What Are The Causes Of Gang Violence In Holler If You Can Hear Me

Greg Boyle once said “You can’t reason with gang violence: you can’t talk to it, sit it at a table, and negotiate with it.” A big problem with the US educational system is that they don’t do anything to stop gangs in school. The gangs inside the school and outside the school are constantly influencing the students making them more violent and aggressive against each other and teachers. In the memoir, Holler If You Can Hear Me By Gregory Michie, Michie and his students face gang problems inside and outside the school.

When Michie was teaching at Ellison he met a kid named Tavares there. Michie would go on to help Tavares until he graduated from school and would eventually come into contact with him 6 years after Tavares graduation. Tavares tells

Hector was a troublesome kid. He would get his gang and go out and destroy things and do bad stuff. Hector was only in 6th grade by the time he “was pretty big in the gang” (Michie 41). While he was in the gang, he had shot someone, ran into a person with a car, and he also did lots of drugs. He tried cutting his ties with his gang and tried to go to school but he stopped after September and went back to his usual self. Hector was such a problem to his mom he had to be sent to a place called Hopewell Hospital. He had to be at a “drug treatment center for at least 6 months” (Michie 37). Hector would eventually realize that the gang he was in was never there for him when he needed them the most. His life was also destroyed by gang life. He never had a normal childhood and was in a gang by 6th grade. If he had never been exposed to gangs he would’ve lived a normal life. Hector was an example of being a “Youth involved in gangs also are more likely to drop out of school, abuse substances, engage in high risk sexual behavior, and experience other long-term problems such as employment instability” (Gottfredson, D. C., et al.). He dropped out of school and started to do drugs more and more often because he had joined a gang. But Hector wasn’t the last of Mcihie’s student that faced against

One of them was Hector. Hector was the “enforcer for the Latin Jester, the local gang” (Michie 25). Michie taught Hector during his 6th grade years and he had a hard time dealing with him since he would always mess with him while they were in class. Hector would also interrupt class by yelling and swearing at others in spanish. Him being a part of a gang while in 6th grade made him much more rowdy and violent compared to other students. But with the help of Michie, Hector would be able to pass 6th grade. Although Michie was able to help him pass 6th grade, the future for Hector was not as nice as Michie was to him. Michie would also deal with other students like Khan and Marvelous. Marvelous was starting to turn into a gangster but Michie stopped him before he could become one. Marvelous was trying to break school rules and get into fights but one day he and Khan got caught up with Mr. Green who gave them a lesson about gangs. While they still wanted to become one, Michie told them to do things they liked instead like drawing and was steering them to "contribute artwork to the school paper" (Michie 141). After they had joined the school newspaper they stopped trying to be a gangster. Michie and Mr. Green was able to stop Khan and Marvelous from getting into fights and becoming gang members. If there were more teachers like them the school would be more safe and not dangerous to