Eli Chen

It was only Alex Kahn’s first time attending an Occupy the Bronx general assembly and as soon as he arrived, he got arrested. “It was a little scary,” said Kahn, “But I was with people I felt safe with. It’s the kind of experience that makes it clear that what the role of the police is [...]

    At Occupy Wall Street, I encountered a pasty, dark-haired twenty-something male who was “teaching” his friends how to build a fire out of a stick and a plank. When I asked what he studied at school, he said simply, “liberal arts” and that he didn’t have a specific major because he was “eclectic.” [...]

Tracie Pearson, 66, loves the birds, the resident squirrel she’s named “Buddy” and the schoolchildren who flock to Padre Plaza, a community garden in the South Bronx. She’s the Vice President of this community garden and has worked hard to restore and run the garden along with her neighbors for the past six years. They’re [...]

Santi Natal, who goes by the nickname “Chan,” picked up smoking a year ago. “It’s because of the people here,” she said. “Sometimes, I want to leave.” She’s referring to the people who take advantage of the community garden on Willis Avenue and 145th in the South Bronx, which she has managed for the past [...]

It’s now been a month since the protests started and the crowd of Occupy Wall Street protesters are no longer just a crowd–Zuccotti Park has become what many press releases are referring to as a “mini society,” an Occupy-topia of sorts. Granted, it’s not exactly a self-sustaining society; many of the provisions from the medical [...]

The cover of I’m an English Major–now what? by Tim Lemire When I was an undergrad, I was heavily involved in event planning–and was absolutely terrible at it. During that time, I met a woman named Isak who managed shows at a community center. She asked me what I was studying, to which I replied “environmental [...]

  Photo Credit: Mandel Ngan/AFP/Getty Images So here’s the present reality: the unemployment rate is at an unchanged 9.1%. and 2.6 million more Americans slipped into poverty, according to the Census Bureau. Congressional ratings are at an all-time low. So who are the unemployed Americans blaming? President Obama, Congress or both? Or should we not be blaming [...]

Photo credit: Salt Lake County Youth Services Last June, the unemployment rate among teenagers 16 to 19 years old was over 24%, according to the US Labor Department. This is a significant increase over the past decade considering that in 2000, when that rate was found at less than 13%. In that same month at our [...]

As the New York Times reported, this is a question that’s getting undoubtedly more volatile every day, especially now after the announcement last week that no jobs have been created for the month of August and President Obama’s decision to abandon stricter air quality regulations. But are the problems of the environment and the economy [...]