UrbaNERD
UrbaNERD: When New York Was a Migrant Ship’s Destination
Jarrett Murphy |
The Mediterranean migrant ship disaster recalls a similar, though less deadly, incident off New York’s coast.
Government
Will Cities Be Heard in Campaign 2012?
Jarrett Murphy |
Great nations feature great cities. But American campaigns usually don’t. Four years after voters elected a president who pledged to do more for cities, is that about to change?
Education
Is The Promise Real?
Helen Zelon |
THE MAN OF THE HOURWe will find the money to do this because we can’t afford not to.Geoffrey Canada strides to the lectern in the New York Sheraton’s Grand Metropolitan Ballroom amid the clatter and clink of laden plates and silver coffee urns, as 1,400 sets of eager eyes and ears–fans and acolytes, students and advocates, civic leaders, law enforcement officers, school chiefs, nonprofit staffers and a handful of funders representing 106 communities across the United States–turn their attention away from their sliced-chicken-and-asparagus entrees to the tall, lean man at the front of the room. The diners are gathered at a conference called “Changing the Odds.” They are there because they seek to glean the secrets and wisdom of the Harlem Children’s Zone (HCZ), Canada’s all-encompassing neighborhood anti-poverty program.And they are not alone in listening closely to what Canada has to say. His grand experiment, which began in 1994 as an intensely local web of cradle-to-college social services and has expanded to include two charter schools and 97 square blocks of central Harlem, is about the hottest commodity on today’s national urban-policy scene.Just a few weeks after the conference, Canada was featured in a glowing 60 Minutes portrait—the second time the premier TV newsmagazine has covered the Zone. Oprah Winfrey calls Canada “an angel from God.”
ARTS and CULTURE
One Idealist's Progress In Fighting Poverty Online
Curtis Stephen |
Darryl Penrice has been needy himself. Now that he’s stumbled across a potential way to reduce want for everyone, he’s determined to make it work.
Bill Clinton
Yes We Can End Hunger
Neil deMause |
In his new book, activist Joel Berg says everyone can have enough to eat.
Bill Clinton
Theme And Variations On Deprivation And Dignity
David Jason Fischer |
A new book includes perspectives on poverty in America both from scholars and those with firsthand experience.
Economy
CITY BLOCKS LIKE SHOPPING MALLS
David Giles |
A new book helps make sense of un-cosmopolitan currents washing over Gotham.
Bill Clinton
HOMELESS BUT NOT VOTELESS:
CITIZENS BECOME ENFRANCHISED
Tanveer Ali |
Hundreds of newly signed up homeless voters are ready to participate in November.
Bill Clinton
City Lit: The Myth of Welfare Reform
David Jason Fischer |
Documenting how much never changed, a journalist points to what could.
Bill Clinton
The Match Game
Mark Winston Griffith |
Individual Development Accounts were the hot antipoverty idea of the 1990s, and tens of thousands of striving Americans now watch their money get matched and grow. Does it matter that most of them weren’t poor to begin with?
