Submitted by Anonymous on
By Ram Uppuluri
During the six years since I first started working as Counsel to the Committee on Human Services and have become the Senior Policy Advisor at FOCUS, I have learned more than I ever thought I would about the causes and devastating impacts of youth violence and juvenile crime; the desperate demand for positive youth programs in our neighborhoods; the overwhelming numbers of so-called “disconnected” and “at-risk” youth in the District; and the seemingly never-ending stream of homeless and incarcerated youth and many others headed for a life of dependency on the system.
The odds of these young people becoming productive citizens and contributing members of society are diminished further every day by the lack of education and educational opportunities they received in their youth.
It has been through this lens that I have arrived at one of the most simple and basic conclusions of my life: education is the most important thing. It is the key to improving the lives of our young people, and yes, it is the last chapter of the Civil Rights movement still, after all these years, unfulfilled.
So we should NEVER say “no” to proposals to create new, high-quality educational opportunities for youth in the District.
Now, one of the District’s highest-performing charter schools, the KIPP School, is proposing to create a high quality 650-student high school at the corner of I Street and South Capitol Street in Southwest DC.
They’ll fill this school with young people who want the education KIPP has to offer, who want to get on with their lives, go to college, and become productive self-empowered, personally and socially responsible individuals.
I can’t help but wonder why Mayor Gray is reluctant to approve KIPP’s proposal. “KIPP is a great school. They do good work, “ his spokesman said. “But that doesn’t mean that we’re simply going to hand over a parcel of land to them.”
Given what we know about the importance of education and its role in changing people’s lives for the better, we should not only be saying “yes” to KIPP, but “hell yes!” and “please come!” and “how can I help?” - not erecting barriers and creating excuses for delay.