It's messy, It's freedom, and it's rules its
rights and responsibilities. It's conflict and resolution, both
empowerment and compromise. It is justice. It is
individual and its collective. It is fairness, respects
and values. It is equality, equality, equality,
equality. It's truth. It is government and its
choices. It's passionate. It's problem solving its
action. And it's possible it's May, my family and
my community democracy. It is
mhm. Hi,
I'm John, I'm Alley. My name's Louisa's and I'm Ashleigh.
People in a democracy used activism to make changes for the better, for
example, working for social justice in other words, making things
fair. When it comes to fairness, young people can take action even in an ordinary
situation. Sometimes the most ordinary things present the biggest
challenges. And if you don't think ordering food can be a challenge, then watch
this. Okay, I
just love basketball. I always have. I'm on the North
Star basketball team, and I think we're a pretty
good team. Minnesota North Star Academy is a charter school for deaf and hard of hearing.
Students were founded based on the principle of bilingual education, using
American sign language in English. We don't view them really is disabled.
We view them as a language minority. It's a really small school,
but at the same time it really makes us feel like family here. Most of the
time, I like being in the deaf world. It's not easy to live, is a
deaf person. I've seen the whole gamut of
experiences. We've noticed a lot of people have difficulty in
restaurants. They have a hard time communicating with people,
especially in restaurants. We'd be sitting there talking, and
we would point very clearly on the menu. I said I wanted the strawberry
milkshake and so the service had fine. But then she brought out a
chocolate milkshake. I said No, I pointed here. I said,
Strawberry. So then she said she understood and came back and then
brought me a Coke. It's like, How can you not understand that they kind
of just roll their eyes because they know it's going to take more time?
Shouldn't be a service job to welcome the customer and provide good service,
you know, just make an effort. I feel it's unfair. I feel like
there rejecting us. So sometimes we have to say, Wait a
minute. It was just obvious that something needed to be done to fix the
problem of service and restaurants. So that's how we decided to make this
video tape. So the initial greeting. Just when you first come
in, we decided to do a training video with the video
way. Hope that service will learn to treat death people right.
We wanted to interview deaf people, so we collected those interviews and made
sure we had those points on our script. Then we contacted
Paul Adams. My name's Paul Adams. I'm a director of franchise operations for T
G I Fridays, so they set up a meeting. What would
PC is? Something beneficial from a restaurant perspective. Our company was
interested in this because it speaks to one of our core beliefs, and that is
diversity. What we get out of this is how to take better care of
deaf guests that we have in our store. She's describing scenario to them
about the waiter coming over T G I.
Friday's It's a big business big company, their nation wide.
So it was nice that we had that access. I think the best thing was the
servers themselves. My role today was Thio
portray the bad server.
What do you want to drink to something that drink? My
test was the good server. Hello, everybody.
My name is Heidi. I was supposed to be
the server that didn't intend to needs the server that had a bad attitude.
They're just right. I was the one who
hopefully did everything I was supposed to dio. I don't believe that I
really have had any training on how thio effectively
weight on deaf people. You can't blame them for something they don't
know. It's our responsibility to teach them. You shouldn't be
afraid of a deaf person. Death people in normal, you know, we're not
creatures from outer space. We're normal human beings.
Hopefully by seeing this video to understand that we wanted to be treated just like
anybody else. Our goal is to spread this out to other
restaurants so that people will see how the best provide service
to deaf consumers. It's going to take time. It's going to take energy. It's not something
that happens overnight, But what we expect is that there will be some
improvement. It's up to the deaf community to inspire other people
and make things positive. I feel like I've done something for our community.
What they're doing can make an impact. With so many
adults, the lives of deaf people are improving. The future
is what motivates me the most. I want them to have a good life, a good
experience. They want social justice. They want
everybody to see them as whole individuals, not as deficits. Someday
a death person will want to be president. Who knows?
Kids at Northstar experienced injustice and took action,
but sometimes you have to do more. Sometimes we need to reach out to
others. Think of caring and compassion. Powerful
words in a community. Skin cancer. Ah, powerful
name for kids with tons of compassion. Let's take a look.
My uncle died of brain cancer. My grandpa has
had cancer. My aunt, my grandpa, actually died from cancer.
I had a grandma who passed away from brain cancer.
This is something that everybody of every age and background is being affected
by. Well, I really got started when my friend Dustin was diagnosed with cancer.
This sucks. It really does. He's barely
18 and he's already had two with cancer. I think it's important
that you reach out to people
skin cancer is a new organization that is
mostly comprised of students from problem high school.
And we started out with about 20 to 25 students three years ago,
and now we're up to 115 students, and it keeps growing.
And we just try and make people's lives as easy as
possible if they have cancer. The Sting part of Singh Cancer,
um, comes from our name Prebble High School and where the Hornets.
So the sting part is fighting against cancer. We do it so many
different kinds of activities, whether it's raising money for people or
just simply, like going and spending time with them. You know, 100%
of what they donate, they know, is going right back into their community. One of the
things that sink cancer does that help people. We go around and we shovel the homes of people
who have cancer. We bring them things we cook them dinner, anything that
just little things that can help them around the house at all. We did this breast
cancer run walk. We directed traffic and it was really cool.
Our students were contacted by the American Cancer Society to help out. They
handed out water at different stations Every week we get
together for about 45 minutes, and then if any of you guys have other
ideas for you can see that you're doing something. You can see the outcome of
what you're trying to accomplish. He's down at Milwaukee Children's Hospital.
So, you know, as a group, we gave him $100 gas card to their
family. It's all for a good
cards off, 10 bucks worth and another five. We need two
more. We were doing a 50 50 raffle. It's to raise money for our friend
Dustin, and we're doing very successful. A lot of people want to help out with this, which is
great. That's fine, thank you very much. Tonight
we are holding a dance. A benefit dance for
Dustin Stein record. That's our goal is to raise as much money as we can with the
dance. He's got a lot of medical cost. I would have to say it would be
tough to pay all the bills. Chemo started two weeks after
after football of stone and you lose your hair chemotherapies
poisons your body. Thio kill anything bad you can't
hang out with your friends because of the germs. You can't go to school.
I'm trying to make a crane way folded over
1000. The Japanese proverb states that if you make
1000 of these cranes, um, then you can make a wish, then
you fold the wings down. That's nice, like, um,
hard to tie him. But it's gonna look so cool and it's done. It's gonna be
awesome. Everybody pitched in forward and all that kind of
stuff. It's going well, almost 200
way made a big card for Dustin Thio.
Everyone can write a message just in just where they want.
Thank you.
I would have to say The whole cancer experience on all these people on
what they did for me was definitely humble.
It feels really good. It's
rewarding toe know that you're helping people. It makes you feel like you're
part of a group working towards one, cause it felt
good knowing that all those people were cheering you on and hoping that you're gonna
make it. I'm a cancer survivor.
I always said when I got sick that I'd give Bacca's Muchas I was given, and
that's all I'm really trying to dio. It's nice to have
hair again. It really is.
Stine Cancer shows how one small idea conspire ed throughout the whole
community. You think something like stink cancer can start up near you?
You never know unless you try. Now what if a natural disaster hit your
area? Would you feel powerless after Hurricane Katrina? Many
people in New Orleans felt like that, but two young brothers decided to
take action with a lot of help from their friends and simple tools like these,
they're making a difference.
It was hard Thio kind of grass book was actually
happening where we're standing right now. There used to be a house
I knew Hurricane Katrina would be bad when the levee
broke, which is the wall of water came helpless. Feeling
is overwhelming. This was probably just a one bedroom
house on the top half looks to be in addition on
the force of the water just caused the foundation to give out and
bringing this top floor onto the bottom. When that hits
you, you realize it's never gonna be the same.
This is the porch of a house that once stood here. All that's left is the
pilings for this house. You just think about what you had,
what you lost and you'll never get it back. That's
when wire and I kind of took off. Our kids picked up on the name used
rebuilding New Orleans, which basically says what they wanted to do.
We're helping. Got the houses on cleanup
clean up. How's this for a lot of people? Wait, I'm here because I
just want to help out all of my city. We're hoping everyone in
that region recover from the devastation. They
contacted the media. They contacted a local news stations and the
main focus buying that it was getting many people involved. It's possible we're
happy to have you all here. I can't believe you spend a Saturday morning
doing something so commendable. It's important to get everyone
actively involved in the neighborhood is kind of in a state of flux. A lot of
people still need help, you know, they had their whole life turned around. This is my
home that I lived in for 52 years. It's just totally
devastated way provide that physical
labor to get them into their house. They need help, can't
do it by themselves. They made this a lot easier for May. We're helping the people
that want help but can't find it.
Gutting a house is extremely labor intensive. We're not
afraid to do the hard work. And when we decided we wanna do something, we're gonna get it
done.
E Usually I'm on fridge duty. When I come out here,
it's not pretty. It's not pretty. Oh, God, that's gonna be bad.
That was pretty aggressive. Gets dirty, but it's gotta get done. So watch out.
Watch out, E. Think the harder I work, the more fun
I had a 21 other time. Can you take a sledgehammer
and break up a porcelain toilet?
Okay, way felt really bad because all these people have
lost all that stuff that happened to me. Also way had to
clean all I was ourself. Just because nobody can help me, don't me and I can't
help anybody else. Every house you got, there's a story behind it. Room on the
corner there was my office and I think it's filled with books because I had
my entire library. I felt really bad. I saw how much information you
had in your house such a waste. So many beautiful
porches in such antiques and my heart goes out to you. Thank
you for helping Thio get that mess
out, and this just puts that hope back in these homeowners.
You don't see the youth having a celebration in these
flooded areas. We come out,
we have fun. We place a music, eat some food. It's work you feel good
about doing. We believe in what we're doing. Hopefully, though, be able to get in
the house a little bit sooner. It's really great morale builder for the city.
New Orleans is one of the largest port cities in the country. The
culture of New Orleans, Mardi Gras, the French
Quarter. If you were in our shoes, you don't want to return. You'd
wanna live where you live. It's your home. We made a difference in
these people's lives, and they're never gonna forget that, And neither will
wait.
The youth rebuilding New Orleans are true activists, just like the
students at North Star Academy and those who want to sting
cancer, too. They all started with a need, Ah, plan
and a passion for social justice, and that's how we all can
have a powerful voice democracy. It is
for more information
about our program. Visit our website at democracy. It is dot
cctv dot org