Things are getting even busier for a Youth Council that’s been working with Project Success of Vermilion County on ways to reduce gun violence. Their initial town hall meeting at the Laura Lee Fellowship House was last July. Now, their second town hall meeting will be this coming Thursday, January 29th, in the Laura Lee Fellowship House from 6 to 8 PM.
Jamie Nightlinger from Project Success says Thursday’s “Youth Action Expo” will focus on some “best practices” to achieve gun violence reduction.
AUDIO: They will explore gun violence through a public health lens; emphasizing on prevention, youth engagement, community involvement; and early intervention strategies, trying to stop the violence before it occurs in the first place. We see a lot of violence between the ages of like 16 to 24 or 25, I would say. And so, some of their ideas are specifically targeting creating safe spaces for that age group, so they have something constructive to do on the weekends.
The currently about 16 members of the Youth Council are made up of Danville High School students, students from Schlarman Academy’s Future Problem Solvers group, area students who are already in college, and one student from North Ridge Middle School.
These students will also be participating in the Healing Illinois Grant that Project Success recently received through the Field Foundation and the Illinois Department of Human Services. Nightlinger says students will be attending some training sessions on topics such as community organization and racial equity. She also says this “Healing Our Streets; Voices of Our Community” project will include a lot of “sit down and talk” sessions.
AUDIO: The students will interview community members of all different ages and races. And the stories gathered throughout the project will be shared during a final showcase, where they present the video that they put together.
It’s about a six month grant; so the plan is to have an “eat and share event” where they do the interviews around the end of March, and then the final showcase event around the end of June. Nightlinger added that the students will be participating in some summer block parties and clean up events, already planned by Project Success.
