen have something? Yeah, my brother's close friend. He had got out of prison for like after doing like three, four years. He tried to get a job or whatever. They turned him down because of what he had going on and then he later ended up getting killed. I'm so sorry. And then even even the expungement process is a headache. There's not a lot of information that is clear to you know, felons who may have something that can be expunged. It's like it's a headache. I had my best friend dealt with it and still is dealing with the process. He hasn't had a case in 12 years. And it popped up on his background checks. But the only reason he was able to get the job is because it was 12 years old. My stepdad had to deal with it. And then you know, he took he took a chance and became an entrepreneur. But a lot of people don't get that same type of opportunity where this felony has hold me back. Number one, I've already done my time. So whatever my crime was, I went to prison and did my time. And now there's something on my name that won't allow me to better my life after I did my time. So now I'm doing double time. And you know, yeah, I know where I could go get this money, but I don't want to go there around. So let me try and go and get a job and better my life. And I'm told no constantly, walking in and out of places because my background check is coming back from something that I've done my time for. That's that's that's unfair. You know what I mean? I would just like to lift as well like with the youth that we've worked with up until July of this year 2021, Indiana required that they have work permits to obtain employment. The requirements to have a work met is good standing in your schools. So grades, behavior, attendance, most of the young men that were in our program are expelled or suspended from a traditional school system. So we're they're out of the school support system. And they're like, what am I supposed to do now? Let me get a job. The schools aren't able or willing to provide those work mitts for the kids to get a job. So it set them up for this. Well, what did you think they're going to do for money and for survival if they can't be in school because of decisions that were made and now they can't get a job because the policies and everything else dictated that they can't. And so finally, July of this year was that change and young people do not have to have a work permit. That's really helpful, Kia. And so let's lift that up again for everyone watching that the work permit requirement has changed. And that maybe soon we will see some of those kind of circular moments break off and branch off towards towards jobs and earning and future schooling. Darian, do you think that Indianapolis is an easy place to find out about jobs, not find a job, but like even know that they exist? Oh, not really. Yeah, where would you look? Where would you find out? Like, what do you mean by that? Yeah, so if you thought, okay, I need to make some money, I want to get a job, where would you even look first? Like, who would you ask? What would you do? I like me, I look, I ask my my mom or some or or I go to the store and ask them and stuff like that. We're going on, you know, internet. Yeah, Don Teres, what would you do? I agree with him. Yeah, I think that's a really important point, guys, because I think we know that you can't find something you don't know about. And we have to think really hard about where everybody looks for information. So do you walk down the street and like a store you see in your neighborhood to the earlier conversations about gentrification? Yeah, I'm going to go in and ask, are you hiring? If you don't have internet at home, or maybe aren't as familiar where to look, the internet could be a place, maybe it's not. And do you think, where do you think we could put more information about jobs, money, the fact that you don't need a work permit anymore, you all can get it at voices. But if you meet somebody on the street, where would you send them? I don't know probably like in schools, they can like let you know where you can get a job at or something. Yeah, schools, career centers, that's great. I see Tyrus and Tia Kea having a conference so they might have an idea. Or did you say that you find or you look for a point? I'll talk to my family too, because I don't like little banking $12 an hour. I need to make like some good money like $20 an hour or so. Right. Right. My family, that we just matter, we just matter. Aaron, did you have something I saw you leaning in? Just, so with Jaylin, he obtained his GED at 16. He can't get into any real jobs that, you know what I mean, that he can, so we were thinking about trades. He can't start a trade till he's 18. So they, in between, so with them, we look for, we try to help look for jobs, but that 14, 15, 16 age group, there's not a lot of jobs that hired at that age. And for them, you know, they want to be, they want to have a job, the number one is going to pay them, you know, fairly well, but also somewhere that's close to them in proximity. So I just wanted to definitely put that out there because, you know, and then you go there two years until you can start a trade program. It's like, all right, I'm starting to kind of lose my focus on what I want to do. And just to add to that, no, the kids that we have with us today might not have the same level of pressure, but we've had kids that were literally head of households. They were paying rent, paying, you know, for younger siblings, food and things like that. It's very hard to tell that kid that's making that money in the streets to go work at McDonald's for 10, $12 an hour, you know what I mean? And so finding better opportunities for these young people that are in those type of situations, how do we wrap more supports and services around them? How do we get the family engaged better so that this pressure isn't on a 15 year old child? You know what I mean? But we also have to be realistic. It's hard to walk away from that street, that level of street money that some of these kids get, you know what I mean? Even with the threat of violence and things that come again, it goes back to survival because we don't know sometimes what's going on in their communities and in their homes. And so just making sure that we understand we need to be realistic. And when we talk about solutions, you know, it's not stop selling drugs, go work at Walmart. That's not realistic. You know what I mean? Sure. Yeah, that's a big leap to ask somebody to make for money and for otherwise. And I really like your point about wages. Tyrus, you said it, our wages in the Midwest are too low for everyone. Our wages in the Midwest are lower for people who are black, lower for women who are Hispanic, lower for lots of different groups. And I think we assume that only people over 25 care how much their wage is. And for all the reasons that you've said, one, it's fair, you're doing the work. Two, a lot of young people are in charge of their households. And I'd like, I just want to lift up and reiterate for folks who have asked, what can we do? Wrap around supports that involve cash and involve earnings. It can't just be wrap around supports that are nice to say. There has to be money attached because there is a realistic problem of support. Jaylin, when you think about going out to get a job, because you said specifically, you're looking for employment, you did something really difficult, which is get that GED and get that GED early. And now you're in that weird space where you're 16 and not everyone can take in. What do you like to do? What would you like to be paid to do? Just anything, blue sky? Hunting. Hunting. That's really interesting. Tell me a little bit more about that. Is that something your family did? Is that something you've always liked? Well, me and my brothers, we'd be hunting sometimes. That's really interesting. I grew up in West Virginia. My brother hunts and it's a common thing there. And I think sometimes people, I don't know, you all can tell me, they forget to ask people what they want to do, what they might enjoy doing. And that's really interesting. I hope that somebody's watching who's from the department of, gosh, I don't know what it's called in Indiana. It's the interior at the national level, but folks who work in parks and natural resources and do work with animal population and do get to work with hunters, that would be a really interesting opportunity. So, Dantarius, I'm coming to you. I know you're interested in real estate. How do you want to learn that? Do you know a realtor? Would you like to be paid to learn the realty game? Are you interested in decorating homes or painting? What do you like about real estate? What gets you going? I like the money. And I know a realtor, my uncle, he make a lot of money from it. I just be seeing him like, dang, you got to get this nice car often just real estate. I was like, I can do that thing. Sure. I think that's smart. It's obviously a really good market. Darian, how about you? What do you like to do? What I like to do, I really want to be an engineer so I can work on cars and stuff because I want to know how to work on my car. My car, it would break down. And I'd just help people out and stuff like that. That's really smart. That's really smart. Tyrus, I know that you said you wanted to be an entrepreneur. What do you love about that? Why is that? I want to keep you here with you, bro. I don't even know what an entrepreneur is. Oh, you know, business. Yeah, what are you just saying? Fishing cars and landscaping, HVAC. I don't know. I got a lot of skills. You do. You have a lot of skills. You know a lot of people. And I think all of you have said in some way or another that you would talk to the trusted adults in your life if you were trying to figure out how to get a job or where to go. And so maybe to the folks asking questions in the chat about what to do, that making sure we can extend what we would call social capital from the people who have it now to people who would want it. So obviously, Deterius, you know a realtor and that's lucky because you can see something that you want. But if you thought you might like something like that and you didn't know anybody who sold houses, that would be a heck of a thing to try and do. And so I think for policymakers and teachers and mentors to be a little more like Aaron and Kia and connect with youth that maybe they don't know and say, here's the thing you can do. Here's a way that I can take what I have and share it with you. And so I think sharing your social network and your social capitals, what I would say to the adults in the chat, helping youth ask them what they like and what they would want to do and share your network with them. Don't just save it for your kid or your nephew or your neighbor. And I would say don't just save it for people who look like you. So kind of back where we started talking about the root causes related to it. Hey Molly. Oh yes, Kia please. There is something in the chat that I wanted to address. Is that okay with you? Take it away. So the first question was about most teens make nine to twelve dollars an hour in one of the viewers area and were some of our kids having trouble identifying those type of jobs. And the answer is yes and no. In the areas that our kids live in, there's not a abundance of job opportunities for them, right? So that requires travel, transportation and those type of things and a lot of those are barriers. How are we going to get a kid from one side of town to the next if mom is already working two jobs and this kid is relying on a city bus, which requires more money. So there's a lot of things that kind of go into the barriers of them obtaining those type of jobs. The other thing that was said in the chat was do they hear anything at their schools about work-based learning programs, apprenticeships and things like that? For clarity, our program is in this special populations group, right? Most of our kids are disengaged from school systems. And so they don't have the opportunity to talk to guidance counselors and things like that about these workplace programs. That's why community-based organizations like ours and others in the city are so vitally important to bring those resources to them. Just because they're disengaged from the school system does not mean they can't have those type of opportunities, but they don't readily get the information. And I think the move in Indianapolis in different places is making sure that we're taking that information to the communities. If the kid's not in school, how is he going to hear about the college tours or the apprentice programs and things like that? And so I just wanted to make sure we clarified that. Thank you, Kia. And I need to piggyback on what you said because of the nice people who own this flag behind me. My bosses at New America would not be tickled if I didn't say we do a lot of work in youth apprenticeship. And I see Jess's question in the chat, and I would say to double down on what Kia just said, it is hard to reach out of school youth with those programs. So an effort to do that better would be great. And also, much like everything else in workforce development and education, youth apprenticeship can be a competitive process that purports to be merit based, but the merits are decided by a lot of folks who frankly kind of look like me, right? Like who kind of already had like have a job at a think tank or something. And so I think to ask ourselves, who is the best competitor? Who is the best recruit for youth apprenticeship? And a lot of them might be some youth who have seen some stuff. To be honest, I'll be frank, people I've met in my life who deal drugs are some of the most organized, motivated, self-employed folks I know. I would like them to do something else for their personal safety. But I think the entrepreneurial mindset, motivation, determination to survive, work ethic is not something that just happens in a traditional workplace. So I really appreciate your point, Kia. And I appreciate Jessica's question about getting work-based learning opportunities to more students, even those who are out of school. So Erin, I want to come to you. Oh yeah. Well, I was going to chime in. So there is a program that I do with youth that is transferable skills. And so kind of like you said, drug dealers, they have the skills to be successful. And not even just that, it's any skills. So teamwork, you know what transferable skills is? We teach them that they already have what they need to be successful in business or in a job. You're already doing it. Okay, now let's bring it. Let's tweak it a little bit and show you how to use it in a job setting. You don't always have to risk your life or your freedom doing that. You have the skills. If you can sell drugs, you can sell cars. They sell themselves anyway. Drugs sell themselves, cars sell themselves. It's about building a relationship and having somebody buy from you. So we do that here also. We just teach transferable skills. A lot of kids come in and don't think they have skills that are until you're like, who is your charge? And they tell you your charge. You're like, okay, this is what you can do. Boom, boom, boom, boom, boom. They're like, oh, wow. Okay. That's literally all it takes. And I also always tell them is that they are built for a lot more in this world than they think. The things that even they come from, the skin that they have to have to even succeed in these areas can prep them for any type of business because it's pepper sometimes, but they already kind of know. So yeah. Thank you so much, Erin. And I see a question in the chat. Kia, I'm going to swing right back to you because this is a really important one. How does someone find themselves disengaged from the school system? Typically through suspension or expulsion is why kids are disengaged. We have transient populations as well that move a lot and they're not able to create, get into that culture. Kids here in Indianapolis could be expelled from school, from outside school, but hey, so it doesn't have to be something that they did inside school. They could have been at the skating rink or the mall and got into a fight with the peer. The school heard about it and they're expelled for the year. Our kids are typically between the ages of 13 and 18. Some of our young men get to the ages 17 and have not finished a full school year since middle school. And so when we talk about some of those transferable skills and the access to those type of resources, there's a lot of different reasons why kids are disengaged. My background is in juvenile probation. And I was a probation officer on the east side of Indianapolis in the school. And the amount of calls that I got from teachers and admin to violate kids on probation issue warrants for their arrest for school-based issues is why I left. The entry points into the system are a lot easier than, you know, the entry points into the school and education systems and the services to keep them engaged. Your locally worn township is doing an amazing job at going back to a school-based community model. So they have a whole expulsion board, you know, where they bring in community providers and they meet with the family right there at the table saying, hey, this kid is up for expulsion. But if they do, you know, home-based therapy, if they participate in this leadership program, they can still earn their credits and will allow them back in. And that's a fairly new model that I hope gets replicated across the city because we know how important these school systems are. You know, that's the mentorship, that's the sports that's sometimes only time these kids eat and all of these other opportunities. And so yeah, I hope that answers your question. Thank you, Kia. So, Erin, right before we got into our last topic, I was actually going to swing to you because I want to make sure that we hear all the wonderful insights that our guests have to offer. And I bet you talked to them more than anybody else. You would know exactly what to ask. I'm going to hand the mic to you for a minute and have you talk to our guests. Okay, for sure. So, I will start with Don Terry's. So, Donnie, how important is it for you to have somebody to talk to, you know, about anything? So, say you have stuff going on at home, how important is it for you to have somebody that can relate to you? Very important because, I mean, I don't got nobody to talk to. It's just going to start building up and then I'm going to lash out. Okay. And how does that lashing out sometimes look horrible? Okay, me yelling at somebody might hit him. Yeah. Yeah. Do you think that if you talk through those problems on a daily basis, it can prevent the lash out, not just for you, but for, you know, all youth. Yeah, yeah, for sure. I was going to ask this one too. Go ahead, go ahead, go ahead. So, we have talked about a lot like the impact of gun violence, right? You know, Mr. Aaron and I have lost three students in the last 30 days of gun violence and I know as full grown adults what that does to us. Can you talk to us a little bit about what it does as young people to kind of see the violence in your neighborhoods and your families and losing folks to gun violence? I mean, like it's crazy because I had a friend that died from gun violence and stuff like that. So, yeah, it's crazy. I don't got nothing to say. Does it become normal? It never becomes like the norm for you. Go ahead, Aaron. Sorry. Now, I pose that same question to Jaylin. Is hearing somebody, your age, dying, has that become a norm for you? Oh, yeah. A lot of these people died. So, as it kind of, since you hear it every day and see it on the news and has it kind of made you desensitized? What does that mean? Basically, it doesn't hit you hard because you're so used to seeing it daily. Yeah. Well, it's been to the point like, out of new people who died and stuff, who are as close with it as anything that I ain't really never hit me like that. I was kind of not like that. And then I'll just pose this question to all of you. You just raise your hand. How many of you have lost a friend at a young age to gun violence? Uh, Deryon Donnie, have you have either one of y'all have either one of y'all lost a friend to gun violence at a young age? I lost like four people. Yeah, I lost, I lost a friend too. So, I'll pose this to anybody who wants to chime in. When you lose a friend at that young age, because I lost one of my best friends after my dad got killed in gun violence and I know what it did to me. How does it, you don't have to go in depth, even if you guys want to answer it out. How does that make you feel as far as moving forward with like your feelings about it? You will go. Yeah. So, boom, I lost my first friend at 14. And I just haven't been the same ever since. Oh, there it is. I'm sorry. Go ahead. I'm agree with him. I'm agree with him. I lost a friend when I was like, I was 14 too. You hear me? I didn't feel the same, neither. Like it's just, it's something about it. It's like when a friend, I was like, you don't care. Like, you feel, you feel some different way and then you move different too, because you don't know if somebody won't come after you or what, like what's going on, touch stuff, need beef with it. Did any of you guys, when you lost your friend, was there, how did you guys cope? Was there therapy? Was there a mentor? Was there a family member? I had a mentor, like, because I was mad at the point. Like, I always wanted to talk to somebody about my feelings and all that, because if I don't talk to nobody, they're not exposed. I get mad over stuff that I'm thinking about, like, because it'd be, it'd be hurting me for some reason. Jaylin, were you going to say something? How do you cope with the death? Well, I mean, I had somebody to talk to, of course, drugs, and I don't know, like, when my first friend died or whatever, like, my behavior changed. Like, for me, I kind of used to already be doing a little bad stuff here and there, but then, like, my behavior changed drastically. Now, I'm asking you, when you lose a person, you kind of stop caring. Is there something that adults can do in those moments? Because, honestly, I don't think it's normal to lose people like that. It is extremely traumatic, and it does, it does change everything for you. Is there something that us as adults can do when something like that happens to, you know, help you? Oh, no. I mean, just, I say, like, be a support system, be there, just be there to talk to whatever going on, ask questions, stuff like that. Erin, I thought I saw some shaking heads on that. Can I ask for our young guests, if there's nothing adults can do, if you're willing and comfortable to share, why does it feel that way? Because, like, I don't know, this is, I don't know. Like, they wouldn't understand this or something. Like, they could try to help as much as they want, but it still won't solve the problem. You got to deal with it the rest of your life. You want your friend back? Yeah, you want your friend back? You feel me? That wasn't their friend, you feel me? So they don't know how you feel. So you got to go through all by yourself. That's how I feel. Thank you for sharing that. And I would lift that up for the audience and point out that it is, it sounds to me like we're hearing it's vitally important that you have folks who have shared lived experience to work with and look to and talk to. And so a practical step is to make sure that we center trauma-informed teaching and counseling and programming that takes into account these experiences. I just wanted to lift that up. Erin and Kia, I'll hand it back to you. I was just responding to a question that was in the chat. It says, do the schools have reentry plans? Is it difficult for kids to follow the plan and what kind of external environments are causing issues for them? Most of our schools do have reentry plans. They include going to alternative schools where they can catch up on their credits, improve their behavior or their attendance and then make their way back to their traditional schools. The most utilized option is at home, online learning without teacher instruction. And that's where we see the most problems with a kid getting the support to return back to a school setting. They don't have teachers that are going through the lessons with them. They've already been out of school for a period of time. Some have internet access if the school provides it. Sometimes they don't. And so those are the type of external stuff. The home isn't really the best condition for learning. Then at the alternative school side, you know, they do work a lot with social emotional behavior and academics. That path back is typically for some of the barriers come in. Go ahead, Erin. I'm sorry. And I just, you know, we started off talking about violence. And I'll say, you can really, anybody can chime in. Do you think that the traumas that we experience, such as losing a friend correlates to growing up and being in violent situations? So the violence that we experience from losing a friend or, I mean, the trauma, does that kind of put you in a situation where it could be violent, more violent, just more. Felt and experienced it. Sorry, I thought we were all mute. Pete, repeat what you said. I'll say, yeah, he's going to make it worse because, you know, you're always going to want to get back, right? You see what I'm saying? The revenge aspect of it is what kind of keeps that cycle going. What are we saying, Jaylin? I'm sorry. More like what he was saying. Like people, I think when I lost a friend, I did become more violent or whatever. Because people just, people don't take that nicely. You know what I'm saying? Losing somebody. Yeah. And then it'd be like this, like when you're friends, there's something they might get the egging on about like making jokes about. And that's what started everything. Distant, you feel me? It's on going cycle. God, that's how gun violence started. And Dantarius, to follow up on that, where do you guys see all the distant and the jokes and laugh it? Where is all that coming from? Insta. What did you say? I couldn't hear you. Insta girl. It's really on social media. Yeah, on social media, they get the distant bad. They get to talk about the family members and all that and then you feel some type of way. Do you want to try to get your get back? But you're not trying to, you're not trying to like say if you want your get back, but you ain't trying to like do the time type stuff. Like that's how people be doing it. They just, they just want to get their get back and then go about their day. Some people, they get their get back and then that's when they either, they'll just be like, yeah, I'd whoop the whoop, and then just say, yeah, my future brother or something like that. God, then it's like an on-going cycle. You don't keep going. You get the dude, you get him, keep on going. It's like a cycle, bad cycle. What if anything stops that? I mean, I think it would stop because Sam's dead. It's people out here right now that they just waiting to come to the next person. And when they do something to that next person, somebody going to be ready to do something to that person. So it's or that person's family. So it's a lot of people affected by the deaths. And then my last question would be to y'all. Do you think that before it gets to a point where we got to use guns, do you think that if we had conflict resolution, resolution skills, that some of this beef could be squashed before it gets to a point where it gets to I need get back or somebody can die or you think you can we can figure it out before it gets to those. I mean, it was obviously there's trainings for it. So it's not like something that people are just born knowing how to resolve conflict. But do you think that will help? I think no, because like, I mean, you got to be a real strong person. I feel like because somebody, if somebody took someone you love so much away from you. Oh, I'm saying before it even gets there. It's already been there. That's what I'm saying. Like before I was even here, somebody tooks, you feel me? It's been going on. It's new. But when we came around, we got into it with the people we grew up with. So before that, it was our family, our older people getting into it with people, people died. That's the generational stuff. You know what I mean? And Erin, we talked to them about this all the time. You know, you touched on it earlier in this part, you know, what they see, you know, that's how they learned to resolve conflict. And so that's why, you know, with us, we've been opening up more services to the family. This is generational stuff. This isn't just something new. That's just starting all of a sudden. That is a perfect place, I think, to wrap up. Not because we couldn't keep talking, we could. But I want to make sure that we honor the time of the students who've joined us and honor Erin and Kia's time. I want to take a moment just to sum up a little bit of what we've heard. One is that gun violence is a persistent problem and it has multi-generational roots. It's not based on our race. It's not based on our culture, but it's based on a series of systems that have gotten us here. Ways that folks don't have resources that they need, whether those are social, emotional, mental resources, financial resources, food, transit, jobs, but also consideration. And I think one of the most important resources we have to utilize here is in the form of places like voices and to start bringing voices and organizations like them and the youth, colleagues and clients that they serve to the table when you're designing a solution because you might tear your hair out and say, well, why don't kids do X? There might be a very good reason or at least a reason that makes a whole lot of sense. And I think to be healing centered and focused on the personal in this, it really matters. And I think we heard that a lot. And so I want to take time, obviously, to thank Erin and Kia for their exceptional work and also thank Lauren Hall, who works at Voices and works with New America. I really, really want to thank Jalen and Duntarius and Tyrus and Darien. It takes a lot of courage to stand up and say, this is how this public problem feels, much less to say it on a screen with some people you don't know. And so I want to thank you and what I also heard besides a lot of loss for which I'm very deeply sorry and I hope you all continue to heal. I heard a lot of ambition and I heard direction and I heard potential and I heard excellence. And I know that that will continue and I hope you'll stay in touch with me and with New America and with the folks at Voices so that we can keep that going. This recording will be made available on the New America YouTube channel to all folks who've registered. Thank you again to Voices, to our special guests, and to everyone who joined us listening today. Keep up the good work and we'll continue the conversation in the Youth America series. Thank you so much.