After completing and presenting their Mikva Challenge project developed in their Waukegan High School civics class, four of the students received a homework assignment from a source other than their teacher.
Leslie Monrey, Jesus Guadarrama, Layla Perkins, and Adrian Lopez were among more than 25% of the groups from five schools who chose gun violence, violence, or a combination of both as a topic to develop for public presentation at the annual event.
Listening intently to the four students, U.S. Rep. Brad Schneider, D-Highland Park, gave them a “homework assignment”. He told them to go gather support in the school and then go into the community.
“Write a letter,” Schneider said. “Get as many signatures as you can. Go to the grocery store and ask people in the community to sign. Send it to your Congressman. That’s me. I’ll tell the people I work with we have to talk about it. That’s politics. You organize and advocate.”
Students from Waukegan and four other Lake County high schools presented the Mikva Challenge project to the public Friday on the school’s Washington campus dealing with issues like mental health, hunger, the environment, and more as well as gun violence.
With between 120 and 150 students explaining their ideas to the public at 60 tables throughout the school’s gym, 16 chose gun violence or general violent behavior including guns as their topic.
Perkins said she and her colleagues plan to write their letter and go into the community to get as many signatures as possible before sending it to Schneider. Using their voice to advocate is one way they hope to change behavior.
“Violence in our community is becoming normalized,” Perkins said. “People don’t understand what a gun can do. It’s not just one person who is a victim. It’s their family, their friends, their community.”
Schneider said he was not surprised so many of the Mikva participants selected guns and violence as topics. Even if they do not know a victim personally, they are aware of the issue from the day they start school.
“Our children are aware of it from the day they start school,” Schneider said. “They have active shooter drills and are told what to do.”
Niolis Collazo, a 2018 Waukegan High School graduate and assistant volleyball coach, was shot and killed in Waukegan on May 6 while driving home. Perkins said the killing hit the community hard as did Assistant Principal Sheonta Myers.
“It had a huge impact,” Myers said. “The whole high school was hit hard.”
Waukegan Mayor Ann Taylor spent more than an hour at the Mikva Challenge. She moved from exhibit to exhibit listening to students and offering advice. She was not surprised by the number of teens choosing violence and guns as their topic.
Taylor said approximately half the crimes committed in Waukegan are perpetrated by individuals between 12 and 17.
“They are very concerned,” Taylor said.”They’re aware of what’s going on..”
Kevin Topete, Jesus Morales, and Brian Raeza were another group who chose violence as a topic. Their display had a gun, a knife, and drugs in separate circles with a line through them signifying a wish to end the practice, The symbols were around an image of a virus.
“Violence spreads like a virus,” Morales said.
“My neighborhood was shot up last night” added Topete of the area around Glen Flora Avenue and Sheridan Road. “It happens in nice neighborhoods.”
Ron Ashlaw, a government and civics teacher at Waukegan High School who organized the event, said he was not surprised so many students chose violence as their topic. Subjects are often topics personally affecting the teens.
“I hear gunshots outside my classroom during the school day,” Ashlaw said.
Ashlaw said the purpose of the Mikva Challenge is for students to choose an issue in the school, community, state, country, or the world. He wants them to not just research it, but to become advocates and work to advance it.
“They follow the Mikva process,” Ashlaw said. “They formulate a solution and create a forum for policy change or work through a local organization to advocate for the change.”
Along with Waukegan, students from Adlai E. Stevenson High School in Lincolnshire, North Chicago Community High School, Round Lake High School, and Cristo Rey St. Martin College Prep in Waukegan participated.
