When I look at these “bad ass kids” I see promise and possibility. They all have the potential to be so much more than what these institutions have labeled them as, and what their own people have begun to co-sign.  

This morning, I witnessed a few of my mentees at Simmons-Pinckney get denied the chance to go to the International African American Museum (IAAM). Their field trip privileges were revoked because of disciplinary infractions – some of them fought each other. I saw disappointment on their faces. They’ve been told for years that they are bad. Not their actions, but them as children. And what I’ve seen all year is that identity being internalized a little more each day. Of all the field trips and of all the children, they should be the ones going to the IAAM. If I’ve learned anything at all about youth delinquency, it’s that a leading driver of their behavior is, in part, due to a lack of self-knowledge.

This morning was a sobering reminder – these are the kids I’m giving a TEDxTalk for today. These kids cause the most disruption, take up the most resources, and contribute to the most violence. They are front and center. Yet hardly anyone really sees them. Or at least the system doesn’t, and therefore the adults whose livelihoods depend on the system slowly stop seeing them too. The people, even my people, become the system. And the result? Our babies transform into the labels we’ve placed on them.

It's a self-fulfilling prophecy.

God, as the time winds down for me to step on stage at the Charleston Music Hall, I pray you wash my body with confidence and calmness. I feel your presence. Yours and the ancestors. THIS is why you called me home. To be a voice for the babies. To tell a new story. A new prophecy for those “bad ass kids”. These Gullah lands are sacred, and so are the children that come from it.

Tonight, I welcome excitement, and I rebuke fear. (I know that both manifest physiologically the same in the body.) How can I be afraid of what’s destined? May the truth I share tonight shake the dungeons in the mind of all who are listening. May it further this journey of transformation for the youth in my city. If transforming the world starts with humanizing it, then I pray those “bad ass kids precious babies” get humanized tonight… Amen.