Author Archives: pattersonpressonline

YouthWorks provides opportunities for students to earn money and gain work experience

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By Mirian Maurizaca

Youthworks is a program for teens that gives them a chance to work during summer and get paid. This program began in 1973. They provide a 5-week job opportunity, from July 8th to August 22nd. Young people between the ages of 16 and 21 are eligible for the program. The application opens every year in January and ends in March. 

“The purpose of YouthWorks is to provide students with hands-on experience in different careers.”, explained Mr. Córdoba, a Post-Secondary Advisor at Patterson.

“Students have the ability to fill out a survey in the registration form that allows them to express which pathways they are currently enrolled in and what careers they are interested in. The Mayor’s Office of Employment Development then uses the information from the registration form to match students with a job site that matches the student interest.”

“It is a way to earn money for fun, to help your household or start a savings account. Gain meaningful work experience to build your resume and learn your likes and dislikes for future employment,” added Ms. Reid, the Community School Coordinator at Patterson.

Students can apply by visiting this link: https://youthworks.oedworks.com/. Students can apply any time before March 22nd-the sooner, the better. 

There are many organizations and companies that hire through Youthworks.

“Students focusing on nursing can work at Johns Hopkins Bayview, while other students who may need to catch up on graduation requirements can attend summer school through YouthWorks.” said Mr. Córdoba.

“Other job sites include the City of Baltimore government and businesses in the private sector. Most of the time, students are required to help out in the daily needs of the business or entity. In every case, students are trained to perform any duty that is asked of them.”

Ms. Reid encourages all students to apply for YouthWorks. “Everyone should apply from age 14, because if you don’t, you won’t have the opportunity to try it out”.

However, Mr. Córdoba pointed out that students do need to have a Social Security number to apply. Seniors who are interested in YouthWorks and do not have a social security number should reach out to Mr. Córdoba to explore other opportunities.

Youthworks is helpful in many ways: it helps students get experience and find out what they like while also earning money. Don’t miss out on this opportunity–apply before the deadline!

Voting age should be lowered to 16

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By Wilfredo Portillo-Quinones

We learn in school that voting is one of the most important rights of citizenship. Yet most high school students are not allowed to vote because they are under 18. I believe that 16 and 17-year-olds should have the right to vote. As a teenager we have fresh perspectives with new thoughts and ideas that can add to what our government already has in mind for the country.

Our current government is run primarily by older people. When the two main candidates for President are the oldest to ever run in history, it feels like we’re lowering our standards. There needs to be a better mind at our highest office of government, especially when we’re making enemies out of other countries and military forces. I think if teenagers could vote, we would vote for a president with an open mind and someone who can relate to our ideas for the country.
Our country needs a leader who has an open mind about things and isn’t quick to make enemies. We as teenagers could support our government with ideas and feel better about our government if we knew we had a president who could relate to us.

There are claims that young people don’t care or even think about our government power and that is false. A lot of young people care about our government, as studies show. According to the website youthrights.org, people of the age of 17-18 vote more than people ages 20-40. In 2014, Chicago allowed their youth to vote and 75% of eligible people ages 16-17 voted compared to 54% of people ages 20-50, showing us that our youth care at least as much as older people do. In Baltimore, we let our youth vote for our mayor in one election and people of the age of 17 voted 35% compared to 36% of people 18 and older, showing us that teens will vote at more or less the same level as older people. This proves that our youth care as much as older people do. The same website also shows data that shows that contrary to popular belief, high school students actually know more on average about the government that older people. This makes sense when you consider that we are learning about government in school and the information is fresh in our minds. Despite some people’s claims that teenagers are too ignorant to vote, the truth is that youth have open minds, are as well-informed as other age groups, and should have the same rights as other Americans. We also care about our country and who our leaders are.

There are many organizations fighting for youth rights and they’ve proven the facts that teenagers have the right ideas for our country. We should support and fight for teenage voting rights. Voting rights for teenagers would create many new opportunities for us to become active citizens and make our country better. I hope these specific facts will convince you that teenagers above the age of 16 do care about our country and should be given the right to vote.



Clippers track and field team makes history at City Championships

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(Photo by Kylayah Davis/Patterson Press)

By Coach Smith

The Patterson track and field team made history at the Baltimore City Indoor Track and Field Championships on Thursday, January 25 at the Prince George’s County Sportsplex. Najah White AKA “Little Nae” won 2 gold medals. She won a gold medal in the mile and rebroke the school record. Then, an hour later, she won a gold medal in the 2 mile.

Additionally, many of our other runners also broke school records. The girls 4 x 400 meter relay team of Ahmawanyah Lewis, Najah White, Dayvia Weaver, and Quintine Nterere broke the school record. Additionally, Rancel Corporan Lagombra broke the school record in the 500 meters. The boys 4 x 800 meter relay team of Joel Lukoo, Vema Maneno, Aaden Hopkins, and Rancel Corporan Lagombra broke the school record. And the boys 4 x 400 meter relay team of Aaden Hopkins, Joel Lukoo, Marshall Mallory, and Rancel Corporan Lagombra broke the school record.

Our track and field team is comprised mostly of freshmen and sophomores. In the next year or two, Patterson track and field will take over the city of Baltimore.

(Photos by Kylayah Davis/Patterson Press)

Health care out of reach for many in the U.S.

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By Dayanna Herrera-Mateo

 Healthcare prices have been a big problem in the United States for years. It is said that the prices are getting more expensive because of new health-related technologies.

From a global perspective, it has been reported that the United States has the worst healthcare prices and they continue to be more expensive than other high-income countries, and still, the U.S. is the only wealthy country that doesn’t have universal health coverage. Universal health coverage is when all people have access to all of the quality health services they need without financial problems.

Spending money per person on healthcare is almost two times higher than in Germany and four times higher than in South Korea. In the United States, people are more likely to die at a young age, the highest death rates are from avoiding conditions that can be treated, and we also have the highest suicide rate, which may stem from mental health problems which can also be expensive. About a total of 79 million Americans have medical bills and/or debt.

Immigrants have also been protesting in front of the Maryland State House in support of a healthcare bill which stated that healthcare is a human right. The bill would have allowed undocumented immigrants to access state health care assistance, but the bill failed to pass. The CARE Act, which was passed in 2016 and is still in force today, prevents many immigrants from receiving benefits from Maryland’s health care assistance program.

Immigrants try to avoid hospitals even when they’re very sick and have a sickness that could even be deadly because they’re scared about the high bill that they could have, so they’re demanding healthcare insurance. There was also a video trending in which a lady was seen trapped in a subway train in Boston and you could see she was struggling but she kept shouting and begging others who were on the scene not to call the ambulance. That might be because ambulance rides can cost about $1,300. It is understandable that she didn’t want the ambulance to be called. 

Healthcare is too expensive for some citizens to even afford, and it has been a problem for a long time now. The U.S. also doesn’t guarantee government or public health coverage to all their citizens. People are getting stressed to the point where they go so far as to unalive themselves because of hospital bills or any type of healthcare bills. 

High School Choice: Why you should care about it as a student and why I think it should be gone 

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By Jayzanay Blessett, Junior at Patterson High School and Diversity Chair of the Associated Student Congress of Baltimore City

Baltimore’s School Choice was established as a program in 2002. It determines whether or not you get accepted into the school you chose by considering your composite score and your academic performance during your Middle School years. If you do not get into the school you would like to go to, then you are typically placed in your zoned school or your other choices. Certain schools require special application requirements, such as Polytechnic Institute, Baltimore City College, etc. In this article, I will express my opinion on why I believe we should put an end to this and why, as a student, you should care.

My Story

As a middle school student you constantly hear your teachers drill thoughts into your brain like, “Go to Poly”, “Go to City”, or “Make sure you do the best you can so you can get accepted into Poly and/or City”. Hearing teachers consistently say that makes students feel pressured that they have to go to those said schools and if they don’t it’s bad or is not “acceptable”. Putting this kind of stress on 12-14 year old children is not healthy whatsoever. 

The idea that only those two schools you will give you the best education is a terrible idea. From a personal standpoint, my School Choice year was during the pandemic. My virtual school year was bad and I was struggling with many mental health problems just like every other student. I was so scared to miss the deadline for my School Choice and I was nervous that I was not going to get into the school that I wanted to, which was Baltimore City College. Once I got my results, I cried, because I got into one of the supposedly “worse’’ schools in the city, Patterson High. 

For the majority of my 7th grade year, I heard so many stories about why Patterson, Mervo, and honestly any school that was not Poly, City, Western, and or BSA was bad, so getting into a school that was not on my list was embarrassing for me because every time I would tell anyone about the school I went to/was going to, I was told I would be “too smart for that school’’ and that I need to transfer to get the education I deserve. 

The Issue

Understanding High School Choice from a student’s point of view, I will now give some reasons why I believe School Choice is an ineffective program and why the District needs to stop doing it. Baltimore’s School Choice creates equity issues, a hierarchy among schools and students, and transportation struggles.      

The Baltimore City school system has long had an equity issue. I feel as though School Choice will hinder us from solving this problem. When I took a look at Baltimore Polytechnic Institute’s website I noticed that they state, “Baltimore Polytechnic Institute (“Poly”) is a citywide magnet high school for Baltimore City Public Schools that emphasizes a rigorous college preparatory curriculum in the Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics (STEM) fields. With a student body of more than 1,600 students and 85 teachers, Poly is committed to ensuring that all students have access to college and post-secondary opportunities.”

Viewing the part where is says “Poly is committed to ensuring that all students have access to college and post-secondary opportunities’’ threw me off because all schools in the city do this. You should not have to go all the way across the city because you only have maybe 2 schools that have a “rigorous college program”. Every school in Baltimore City should have equal robust classes dedicated to help them get into college. Being a Patterson student, we are not offered many of the classes that schools like City have, which makes it difficult to receive the education I need to compete with other students for college.

Having a program like High School Choice also creates a hierarchy between the students because you will get shamed for going to a school that’s not highly liked. It also creates an issue with transportation. If we focused on giving each school the same resources and opportunities, students would not need to transport themselves all the way across other parts of town to go to school. 

We could have school busses that take kids to school because no school would be better or worse than the others and students could just go to their zone school, but in the system that we currently have, we push all “high achieving’’ kids into one school and kind of just push out the other students. If you take a look at Baltimore County’s public school system, they are outperforming us because they don’t have something called “School Choice”. They have zoned schools with each school properly allocated equal resources and robust class courses. 

Taking Action

If students speak up on this issue a lot more, we could possibly make a change in some way. Imagine going to a school that has everything you need to be successful and pursue higher education without having to pick a school and maybe get rejected. Every single school in Baltimore need to have robust science, math, and English courses. If one school offers AP in Freshman year, then all schools need to that.

Yes, I understand that School Choice is an important tradition for Baltimore City, but the System is setting us up for failure and as a student, you should care about this too. As the student Chair of the Diversity Committee for Baltimore City Public Schools, I plan to advocate on the issue to the best of my ability.

Patterson provides services to meet student needs beyond education

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By Deontay Blackwell

Ms. Lia Reid, Community School Director
(Photo by Deontay Blackwell, Patterson Press)

Like most schools in Baltimore, Patterson High School offers services or help to students who may need it. For our school, we have a plethora of services that need to be better known by the general student population.

Ms. Reid, the community school director, runs the community center at Patterson, better known as the pantry. She helps to bring partnerships into the schools based on students’ needs. For example, she brought the B.A.T.S Automotive Club to our school last year and an interpreter program this year. 

“I have a lot of families come in just to get food to take home for the weekend or holiday break, we get frozen meats which is new this year, we also get a lot non perishable items all the time in the pantry.”, Ms. Reid said.

Ms. Reid also runs the Clipper Closet where people can find any clothes they need. Ms. Reid explained how the community center can provide clothes for people like button-downs, ties, and dresses for job interviews or any other reason. Even if there’s none on hand students can request a specific article of clothing that they might need if asked. They also have a lot of shoes and jackets not just for students but for anyone in their family who might need some clothes or request sizes for people who might have younger siblings by working with other schools that have clothes as well.  

Ms. Reid also has a comfort closet within the community center where she keeps toiletries and feminine hygiene items for students who might not have some, in addition to that she sometimes even has household items like laundry detergent, sheets, pots, and pans.  

While Ms. Reid operating the community center here at Patterson brings in much support for students, the nurse’s office/health suite next door also provides medical services for students here. Katie, the nurse practitioner here, helps provide medical care to students while other nurses are giving vaccines to students, doing physicals for upcoming student-athletes, helping kids with chronic illnesses like diabetes, and giving medication to those who are sick. They can even help with allergens and other minor chronic illnesses. The health suite is run by the Baltimore Medical System which also supplies them with the things they need on a day-to-day basis. Students can also receive STD testing, condoms, birth control, and sign themselves into a confidentiality consent law that doesn’t require their parents’ permission to receive these services. 

Although there are many services at our school that are unknown to most students, you can always ask the Main Office or a teacher for help and they will direct you to someone who can help with your needs. There are many more services besides the ones mentioned in this article. 

Bentley Law holds drunk drivers accountable for child support

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By Dayana Herrera-Mateo

About 43% of car accidents involve drunk drivers in the United States. About 10,850 people have passed away every year because of drunk driving crashes. In Austin, Texas, a new law was made in which drunk drivers who have killed a parent or parents have to pay child support until the kids turn 18.

The law took effect on September 1, 2023. This law was made after a fiery car crash that killed Cordel, Lacy, and their four-month-old son, leaving behind Bentley and Mason under their grandparent’s care. Cecilia Williams, the grandmother of Bentley and Mason, and the mother of Cordell, said that kids of this circumstance no longer have parents and she wants people who cause that sort of pain to be held accountable. She believes they should pay child support for the consequences of their actions.

At the moment, four states have passed the law. Tennessee was the first to pass the law, along with Kentucky, Maine, and Texas. Cecilia Williams is hoping that by December of this year, all 50 states will have passed this law. She also hopes this law prevents people from driving drunk and helps the victims who are struggling. 

Teenage gun violence at its highest rate

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By Jennifer Iraheta-Delcid

Incidents of gun violence involving teenagers is rising in Baltimore. Teenagers are being injured and even killed in 2023 at a pace never seen before in at least a decade. On average, one victim is shot every two days and one is killed every week. The cause of the highly elevated rise in teenage brutality may be because of disagreements and rivalries.

This year, Baltimore City made a significant advancement in reducing overall violence by seizing 398 guns while seeing a 25% reduction in homicides and 27% in non-fatal shootings. Yet many Baltimore residents still have easy access to these guns, which is also a reason for this increase in gun violence among teens. High school-age teens continue to be shot in record numbers, with the year 2023 ending with 16 juvenile homicides and 94 non-fatal juvenile shooting victims. This generation of young people can’t resolve problems peacefully like talking it out. Most situations like this are victims younger than 19 years old. These conflicts can affect the well-being and mental health of many students, teachers, and parents by inducing fear and worry, and it’s devastating to the community.

“This makes me feel sad and worried at the same time because there is no security anymore… This affects me because I have a daughter in high school”, stated Joselyn Delcid. She added, “ I believe they should have more security like metal detectors and the state should remove the easy access to guns. I would feel more at peace with the security and well-being of my daughter and everyone in the school.”

Mayor Brandon Scott associates gun violence with the lack of responsibility and care of parents or even the way they raise their children. He is looking for ways to hold parents accountable. Scott is partnering with a program called “We Our Us“  in hopes of making progress through numerous small efforts that can add up to have a big impact. Scott also said he will be placing more mentors and specialists in Baltimore City schools to see if it makes an impact. The Mayor said the state and the country need stricter laws and a more efficient justice system to hold criminals accountable. Whether or not we will see a decrease in violence in the future is unclear, as teenage gun violence continues to be an unsolved problem.

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