• Poverty Made Me Ashamed and Secretive

  by Parris Smith

  I was born and raised in Kingston, Jamaica. Although we lived in an area that was considered a ghetto, our lives seemed luxurious to me. I thought our house was a castle, since it had three floors that towered over the one-story houses in the neighborhood.

• Marching for a Future

  by Zachary Macpherson

  On Friday, September 20, 16-year-old climate activist and Nobel Peace Prize nominee Greta Thunberg addressed thousands of high schoolers who had walked out of school in New York City. The crowd of demonstrators, which the mayor’s office estimated at 60,000, had marched through the streets of Lower Manhattan to protest the destruction of their future.

• The 13-Year-Old Striking to Save the Planet

  by Zachary Macpherson

  As I walked toward United Nations Plaza, I noted the quiet surrounding the bench Alexandria Villaseñor was sitting on. Every Friday for the last 16 weeks, wrapped up in her sleeping bag on particularly icy days, the 13-year-old has planted herself here to protest government inaction about climate change.