It is no exaggeration to say that we are in a pivotal moment in the history of race relations in America.

George Floyds outrageous, painful, and agonizing murder at the hands of Minneapolis police set off a wave of national unrest that we have not seen in 50 years. Black America has long known that systemic racismfrom early childhood experiences to educational opportunities, to housing and workplace discrimination, to medical discrimination and excessive policinghas cut short the lifespans and ruined the lives of millions.

Over the last few years, this recognition has gained greater traction in the rest of America, due in part to the ubiquity of cell phone videos capturing and broadcasting everyday acts of racial bigotry and violence. But let us not forget the important role that Black youth have played in social movement leadership. Thanks to their cross-racial organizing, young marchers today who identify as Latinx, Native American, White, Asian American, or Pacific Islander are acutely aware of the pervasiveness of anti-Black racism and its effects on their own lives.

The leadership of Black youth may seem like a recent phenomenon. However, a deeper look at civil rights history reveals that Black youth have consistently been at the forefront. In 1963, when the Black civil rights movement began losing momentum, the Childrens Crusade was born. On May 2nd that year, over 1,000 school-aged youth left school to march in downtown Birmingham. Reminiscent of that time, we all watch today with keen interest as Black youth take to our streets to protest, disrupt, and force us to collectively re-imagine our current systems and frameworks, from criminal justice and education to housing and employment.

Since 2007, the Youth Mentoring Action Network (YMAN) has been working to support this tenacity among Black youth. Teaching them about the legacy that they continue, YMAN provides them with platforms and opportunities to utilize their voices, promote their healing and self-care, and allow older adults to be the best co-conspirators in that journey. Indeed, our experience working with youth-serving organizations all over the country and the world has taught us a valuable lesson. Policies and initiatives work best when adults can learn to share space and wisdom with young people. Young people hold us all accountable in powerful ways, pushing us to be better than we would be on our own and making initiatives and policy much more successful than we typically imagine.

The same could be said about Sigma Beta Xi. SBX started as a high school club at Rialto High School in 1998. Instead of disappearing with the graduation of its founders, the organization transformed into a stand-alone nonprofit. Youth energy helped fuel the organization to become a leading nonprofit in the region, providing research-based mentoring and development services for the most marginalized youth. It has also been a vehicle for leadership development; many of the youth involved in SBX are leaders in the organization as well as in the community more generally.

We also know that one or two organizations cannot do it alone, given the challenges Black youth face in our region, and the need for multiple opportunities for leadership and development. To that end, we have worked and continue to work collectively with powerful organizations like the BLU Education Foundation, Tru Evolution, Youth Action Project, Young Visionaries, and others who are dedicated to ensuring that Black youth voices matter.

Getting there will require strategic and coordinated investments in building a strong youth-serving ecosystem in the Inland Empire. In the coming months, we resolve to work more closely with each other, and in deep collaboration with our community partners, to bring about meaningful systems change in areas ranging from education and housing, to criminal justice and workforce development. This is the kind of transformation our youth are calling for. Lets help them build a future we can all be proud of.

Dr. Torie Weiston-Serdan is Co-Founder and Executive Director of the Youth Mentoring Action Network. Corey Jackson is CEO of Sigma Beta Xi: SBX Youth and Family Services. Karthick Ramakrishnan is professor and director of the Center for Social Innovation at University of California, Riverside

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Engaging black youth will strengthen the Inland Empire - Press-Enterprise