www.BXTimes.com BRONX WEEKLY January 19, 2020 8
Activists, residents address safety in their community
BY JASON COHEN
Improving relationships with
the police and creating more youth
centers are some of the things residents
feel should be done to make
the borough safer.
On Thursday, January 9, Save
Our Streets, (SOS) a non-profi t,
that works to prevent violence,
held its fi rst meeting of the year,
where the topic of discussion was
“respecting and protecting our
communities.”
“Our goal is to start the conversation
about how we can make
the community safe and the people
that need to be involved to make
the community safe,” said SOS
program supervisor James Redding.
Attendees discussed how safe
they feel, how things can improve
and how residents can work better
with law enforcement.
The consensus was that residents
want better street lighting,
more youth centers and a larger
police presence.
Some people actually have no
issues with their neighborhoods.
Yukia, who has lived on Fordham
Road for 38 years, explained
she feels safe, but if she travels a
few minutes away, things can get
dicey.
Carlos, 16, a resident of Arthur
Avenue, shares her sentiments.
“I feel my own neighborhood
is pretty safe,” he said. “You go
up the block ... and there’s a lot of
crime. It hurts because that’s my
community. I know friends that
have been robbed and put into bad
situations.”
The lack of youth centers was
brought up many times throughout
the evening.
Craig Lewis, 28, a resident of
Eastchester Gardens Houses in
Gun Hill, said when he grew up
there were several rec centers near
him and now there’s only one.
He suggested if there were more
there might be less crime.
“The more they close down the
more people hang outside,” Lewis
explained. “They (kids) have nothing
to do, so they go into smoking
and gang banging. We need
to do more activities. Idle time is
a very dangerous thing in a city
that doesn’t sleep. The more people
are busy the less problems we will
have.”
Lewis also stressed how important
it is to work together with the
police.
“We want to build better relationships
with the police and the
community,” he said. “You have to
let the youth understand the police
are there to protect you.”
Attendee John King said people
need to stop playing the blame
game and be proactive, not reactive
. “I feel like as a group it starts
with us,” King said. “Fixing it ourselves
and bringing it back to life
instead of expecting someone else
to help you.”
He noted that kids should know
they can be successful in life and
should not have to live in fear.
“Once you get them out of their
community and you show them
something other than what they’ve
seen, they start to grow and learn,”
he said.
James Redding, the program supervisor at Save Our Streets, (SOS), at its meeting on Jan. 9. Schneps Media Jason Cohen
Bronx violin teacher named a national music award fi nalist
BY KYLE VUILLE
The founder of a Bronx
school string orchestra
has been named one of ten
fi nalists for the 2020 Music
Educator Award presented
by the Recording
Academy and Grammy
Museum.
Dr. Kokoe Tanaka-Suwan,
of Cos Cob, CT, has
been become the only fi -
nalist nationwide from
New York for her contributions
to the Bronx
Global Learning Institute
for Girls Charter School.
BGLIG (Big League)
opened in the south Bronx
back in 2008 with Tanaka-
Suwan as one of the founding
faculty members.
“What really drew me
to this school was they
(administration) said
they wanted a string music
program,” Tanaka-Suwan
said.
Every student at
BGLIG from kindergarten
to eigth grade learns
to play the violin with
lessons taught on a daily
basis.
“The concept is, not
only, are they learning
to play a complex instrument
like the violin, but
they are really given all
the tools to become wellrounded
individuals,”
Tanaka-Suwan said. “The
mission of the school is to
create future women leaders.”
T a n a k a - S uwa n ,
started playing the violin
at age 4, attended the
New England Conservatory
of Music in Boston
for her undergraduate
and received her Graduate/
Doctrine at Columbia
University.
Including her time at
BGLIG, Tanaka-Suwan
has taught in the borough
for 16 years, 11 of those at
BGLIG.
“It’s rare to have a
teacher or classroom that
I would see them every
single day every single
year,” Tanaka-Suwan
said. “So I really was able
to create close relationships
with students and
their families and I think
that’s important to work
collaboratively and looking
beyond that, I’m now
writing recommendation
letters and they are going
off to college.”
Statistically, BGLIG
sits in the poorest congressional
district in the
nation. Ninety-eight percent
of BGLIG’s students
qualify for federal free/
reduced lunch, which
puts them under the poverty
line.
The administration,
faculty and staff at BGLIG
all fi nd it their mission to
open student’s minds to
future opportunities and
possibilities.
“We want them to raise
their sights on what’s possible,”
Tanaka-Suwan
said.
Three of Tanaka-Suwan’s
former students can
attest to ‘Ms. Kokoe’s’ charisma
and drive to indulge
into the world of music.
Victoria Flores, 11,
who was a student of
Tanaka-Suwan’s, fondly
remembered her teacher
using ‘violins’ made of
cardboard to learn proper
posture when she was just
a kindergartener.
Another former student
of Tanaka-Suwan’s,
Madison Rodriguez,11,
said ‘Ms. Kokoe’ was the
kind of teacher she could
talk to and used scholarships
to weekend music
schools as an incentive to
keep practicing.
Tanaka-Suwan not
only left a distinct impression
on her students, but
also former colleagues
like music teacher, Jessica
McWilliams.
“The biggest takeaway
from her was her
positivity and resilience,”
McWilliams said. “She always
brings that positivity
and it makes a world’s
difference.”
McWilliams emphasized
the appreciation
the students, the staff and
the community have for
the string orchestra program.
“The most special
thing she did was create
the strings program,”
McWilliams said. “The
students, the staff and the
community all feel it.”
Dr. Kokoe Tanaka-Suwan, second from eight, stands with three of her former
students, (Left to right) Leslie Gutama, Madison Rodriguez and Victoria
Flores, and the two current music teachers, Jessica McWilliams and Jennifer
Hosten inside the auditorium at the Bronx Global Learning Institute for Girls.
Dr. Tanaka-Suwan has been nominated for a national music educator award
by the Recording Academy and Grammy Museum for her work at BGLIG. Photo
by Kyle Vuille/Schneps Media
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