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

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  • Black Women Find Healing (But Sometimes Racism, Too) in the Outdoors

    To encourage more Black people to explore outdoors, individuals and organizations in Colorado are working to address underlying barriers such as access to transportation and gear, as well as fear and concerns of safety. Despite the groups still encountering "frustrating" incidents with other outdoor recreationalists, the movement has spread to other states and steadily attracted a growing community of members.

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  • The ex-monk and the Thai sex mafia: helping victims find another way

    Wat Arun Rajvaram Community Learning Centre, founded on Buddhist precepts by a former monk, has trained more than 250 Thai young women for work as nurse assistants, jobs aimed at keeping them out of the illicit sex trade, forced labor, and arranged marriages. High school graduates, ages 16 to 19, are selected in groups of 15-20 per year, mostly on scholarships paid by donors. They typically come from rural towns where poor families often sell their daughters to traffickers. Nearly all graduate and are guaranteed jobs at hospitals and health centers in Bangkok or elsewhere in Thailand.

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  • CASA program uses volunteers to advocate for kids

    In 55 Ohio counties, judges can appoint volunteers from Court Appointed Special Advocate (CASA) programs to represent the interests of children when their families' struggles end up in court. CASA volunteers act as a judge's eyes and ears in the lives of children who are suspected of being victims of abuse or neglect, or who at least need a more stable home. They recommend placement options and treatment services. Such programs can save counties money, by replacing paid lawyers serving as guardians, and volunteers can be more attentive to children's needs.

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  • 2021 Will Be the Year of Guaranteed Income Experiments

    Universal Basic Income is gaining popularity across the United States, where 11 cities in 2021 are either extending or piloting new programs that provide cash payments without any conditions on how to spend the money. The success of UBI has been detailed in several other cities, most notably in Stockton, California, under Mayor Michael Tubbs, who has been voted out but has since launched the Mayors for a Guaranteed Income. The coalition of 30 mayors will run experiments by choosing families and individuals facing economic hardship; the ultimate goal being a federal UBI program.

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  • How activists successfully shut down key pipeline projects in New York

    Landowners, residents, community leaders, and activist groups across New York state came together to halt several pipeline projects. By conducting research, holding public events, and building a multiracial coalition of people who would be the most impacted by a pipeline, they were able to pressure state officials to deny a water-quality permit for the Constitution pipeline that would carry fracked gas throughout the northeastern United States and Canada. While some pipeline projects are continuing in the Empire State, their successful model could be used in other states.

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  • Five Days Without Cops: Could Brooklyn Policing Experiment be a ‘Model for the Future'?

    For 50 hours over five days, police and community members collaborated on the Brownsville Safety Alliance pilot project, which kept police officers away from a longtime crime hotspot so that community members could provide for police-free public safety. During the experiment, no one in the neighborhood called 911 to report a serious crime. Criminologists caution that the test does not prove that police can step away permanently. But residents say that after longstanding friction over policing, they and the police struck a new tone of cooperation in community-led crime prevention that they hope can continue.

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  • New laws lead some Washington prosecutors to rethink three-strike life sentences

    Nearly three decades after Washington voters made their state the first to enact a three-strikes law, imposing life imprisonment for repeated, serious offenses, some prosecutors have found ways to avoid the law's effects that are seen as unduly harsh or racially biased. Some have interpreted a law authorizing resentencing to apply to three-strikes cases. Others have pushed the governor to grant clemency more often. This new willingness to question the law's effects is not universal among prosecutors, and the state Supreme Court soon will weigh in on the issue.

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  • A Year of Intersex Victories

    To promote the need to end intersex surgery, an organization launched a multi-pronged campaign that raised awareness about the potentially damaging impacts of the practice. The group used social media, created a petition, and held protests outside of a local hospital – all of which resulted in the Ann & Robert H. Lurie Children’s Hospital of Chicago issuing an apology and declaring that "they will no longer be performing intersex surgeries unless absolutely medically necessary moving forward." Throughout the world, similar awareness efforts have also garnered positive outcomes.

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  • How a German organisation tackles anti-Semitism in schools

    Meet A Jew is a volunteer organization in Germany helping combat anti-semitism and bigotry by educating students in elementary and secondary schools about Jewish culture and traditions of those living in Germany. The organization has about three hundred volunteers from a variety of different backgrounds, who then hold 90-minute sessions where students are welcomed to ask anything.

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  • At Chicago's Immigrant-Run Corner Stores, Striving for Food and Racial Justice

    The Corner Store Campaign alleviates food insecurity in Chicago by providing fresh produce and supplies to customers who frequent the neighborhood establishments - typically in places that are more likely to be food deserts. The program is run by Inner-City Muslim Action Network (IMAN), which also seeks to ease and heal the historically-fraught relationship between immigrant corner store owners and the black communities they typically cater to by partnering with the Muslim Anti-Racism Collaborative to engage in dialogue about policing and community safety.

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