Precious Lives

Stories about kids, guns and how to stop the violence. Precious Lives, created by 371 Productions, is a 2-year, 100-part weekly radio series about gun violence and young people in the Milwaukee area. The series applies a public health lens to each story to help listeners understand the full scope of the problem: who are the victims and the shooters; how are the weapons obtained; and what can we change about the environment that contributes to violence in Milwaukee?

#066 Precious Lives: Milwaukee Teacher Links Oppression And Gun Violence

WUWM 89.7 FM

Published April 19, 2016 at 11:17 AM CDT

Reggie Jackson, who teaches at Universal Academy for the College Bound, with a wall outside his classroom dedicated to young African American students who lost their lives to gun violence in the past year.

A bulletin board in a Milwaukee middle school bears the city’s 2015 homicide statistics. 152 murder victims, although a handful of those cases were later considered to be self defense homicides. Photos of some of the victims accompany the statistics. They are all black.

One educator has an explanation for this and uses the board to spark conversation with students about how present day gun deaths relate to centuries of oppression.

Corresponding Content:

Milwaukee Journal Sentinel - 'Griot' makes history hit home at school touched by violence