Linda Rainey, 70, brought her great-grandchildren to live with her while their mother was deployed in Afghanistan.

Like many mothers in the 1960s, Linda Rainey swaddled her two daughters in cloth diapers delivered by a service. But when her 2-year-old great-grandson Ahmir Trammel came to live with her last year in East Harlem, he had disposable diapers.

“Pampers,” said Rainey, 70, with a laugh. “I didn’t know.”

Ahmir and his 7-year-old sister Ayanna Davis moved in with Rainey when their mother, Sgt. Arielle Gates-Davis, deployed to Afghanistan. With all of the men in the family out of the picture and her mother deceased, Gates-Davis turned to her grandmother to care for the children during the year she was away.

“I had to shut down and totally devote my time to my great-grandchildren,” Rainey said about raising them for the year. “You are the caregiver.”

Pampers weren’t her only surprise. A week’s supply of Ahmir’s powdered milk cost $11. “Ridiculous!” she said. “That’s what they drink.” And his daycare cost $349 a week.

When Ayanna needed medical treatment for a thyroid condition, Rainey had to take her to a military doctor, in accordance with the mother’s military insurance. That meant finding time for a trip to the closest one—in upstate New York.

The U.S. Census Bureau estimates that 2.7 million grandparents were raising their grandchildren in 2010. In New York, almost one in three grandparents who live with their grandchildren are responsible for their care.

The challenges Rainey faced in caring for Ayanna and Ahmir are common ones. Grandparents are older, which can mean physical or financial limitations that did not exist when they brought up their own children. And things have changed–like the nature of diapers and baby food. Add in the fact that children often move in with grandparents under traumatic circumstances such as the death or imprisonment of the parent, and it’s not surprising that these grandparents may need help.

“It’s an economic challenge. It’s a financial challenge. It’s an emotional challenge. It’s all of those things,” said Kathy Gibson, founder and executive director of the nonprofit Grandparents Advocacy Project, which meets biweekly in the Bronx River housing development.

“I wanted an outlet for them where they could get support from other grandparents, and we could help them,” Gibson said about her organization.

Grandparents—or great-grandparents in Rainey’s case—are often retired and living on fixed incomes, including Social Security, pensions or other assistance. Caring for children can exacerbate their financial burden. A quarter of these grandparents live in poverty and nearly 50 percent received additional public assistance in 2010, according to U.S. Census Bureau data.

Rainey's granddaughter, Sgt. Arielle Gates-Davis

Rainey retired from a secretarial job in 2006 to care for her ailing husband who died in 2008. Later that year, her 16-year old granddaughter Tiel Tanner—Gates-Davis’ younger sister—moved in with her for a year and a half. Six months after Tanner moved out, Ayanna and Ahmir moved in. Rainey received military-provided assistance from Sgt. Gates-Davis, but it did not entirely cover the cost of raising two children in Manhattan. By the time Gates-Davis returned from Afghanistan, Rainey had to go back to work two days a week to compensate for her diminished savings account.

Gibson mostly sees grandparents step in to provide care following a death, abandonment or imprisonment of the mother, she said.

Often, unless the grandparents take custody in such situations, the child will have to enter foster care. “To keep the children out of the system—that’s the main thing I always heard,” Gibson said. “ ‘I don’t want my grandchildren in the system.’ ”

When Evelyn Latimer brought her son’s daughter, Stephanie Dukes, to her home in the Castle Hill housing development in 1998, the 10-year-old had already lived with her mother and other grandmother—and experienced the death of both—in the span of about a year. The remaining family split up. Dukes’ half-brother moved to Florida to live with his father’s mother. Her half-sister, with no remaining family, went into foster care.

Latimer noticed a substantial difference in her granddaughter. “She got very sickly after the mother passed away,” said Latimer, 77. “She had to go see a therapist.”

Dukes also struggled at school. Latimer enrolled her in Teach and Tutor, a program run by Gibson that provides tutoring for children in their homes. That was not enough. Dukes was frequently skipping days of class and ultimately dropped out of high school.

“I went through quite a bit of things with her,” Latimer said. Dukes, 23 now, is currently studying for her High School Equivalency Diploma.

Classrooms have perhaps changed even more than diapers since most grandparents raised their children. When Gibson, a college professor, started her organization a decade ago, she noticed that many children living in their grandparents’ households were struggling in school.

Children were failing first and second grade. She started Teach and Tutor in response. Because tutors came to their homes, the adults could learn along with the children and eventually provide support.

“How do you hold somebody back in first grade?” Gibson said. “The students were being penalized for living with grandparents. The grandparents couldn’t help with homework.”

Carlos and Maria Martinez with their granddaughter Leila in their apartment in Ravenswood.

Maria Martinez, 55, and her husband Carlos Martinez, 71, who live in the Ravenswood housing development in Astoria, Queens, experienced this problem. Like Rainey, they found themselves caring for their 5-year-old granddaughter, Leila Carter, while her mother was deployed overseas in the military.

The Martinezes, both from Colombia, only speak a few words of English. While Leila gained fluency in Spanish, her grandparents were unable to help her with kindergarten homework, which was written in English. So, Maria Martinez enrolled in a family literacy program at the nearby library, where English-speaking assistants could help Leila instead.

“She needs to understand the homework in English so she needed help,” said Silvana Vasconcelos, manager of the program. “Things got better as they both got more support.”

Beyond the challenges of education, finances or the child’s emotional state, older adults face physical impediments when caring for their grandchildren.

“That’s a major challenge. A major, major challenge,” Gibson said. “Many of the grandparents do have health issues of their own.”

While caring for Ayanna and Ahmir, for instance, Rainey could only travel to places accessible by car. The great-grandmother has knee problems, and navigating public transportation while rustling young Ahmir was unmanageable.

One grandmother in the Grandparents Advocacy Project raised several children while consigned to a wheelchair, because she had only one leg, Gibson said. Another, who is raising a 14-year-old, recently underwent spinal surgery.

Gibson says the youngest woman in her program is in her late 40s. The oldest is 97.

“These are women who never had a real good job, never had a real good anything,” she said. “They’re sharing their life or sharing their last days.”

To contact the reporters about this story, email Alessandra Potenza (ap2993@columbia.edu) or J. Ben Bradford (jbp2138@columbia.edu).

Fe Maria Guerrero, 40

As three children noisily play with big Lego pieces on an oval blue carpet, Fe Maria Guerrero, 40, sits on a child’s chair close to the grandmother of one of them. While they quietly speak in Spanish, Guerrero attentively observes the children building a Lego car and cheerfully running around.

Guerrero, originally from the Dominican Republic, works as a teacher assistant in the Family Literacy Center at the Queens library in Ravenswood, a program designed to help immigrant parents learn English with their children by doing homework together. Guerrero, who takes care of 1 to 5 year olds, is the Spanish-speaking connection between parents and the other teachers in the program.

“Yo tengo una buena relacíon humana con las otras mamás,” Guerrero said in Spanish. I have a good relationship with the other mothers.

Whenever the parents come to her with a question, she tries to help them. Some ask her which books they should read to their children before going to bed, or how to play with them. If she can’t answer their questions, she directs them to Silvana Vasconcelos, 55, manager of the Family Literacy Program.

“We hired her to work with the Spanish-speaking children,” Vasconcelos said of Guerrero. “But she is good with all the children, no matter where they’re from. And she can relate with the mothers as well.”

Maintaining this relationship, this connection, with the immigrant mothers enrolled in the program is easy for Guerrero. After all, she arrived in New York nine years ago and she is still very attached to her home country, the Dominican Republic, and she understands what it means to adapt to a new culture.

Although it was not easy for her to understand the American culture, which is made up of many other cultures and religions, she said,  Guerrero always tries to have a positive and open attitude: She listens carefully and tries to understand.

This “jolly disposition,” as Vasconcelos defined it, helps her a lot to communicate with others and relate with the immigrant parents in the program. The relationship works so well because she can put herself at the same level.

“Se van adaptando poco a poco a las reglas y las normas del ambiente americano,” Guerrero said of the other mothers who attend the literacy program, explaining that, eventually, “la cultura de origen se cupla con la cultura americana.” They adopt little by little the rules and norms of the American environment; the culture of origin couples with American culture.

The literacy program, and the Spanish-speaking connection Guerrero provides, is particularly important for the local community, because 43 percent of Ravenswood residents are Hispanic or Latino, according to the 2010 Census.

Guerrero, who has a green card that permits her to live and work in the United States, resides in the Ravenswood housing development. She came to New York because her father has been living in the city for 35 years. She arrived when she was seven months pregnant with her son Luis.

In the Dominican Republic, Guerrero studied law and worked as an executive secretary at a family-run farm. In New York, she obtained an Early Childhood Education and Training Program certificate at the New York State Office of Children and Family Services and opened a daycare in her apartment.

Because of health problems, she wasn’t able to take the class required to renew her daycare license and  she began looking for another job. Every month she popped in the Family Literacy Center and talked to Vasconcelos, to see if there was a job opening for her.

“When she wants something, she doesn’t give up, she persists,” Vasconcelos said.

And finally a job opportunity did pop up. Actually, more than a job. She was able to enroll in a work-study position that allowed her to take classes and do homework with Luis for 12 hours, and work for 17 hours a week in the Family Literacy Program.

Since this year, though, because of fund cuts by the NYC Department of Youth and Community Development, she had to drop the study position and her work hours have been reduced to two, from 4 p.m. to 6 p.m., every day from Monday to Thursday.

Unlike the other children in the program, who are helped to do their homework by their parents other than a teacher, Luis now is the only child who does his homework without his mother’s supervision. But Guerrero works with younger children in the same space and Luis knows his teacher very well, so he hasn’t had problems so far, according to Vasconcelos.

Guerrero needs to work “para poder compensar la vida,” – to survive, she said. But she misses studying. At the Family Literacy Program she took a nutrition class last year and she learned a lot about eating a balanced diet: correct amount of salt, a lot of water throughout the day and no soda.

She is also sorry that she can’t tutor Luis with his homework anymore, but, at the same time, she sees this as a chance for her son to grow up and become more independent. She gives him the structure, she said, but he needs to be self-reliant.

While taking away from her own child, Guerrero gives all herself to the other children in the program.

“She has a very good energy,” Vasconcelos said. “She brings a lot of life.”

Guerrero is very active. She plays with the children, sits with them on the floor, helps them with puzzles and Play-Doh, and she creates songs with them. Maria Martinez, 55, originally from Colombia, says her 5-year-old granddaughter Leila loves her songs.

“Tiene paciencia con los muchachos,” she adds about Guerrero. She’s patient with the children.

Norma Leon, originally from Ecuador and mother of three children who attend the program with her, says Guerrero is always active and creative: “She’s very good with the kids. She likes to play around with them.”

“She is able to make them feel comfortable,” said Amy Williams, 58, early-child specialist and teacher at the literacy program. Williams has known Guerrero for three years and trained her to become her teacher assistant.

In the Family Literacy Program, immigrant parents and their children find a second home. A safe place where they are helped with the language and any problem they may have. They are also informed of all the services – such as healthcare, food stamps, college degree credentials – available to them in the community.

“Everybody come in the library and they say family literacy center is my house,” Guerrero said, adding that she feels the same. “Me siento bien aquí.” I feel good here.

And the love she provides is the same one her 8-year-old Luis receives.

The future is in the children, Guerrero said. “Si educamos los niños, podemos tener un mundo mejor.” If we educate the children, we can have a better world.

To contact the reporter about this story, email ap2993@columbia.edu or Twitter @ale_potenza.

Tailaya Tomer, 15, lifts her legs as her Jazzy Jumpers teammates turn two jump-ropes through the air in eggbeater fashion. Faster and faster Tailaya’s feet skip in rhythm with the flying ropes, framing her in a lemon-shaped space every time her sneakers lose touch with the ground. Then she switches out and turns the rope as one of her teammates takes her place. A judge standing nearby keeps count, pushing a clicker every time the jumper’s left foot hits the stage of the Apollo Theater.

The Jazzy Jumpers are one of the many teams competing in the 20^th annual Double Dutch Holiday Classic hosted in Harlem’s world famous Apollo Theater in memory of David A. Walker, who founded the sport in 1973. Teams come from as far as Japan and France to take part in this competition, based on a game Dutch settlers play in the streets of New York over 350 years ago. Athletes from fourth grade through college and beyond compete in three categories: speed (how many time the left foot touches the floor in two minutes), the standard compulsory test and fusion, also known as freestyle. The latter fuses jumping with music, hip-hop dance and acrobatics, allowing teams to be completely creative. Teams are judged on technicality, originality, creativity and difficulty.

Time is up. Tailaya and her teammates leave the stage to cheers and applause from the 1500 members of the audience. Tailaya, or “Mousey” as her teammates like to call her, joined the team eight years ago, when her former coach, Sandra L. Baker-Fortune discovered her doing flips in the gym. “I competed with her since 5^th grade,” Tailaya says with a touch of melancholy in her voice.

Her long-time coach, Baker-Fortune, passed away in April of this year after a short illness and complications with her heart, leaving her husband, Eugene Fortune, and her daughter, Zana Delsorbo, behind to take care of the team from P.S./I.S. 323 in Brooklyn. Dolsorbo, 42, worked as a fitness trainer until recent events inspired her to continue her mother’s legacy. “It started with my mom. Now that she passed away, she got me into it,” she says. The Double Dutch Holiday Classic at the Apollo was always her mother’s favorite, remembers Dolsorbo.

Toni Veal, 23, is the assistant coach of the Jazzy Jumpers. She has been part of the team since the age of 12.  “You gotta love this sport to stay good at it,” she says as she explains that the Jazzy Jumpers train three times a week. But this year has been exceptionally difficult. Losing Baker-Fortune has been hard on everyone.

“It’s really rough. I took the team to the cemetery yesterday… It sucks so bad.” She covers her face, “You’re gonna make me cry. I’m trying to hold it….” Eugene Fortune embraces Veal and accompanies her up the aisle and through the audience to take a walk outside.

Delsorbo, sporting a Santa hat and a matching red tracksuit is also fighting tears. It is not easy for her to be back at the Apollo Theater, this year without her mother by her side. Yet she is able to hide her sadness, smiling and cheering for the athletes. As three of her girls come off the stage, she hugs each of them and kisses them on the forehead.

Even though the team hopes to be successful at today’s competition, members are “keeping it simple and low key,” Delsorbo explains. “We didn’t feel we had the time to put our mind into it.” Even though the Jazzy Jumpers aren’t competing in the fusion freestyle section this year, they know that taking part and enjoying the athletic performances of teams from all around the world is what counts.

The Nationals at the Apollo are actually international. “Teams from all over the world participate. They put so much time and dedication into it,” says Judy Walker after complimenting Delsorbo for stepping into her mother’s footsteps. Walker’s daughter, Lauren Walker, stepped into her father David A. Walker’s footsteps and is now president of the National Double Dutch League that he founded in 1974 and event director as well as producer of the Holiday Classic Competition. It was David A. Walker who traveled around Europe and to Japan in the 1980’s to publicize the sport he created. “They went crazy for Double Dutch. They loved it,” Walker says. “We want all people to come together.”

This year there were four teams from Japan. One of them, Black Pierrot, came all the way from Kawasaki City, to take part in this competition for the first time and they have their eyes on the prize. Whether they will win will be decided by a panel of expert judges at the end of the day, yet the best-of-show award trophy is already sitting on the corner of the stage, motivating everyone to keep those feet moving.

The Double Dutch Forces don’t need to see the trophy to be motivated. They traveled 12 hours by bus, all the way from Columbia, S. C. to compete at the Apollo Theater for the eighth time and their coach, Joy Holmon, is optimistic. “We’ve done pretty well,” she says. “We drove all the way here, so we’re pretty serious. We come with our A game.”

Tia Rankin, 18, has been a member of the Double Dutch Forces for 11 years now. “I just saw it and it looked fun,” she says. Her team meets for practices four times a week. “And during the Thanksgiving holidays it’s practice, practice, practice,” adds Holmon. What Rankin enjoys most about the competition hosted at the Apollo Theater is that, “people get to see what you love doing.”

Cita Wise, 30, is the star of the Double Dutch Forces. He has been with the team for 21 years and he recently taught film star Adam Sandler how to Double Dutch for the movie “Jack and Jill.”

“I trained him. I’m actually turning [the rope] for him in the film,” Wise said. When he’s not jumping, Wise teaches at a secondary school. And even though Double Dutch practices are very time consuming, he has no plans to stop and says he will continue to travel all around the world with his team. “We’ve gone as far as Paris, France.” And even though the Apollo Theater is just a bus ride away, this competition is especially exciting, he says before turning back toward the stage and cheering on his teammates: “Come on! Now they can speed it up.”

Next to the Double Dutch Forces, Stan’s Pepper Steppers from Far Rockaway, Queens, are also cheering on their team on stage. Their coach, Stan Brown, has been coaching for 40 years. “My granddaughter is jumping right now,” he says, his eyes fixed to the stage. “It’s a family thing. I was here from the beginning. For this time of year this is the highlight. You can’t beat the Apollo.”

The hosts of the event, Richard Cox and Latoya Naughton who is wearing sparkling heels, step on stage to announce that the award ceremony is near. But first, for the first time in the history of the Holiday Classic, there has to be a jump off. The Jazzy Jumpers make their way onto the stage one last time before the trophies are handed out, and it is worth it: They win 2^nd place in the doubles division.

All winning teams make their way up on stage as they hear their names being called out and the Double Dutch Forces prove their talent and discipline by winning 1^st place in a number of divisions. Yet the biggest winner of the day is  Black Pierrot from Japan.  Team members are overjoyed when Naughton hands them the glittering best-of-show award.

“Thank you very much!” they shout, jumping up and down, waving their trophies in the air and enjoying their moment of glory in the city that never sleeps.  The Jazzy Jumpers are a little disappointed, but their coaches remain optimistic: “We’ll do better next year. With everything that happened….,” says Dolsorbo.

What took months to prepare is now at an end. Teams from all around the world are making their way to the exit, trophies in hand. Yet as everyone leaves the auditorium, Walker remains behind to wait for her daughter who as the producer and event director of the tournament is still busy back stage. “I am so proud of her,” she says. The next step is to take Double Dutch to the Olympics. That is something her husband would have wanted: “That was his dream.”

Elijah Knight (left) and Elijah Dumont pose at the Bushwick-Hylan Houses Community Center (Pic by Nic Stone)

Elijah Knight is seven years old, and he has just spent ten minutes freestyle rapping. He now leans into a brand new iMac and opens a program.

“Keef told me he was going to show me how to make a beat,” he said. “We could do a Garageband band here, you know.”

Knight slowly learns how to produce the beat he wants on Garageband, as Keef Ward, the Multimedia Director and Staff Member at the Bushwick-Hylan Houses Community Center, looks over his shoulder and carefully explains the difference between 3/4 and 4/4 timing and why some baselines sound better than others.

To their left sit another six new iMacs, which arrived at the Center only a few days earlier. Throughout the afternoon, children come and go from the room at allotted times, using the computers to make music, take photos, research interests, watch videos and play games.

Thanks largely to the arrival of Ward at the Center in March along with a concerted effort by Center Director Jackie Sanchez, the Center has undergone a rapid technological development. Ward has made it his job to get the digital face of the organization up to speed and to help build the computer skills and artistic output of the students.

Ward has led a rebranding of the Center, which will be called CS1 and has established a Facebook group and YouTube channel to display the children’s work. And now he has orchestrated the delivery of the seven brand new iMac computers.

The changes are not merely about flashy output and digital upgrades. There has been a concerted effort among the staff to develop high quality content and an interesting portfolio of work to help the children–and to persuade financial backers to invest more heavily in the center.

“Altogether, by December this year our budget will have dropped around $100,000 from previous levels,” said Sanchez, who oversees all of the programs at the Center. “So we are putting the effort in to try to get some new investors.”

The Center operates primarily by winning grants from various organizations. It currently receives funding from the Extended School Day grants, Teen Pregnancy Prevention grants and the Grand Street Settlement, which provide the main source of income.

As the Center Director, Sanchez communicates with these funders on a regular basis and makes suggestions as to where funding their dollars should be directed.

“Originally I thought we could get some production equipment,” she said. “Stuff for making CDs, documentaries. But it was all expensive and complicated. It was Keef who introduced me to Macs. He told me that we can do all this – and cheap.”

Despite the budget being quite tight, Sanchez approached the Grand Street Settlement, the program’s main backer, to ask for the new computers.

It took six months, but Sanchez was able to replace some aging PCs with seven new iMacs. The arrival of the computers and the reactions of the children has been so successful that they are now going to ask for another ten new iMacs.

For Ward, the focus has been on helping the students achieve their goals.

“They all want to be rap stars or sports stars,” he said. “I do the best that I can to feature them and the center, and we hope to leave it better through the new networking.”

Keef Ward, the multimedia director at the Community Center (Pic by Nic Stone)

By letting the kids showcase their skills on Facebook and YouTube, Sanchez and Ward hope that funders will see the potential and attraction of providing more money. “One of the hopes is that if one of these videos does blow up, it will interest funders,” said Ward. “And now we want to do more advanced projects featuring their skills.”

Ward is very aware of the benefits a digital upgrade can bring to an organization. Prior to arriving in New York in January, he oversaw the rebranding and digital development of Buena Vista Child Care in his native San Francisco. The management at Grand Street Settlement has already communicated to him that the upgrade can raise the profile of the organization.

“It is a great showcase for Grand Street and we want it to lead to funding,” he said. “It hasn’t happened yet, but we are getting plenty of compliments from the top.”

But it is not only the representatives from Grand Street Settlement who are happy to see the development of the online work. As Ward teaches the kids how to use programs like iMovie, Garageband, and even a new online slideshow developer called Animoto, they too are noticing a more exciting environment developing at the Center.

There is Saniya Francis, who is eight and attends P.S. 257 across the road from the Community Center.

“When I grow up, I want to be a fashion designer,” she said. “So I use games on the computers to do that. It’s like technology and knowledge. The computers help a lot of kids and they make kids smarter.”

Ijaniya Thornhill, who is seven, likes hip-hop artist Nicki Minaj and also enjoys taking photos. With the new computers she has been able to create music and pictures, which is something she has never had the chance to do before.

“I don’t listen to music, I just make it. It is just like beats,” she said, sounding far older than her meager years.

Ward hopes to have a blog and website operating by Christmas to round out the Center’s presence online, and Sanchez would like to host some events to showcase the new output.

“By the end of the year we are hoping to run a film festival and a music festival,” she said. “Hopefully this will help us garner some more interest.”

Judging by the way Knight is mixing beats and thinking about his next rhyme, the interest might not be too far away.

***

For more videos of the children and their skills, visit their Facebook Page or Youtube channel.

More videos will be made available soon as NYC in Focus follows the children for a story on hip hop in the housing developments.

Contact the writer:  nic.j.stone@gmail.com or @NicStone

Janet De La Cruz and her daughter, Skyy, work on homework together at the dining room table.(Photo Credit: Marin Austin)

“I was asleep and then I felt something dripping down my nose… I screamed, ‘Mom, my nose is bleeding!’” Skyy was five years old when her doctors diagnosed her with Kawasaki disease, a rare heart condition that only affects about 1,000 children a year in the U.S. She spent 28-days in the hospital with her mother, Janet De La Cruz, by her side. When she recovered, she never thought that the disease would have an effect on her ability to play sports. But, she was left with a hole in her coronary artery. The Doctors told Skyy that physical activity could kill her. They feared that with her condition, even a minor injury could turn fatal.

The day her doctor broke the news to Skyy and her mother, they were standing on the sidewalk on 141st street and St. Nicholas Avenue in Harlem. Skyy remembers when her mother got off the phone with the hospital. It was below freezing outside as the two of them stood in silence for a moment.

“Mom, I can’t ice skate anymore? This sucks. It was so fun,” Skyy said. De La Cruz says she thought quickly. “I didn’t want to pigeon hole her in to being home and not being active,” she remembers. “I’m all about making your dreams come true and understanding the potential that you have. Not relying on anything to get you by, I’m a stickler for that.”

De La Cruz then saw a sign for “HSA”, Harlem School of the Arts. It’s a program aimed at enriching the lives of young New Yorkers who may not have otherwise had the opportunity to attend an arts school. The school almost closed down in April of 2010 after experiencing financial troubles. But donations of over $1 million from private funders and arts education advocates enabled the school to stay open, with the assurance of an entirely new board.

De La Cruz immediately grabbed Skyy’s hand and the two ran inside the school. When De La Cruz looked down at Skyy, her eyes were glowing in anticipation. Since that day, Skyy has been a passionate artist.

“In my art, I want to show people how I feel, where I’ve been, where I want to go, what I think my paradise would be.” One of Skyy’s biggest dreams in life is to travel the world. The native Manhattanite has lived with her mother in the Dyckman Houses since she was a toddler. “I love living public housing because it shows you New York is not some big la-tee-da place with people walking around and smiling at you. This complex is a part of what New York is and a part of who I am.”

Public housing is a part of her that her mother hopes she will someday leave behind. De La Cruz says her dreams of success for Skyy aren’t just a hope, they’re a must. And so far, Skyy seems to be well on her way to success. She has been at the Talented and Gifted Young Scholars School for over a year now. “I never thought her art would take her so far, and so early…” says De La Cruz, “she understands that her art is very expressive and it makes people feel a certain kind of way when they see it.”

In September, Byron McCray, the Director of visual arts at Harlem of the Arts recommended Skyy to be featured in the 9^th season of Lifetime’s Project Runway reality show. Designers were paired up with young artists in Episode 6 to create “avant-garde” outfits. Each designer was challenged to design a dress inspired by their partner’s painting.

Skyy was paired with Viktor Luna. She “used a lot of swirls and movement” said Luna on the show. Skyy says her painting was inspired by “the movement of water.” The chiffon dress got Luna approved by the judges and on to the next round. “I was just being myself, I forgot the camera was even there. One minute I’m painting a picture and creating a dress, the next minute I’m watching it walk down the runway.”

The next item on the mother and daughter’s agenda is getting her into New York City’s Art and Design High School. She’s already begun working on her portfolio of paintings and drawings. But, she says she wants to keep an open mind about the future. “If I narrowed my dream down, and I thought of only one specific kind of art, I wouldn’t know about all of these other beautiful things that I can express my emotions in to… I want to open my surroundings to all sorts of art.” But one thing is for sure, “I want to go to Columbia University,” she says.

Skyy’s mother says she will be alongside her daughter’s journey, every step of the way. “If you’re an educated young woman wherever you go, you will be highly respected and regarded, I want her to feel she accomplished something in her life, much greater than she ever thought at 12-years-old. So when she is a grandmother, she will have a legacy.”

After all, she says, “The sky is the limit, this is why I named her Skyy.”

In 2006, the Apollo Theater partnered with Significant Elders, a storytelling initiative that connects senior citizens with local youth. Previously operating as a part time program through community centers and local theaters, Significant Elders has found a new home with Tubman Elementary School students eager to learn about the history of their own neighborhood. Each week, 4th and 5th-grade students meet with the Elders to talk about life in Harlem through the decades. In the spring, students in the 5th-grade stage productions at the Apollo based on the legacies from their new friends in the classroom. Combining history and social studies with the arts allows teachers to diversify their curriculum.

Debbie Ardemendo, Director of Education at the Apollo, says that she is thrilled to see how excited the seniors are to share their stories each week. Rasheeda Ali, a 50 year Harlem resident believes it is the duty of her generation to share their stories. “We had the experience of being raised by people who were morally responsible but did not have the opportunity to express that openly and freely,” Ali said. “I kind of think of it as an obligation to those ancestors to do everything I can for the young people coming behind me.”

Tubman currently has no arts education curriculum for its kindergarten or pre-K students and Ardemendo hopes not only to expand to other grades but to more area schools. The project potentially has implications beyond the classrooms. “I hope we are teaching these kids applicable life skills so they can continue to learn. They might not remember the specifics of what every elder says but they will know how to get the information they want.”

Advocacy groups like the New York State’s Alliance for Arts Education say that incorporating some creative instruction – dance, theater, music, or visual – is a vital part of childhood development. While the diversity of arts disciplines in city public schools has grown over the past 10 years, Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg’s recent scholastic budget cuts continue to threaten money available for hiring adequate personnel and supplies.

Nov. 5– As a child growing up on Nostrand Avenue in Brooklyn, Marlon Peterson was familiar with crime and violence. By the time he was a teenager, he had been shot once and “jumped” several times. During high school, Peterson gravitated toward drugs and weapons. At 19, he was one of five men arrested for participating in an armed robbery and double-murder in a Soho bakery.  At the age of 20, Peterson was sent to jail for 12 years.

After serving ten years of his sentence, Peterson came back to Crown Heights where he began working for Save Our Streets as a “violence interrupter.” The SOS program is a replication of Cease Fire, a successful program in Chicago that focuses on educating the community and mediating conflict to change mindsets about gun violence.

Marlon Peterson holds an after-school workshop for a new youth development program called YO-SOS.

For nearly 30 years, murder has been the leading cause of death among African-American men between the ages of 14 and 34, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. The part of Crown Heights that SOS works with is about 72% African American, according to 2010 Census data. In Precinct 77, which serves Crown Heights, murder is up compared to 1998, the year the Crown Heights Mediation Center opened its doors. That year, there were 9 murders. Last year, there were 20 murders in Precinct 77.

Peterson, now 32 years old, is the program coordinator of Youth Organizing to Save Our Streets, a program that encourages teens to fight gun violence. It operates out of the Crown Heights Mediation Center on Kingston Avenue, part of the Save Our Streets violence mediation program.

The SOS Violence Interrupters canvas the streets to diffuse escalating conflicts before they become deadly. On most nights, VI’s head out around dark – armed with picture postcards of young children that read, “Don’t shoot, I want to grow up.” The VI’s use the cards as conversation starters with those who live in the program’s area of focus:  between Atlantic Avenue, Eastern Parkway, Kingston Avenue and Utica Avenue. Their work often starts with a tip from a friend, a phone call from a former gang member, or a few words overheard on the street that hint at a potentially violent situation. Once they arrive at the scene, the VI’s act quickly. They have been trained to separate the groups that are involved, not to step in front of bullets, but rather calm people down and talk them out of using weapons.  Some of the most successful mediation attempts have ended with rival gangs shaking hands and walking away.

SOS messengers patrol the streets at night and talk to people about the dangers of gun violence.

Peterson says that SOS works because they use credible messengers – individuals like himself who have “been there, done that, been through some things, and are in a position now where they are willing and able to kind of draw people out from the same rut that they were once in.”

The Cease Fire model treats gun violence the same way an organization would treat a spreading disease. The model began in Chicago after Gary Slutkin, a physician and professor of Epidemiology and International Health at the University of Illinois at Chicago, returned from working on cholera and tuberculosis epidemics in refugees in Somalia. According to the Director of the Mediation Center, Amy Ellenbogen, Slutkin realized that gun violence operates in the same way that many diseases operate. He applied a three pronged approach of disease prevention to identify the presence of gun violence, interrupt and intervene, and change norms and behaviors. According to a U.S. Department of Justice evaluation, this approach has worked in Chicago. They found that 5 out of 8 areas served by Cease Fire, have had a 100% reduction in retaliation murders since they were introduced to the program.

Although major crimes, such as rape and robbery, have decreased in Precinct 77, some community members say that they still don’t feel safe. Phyllis McDuffie has been in the neighborhood for over thirty years. “It’s a really beautiful place, but lately we had shootings, all kind, rape, different things. I just think the community as a whole- Jews, Blacks, all of us- have to come together as one,” she said. Resident Dana Davenport, 26, agrees. She lives in Crown Heights and thinks that the problem lies in the youth. She says that the area needs cops at every corner.

SOS held its second annual Peace March on Oct. 20, 2011.

Peterson says that gun violence is so normalized in neighborhoods like Crown Heights that it has become a public health issue. “You don’t necessarily have to be the person that grew up in a broken household to get involved with violence, whether it be the person that’s a victim of it, the person behind it, or the person who witnesses it first hand,” he said. However, in the area where SOS focuses their efforts, the number of shootings have dropped 60%, according to Ellenbogen. She says they can’t say for sure if their efforts have contributed to this decrease because they have not been evaluated. “But whatever it is, we are happy to be a part of it,” she said.

Peterson says that the community is taking notice of their efforts. The center has distributed signs that now hang in the windows of nearby stores, recording the number of shooting-free days in the SOS catchment area. They hired a clergy liaison, Reverend Kevin Jones, whose own son used to be involved in gangs but now works for SOS. A recent “Week of Peace” featured community-wide anti-violence sermons, a Peace March, and a youth flash mob. Peterson says that compared to when he was a child, people talk about violence more as an unacceptable part of life. And to him, that alone is a “step in the right direction.”

The girls, all fifth and sixth graders, are about to begin their weekly health class, the hour-and-a- half on Tuesday afternoons when they get the chance to discuss sensitive topics concerning their bodies, sexuality and health. No men allowed.

The class, part of the Girls Inspiring in Real Life program, is offered to middle- and high-school age girls. Funded by the New York Women’s Foundation and provided by the Jacob A. Riis Neighborhood Settlement House, the GIRL program “focuses on the emotional, physical, and academic development” of its participants, according to the Riis Settlement website. The GIRL program is offered after school at both the Ravenswood and Queensbridge housing developments.

Launched last year, the program teaches technology and life skills and now offers health and blogging classes for girls in fifth through eighth grade. The girls are divided into two groups — fifth and sixth graders in one, seventh and eighth graders in the other — because “they are at different stages developmentally,” said Oshea Moye, director of the Ravenswood Community Center.

The younger and older groups maintain separate blogs, but the Ravenswood girls share their blogs with the girls in the same age group in the program in Queensbridge. “I want them to have a sense of unity,” said blogging teacher Aminah Salaam, 27.

Unlike many after-school programs that don’t do much more than provide a place for kids to hang out, the GIRL program is designed to teach students life skills. “You learn to be you,” said Eliza, 9.

In Sharon-Ariela Weintraub’s class, the girls discuss health issues, read poems, write journals and find a friendly, informal place to express themselves. Topics covered include the reproductive system. During a recent class, Weintraub, 25, described menstruation, explaining what a uterus is and showing pictures of female eggs.

“It is important to start at this age, so they’re comfortable to talk about it,” said Weintraub, who hopes that sexual education will help the girls make safer decisions as adults. “It sets a stage for making good decisions in the future,” she said.

“I learned about interesting things about my body that I didn’t know before,” said Jocelyn, 10, cupping her little hands with glittery, nail-polished fingernails on her abdomen. “I learned how I’m made.”

While the younger girls work with Weintraub, the older ones study blogging with Salaam. After an hour and a half, the girls switch classrooms and teachers.

In Salaam’s class, they create a blog analyzing what they have learned in the health class. In their posts, the girls get a chance to write their impressions about such topics as anorexia, bulimia, body image and self-esteem.

The blog, which will go public in December, is seen by Salaam as a tool to share what the girls are learning with other girls who aren’t in the program. In one post, Milan, 11, analyzed anorexia and self-esteem using Paris Hilton and Tyra Banks as examples.

Many girls try to imitate them because they want to be like them, Milan said. But “everybody has different talents. I’m already happy the way I look.”

By allowing the girls to understand their bodies and talk about sensitive issues such as eating disorders, the GIRL program helps its students develop the self-confidence that teens and pre-teens often lack. “I am proud of who I am and how I look now,” Karen, 12, said, adding that she doesn’t care about what people think and say.

At the same time, Salaam’s blogging class teaches the girls the technical skills needed to maintain a WordPress blog. Amil, 10, who said she wants to be “a fashion designer, an artist and a basketball player” in the future, doesn’t have a computer at home. For her and many others, the class offers the first opportunity to create a blog and write online posts.

The girls aren’t limited to blogging about health. Jocelyn chose to focus her page on music, one of her favorite topics since she wants to become a singer. She chose a song,“Unbroken” by Demi Lovato, and uploaded Lovato’s YouTube music video online.

The girls will learn more technological skills as the program unfolds. In a few months, under Salaam’s guidance, they will study how to shoot and edit one-minute videos called “Sixty Seconds of Wisdom,” about one of the topics discussed in Weintraub’s class.

The GIRL program offers more than useful skills, it also gives the girls help and support during a period of growth and development.

“If we have a problem, we can ask,” Jocelyn said. “They’ll help.”