Jeff for America

Never “one of the guys” growing up, I spent much of last year as somewhat of an outsider among the male staff members at school. I can count my male friends on one hand, and if we’re just counting straight guys, it’s even less. At school, it didn’t help that I was the only male teacher on the middle school team. And while I fit in to a large degree, I always felt a bit out of touch in this way. There was an unsaid tension that existed whenever the men tried to include me in a pick up basketball game or conversation about their weekend excursions at the club. It got to a point when I think they just kind of gave up on me, relying instead on a friendly “hello” and fist bump every now and then.

More than reveal my own vulnerabilities, these insecurities prevented me from being seen as a legitimate role model in the eyes of my male students. The boys mentoring program had existed before I came to DCS, but it had little life and energy. The men who led it were unmotivated and put on half-hearted events that didn’t really leave an impression on the boys. They went to a car show here, a homeless shelter there. While important, these trips were glaringly missing the mark.

Since I’m one of the veteran teachers this year (now one of two men in the middle school), I felt compelled to take things into my own hands. It started with a makeover – I designed a new logo for the group, wrote up a vision and mission and planned out monthly excursions for the academic year. By June, our boys will have visited a domestic violence shelter, learned about first date etiquette and completed a group ropes course.

To start things off, I wanted to go all out. These boys needed to see something they would never forget – an experience that could permeate their tough exteriors and start a real dialogue about life and the meaning of “being a man.” Using a connection from within our school, we scheduled a visit to the Philadelphia County Courthouse & Jail to learn about actions and consequences, and how the justice system works (and sometimes doesn’t work). After doing some research to prepare for the trip, I gathered some pretty offensive statistics.

To start, nearly 66% of African American kids don’t live with their biological fathers. Of those, only 9% have ever met their father. The prison population in the U.S. is the largest of all industrialized countries and puts about 1/31 of its citizens under correctional control at some point in their lives. Within the African American population, 1/11 will come in contact with a jail or prison during their lifetime. African Americans make up 14% of the U.S. population, but 40% of the prison population. And it gets worse and worse. The stories behind these numbers bring shame to our country and our failed justice system. But it’s what we have, and it’s what my boys will deal with one day. So I figure they might as well understand it and see it before they end up living it.

We departed school at 10 this morning and arrived at the marble courthouse just in time to get swept through the metal detector and rushed into a waiting room. The guards led the boys onto a platform and walked them into a Sheriff’s transport bus (the gray ones with barred windows). The boys were curious, looking around and chatting. Our tour guide arrived and greeted the boys.

“How’s everyone doin’ today? Feeling alright?”

The boys must have thought they were still at school. Little laughs and giggles filled the cold bus, and they replied with gleefull “yeses” and “good mornings.” Before they even got through it, he interrupted.

“Shut the fuck up.”

Silence.

And I didn’t hear a word for the next 2 hours. We were taken to a holding cell and told about the horrors of prison rapes, violence and cell mate murders in the middle of the night. Whether the stories were true of not, those kids were hanging on every word. One fascinating point about the prison economy that caught my attention: due to new restrictions on smoking in prisons, cigarettes are no longer allowed, eliminating a key product of the prison trade system. Cigarettes used to be the item of choice to pay for things in jail. Since they are mostly outlawed, sex has become the main commodity of trade. Newly minted prisoners have nothing to use for collateral except their bodies. Sick and sad, but an interesting implication of policy.

Next, we headed to the cell blocks to see the inmates living quarters up close. No doubt the tour guide riled up the inmates before we got there, because it was unreal. They were pounding on the windows and walls, yelling at the boys, making threats and lewd gestures. It was probably traumatizing for some of them, but a reality that they surely didn’t consider before. Walking by all 177 inmates for the next 10 minutes felt like an eternity. Some of the boys just stopped looking to their sides, blocking out their periphery to avoid a sudden breakdown or awkward glance.

By the time the tour was over, we were discussing the importance of education and the choices that lead to real success. The jail staff did a great job keeping it real and making it an accessible experience for even my middle school boys – some of them just 12 years old. It got me to thinking about how amazing it would be if every child, urban or not, black or not, experienced a similar trip – seeing the lifestyle of confinement and hearing about the limited opportunities after conviction. It might give people a different perspective, a gratitude for freedom and laws that might otherwise seem abstract and unnecessary.

I don’t think the boys see me as any more of a role model this year than last, but I also know that’s not the point. Being a role model has nothing to do with the mentor. It has everything to do with the kid. I won’t be in their lives for long, but I’m gonna make a go of it while I am.

- Jeff