COVERY STORY
Above: students engage in a simulation with law enforcement officials on what do do if one is stopped in a car in Orlando, Florida.
740 high school serslautern High School eagerly antici- pating the opportunity to take part in a training that might literally save their lives one day. The training was Kappa Alpha Psi’s Na- tional Learn 2 Live Initiative. In short, the initiative teaches our kids how to get home safely when forced to interact with the police. The program was designed to provide information, education and students filled the gymnasium bleachers at Kai- training to prepare the youth in com- munities of color for the negative law enforcement encounters that they have a statistically high probability of experi-
encing during their lifetime. But this was no ordinary high school. These were not the population of students typically served by this initia- tive. And this was no ordinary location. Kaiserslautern High School is on the Vogelweh Military Installation in Kai- serslautern, Germany. Most of these students have never lived outside of a military community or in the continental United States. Furthermore, the major- ity have never experienced the issues that precipitated the fraternity’s launch of this initiative four years ago. Howev- er, most if not all of these students will be transitioning back to the American mainland to attend a college or univer- sity after graduating high school. As
ironic as it sounds for a group of Ameri- can youth, they’ll be in a strange land by transitioning to the continental United States. They’ll be immersed into a new lifestyle rich with an enhanced set of opportunities, options and temptations not typically available on a military base setting. They will encounter new experi- ences that will broaden their horizons and provide opportunities for growth and learning. But unfortunately, they’ll be presided over by a new style of policing. Their impending transition creates the relevant need for this training in Kaiser- slautern and is the reason why the Learn 2 Live initiative made its initial visit to foreign soil.
THE JOURNAL ♦ SPRING 2020 | 167
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