How can we stop gang-violence in inner cities and motivate young people to place importance on education?

Question

This question was asked at the Dropping Knowledge event on 9th September by Stephanie Allen, 53, Santa Monica, California, USA. To find out more about Dropping Knowledge check out our blog:

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Answer 1

There are some cultures and tribes that say...

"It takes an entire village to raise a child"

If we all watch out for all the children and raise them together then may be they won't be inclined to join a gang for acceptance. It is not a matter of using jail, violence or boot camps to teach them a lesson and scare them into being a good samaritan, it is a matter for us to join together as a society, adults, educators, "hero's", to raise them.

We can't lay individual blame on the parent(s) schools or teachers for misguided kids in the streets or to use them as the answer to correct the problem. It is us as a society who should be to blame because we are scared, don't care, not my problem, I have my own problems, who are to blame. If we all watch out for one another then the world would be a better place to live in.


Many hands guiding the young, enrich their knowledge to make a better world.

Answer 2

Well first of all, someone has got to get through to all these teens who end up pregnant and on welfare, who think drugs and booze are the be all and end all and who have access to guns and bullets in mommy and daddy's bedroom closet.

These kids have to be SCARED STRAIGHT. No other way around it.

Parents should be made accountable for minors. Minors should have curfews and those curfews should be enforced and if not parents should be fined. The more curfews the bigger the fine.

Again, the big SCARE factor. Believe me it works.

I've taken care of many a bully that victimized my children, and it wasn't by getting through to the bully, because they would just stick out their tongue at you and worse, but when you threaten the parent with charges, wow...does the bullying suddenly stop! Twice I've had parents remove their children from the school (and run). What do I care, I've solved the problem. But the problem is bigger than this and must be taken seriously by society and by our judicial system.

Charity begins at home. So does discipline. I don't care how ignorant you are, it doesn't take a genius to raise a child and keep them off the street.

As I said if you are having teens and crackheads bearing children and then having government supporting them...well there is something wrong with this picture. Why would someone from an environment like that work, when they can sell drugs and earn hundreds or thousands a day. If that is what they are born into it's a pretty rare bird that will leave that environment.

Stop the problem from happening at the source and eventually the gang-violence will trickle off.

It's no easy thing mind you. We need to get tough with guns as well as drugs. Canada needs to get wicked and mean with the good old USA who needs to do something about this problem of guns there. Time to hang up the cowboy boots and bring out the whip I think.

Answer 3

How can you stop gang violence?
The same way you can motivate
parents to love their children.
When you figure that out,
the education will come naturally.

This entire problem is about love
and caring. Parents do not love
their children because nobody
loved them. They do not know.

These kids have just been
born like cattle to people
who could care less about
a new life or whether it
'makes it' in the world or not!

The lack of love breeds the
lack of caring. Nobody cares,
because it doesn't do any
good to care.
They are stuck in a hopeless
downward swirl. They can't go
up, because they never
even LOOK up!

It is in all humanity to seek
love and attention, a positive
feeling, and a sense of
belonging....ta da!....the gang!

The 'belonging' may be the
only time the child has ever
had a sense of being a 'part'
of something.

The saying about strength in
numbers, is true - they gain
their strength from knowing
that they are hooked up with
people like themselves.

They all have something in common.
The bathe their emotions in the
sense of being a part of something.

They feel they must take the harsh
treatment of the 'leaders'
(parent symbols) because that
is just like they had at home
from their parent (s?) and older
stronger siblings.

They have only been taught
survival. (and that is self-taught)
If indeed they have survived!
Quite a few don't! Not love.

Find a way to make mothers
LOVE their children (and it is
NOT by giving them money!) and
you will not have the problem of
gangs, or lack of education.

Any mother who loves her child
will see that they get an education
so that they can enjoy a richer life.

We actually have the same problem
with people with a higher standard
of living. Even they go through the
'motions', they do not have genuine
love for their children and they are
just as lost as the gang members.

It is just that their parents 'buy them off'
with trips to the mall and camp and
anything else to 'get the kids out
of their hair!'

We have lost love. LOVE
breeds understanding and
caring and nurturing and
everything that this world
is lacking.

How can you teach love?
How can you legislate love?
How can you penetrate
and saturate love into the
areas that it is needed?

There is only one way that
I have ever known about, and
you don't want to hear about
that........

Answer 4

Charity begins at home. So does discipline. I don't care how ignorant you are, it doesn't take a genius to raise a child and keep them off the street.

As I said if you are having teens and crackheads bearing children and then having government supporting them...well there is something wrong with this picture. Why would someone from an environment like that work, when they can sell drugs and earn hundreds or thousands a day. If that is what they are born into it's a pretty rare bird that will leave that environment.

Stop the problem from happening at the source and eventually the gang-violence will trickle off.

Answer 5

This is a very important question, but unfortunately, at the point when people already join gangs, the damage is almost irreversible. In order to solve such an issue it would take an enormous effort to educate the potential parents. To do that we need to look at who typically gives birth to a future gang member. Young people typically turn to gangs because they provide the sense of family that they lack at home. The question then becomes how do we give that sense of family to kids who grow up to become gang members when their parents don't provide it? Community outreach programs like big brother and big sister help, but the government needs to also provide more places where troubled youth can turn to. Even when the occasional troubled youth gets to go along on a trip or to a camp that parents usually pay for, through a scolarship program for instance, it is hard for the child to then come back home and be hit in the face with their harsh reality. This is a tough tough situation.

Answer 6

We can show these gangs there are other ways, but inner city gangs have been a problem since before the Civil War, so I rather doubt it is that simple. It's not poverty that holds them there, just look at the type of cars they own and drive. You are as likely to see a $50,000 SUV parked in front of a run down home in a poverty area, as you are to see them in high income areas. Being a cab driver, I see it every day. People like Jesse Jackson do help keep many in poverty by not encouraging them to enter blue collar work, the training for which takes 1/5th the time of a college degree, and has starting pay rates $10,000 higher than business college graduates. And, they are not as likely to get laid off.

Answer 7

I know this will sound odd compaired to some, but I do not think putting religion back in schools will help.

Offer more programs that let them have fun learning. Not just the same boring classes over and over. Ok so you have to learn English, let them create something besides essays. Have a poem contest or even a rap off to see who can use the most proper words with out sounding goofy. Could work.

Let them vote on the ciriculem instead of just learning it. They will surprise you. Note what they suggest, dont just toss it out. Happens alot, we dont listen. One teacher threw out an idea given her by a student, another found it not realizing it was written by a student. The first teacher hadd the same issues all year, the second one had more a students then in any other year. All the kid suggested was they be allowed to make creative posters on what they were learning in History to keep track of where they were. There was a small prize for the best one to be voted on by the studnet body, no names allowed to be placed on the posters until after the vote was final. This kept the popular kid from winning just because they were popular. A free day for a student is a small prize granted, but it still something to strive for. Free time in class just for making a reminder poster? Hmmm... Hey it worked.
Set up classroom courts, where they can talk out thier problems and have some one mediate offical rules for certain behaviors. Kids are smarter than we think, if they help set the rules they are less prone to break them.
Creative math, not just boring algebra. Dont make it the usual x2 times 3percent equals y, use things they are interested in like if Joe wants to buy a car that cost 500 dollars how long will he have to work at $6.15 an hour to save up the money. Trust me that will grab them. They are already thinking about it. Offer to use something they give you as a math problem. Make it interactive not dictative.
That is really all I can come up with off the top of my head.

Answer 8

A lot of inner city gangs are growing because the young are feeling part of something, giving them a sense of importance by being part of the gang. To feel this then they must be lacking belief in themselves, for themselves and probably little hope in change for themselves because they are unable to see into the future (and we all thought we knew it all as teenagers didn't we ;)), unable to foresee the changes that can be created with motivation.
If there were more facilitys for the youngsters to see their own potential-to create motivation and somewhere to encourage this ambition then it may help to separate them from the gangs. It's a slow progressive program required because it takes time for hope to creep in if not got any. They will start working for themselves rather than the gang-give them a hope for them rather than avoid thinking of their futures therefore falling into the gangs to fill a gap
Children has to be taught to have confidence in themselves, and that has to be an early implantation like school as well as home

Answer 9

As humans the most we can do is warn them not to go into gangs. (Mind me im 13 just sound like im 30 lol). I disagree
with the person that said " they need to be condidered as human beings". They ruin society they prevent mankind from aceiving their goals. They do not diserve mercy. Honestly I focus on my education. I am in honors classes. Personally I definetly don't think they diserve understanding and should be destroyed.
Maybe they have problems in their families but why
do they have the right to ruin the world just because of their personal problems? The world should show no mercy on gangs because they show no mercy on the world. That would most
definetly stop them from joining gangs. To see what becomes of them if they do. Again and again people try to sympathize with these horrible people but why? Sometimes we just have to give up. I have a window theory. The window is siciety. Dust and
grime are things that ruin society like gangs and murderers and rapists etc. When the dust and grime is cleaned of the world is perfect and the window is clean. Sure it will get dirty again and
we clean again. Right now what we are doing is putting a curtain on the window (sympthaizing with gangs pretending it works).
So as an awnser the only thing that can stop them is eliminating them. That would stop future gangsters from becoming gangsters.

Answer 10

We have to go back to the drawing board and start over.
Education is really the key, but when you have young people living in conditions that they do today, especially in the inner cities, where young people has so much thrust on them at such an early age and see things that some people in other neighborhoods only see on TV, such age murder, rape, drug deals and just everyday abuse.,
there is no such thing as normalcy for these young people.
I am going on but I don't have an answer, because there are so many things that must be changed, if we can reach some of the younger children of gang members etc. we might stand a chance
to turn some of their lives around before it is too late for them.

Answer 11

We need to get the cities on our side first. Organize families, neighborhoods and areas, once you get community cooperation it will be eaiser to reach the children.

All children have some respect for their families or an authority figure at some point in their life. If we can motivate small neighborhoods to take care of their children as a community we can reach some before it is too late.

Even for teenagers who are thought of as it being too late to reach, there is always time. It just takes time to build a trusting relationship with eachother. It helps if the autority figure is someone from a similar background, but it is not necessary.

Don't blame one ethnic group for all the violence and degradation of society, it is just as much a white problem as it is any other color problem. Our society seems to perpetuate the myth of the poor violent minority. I have seen just as many white gang bangers as any other color. It isn't the rap culture either, as I am a professional who is college educated, but loves rap music. I am not violent, I teach kindergarten, do not rely on stereotypes.

Stop hiring sub-standard teachers. There are many many great teachers out there looking for work. Often I walk into a school district and am horrified by the quality of the teachers. Do not hire alternate route to licensure teachers. 9 times out of 10 the teacher who has taken the "alternate route" is a poor quality teacher who really shouldn't be teaching in the first place.