With their permission, I've decided to share a few stories from my students. (They speak for themselves. They are verbatum.)
"I remember at the age 12. I seen these drug users fighting over a pipe which is use for crack cocaine. The pipe was lost. The first drug user Chris thought that Joe stole his pipe so Joe went and got a gun from his car but Chris exscaped out of the window, hours late they where back together using drugs again
I remember I was in the 6th grade and my mother lost her job so she didn't have any money to buy me the name brand shoes. My mother bought me some cheap shoe out of Pic N Pay, the name of the shoes where Jordansie knock off. I went to school in the shoes and we had field day that day. All the kids were picking on me because, I didn't have Jordon on it was the most painful day of my life I was in a fight that day the kids pick on me. I was suspend from school for five days. I told my mother why I was susupened and she got some money from my grandmother to buy me the real Jordan. Thank God for Grandmom."
--Ant
"My next door neigbor beat up his girlfriend and the police and swat team came out this was last year. it was a stand off the police made everyone come out there apartment and it was very cold the news peoples came out we was on the news he tried to kill his self. he had just got out of jail for jumping on his mother so he was out on bond. we stayed outside for three hours. when they finally brought him out he was cursing and talking about killing his girlfriend they hit him with the stung gun and that didn't even fase him. he just jump around and laugh."
--Delois
"Mainly, in my childhood, all I ever saw was arguing, fighting and drinking. By the time I was ready for my bath, my mom or my dad was drunk. My parents were divorced, so that is where the arguing and fighting comes into this. Unless my sister was around, I was always alone. My sister practically raised me because my mom and dad was always drunk. If my sister was not around, I had to do everything on my own. At eight years old, I knew how to cook myself dinner. From all of this happening, I always thought that I would end up to be a nobody in life. I really never thought there was anything more than working during the day and drinking all night. Then, someone came into my life and showed me that I can do what I want with my life and that I do not need to follow the same road as my parents. At this moment in time, I have proven to my entire family and all of my friends that one day I will be someone in life and that I will be successful. I just hope one day, my son will follow this way of thinking and create his own path or road in life and that he does not have to follow other people's decisions."
--Andrea
"I witnessed my best friend killed by her baby daddy prior to him killing her the night before he broke into her house and brutally beat her with a baseball bat. She called the police who didn't do anything about it. Her baby daddy called her apologizing about what he did to her. And told her he wanted to make things right. He needed to talk to her so she told us that she was going to the southside to meet up with him we tried to talk her out of it. But she insisted that she talk to him when she pulled up he shot her in the head twice right in front of their child then went up the street and killed his self. In conclusion to this two lives were takin due to nonsense."
--Nichole
"It was a nice weathered friday summer night. I went to yet another friday night party at the Rec Center. I went to many of them, but this one would turn out to be different. The night started off right, and we were having fun. And then that's when it started.
I was sitting at a table with some people when one of the guys requested a certain song. The bass player told greg that they didn't do that song. He then said, if he wanted to hear that song he had to go home and hear it. Some peple started laughing. Greg was offended. Greg stood and started making threats to the bass player.
The bass player seen that Greg was tkaing this the wrong way so he apologized. He even walked up to our table and shook Greg's hand. Then he went into his pocket and pulled out a bag of weed. He put a pile on the table and said, You guys can have this. Well, this still wa snot good enough for Greg.
Greg continue to make threats and make avancements toward the bass player. The arguing continued. Then Greg's friend Dennis joined in. I just looked, I wasn't in it. They than started following the bass player outside. They show was over. Greg pulled out a knife. He didn't know that oe of the other band members had passed the bass player a gun. He starting to shoot. Greg was shot first because he was the closes. Then Dennis was shot. Because he saw me sitting with them he asumed i had there back so he shot me when I was on the run. fortunately for us nobody died."
--Stan
"I had a twin brother that was killed in a car wreck. My brother, my mom and I all worked at the same place a place called Dayco. We all go up on the day of April 27th, 2011 to go to work. My brother rode to work with us but when we got to the parking lot his friends we picking him up because they all were going to Cherokee to a bike rally for the weekend. Before mom and I went in for work we told my brother bye and told him to be careful. Later that day I was working and started to hurt really bad in my stomach so I went over to my mom and told her. Then she goes called my dad and told him to come pick me up and take me home. Dad came get me we got home and 2 hours later my mom comes home early and she's crying and said that my brother and his friends were in a car wreck and my brother was dead. Me being his twin I went crazy. They were on this curving road and it was raining and they went off the road down a bank and flipped and my brothers head hit a big rock. There were in the mountains so it took the paramedics a while to get there by then he was bleeding inside real bad but he died on the way to the hospital. All the family by now is arriving up to the hospital t osee my brother when I walked into that room and saw my brother lying on that table I will never forget that. He was covered in blodd and his body was so swollen that you barely could tell who he was. When we had his funeral it was the hardest hink I ever had to go through ever in my life. I just didn't loose a brother I lost my best friend."
--Karen
"When I was sixteen I was riding my bike one day. I could ride real well and I had a big head about this. I felt like my bike was the fastest in town. I also felt that I could even beat small mortorcycles. I felt like a profesional bicyclist.
One day my father tolded me to go around the corner and get my sister. I went around the corner to get her. She said something smart and took off. I went after her I thought I'll really show her something if I swing around the curve wide and catch her. I was riding with no hands. Being a real show-off.
This was a mistake. There was a car coming. Even though he was on the wrong side of the street, I should have had my hands on my handle-bars. By the time I reach for them it was to late. I ran right into the front off the car, hit the windshield went up in the air and came down and hit the street.
I substained injuries to the left side of my body. The worst being my left forearm. I woke-up in the hospital the next day. They had me down for a amputation. They flew in a specialist and he saved my arm! I had just started practicing with the football team. Now I was out for the season. I think this was one of the turning points of my whole sports career."
--Stan
