photo by John Crum
In the summer of 2006, the city moved to shut down our HarlemLIVE newsroom. Sections of plaster had fallen away in the stairwell, exposing the brick beneath. Inspectors decided the building was unsafe. For the teens who treated the newsroom like their second home, it wasn’t a bureaucratic ruling. It was a threat. They pushed back, and what followed revealed exactly what HarlemLIVE had become.
That moment is one scene in a fifteen-year run. This book shows how that resilience was built.
As a public school educator and founder of HarlemLIVE, I saw how teaching journalism to teens sharpened their curiosity. Equipped with press badges and a digital platform they ran themselves, students grew into reporters, photographers, designers, speakers, and organizers.
Why This Still Matters
Young people still need places where they can think, write, and work with purpose. HarlemLIVE offered that space. The lessons behind it still hold.
This book was written with several readers in mind: educators and mentors looking for practical ways to give young people real responsibility; nonprofit leaders and funders interested in models of youth development that produce lasting outcomes; readers interested in Harlem, youth culture, and the early internet; and HarlemLIVE alumni reconnecting with a shared history.
Some readers may move straight through the narrative, others may jump between sections. Both approaches reflect how HarlemLIVE itself worked.
Part 1: The HarlemLIVE Narrative
Section A: The Accidental Educator
My path from California to New York City, into the classroom, and toward the ideas that eventually shaped HarlemLIVE. Letter-writing campaigns. After-school trips. Guest speakers. A student-run newspaper. Plays built from African folktales and student writing.
On this site: Ch 3: Teaching Beyond the Walls, how each of those practices worked and how to try them now.
Section B: The Story of HarlemLIVE
The full arc of HarlemLIVE, from its earliest days as a fledgling newsroom to the work required to sustain it. The early chapters focus on building the program from scratch. The later chapters follow the pressures of growth, the challenges of leadership succession, and the breakthroughs that emerged when students took the reins.
On this site: Ch 9: Building Blocks, the Newbie Card, Story Tickets, role checklists, and press badges. Epilogue: The HarlemLIVE Effect, what came after.
Part 2: Building on Legacy
Section C: Principles of a Successful Youth Program
What made HarlemLIVE work: experiential learning, trust, mentorship, community involvement, and giving young people ownership of the work in front of them.
On this site: Ch 20: Creating Youth Journalists, practical steps for starting your own.
Section D: Alumni Updates
Alumni now work in fields ranging from software engineering to higher education to digital media. Treniese Ladson became a software programmer. Dr. Odie Santiago teaches at the University of San Diego. Dion Yang travels the world as a YouTube creator.
On this site: Alumni, updates on where they are now.
Section E: Resource Guide
Organizations, tools, and reading for anyone doing this work.
On this site: Resource Guide kept current.
A Blueprint for Right Now
In an era of AI-generated noise and algorithmically curated feeds, a teenager showing up with something real to say still matters.
HarlemLIVE didn’t coddle them. It gave teenagers real assignments, real deadlines, and a platform they were expected to run.
A camera. A notebook. A login.
And the expectation that their voice counted. That model doesn’t belong to the past. It’s a blueprint for right now.
Discussion
- Where in your community can a teenager think, write, and test ideas without being talked over?
- What would your students do with a camera, a notebook, and a login, and the expectation that it counts?
- When the city tried to close the newsroom, the teens pushed back. What would your students fight to keep?
