Investigative Report

Artistic Expression: A Safe

Haven
Hillary Rogers and Jairson Ascencao
URI WRITING 104
Mrs. Girasole
November 20, 2016

Introduction:
Growing up in an urban community can be rough on a child. Drugs, alcohol, and crime
are just a few of the negative influences that exist on the streets. Its easy for a kid to feel
overwhelmed and oppressed in such a hostile environment. Finding a safe place that allows them
to release pent up frustrations without fear of being judged is one of the most important steps to
self-discovery. Self-expression has proven to be valuable to teens, who use art as a way to get
their opinions heard in a world where the voices of children are often ignored. In high-risk, urban
areas such as Chicago, or Los Angeles, teenagers are often victims of, and participants in, violent
acts and crimes. However, some of these children are lucky enough to have active leaders in their
communities. These leaders work to create safe havens and keep youth away from the criminal
activities that have given a negative reputation to urban youth. Through programs like the Truth
N Trauma Project (Harden, 2015) and the CHAAT Initiative,(Goicoechea, 2014) these
leaders are able to make a big impact on the children that they work with by helping them find
ways to express themselves.

Expressive Counseling and Urban Youth:

Kids seen in the low-income areas of large cities such as Chicago, Philadelphia, or Los
Angeles are often struggling to deal with problems of alcohol and drug influence. Some children
have to deal with verbal and physical abuse from parents that use these substances. This abuse is
psychologically damaging and affects how the children view their parents and those substances.
However, artistic expression has been shown to be beneficial to teenagers psychologically.
According to Jessie Goicoechea, the psychologist and professor who designed the Childrens Art
and Talk Program (CHAAT), kids can use art as a tool to help them push through traumatic
experiences, discover themselves, and let their voices be heard (Goicoechea, 2014).
The CHAAT program was based in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, and brought together kids ages seven to twelve - from families with drug or alcohol addiction. The program was run by
therapists-in-training, artists of color, and community leaders. The eight-week program had
weekly meetings where the children would complete an art activity and discuss the lesson behind
it. The CHAAT program helps these kids through expressive counselling. As stated by
Goicoechea, expressive counseling uses poetry, literature, music, and other forms of art to help
participants open up about tough topics they might not have otherwise been willing to share. By
asking the children to participate in everyday art activities, the staff could observe the children
without unnecessarily stressing them. The kids were able to express themselves and felt
comfortable while doing it! Keeping the children in groups also made them feel more
comfortable and willing to share, as they realized that they werent the only ones dealing with
problems at home. At the end of each session, the children were encouraged to share their
artwork with their parents. Whether this art was a poem, a drawing, or a song, this gave the
parents the chance to learn how their children felt about their lives at home.

The CHAAT initiative was not the only program using expressive counseling as a way to
help urban teens. Expressive counseling was especially useful for dealing with the teenagers,
who at first didnt feel comfortable sharing information with the adults who were trying to help
them. A theatre in Chicago created a program for the female teenagers in juvenile detention
centers. They were able to do this without any professional psychologists or therapists; those
involved in the program were community leaders and theatre directors. Program staff members
drew up musical dramas based on interviews with a variety of inner-city schoolchildren and
organized performances with the teenagers.
As the program developed, the incarcerated girls were encouraged to create their own
productions. Many based these pieces on traumatic past experiences. These were stories of young
girls that grew up in broken homes, their biological fathers often nowhere to be found and their
mothers constantly under the influence of drugs and alcohol. The mother, in an attempt to replace
the father of their children, often involved herself with other men. At times these men were
strangers; other times these were men the daughters had come to trust. These girls became
victims of rape and sexual abuse, and often went on to continue the chain of abuse before ending
in up in jail. By writing these productions, the girls were able to release the anger and stress that
they had carried for years because of these traumatic experiences. Group counselling was also
used here, as girls shared their experiences in groups and were able to identify with one anothers
traumas. Together, they even managed to write a poem expressing the outrage they felt towards
the men that had assaulted them as children:

I thought you wouldnt hurt me

I thought you of all people would protect me
I thought you would be there for me
I thought you would die for me

I even thought you would cry for me

But, still in all, you lied to me.
You touched me in unknown places.
You did the unthinkable to me
(Palidofsky and Stolbach, 2012).

This poem is just one example of the incredible amount of good that programs like these
can do, allowing these deeply broken girls to release some of anger built up inside of them. In
some cities, community leaders have created more comprehensive programs which allow these
teens to be further involved in the healing of their community.

Restorative Practice in Urban Communities:

With crime being such a major factor in the lives of these children, even death is no
longer a stranger to them. Since 2008, over 800 people have died in Chicago. Crime-related
deaths like these especially affect the teenagers of urban communities, who are often the ones
dying. One teen even commented Every day somebody dying and its not even natural causes
no more. Its everybody dying cause they got shot. Innocent people. (Harden, 2015) Recently,
to combat all the death and violence in Chicago, the Truth N Trauma project began. The
project aimed to aid urban teens through a process called restorative practice. This practice can
be formal or informal and helps to teach kids how to properly express their emotions through the
use of tools such as peace circles. (Harden, 2015)
The program had forty-four urban teens --from ages 14 to 18-- participate in a bunch of
different activities. They had some of the teenagers working in media production: these kids
filmed and created a documentary raising awareness for the violent crimes happening in their
community. Another group participated in theatre, an activity that empowered the teens as,
though they were nervous, they successfully performed in front of live audiences many times;

they covered mistakes and miscues for each other, further building the level of trust they placed
in each other; and most importantly, they commanded the attention of the audience and were
heard by it. The study even had some of the youth in research groups, looking at the social
problems that were a part of their lives and working to find solutions that would better their
community. The students focused their research on problems such as economic disparity
and school inequality, the criminal justice system and the police role in their communities, and
events of large scale violence in communities of color, and the reasons behind them.
The investigation was conducted over a period of nine months, with each of the teens and
the staff members involved taking a survey before beginning the program as well as at the end of
it to determine if the program had a significant impact on their lives. The survey showed that at
the end of the nine month testing period, the teens had increased their involvement in school, and
in their communities. Most importantly, the survey showed that the program had helped the teens
realize their potential, and made them feel as though they had talents and abilities that they could
use to help others (Harden, 2015).

In Conclusion:
Kids need guidance. They need an experienced hand to help keep them out of trouble,
and through programs like the ones mentioned previously, troubled teens can find safe havens
where they can be guided toward positive activities like theatre, or poetry to help them release all
the tension that comes from living in these high-risk, urban areas. These programs have lead to a
decline in violence and given children a place that makes them feel safe and brings a new
perspective to social commentary. And even though these practices were not organized by
professional psychologists, community leaders were still able to help the teens begin the mental
healing process. What was important was that strong community leaders came together and

created safe havens that let the teens in their communities express their thoughts and share their
experiences. In these safe havens, kids who were forced to watch their friends get gunned down
in the streets were able to let out the anger that they felt because of the events. Most importantly,
these programs gave youth a firmer grasp on what they thought were their limits, and helped
them realize they had talents and abilities that could be used to help others. This feeling of selfworth changes a lot for these teens, who often felt beforehand that they were useless, and could
lend nothing of meaning to the community. The safe haven method, in which community leaders
create a safe environment for children, gives them the chance to relax and release their
frustrations. This method has been proven to work in this setting and has an incredible amount of
potential to help and heal teens, as long as more communities take charge and try.

Works Cited

Goicoechea, Jessie, et al. "Group Counseling For At-Risk African American Youth: A
Collaboration Between Therapists And Artists." Journal Of Creativity In Mental Health 9.1
(2014): 69-82. Academic Search Complete. Web. 9 Nov. 2016.

Harden, Troy, et al. "The Truth N' Trauma Project: Addressing Community Violence Through A

Youth-Led, Trauma-Informed And Restorative Framework." Child & Adolescent Social

Work Journal 32.1 (2015): 65-79. Academic Search Complete. Web. 8 Nov. 2016.
Ingalls, Rebecca. "'Stealing The Air': The Poet-Citizens Of Youth Spoken-Word." Journal
Of Popular Culture 45.1 (2012): 99-117. Academic Search Complete. Web. 8 Nov. 2016.
Palidofsky, Meade, and Bradley C. Stolbach. "Dramatic Healing: The Evolution Of A TraumaInformed Musical Theatre Program For Incarcerated Girls." Journal Of Child & Adolescent
Trauma 5.3 (2012): 239-256. Academic Search Complete. Web. 9 Nov. 2016.
Travis, Raphael. "Rap Music And The Empowerment Of Today's Youth: Evidence In Everyday
Music Listening, Music Therapy, And Commercial Rap Music." Child & Adolescent Social Work
Journal 30.2 (2013): 139-167. Academic Search Complete. Web. 9 Nov. 2016.