News – Survivors to Superheroes

The Sound of Freedom and its Misleading Narratives about Youth Trafficking

Julia Kopala March 18, 2024 0 Comments

Approximately 350,000 children are trafficked across international borders each year, according to US State Department data from 2005.1 Due to the datedness of these statistics, the numbers may well be even higher today. Unfortunately, this population, though greatly affected by sexual violence, is not often spoken about. Youth trafficking is the illegal movement of children, typically for the...

Sexual Violence and the Police: Understanding the Institution that is Supposed to Protect Us

Jackson Diamond May 1, 2023 0 Comments

David Carrick, a former police officer with the Metropolitan Police Department in the UK, was arrested in October of 2021. In January of 2023, he admitted to forty-nine offenses committed over a period of eighteen years, twenty-four of which were counts of rape. In total, Carrick has admitted to over eighty different instances of sexual misconduct. Unfortunately, David Carrick is not an example...

Dress Codes, Then and Now

Laura Browne November 9, 2022 0 Comments

I never really planned to become an educator, but it’s something I’ve found that I really love. I’m a teaching artist, focusing on theatre, improv, and public speaking. I’m not that much older than the students I teach—around 10 years their senior at most, depending on whether they’re middle or high schoolers. Sometimes the generational gap between us seems shockingly small,...

Reflections on High School Students’ Protest against Sexual Violence: A Teacher and Survivor’s Perspective

Julia Kopala November 4, 2022 0 Comments

I am a twenty-four–year–old special education teacher at a charter high school in Boston, Massachusetts. This piece was written about my first year as a teacher in a live school setting due to the Covid-19 pandemic. In college I had been active in protests and student-led discussions about social issues, and I have always been open to hearing people’s stories about gendered violence. I was...

R. Kelly’s conviction offers hope, at last, to survivors, but only after decades of abuse and judicial failure

Alyssa Henderson September 28, 2021 0 Comments

TW: Mentions of sexual abuse and trafficking In a bittersweet ruling, R. Kelly was convicted on all charges for the sexual exploitation of a child, bribery, racketeering, and sex trafficking in Brooklyn earlier this week, facing a possible 10 years to life in prison. While this justice is a relief, especially for the survivors who boldly stepped forward to share their stories, the fact that...