Artwork stating 'Education Destroys Barriers', 'We Demand Treatment', and 'I Need A Chance'

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  • The judge, jury and lawyers are kids. But punishments at N.J. youth court are real.

    The 10-year-old Newark Youth Court has heard some 700 cases in which high school students serve as judge, jury, and lawyers in proceedings that avoid school discipline or criminal charges with creative exercises in personal accountability. Taking aim at fights, disruptive behavior, or more serious offenses involving weapons or drugs. the Youth Court seeks to encourage better life choices. Outcomes may exclude punishment altogether, imposing community service (including Youth Court jury duty) or other alternatives to jail, avoiding criminal records that can ruin someone's future.

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  • More Seattleites are housing homeless people in their backyards, but it's hard to find the right fit

    In Seattle, the BLOCK project started two years ago to build houses for those experiencing homelessness in backyards. While the project has slow-going - with only 9 matches between families and an unhoused person completed - that's in part because the non-profit is incredibly deliberate about its process in recognition of some controversy the idea has recieved.

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  • After positive results, Minneapolis looks to expand anti-violence program

    About 40% fewer people were shot in gang-related disputes in Minneapolis during one interval in the first year of the city's Group Violence Intervention initiative. The program uses "call-ins" where people at high risk of shootings meet with law enforcement and other agencies. There they are offered incentives, including needed services, to stop the shootings. It also puts former gang members on the streets, without police involvement, to mediate disputes and counsel young men prone to violence. Based on the initial results, officials planned to expand the program to more parts of the city.

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  • Holland Aims to Bring Back Its Starry Nights

    To address the harm - both to human psychology as well as natural ecosystems - of artificial light, The Netherlands calls on its citizens to turn their lights off and feel the effects of a natural darkness. The awareness of negative consequences of artificial light has helped residents reduce light consumption, though turning the lights off is an uphill battle with international corporate powerhouses.

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  • Chicago Police Hope To Build Trust With Experiment In Community Policing

    Chicago police have rebuilt some of the trust they lost in one part of the city, where the police department has used private funding to launch a community-policing program. In the department's 25th district, residents get to know their neighborhood officers and can call them directly, something they did 20,000 times in just the first nine months of the pilot project. "Community ambassadors" serve as liaisons between officers and neighbors who are leery of connecting with the police whose department's brutality and misconduct strained relations over many years. The city is working to expand the program.

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  • Greta Thunberg sparks surge in sailboat hitchhiking

    Greta Thunberg is well-known for leading the youth climate movement, but her habit of using sailboats as a means of transportation is also gaining traction. Facebook groups that help connect sailboat hitchhikers have seen a significant uptick in members as of late, which in turn supports eco-friendly traveling.

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  • Recife is tackling violence by making life better for its youngest residents

    The Brazilian city of Recife is tackling violence prevention by focusing on early-childhood education through a program called Urban95. In addition to painting the streets and buildings bright colors, Urban95 offers accessible services like pre- and post-natal services to caregivers and storytelling & play opportunities for young children. The program was rolled out in two communities, and one proved more successful than the other because it partnered with a preexisting organization within the community.

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  • Housing initiative for LGBTQ young people strives to create a ‘family bond'

    For LGBTQ+ youth experiencing homelessness and/or with a foster placement history, barriers to education, work, health, and general safety are a common experience. The Quads on Lancaster supportive housing program in Philadelphia offers a small amount of transition housing for LGBTQ youth who have aged out of the system, establishing personal connections and providing services to help participants prepare for adulthood.

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  • In Borneo, healthy people equals healthy forests

    Those who live on the island of Borneo understand that their well-being comes from the Gunung Palung National Park, but logging remained rampant because it was the only way to make money to pay for healthcare. Thus, an organization named "Health in Harmony" was borne through "radically listening" to locals to find out what they needed. This organization accepts creative forms of payment for healthcare and offers incentives to cease logging, including a chainsaw buyback program. As a result, ten years later they saw a 90% drop in logging households and a re-growth of 52,000 acres of forest.

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  • The boys learning anti-sexism in India

    A program launched by the Equal Community Foundation (ECF) in 2011 called Action for Equality (AFE) educates more than 5,000 teenage boys in Pune, India about violence against women. They spend 43 weeks learning curriculum designed to help them spot gender-based violence, how to intervene and be a model for change, and how to disrupt gender norms. The program is especially effective, because it is coordinated by young men in their 20s whom the teenage boys look up to. About 80% of participants graduate, and many families testify to their son/brother/nephew's changed behavior.

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