Youth Empowerment Day: June 3rd

FOR Immediate Release
For more information: 510.225.8491
Tuesday, May 23, 2006
International Figure Lennox Hinds and R&B/Pop Star Raz B
Join the Education Not Incarceration Coalition (ENI) for
Youth Empowerment Day to launch a campaign to address the
crisis of students pushed out of school and into prison

WHAT: “Youth Empowerment Day” to Stop “Pushouts”
from School into Prison

WHEN: Saturday, June 3, 2006, 6pm to 9pm

WHERE: McClymonds Educational Complex , 2607 Myrtle
Street (26th Street, between Adeline and Market Streets)

WHO: Students, parents, labor unions, educators,
community leaders, interfaith leaders and elected officials

Oakland, CA – Youth, parents, educators, labor unions,
interfaith, community members, and elected officials will
join Lennox Hinds, lawyer for South Africa, Rwanda, Nelson
Mandela and Angela Davis; Raz B, R&B Pop Artist, formerly
of B2K; Camila Chavez, daughter of Delores Huerta, niece of
Cesar Chavez and Executive Director and co-founder of the
Dolores Huerta Foundation, and Barbara Becnel, gubernatorial
candidate and lawyer for Stanly “Tookie” Williams for Youth
Empowerment Day to launch our campaign to stop students from
being pushed out of our schools – into our streets - and
into our prisons.

In Oakland over 52% of youth and 73% of all African American
males do not finish school. Throughout the country in inner-
cities over 50% of African American males do not finish high
school; 72% of these “pushouts” were jobless in their 20s;
by their mid-thirties, 60% had spent time in prison.

Through excessive policies of suspension and expulsion, lack
of adequate resources, insufficient school staffing,
deteriorating and decrepit facilities and standardized
“one size fits all” curriculum, our youth are increasingly
being pushed out of our schools – on to our streets – and
into our prisons.

Education Not Incarceration has worked extensively with youth,
parents and educators at McClymonds Educational Complex and
throughout Oakland to develop a campaign that seeks to make
changes to the education system that will make students want
to stay in school.

“The issue of pushouts is central to communities of color
throughout the nation. Students forced out of school leads
to unemployment and forces young people into criminal
activity to survive. We can either invest in our
children today or in their incarceration tomorrow.”
said keynote speaker Lennox Hinds.