Students Protest New Orleans Center for Creative Arts High School (NOCCA)

Friday, May 19, in the early afternoon NOCCA leadership used security to remove three young black men, their parents, and advocates from the campus. The school refused the right to graduate two young black boys after giving them an additional 1,790 online assignments to complete only hours before the graduation ceremony. 

The school then failed to provide the young men access to this unreasonably large work packet in time for them to complete it. The school finally barred the students from attending their graduation ceremony, citing these incomplete assignments. NOCCA also attempted to "counsel out" (force to transfer) another young black men, who was recently accepted to University of California Berkeley, and had completed all of his course work.

When he requested a hearing to discuss the options, he and his advocates were also forcibly removed from NOCCA’s campus and he was barred from attending his school's graduation ceremony.

NOCCA has admitted to having problems retaining young black men in their academic program. This is largely due to failing to provide culturally relevant support and appropriate accommodations for students with trauma and divergent learning styles, as well as blatantly racist policies. At least five other black boys and one black girl have been "counselled out" this year. Parents are often told that the school is "not a good fit for them.” It leads one to believe that NOCCA is not a good fit for black children.

Following are the demands being voiced by the black students, parents, and advocates:

1. An apology letter to the young black students and their families for undue stress and trauma.
2. An apology to the class of 2017 for disrupting their graduation ceremony and causing them pain. Many of these young men classmates were hurt by the school’s treatment of the young black boys.
3. That the young men are allowed to participate in the Arts Master Celebration on Monday.
4. That the school get Undoing Racism, School to Prison Pipeline, and Culturally Relevant Education training for all faculty, staff, and board members. 

Organizers are also asking that concerned community members join in the ongoing fight for education justice in this city's school system, which is itself a powerful symbol of white supremacy that must also be TAKEN DOWN and replaced with a liberatory system of community controlled PUBLIC schools!

For more information please contact:

Ashana Bigard  ambigard@gmail.com
(504)322-6582

Roshsaana Ison isonacts@gmail.com
(504)621-7452

Gina Womack gwomack@fflic.org
FFLIC.org

 #NOCCA3
#BMR support young black men
#FFLIC NOLA EDU on trial

Talking To My Son About Troy Davis, By Gina B. Womack

From Bridge the Gulf:
Friday, September 23, 2011

Tonight on my way home, I told my 13 year-old son that Troy Davis was put to death by the State of Georgia. He immediately broke into tears. I was taken aback by his reaction. We were just coming from his school football game where he had an awesome tackle and we should have been focusing and having a joyous discussion about that. But he asked me how my day went and when he was studying the constitution in school we had discussed Troy Davis and the right to a fair trial, so I thought I would let him know.

This is really a sad day for Troy Davis’s family, for all who are caught up in the INJUST justice system and for all children who are being taught about our constitution, especially children of color who need to learn that the constitution may work for some but not for everyone. As an African American male, he needs to know that not only is he 6 times more likely to be incarcerated than his white friends but also 3 times more likely to be executed.

This has left my son questioning how the United States would execute anyone, particularly someone who might be innocent like Troy Davis – From the mouth of babes. One might wonder how this could ever happen once, but it is a sad and awful truth that this occurs too many times. This isn’t something he will learn in his history class.

Reflecting on our criminal justice system as a whole, it’s really difficult to know how to move forward especially after Justice Scalia’s statement: "there is nothing unconstitutional about executing the innocent” and in comparing two very similar situations where a black man is executed and a white man is given clemency, as in the recent post I’ve seen about Troy Davis and Samuel Crowe. We have our work cut out for us. This is not a time to revert back to our everyday life, but a time to stand up and shout that this is wrong and we are not going to stand idly by and continue to watch this happen.

In our work in the juvenile justice system in Louisiana we see far too often the hands of evil working against our children and families. Far too often there is no accountability, from the Office of Juvenile Justice right up to the Governor’s office. When shown the evidence that children continue to be hurt and neglected by the hands that are supposed to care for them and help keep them from entering the adult system; or even worse, when shown the fate that has befallen Troy Davis, too many times those in power turn a blind eye.

What is being said here is that it is ok when our system makes mistakes, ignores the law, ignores the constitution, and takes longer than necessary to reform. Apparently, we can just lock children up for making mistakes, we can beat them, we can fail them, we can incarcerate them, we can push them into the adult system, and even kill them. 

Yes, we must keep up the movement, but it’s time that our movement includes action to get rid of those in power who continue to harm our communities! Our children are counting on us to keep them safe, and they are counting on America to include Justice for ALL!

Gina B. Womack is the executive director and co-founder of Families and Friends of Louisiana’s Incarcerated Children (FFLIC), a statewide membership-based organization dedicated to creating a better life for all of Louisiana’s youth, especially those who are involved, or at risk of becoming involved in the juvenile justice system. Gina is the proud mother of three children, a member of Pleasant Zion Missionary Baptist Church and Sanctuary Choir as well the Joyful Gospel Choir. She is honored to be a 2006 Petra Foundation Fellow, 2009 Juvenile Justice Project of Louisiana Advocate of the Year and 2009 Ms. Foundation Women of Vision award. Gina is also a 2011 Alston Bannerman National Fellow.

Juvenile Justice Advocates Release Report: A Failing System Reminiscent of Tallulah

From our friends at Families and Friends of Louisiana's Incarcerated Children:
On Monday, Families and Friends of Louisiana’s Incarcerated Children (FFLIC), released a report to the Office of Juvenile Justice, the Juvenile Justice Implementation Commission, and Governor Bobby Jindal, providing details of family reports of failing juvenile reform. The report highlights OJJs failure to in implement the Juvenile Justice Reform Act of 2003 (ACT 1225) and offers recommendations which will bring about reform and move Louisiana more inline with an internationally accepted model of juvenile rehab services. (Family reports comprised by FFLIC were given anonymously due to concerns of retaliation or other harm against incarcerated youth.)

FFLIC is a state-wide agency serving as an advocate for parents who have children receiving inadequate care, safety and rehabilitative services while in the care of state juvenile facilities.

In the nearly 20-page report, FFLIC highlights comparisons and contrasts to and between the current Louisiana and Missouri models of juvenile rehabilitative services. According to FFLIC, the Office of Juvenile Justice agreed to adopt the internationally acclaimed Missouri Model, developed by the Missouri Services Youth Institute, which focuses on therapeutic, child-centered environment versus a traditional adult correctional or custodial model. Among the standards successfully implemented in the Missouri Model, FFLIC believes Louisiana is ineffective in rehabilitative therapy, placement of low-risk youth, facility staff and administration, youth transitions to productive citizenship, education, and physical facilities.

Gina Womack, Executive Director of FFLIC, says she is saddened by the findings in the report and is disappointed that these constant shortcomings by the Office of Juvenile Justice force organizations such as FFLIC, observing its 10 year anniversary, to exist. “In the 10 years we have existed, we’ve gotten a law passed — a law that is largely being ignored. Children are still being abused and neglected within a system that vows to care for them. The fate of our children is in the hands of people who continue to treat our children with disregard and their families with disrespect,” Womack says.

“Our children are being handled according to outdated correctional methods. We need to get a handle on this situation before another child dies behind those razor-wire fences,” Womack added.

Other major areas of concern cited in the report include:

A lack of family involvement
A mother of a child currently at the Bridge City Center for Youth said she was not given any information about her child when he entered Office of Juvenile Justice custody. Upon her child’s intake, she was not made aware of whom she should call in order to receive information. Another parent expressed her concern about how parents are informed of policy changes. While visiting her son, this parent was informed that visitation policies had changed while some parents were turned away before seeing their children.

A lack of high caliber staff involvement
FFLIC believes Bridge City struggles to retain adequately trained staff due to administrative problems and a lack of support. Currently, probation officers and parole officers are being used to supplement understaffed shifts. The report also cites multiple incidents of staff sexual misconduct and intimate relationships with the youth. A social worker was terminated from Swanson for having a relationship with a youth and there are reports of misconduct at Bridge City.

Poor youth services and harsh facility conditions
Parents are learning from their children that youth interactions have grown “extremely hostile” within the past months, resulting in fights between youths from different neighborhoods. As a means to prevent the violence, one parent said the Office of Juvenile Justice simply places more aggressive youth in the same dorm facility.

“The Louisiana juvenile justice system does not seem to be rehabilitating too many youth,” FFLIC officials stated in the report. “Instead, these youth are being housed and released without any significant change to their behavior and perceptions. Sometimes due to the mistreatment and the violence they have suffered while locked up, they (youth) become more harden(ed) and jeopardize themselves and their community.”

FFLIC came on the scene in 2001 when the organization held a “Mock Jazz Funeral” to mourn the dead and dying dreams of Louisiana’s youth. The jazz funeral protest garnered national media attention and led to the closing of the Tallulah youth prison, deemed the worst juvenile facility in the country by the New York Times in 2000. At the Louisiana facility, youth were subjected to broken bones, black eyes, fractured jaws, and rapes as everyday occurrences.