Press
Turning the turntables
on teen apathy
by Bill Picture
San Francisco Examiner 01.27.2002
Two years ago, Jeff Feinman was running the employment program at
Horizons Unlimited, a nonprofit organization based in the Mission
that provides youth services to low-income teens. It was then and
there he came up with an idea to educate and empower the young people
he was working with by tapping into their passion for music.
Most Horizons clients are in high school, where many of them are doing
poorly, he says. "One day I realized that the reason so many of them
weren't doing well was because they had had terrible experiences with
school. So I started trying to come up with some more creative educational
experiences, stuff that would tap into their identity somehow and
make them want to learn."
Feinman says many youth programs are unsuccessful because they fail
to address young people's interests: "I thought, 'What do they like?
Music.' A lot of these kids live within a four-block radius because
of gangs or this or that. So I thought, 'If I can allow them to see
beyond their block, that's a cool thing.' And music is the best way
to do that.
"So I was like, 'OK, what's hot right now? Turntablism and DJ-ing.
Everyone can get down with that.' Music is such a part of these kids'
identity so I figured we could use it to motivate change."
In November of 2000, Feinman, with a small grant from the Private
Industry Council, began The DJ Project, a three-month, hands-on workshop
on the music business.
The goal of the program, Feinman explains, is that participants finish
the program with a CD of their own creation. "They come up with the
concept for the record. They record it. They create the artwork for
the cover. And they develop the skills they need to walk into Amoeba
[Records] or wherever and say, 'Hey, I'm representing The DJ Project.
This is what we do. Will you stock my CD?' "
Like Pieces of a Puzzle
Every day after school, the teens meet in the basement storage space
that Feinman and his youth leaders have converted into a small studio.
There Project leaders work one-on-one with teens at designated workstations.
"One group might be working over here on the MPC, learning how to
hammer out a beat," he says, displaying the studio equipment he's
purchased using grant money and donations from local agencies. "Another
group might work on the computer learning to layer tracks. Someone
else might be in the lyrical workstation working on lyrics. Someone
else might be on the [turntables] practicing their cuts. Eventually,
it's like a sonic collage and before we know it, we have this CD."
Feinman, though he admits he enjoys the music as much as the kids,
says it's really just a vehicle for creating positive change in the
young people's lives: "The music's fun, but my whole thing isn't really
the music or the technology or any of that. It's really just the process
for getting them to love learning.
"I was listening to an African American author and intellectual on
the radio the other day and he was talking about how the biggest challenge
for youth workers today is differentiating between school and learning.
Our kids are having negative experiences with school. They're unsafe
or underfunded or whatever. So our goal is to show them that school
is just a place. In fact, oftentimes, it's just a warehouse. We have
to separate 'learning' from school."
The Non-Musical Reward
So far, Feinman's efforts seem to be paying off. Beverly, one of the
10 teens currently enrolled in The DJ Project, says her grades have
improved slightly since she enrolled in the program last fall. "Are
your parents happy?" I ask. "Yeah," she says without looking up from
the sheet of lyrics she's finishing for a song she'll record later
that afternoon.
"The kids see that learning can be fun," says Juan, one of Feinman's
five youth leaders. "They come here and they learn about things they're
interested in. They see what they can do and they get really excited.
Then when they go back to school, they stick with it."
"We're not trying to create the next big rap star or DJ Qbert," says
Feinman, referring to the legendary turntablist some of his young
students want to emulate. "That could very well happen, though. I
mean, these kids have some mad skills. But what we're trying to do
is help them develop real-life skills."
For many of these young people, just steering clear of the trouble
that seems to await them around every corner is a challenge unto itself.
And many have learned that self-preservation is the only means for
survival in such a dangerous environment. For this reason, teaching
them to get beyond each other's cultural differences and to function
as a team is sometimes Feinman's toughest challenge.
The 10-week program begins with a series of activities Feinman says
helps the kids get used to working together, despite their differences.
"I took them down to the rope courses and we did some team-building
exercises," he says. "I'm trying to show them that they can work together
even though they come from different backgrounds. In the real world,
they're going to have to be able to collaborate and work with people
that maybe they don't like. We've had those problems come up before
and we deal with them. We're just trying to prepare them for life.
I know it sounds clichˇ but it's true and the schools just aren't
doing it."
Why He's There
Feinman's passion clearly is on helping these young people develop
to their fullest potential. Just a big kid himself, he is a mentor,
big brother, teacher and friend to every one of the kids, and they
appear to genuinely enjoy his company.
The fact that he has earned their respect allows Feinman to work in
some traditional classroom-type lessons without much objection: "Say
we bring in a guest DJ to spin some Afro-Beat. I'll pull out the map
and say, "That music comes from Ethiopia,' or wherever. 'Show me where
that is.' Maybe we'll go to a restaurant and try some Ethiopian food.
All of a sudden their minds are a lot broader, and it all started
with music."
He also seeks to address some of the negative images that he says
young people today are bombarded with. "We deconstruct a lot of lyrics.
I'll print out the lyrics to a song and we'll talk about them. Bitch
and ho come up all the time. So I'll ask the girls how that makes
them feel. It stimulates a great discussion. Critical thinking, man.
We wanna' get these kids to think about all that crap they see and
hear everyday."
One of Feinman's goals for the second year of the program was to recruit
more female participants. DJ-ing is still generally perceived as a
male activity, and girls are often reluctant to step up to the decks
for fear of being embarrassed in front of the boys. Feinman believes
that mastering the turntables can help young girls overcome many of
their fears: "It's like a shortcut to self-esteem."
Feinman says he'd like to see the program expand into a national pilot
program. "If I could get someone to underwrite it -- maybe someone
in the hip-hop game -- we could maybe do something similar to this
in, like, five cities across the country. That's a long-term goal.
The short-term goal is to set up more workshops in other local agencies
or maybe even in the schools so that more kids can participate."
"Eventually, this program will be entirely youth-led and run," he
says. "I mean, they're young, so I'll be here to give them structure.
But I want to be able to disappear and let these guys run everything,
from outreach to hiring guest-artists-in-residence. I'll just sort
of supervise. But I really want it to be their thing, something they
can be proud of."
E-mail Bill Picture at bpicture@sfexaminer.com.
For more information on Horizons Unlimited DJ Project or to find out
how you can help, go to www.theDJproject.com.
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