EL SERENO : Wilson High Seniors Take on the Gangs

Enrique Rosas sat with his friends in a Wilson High School classroom, a mural adorning the wall behind them. Pointing to a video camera operated by teacher Neal Haworth, he asked, “Hey, are you under pressure to join in? Then why don’t you join some of my friends.”

His friends, mostly seniors in Haworth’s government economics class, chimed in with suggestions to avoid gangs, such as running track, becoming a mechanic, working on computers and even reading a book.

Rosas and his friends were part of a 30-second, videotaped public service announcement, which ends with the students saying, “Don’t get caught up in the cross-fires of life. Make good choices, have a good life.”

The video will be aired on Spanish- and English-language television, in addition to a video that chronicles Law Works, an anti-violence project sponsored by the State Bar and the Citizenship and Law-related Education Program, a Sacramento-based nonprofit organization that runs teacher training programs and conducts student activities. Haworth is one of three teachers in the state chosen to run the program.

In the three weeks that the students have been involved in the project, they have surveyed 150 elementary students in their neighborhood about their exposure to violence and put together the public service announcement. They have also drawn posters, met with attorneys and police officers and gathered statistics on crime.

But the most lasting impressions have come from the fourth- and fifth-graders they spoke with at the schools, the high school students said.

“A lot of them are grown up before their time,” said Victor Sahagun, 17. “They know about gangs, drugs, violence--things that we know already. It’s out there. It’s something nobody can miss.”

Even though many of the high school students grew up with the threat of gangs, and in some cases had become gang members, they said they were surprised at how much violence the children had seen.

“It’s touched everybody around here,” Haworth said. “Ninety-nine percent of all the kids that were polled said they fear gang violence. It’s in their neighborhoods . . . 40% said gang members either lived close by or were in their families.”

As a result, the high school students decided on their own to start an after-school program with activities in a nearby park for the children they met.

“The kids really know what’s going on around them,” said Daniel Gonzales, 18, who hopes to contact local businesses before the summer to help raise money for activities. “They told us they need role models, so we decided to do this program so they can see that we care.

“It’s really hard growing up in this neighborhood. I’m just lucky I met good friends.”

Rosas said many programs have been started with good intentions but abandoned along the way, leaving children without positive mentors.

“We figured the children are our future and we need the children to have a future,” he said. “You don’t have a future unless you do something to change. We’re tired of seeing it the way it is.”