Chicago Gun Violence

Last night the CBS Evening News showed this story on the rash of recent gun violence in Chicago:

It always makes me sick to learn of senseless deaths, especially those
of young people. The story told about one young victim who was only
ten years old!

According to the report, "Since September, 24 students have been
murdered, most of them shot. The dead amount to a classroom of kids. ... Last school year 34 students were killed. That's 58 deaths over what amounts to a 17-month period. And that makes an average of one child getting murdered every eight days."

Several years ago, I was in a high school about twenty miles out of Minneapolis, and asked a class of seniors what they wanted to be doing in five years. I got a number of responses like, "I'd like to be in grad school," "I want to be done with college and starting on my career," "I want to be married and starting a family," among others.

After seven or eight answers, the one black male student raised his hand and said, "I want to be alive."

I asked him, "Why would you say that?"

His response was, "Because the life expectancy for young, black males isn't very great."

I asked, "Why is that?"

He said, "Because we don't know how to solve problems. It's just easier to pull your gun and shoot the other guy. Back in my 'hood, I could be shot in a drive-by at any time. That's why I drive all the way out here through the open enrollment program."

Then I asked him, "If you decided to get out of your old school and drive out here, why don't you find a different group of people to hang with who don't hang out on the street to be targets for drive-bys?"

You should have seen the look on his face! That thought had never occurred to him. My thinking was he had made the decision to switch to a safer school, why not make the decision to make safer friends?

How do we change the paradigm of violence?

I'm interested in your comments on the subject.

Later,

Mike

Effective Listening

Last Saturday I got to hear another speaker friend do his thing. I've known Kit Welchlin since 1991, and haven't seen him for several years. I was giving two breakout sessions for the annual Metro ECSU's Winning Strategies Conference for paraprofessionals, and I saw Kit's name on the agenda; so, I decided to go out early and listen to Kit do the keynote. I'm glad I did.

The title of Kit's address was Problem Solving & Decision Making Through High Impact Communication. I discuss problem solving, decision-making and communication all the time; so, I wanted to hear what he says about those three issues. I wasn't ready for the high energy/impact he let rip for about an hour. It was a great presentation with many highlights.

His list of 14 Characteristics of Effective Listening I've posted here really hit me. Simply click on the image to make it larger:


I love listening to other speakers, especially when they are saying many of the same things I say. It reinforces to me I'm doing the right thing and I'm on the right path. I especially like #7 which simply states, "Ask Questions."

I wrote an entire chapter on asking questions in PreTeen Power which was published in 1997. I'm rewriting it for I'm Not Done Yet. Stay tuned, I'm working on it.

Later,

Mike