Youth & Police Dialog Meeting!

 This meeting went over the Broward Sheriff's Community Justice Program in South Florida and their future plans with the community. The meeting can be found here!

Here is also a brief essay summary on what this meeting went over by an attendee:

Essay on Seminar with Police Officers

M. S.

Today I joined a zoom meeting with other teens, police officers, lawyers to discuss some important topics related to misconceptions between the police and teenagers. We were broken up into three groups where we could talk and ask questions. The breakout session lasted about an hour.

 Lots of people including some teens think that cops are “bad” and they’re just going to arrest them for no reason. Us teenagers asked questions about why there are random police pull overs and how often a police officer is on duty. The officer in my group explained that their main focus is to protect our community. Pulling over random cars is part of their job patrolling the community to be sure that everybody is safe. He explained that he works weekdays; however, if there is a life-threatening situation when he’s off duty it’s his responsibility to step in. Officer Osborne was in the army prior to becoming a police officer. We also discussed on what our future goals were, and the officer and lawyer gave some motivational words to help us reach our goals. 

All in all, I believe this was a great learning experience for everyone in the call, not just the teenagers. I am glad we were able to make a middle ground between us and police officers, and also learned a lot about their job. I hope many other teenagers in my situation can do this too because it would be great for them. I am glad I joined this zoom call.