“EMPOWERING AND REVITALIZING URBAN COMMUNITIES”

OCTOBER 2011

Thank You!

for re-funding Rites of Passage for

2011-2012

The Rites of Passage Program is generously funded by The Children’s Trust. The Chil-dren’s Trust is a dedicated source of funding created by voter referendum in 2002 to im-prove the lives of children and families in Miami-Dade County by making strategic investments in their future – because all children are our children.

Meet the Staff

Vice President

Saliha Nelson

Northwestern

University

Graduate, BA

Programs

Manager

Shedia Nelson

Hawai`i Pacific University Grad-uate, BA

Mentor

Carla Stitt

Tennessee State

University

Graduate, BS

Inside this issue:

Urgent, Inc. 1600 NW 3rd Ave.,

Blg D Miami, FL 33136 (O) 305.576.3084 (C) 305.586.6694 (F) 866-811-7778

www.urgentinc.org Email: Shedia@urgentinc.org

UPCOMING EVENTS

What: Museum of Contemporary Art (MOCA) Women on the Rise

Activity: Celebration of contemporary women artist with historical reference and visual art project incorporating conven-tional and unconventional media like pho-tography and experimental multi-media collages. ART PROJECTS

When: October 18, 2011

Time: 3-5pm

Where: Booker T. Washington Senior high school

What: Museum of Contemporary Art

(MOCA) Women on the Rise

When: October 20, 2011

Time: 3-5pm

Where: Edison high school

Activity: Focus Group Discussion of concep-tual photography from teen perspective

COURTESY REMINDER

No gum, candy, sunflower seeds,

texting or MP3’s, ear phones

Upcoming Events 2

Advice Column 2

News stories 3

Resources 3

Snaps 4

Awareness Themes 5

Calendar 6

Photo Courtesy: Crystal Pearl Molinary

Urgent, Inc.’s mission is to empower

young minds to help transform

communities.

Rites of Passage News

PAGE 2 NEWSLETTER TITLE

College Tour Coordinated by the Dade County Bar Association:

Horizons Committee

ATTENDANCE REQUIRED TO QUALIFY FOR

SUMMER PAID INTERSHIPS

What: Overnight road trip to Florida Atlantic Memorial Univer-sity

When: Thurs, Oct. 27– Fri. Oct. 28th Thursday is Early Release Friday is no school

Who: Limited to first 5 young ladies with attendance of 1 fieldtrip and 10 weekly meetings will qualify for trip and consistent participation When: TBA Where: Barry University Time: 9am-3pm When: TBA Where: Miami Dade College North Campus

COLLEGE TOUR

that dating means having sex. Guys look at girls in 3 ways: anything goes, gulli-bles and wifey material. Anything goes means easy girls. The gullible girls will fall for lines like “You would do it if you love me.” The wifey material are girls who have strict boundaries, stand their ground and respect their bodies. Find out why he

Dear Blue Rain, I really like this guy but I’m not allowed to date yet but I really wanna go with him. Sincerely, Confused Dear Confused, According to my findings, dating and going out is not the same thing to boys. Boys at my school think

wants to go with you and if he’s willing to wait for you. If you are not ready to have a sexual relationship with a guy and handle all the responsibilities and conse-quences that comes with having sex, then you may want to talk to him as a friend. Sincerely, Blue Rain

communities. Through conceptual visual images and accompanying nar-rative they answer questions using a systems thinking framework to define 1) What is teen dating violence, 2) What are the root causes of teen da-ting violence and 3) How do we pre-vent teen dating violence? Through-out this project, they shared valuable input and helped promote the imple-mentation of recommendations based on the environmental scan and policy assessment findings. At this stage, they have added the youth voice to the

coalition’s policy rec-ommendations to address the current situation, and are in the process of formal-izing an advocacy campaign to prevent teen dating violence and change the existing MDCPS bullying policy to include dating and interpersonal violence.

By Saliha Nelson

Ten young ladies have committed to a Reproductive Justice campaign advo-cates for teen dating violence and school board policy change. The cam-paign will include a teen photo voice exhibit on Thursday, December 8th from 11am-2pm that will include elected Officials, Domestic Violence Advocates, Women’s Groups, Media, Teen Programs, Experts/Academics, Special Interest Groups, teen girls share their perspective on the issues of dating and interpersonal violence as they see it impacting their lives and

“WOW, DOING THIS RESEARCH

HAS REALLY OPENED MY EYES

TO WHAT DATING MEANS TO BOYS.” BY

MODLINE PHILISTIN

DEAR BLUE RAIN...

A Reproductive Justice Initiative: SHE KEPT HER BRA ON! - THE CAMPAIGN FOR GIRLS WELL-BEING

A Youth-Led Project for Social Change to prevent Teen Dating Violence

PAGE 3 VOLUME 1, ISSUE 1

Mi-Lola—Miami Interna-tional Latinas Organizing Leadership and Advocacy, 3rd year partnership

IT Women—Information Tech-

nology, 3rd year partnership

Hands 2 Help, Inc.: Passage to Womanhood 2nd year partnership

Sierra Club Miami Inner City Outings 7 year partnership

Dade County Bar Associa-tion Horizons Committee, 6 year partnership

Museum of Contemporary Art (MOCA): Women On The Rise

Booker T. Washington SHS, 7 year partnership

9 year partnership

THANK YOU COMMUNITY PARTNERS

can learn to cook healthy meals and earn community service hours. Mr. Jennings has been a strong supporter and club sponsor for Rites of Passage girls club for the past 3 years. This partnership has been extended to include Urgent, Inc.’s Intergenerational Project’s grandparents who will participate in mentoring, cooking and sharing recipes for the Overtown Cook-book monthly. Mr. Jennings invit-ed David Brown, a physician edu-

cator based at the Jefferson Reaves Health Center in Overtown to join EESAC. EESAC and the school district formally sanction the Overtown Cookbook project as a part of the school's improvement plan. The Historic Overtown Public Health Empow-erment (HOPE) collaborative is a voluntary collaborative where its mission is to promote health in Overtown.

Over-town - The Over-town Cook-book club is under the leader-ship of

Mr. Anthony Jennings where Booker T. Washington students

Partnership with Overtown Cookbook by Anthony Jennings

Carla Stitt is a graduate of Tennes-see State University with a Bachelors

of Science in Chemistry. “I chose this major because I was good in science and wanted to become a OBGYN. After studying abroad in Africa, I decide to get a Masters in Divinity as I then planned to do missionary medical work over-seas. However, graduate school helped me to discover my passion to work with women in a social justice aspect and not medically in gynecology.” She studied abroad in social and academ-ic methods of study in Bermuda. Her experience of mentoring youth

includes volunteering with Big Brother Big Sister and Disney’s sui-cide prevention events and extends internationally to Uganda, Kenya and England with a focus in spiritual growth. She managed special pro-jects for Will and Jada Smith’s Fami-ly Foundation and Enterprises Over-brook Entertainment. Her gift to the young ladies in Rites of Passage is “knowledge, incite, teaching, lead-ership, service, wisdom, hospitality and administration. It is my goal to help each girl grow and discover their gifts”.

WELCOME MS. CARLA STITT, MENTOR FACILITATOR

Photo Courtesy: Carla Stitt

Photo Courtesy by Anthony Jennings

PAGE 4 RITES OF PASSAGE NEWS

U 2! By Tanisha Fleming

Untitled

Strength is overcome by weak-ness

Joy is overcome by pain

The night is overcome by bright-ness

And love it remains the same

Your Love Your love is a window

Strong as a rock, yet fragile as a vase

Sometimes we go through hell But the trip back is swell

We both want happiness and no pain

Yet what is a rainbow without rain

Your love is worth fighting for Yet it is a four letter word

Guess what

I feel no one can bring me down

I touch the beautifully soft angels that leads me on my journey

I worry about losing my family and mom

I cry with my heart full of joy

I am dark and lovely

I understand it’s not easy to avoid the bad people that gonna try to

put me down, stop me from trying to accomplish my dreams

I say I believe in myself

I dream of being a millionaire

I try to avoid the bad crowd

I hope I make it which I will

I am dark and lovely

By Shaquita Andrews

I am

I am dark and lovely

I wonder how my journey will begin

I hear voices saying you could do it

I see angels crowding around me

I want all the money in the world

I am dark and lovely

I pretend I see no evil

Snaps! Poetic Expressions

Monthly Recog-nition Party!

Birthday

Celebration

Best

Attendance

Challenge Badges

Academic Excellence

AWARDS

really feel I feel like taking all my anger out on the person for what I’m angry about

I touch the hearts of friends and fam-ily when they need me the most, I

hope I worry that I won’t have any family or friends by my side when I grow up

and need them the most I cry for many reasons

I am unique and real so deal with it I understand that sometimes who

you want me to be but on the other hand I’m very hard to work with

I say I’m sorry but you gotta deal

with me I dream that even though I think of this

I will be very successful I try to understand and deal with others but I’m tired of it because it don’t turn

out the way I want it to be I hope that what I dream to be would

come true I am unique and real so deal with it

By Kervelene Saint-vil

I am Kerva I am unique and real so deal with it I wonder how my family and friends

relationship will end up with me I hear voices from others and myself telling me things that sometimes I want to hear but don’t other times I see myself and no one telling me

other wise I want to be Kerva and not what oth-

er people want me to be I am unique and real so deal with it I pretend to like people and their

ways and don’t tell them how I

PAGE 5 RITES OF PASSAGE NEWS

Monthly self-breast exams are im-portant and easy to do. It is a tool that helps you become more familiar with how your breasts look and feel normally. Knowing what’s normal for you, you will be able to notice more readily any changes in your agencies.

If you notice any changes in your breasts like the follow-ing please see a health care provider right away.

Lump, hard knot or thickening

Swelling, warmth, redness or darkening

Change in the size or shape of the breast

Dimpling or puckering of the skin

Itchy, scaly sore or rash on the nipple

Pulling in of your nipple or other parts of the breast

Nipple discharge that starts sud-denly

New pain in one spot that doesn't go away

See a health care provider on how to do a breast self exam or come to Rites of Passage for a presentation from Planned Parenthood and receive more information.

Breast Cancer Awareness Month

The magazine became the larg-est selling Hispanic language magazine in the United States. Now she runs Telemundo, a TV channel in the Spanish lan-guage. She also serves on the board at Simmons College School of Management, a gradu-ate school devoted to creating strong business women.

Jacqueline Hernandez is the publisher of People en Espanol in 2004. Her role as the pub-lisher is to ensure everything communicated the vision of the magazine and Latino culture. She has won many awards like: Media Executive of the Year and Advertising Age’s Top 10 Players in the Hispanic market.

by their partner. Thirty percent of women between ages 15-19 are killed by their husband or boyfriend each year. Fifth leading cause of death in Florida among youth ages 10-24 is unintentional injury.

One in three women worldwide will be physically, sexually or otherwise abused during her lifetime with rates reaching 70 percent in some coun-tries. Forty percent of the women, who die every year, die as a result of domestic violence incidents.

If you or know of some-one who’s life may be in danger, please report it to the police and call the National Teen Dating Abuse Helpline at 1.866.331.9474 or the National Domestic Violence hotline at 1.800.799 (SAFE). Have a plan to leave to go to a shelter or new loca-tion. Visit: www.loveisrespect.org for more information or www.teensagainstabuse.org Www.safespacefoundation.org

One in three teenagers report being texted ten to thirty times an hour by their partner inquiring where they are, what they're do-ing, or who’s

with them. One in three teenagers report knowing a friend or peer who has been hit, punched, kicked, slapped, choked or physically hurt

“ONE IN FIVE HIGH SCHOOL

GIRLS HAS BEEN PHYSICALLY OR

SEXUALLY ABUSED BY A

DATING PARTNER.”

Hispanic Heritage Awareness

Domestic Violence and Teen Dating Abuse Awareness

5

Where: B. T. Washington, Sr. (BTW)

1200 NW 6th Ave. Miami, FL 33136

When: Monday—Thursday

Time: 2:30-5:00pm Room: 308

Rites of Passage Girls Clubs!

For Who: Girls ages10-18

Closed: Holiday and Spring Break, Teacher Planning, Early Release Days and inclement weather

*For more information:

Call (305) 576-3084 or

(305) 586-6694

Where: Edison Eduplex High School

6161 NW 5th Ct. Miami, Fl 33127

When: Wednesdays and Thursdays

Time: 3–5pm Rm: A-121

Work America, Inc.

430 NW 9th St. Miami, FL 33136

When: Mondays Time: 6:30-8pm

Rites of Passage Academy Girls Club Meetings

October 2011 Sun Mon Tue Wed Thu Fri Sat

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2 3 4 5 6 7 8

9 10

Drama

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12

13

Drama

14 15

16 17

Drama

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20 21 22 FAMU OVER-NIGHT ROADTRIP

23 24

Drama

25 Recogni-tion

Party

26

27

Drama

28 29

30 31

Drama