The following is a sneak peek from our November issue, on its way to newsstands now.
Shyamuu Bhagat (left) leads a drumming circle at Sixth Mount Zion Baptist Church on Oct. 7. Organizers of the Gilpin Court Youth Peace Team hope to use the event to teach kids life skills. (Photo by Parker Michels-Boyce)
As a kid at Blackwell Elementary School in South Richmond, I was stoked about joining the performing dance troupe. I attended the practices and rehearsed the moves in my head over and over again. On the day of tryouts, the dance instructor called a group of us onstage and started the music. We were about to perform a choreographed dance to the O’Jays 1972 hit, “Love Train.” It was a song that my classmates and I really dug. We could move easily to the beat and the message was one of hope.
The instructor stood in front of us and began the dance moves with the group. We were feeling good about our performance when he abruptly walked offstage to chat with another adult. Several of us paused mid-dance to await his return. Moments later, he walked back toward us and pointed at each person who’d stopped dancing. We’d been cut. It was a hard lesson, but the message was clear: No matter the distraction or diversion, never stop dancing. How can you dance to your fullest potential if you allow distractions — which often come in the form of challenges, adversity and doubt — to pause your purpose?
Today, in our most vulnerable communities, children desperately want to dance to the drums of success, achievement, confidence, peace and prosperity. They are eager to become innovators, change makers and revolutionaries in their own right. But a system of oppression makes it all too easy to become distracted and disillusioned. Traps ensnare them, and they stop dancing. Some of them never even get the opportunity to begin.
The fact that Richmond lost several teenagers to violent crime this year and has seen multiple homicides within its public housing communities reminds us that we are continuing to fail the people who live there — more than 50 percent of whom are children. We ignore the historical fact that Richmond’s “projects” were created to isolate low-income blacks. This has resulted in lack of access to key resources and opportunities, including quality schools, gainful employment, healthy food and a safe, nurturing environment.
The city’s recent talk of placing cameras in public housing neighborhoods, issuing mandatory car decals and relying on a “Respect Richmond” marketing campaign won’t resolve the generations-long damage inflicted there. These temporary tactics — which scream surveillance, confinement and criminalization of the poor — only mask the root of the crisis while superficially dealing with the symptoms.
We should become more concerned about how the inequitable structures of education, housing, health, employment, transportation and other components work together to fuel poverty and crime. Black and brown boys and girls are negatively labeled by society, disproportionately disciplined in their schools and wrongly pushed into the path of the juvenile justice system because of the color of their skin, their ZIP code and a lack of cultural competency training in schools.
Richmond’s leaders, including the mayor, police chief, public housing officials, school administrators and others, must begin working collaboratively with a more thoughtful, holistic and intersectional approach. Stronger and more genuine partnerships between city officials, residents, advocates, activists, community organizations, businesses and colleges can help to connect dots and fill gaps on behalf of our children, who, according to a recent Virginia Commonwealth University study, have a 20-year difference in life expectancy if they live in Gilpin Court public housing than if they live only 5 miles southwest in the Westover Hills neighborhood.
How can we tout that we are “One Richmond” when many of our children are seemingly living in two different worlds, one of which has too many black and brown children suffering and dying prematurely? And then we wonder why some of our children aren’t dancing, aren’t thriving. It’s certainly not because they don’t desire to, or deserve to.
I grew up in Hillside Court, a public housing community in South Richmond, where I heard gunshots almost nightly and had to wade through strangers selling their wares just to get to my front door. I lost friends to violence. Often, I wondered if anyone in city government cared about my community. But I came to realize that we had the power to shape and tell our own story. I went on to become a journalist writing about the ills facing places like Hillside, a public relations professional helping to reframe the narrative around such communities, a doctoral student researching the correlation between the media and health outcomes for marginalized populations; and a mentor working with youth.
What I know is that children in vulnerable communities, if given resources and support, are highly resilient. My siblings and I can attest to this, as well as childhood friends and youth that I mentor.
Back at Blackwell Elementary, after my second tryout for the dance troupe, I made the team. I was determined that I wouldn’t stop dancing no matter what — I would move to the beat of the drum within me.
As a collective, we need to dismantle policies and practices that perpetuate injustices. When violence strikes, we must tackle the underlying causes while also wrapping supportive services around the affected neighborhoods. At the same time, it is critical that we cultivate resilience in our youth, families and communities. We must build on their strengths and potential. We must constantly let our children know that even in the face of distractions, trauma and adversity, they have a beautiful dance within them. They need to know that their dancing spirit can liberate minds, move mountains and revolutionize the world.
Osita Iroegbu, a first-generation Nigerian-American, is a communications professional, community advocate and doctoral candidate at Virginia Commonwealth University. This past summer, she served as a 2017 Governor’s Fellow in the Virginia Governor’s Children’s Cabinet, which works to align local, state and federal policies, as well as public-private resources, to enhance services for Virginia’s children and families, especially those at highest risk. She can be contacted at oiroegbu@gmail.com.
