Youth gun deaths are on the rise nationwide. Yet, there are solutions.

"Even when we cannot - always - prepare our society for our children, we can prepare our children for our society. It takes strong youth and strong communities." Enjoy!

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by JOCE STERMAN and ALEX BRAUER, Sinclair Broadcast GroupMonday, October 14th 2019

ST. LOUIS, Mo. (SBG) — Research shows gun deaths involving children and adolescents are on the rise across the country. Experts say there's a clear reason it's happening, and they believe the solution must include addressing the trauma that comes with living in violent areas.

Youth gun deaths are on the rise nationwide. Here's why experts say it's happening.

For Kevin Gaten, 17, the trip to pick to up something to eat two blocks from the insulated safety of his school, ended with gunfire and a good friend shot. He told us, "After we got the snacks, they just got to shooting. We saw bullets sparking off the ground and we ran." This kind of violence, Gaten explained, is just part of reality. He says it's something that’s become normal for kids in this town near Ferguson, Missouri, a city that erupted in protest five years ago following the death of 18-year-old Michael Brown by a police office officer.

Kevin Gaten, a student in the Jennings School District, talks about a shooting a few blocks from his school that left a friend wounded (Photo: Alex Brauer, Sinclair Broadcast Group)

When Spotlight on America asked Gaten if he thought kids across the country felt the same way, he responded, "I know all over the world they do. Because some places are just like this."

Many places across the United States are just like this, dealing with unthinkable violence as more and more young people are gunned down and teddy bear memorials pop up in their place. Gaten's classmate, Adrianne Bowman, 18, said, "Growing up in this area has been kind of rough because there’s a lot of violence going on. It’s the majority of people my age, that’s killing each other."

Protest signs dot the city of St. Louis following a rash of deadly shootings where children were the victims

When we met Gaten and Bowman, it was after a deadly summer just down the street in St. Louis, where at least a dozen kids under the age of 16 were killed by gun violence. The area was clearly impacted, with signs of outrage and calls for peace decorating block after block. The city has become a symbol of the growing problem of youth violence in America. A New England Journal of Medicine study released in late 2018 found gun deaths on the rise among kids and adolescents, up 28% nationwide between 2013 and 2016. Gun homicides specifically are up even higher than that among youth according to the research.

"It’s almost like a social contagion," explained Daniel Webster, Director of the Center for Gun Policy and Research at the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health. "As violence starts to increase, it starts to perpetuate itself."

Much of that violence is motivated by fear, says Webster, who has spent nearly 30 years studying gun violence at Johns Hopkins in Baltimore, a city that's had its own struggles with youth violence.

"Young people feel vulnerable. They don’t feel like adults, police, school protects them. And when they feel vulnerable they may pick up a gun themselves out of the belief they’ll be safer if they have a gun," Webster said. "And if you sort of multiply that out, all of a sudden you’re in an environment with a lot of young people with guns."

The problem of violence, research shows, impacts young African-American men in the highest numbers, particularly in urban areas. And studies Webster referenced show just being connected to someone who's experienced gun violence can increase a person's odds of becoming a victim or a perpetrator. That’s why programs in cities like Oakland, California, and New York, which have drastically cut shooting and murder rates, have gone after youth at highest risk first. Their approach, which includes something called "focused deterrence", involves so-called call-ins. At these meetings, at-risk members of the community are addressed by credible stakeholders who send the message that these individuals are valued, but shootings must stop or law enforcement will step in.

Webster says other successful programs have also focused on teaching at-risk youth how to properly deal with conflict and healing the trauma that comes from growing up surrounded by violence. He said, "It takes time, frankly it takes money to help them get the proper supports, to get them on more positive trajectories away from violence."

Activist Antonio Moore with Students Demand Action, says youth need to have a powerful voice in the effort to curb violence.

Antonio Moore, a young man working with Students Demand Action, an activist organization aimed at curbing gun violence, echoed Webster's perspective. Growing up in Baltimore, he said strategies for dealing with street violence are a matter of survival. And he emphasized the need to focus on healing the trauma those strategies require, "It's not just about interpretation of numbers and national statistics. It’s about the story behind those numbers. A lot of times we largely ignore and put Band-Aid solutions on problems that run real deep."

That's why Dr. Art McCoy, Superintendent of the Jennings Schools District near St. Louis, is a stakeholder in an initiative called Strong Youth, Strong Communities and takes a "trauma-informed" approach to education. He told Spotlight on America, "If you don’t tackle it head-on, it will take you out head-on."

Trauma-informed approaches are holistic McCoy told us, and take into account the real-life situations students may deal with as a factor in their education. McCoy says it's about healing the child, supporting them and understanding why their response to violence happens in a certain way, because of a root cause.

"If a kid even brings a gun to school, let’s say. The problem isn’t even knowing they brought a gun to school and taking it," McCoy said. "The problem is what caused the child to bring a gun or carry a gun in the first place. What gang? What safety issue? What money? You have to tackle it head-on, be proactive and lean into the discomfort of the real situations of our families."

Holistic educational approaches and work with initiatives like Strong Youth, Strong Communities are among the ways some communities are addressing youth violence (Photo: Joce Sterman, Sinclair Broadcast Group)

In McCoy's district, the impact of gun violence isn't ignored. It's in the classroom, the curriculum and the conversation. So are the services he says students and families need to stay on a positive path. That includes everything from laundry and homeless shelters to meditation spaces and job training classes.

"I tell my educators, we have to be real," Dr. Art McCoy said. "Bottom line is, we have to lead like our lives depend on it, like our legacy depends on it. Because it does."

For McCoy, who had his own experiences with violence as a child in St. Louis, the legacy is about building opportunities that break the cycle and set students up for success. Kevin Gaten and the classmates we spoke with say it's given them hope, despite what they've seen on the streets. "I never lose hope," Gaten said. "Because there’s always gonna be another way."