Sharing Art Created in Juvenile Justice Spaces

This post originally appeared on the LAIP in November 2014.

Kelly Hiser is back on the site today to share more info on sharing community created content a the library– this time taking a closer look at teen artwork generated in juvenile justice programs. Be sure to take a look at the Terms of Service documents Kelly shares, and check out all of her posts in this series HERE. ~Erinn

Avatar = Cat from The Bubbler on Vimeo.

by Kelly Hiser

Some of the most incredible art created in the Madison Public Library’s Bubbler is not made in the library. Each week, Teen Librarian Jesse Vieau and Media Lab Coordinator Nate Clark pack up art supplies, iPads, and cameras and head to Dane County’s juvenile detention center and shelter home. They’re frequently joined by professors and students from the UW-Madison’s Center for Law, Society & Justice, which collaborates with the library on the workshops. Teens in the shelter and center make digital art projects guided by Bubbler facilitators and, in the process, pick up digital literacy skills like photo editing and stop motion animation. The result is powerful art that embodies the experiences and emotions of young people living through incredibly difficult experiences.

Teens in the shelter and center make digital art projects guided by Bubbler facilitators and, in the process, pick up digital literacy skills like photo editing and stop motion animation. The result is powerful art that embodies the experiences and emotions of young people living through incredibly difficult experiences.

Many in the Madison community have little idea just how difficult those experiences are. The 2013 Race to Equity Report revealed systemic and stark racial inequalities in Dane County’s juvenile justice system: in 2010, black teens in Dane County were six times more likely to be arrested than their white peers. In 2011 black adolescents comprised less than 9% of the county’s youth population but made up 80% of the local kids sentenced to the state’s juvenile correctional facility. While leaders and community members are increasingly aware of and eager to ameliorate injustices like these, for many in Madison, these statistics are, unfortunately, just numbers. This included me—when I lived in Madison, I didn’t know any teens or families affected by the disparity that marks the juvenile justice system.

Bubbler leaders like Jesse saw posting art online as an opportunity to amplify the voices of the young people behind the statistics on Dane County’s juvenile justice system.

Bubbler leaders like Jesse saw posting art online as an opportunity to amplify the voices of the young people behind the statistics on Dane County’s juvenile justice system. And there was another, equally compelling reasons to post the work online: it turned out to be the only reliable way to give creators access to their work, something participants routinely asked for. Many of the teens don’t have email addresses (the usual way Bubbler leaders share work), nor was there any guarantee that teens in the detention center or shelter home could take jump drives with them when they left.

Avatar = Forces of Nature from The Bubbler on Vimeo.

Before library staff could publicly post this work, though, we had to sort through several thorny legal conundrums. First, since the participants of these programs are minors, they can’t sign legal documents. Nor do Bubbler facilitators have access to parents or guardians who could sign on behalf of the teens. As a result, the general Bubbler license for patron-created art (that I wrote about here and here) is pretty useless in this situation. Second, confidentiality is critical for teens in the social justice system. Public information about a detention can result in debilitating discrimination in employment, housing, and education that can follow teens for the remainder of their lives.

I worked with the Bubbler team and legal counsel to craft a solution that would allow the library to share artwork made in juvenile justice spaces in a way that was transparent, fair, and respectful. After multiple meetings with attorneys for both the library and the UW-Madison, we settled on a Terms of Service as a legal framework. This document doesn’t require a signature; it simply informs participants about a program’s parameters, including the possibility that their work will be shared online. The document, which you’ll find at the bottom of this post, is simple and short by design, since most kids will spend only a moment glancing at the text at the start or end of a workshop. It briefly describes the program and tells participants where work will be posted, how they can have it taken offline, and how to access work that isn’t publicly posted. The Terms also create a commitment that the library will protect the confidentiality of participants.

MAPS: Destinations from The Bubbler on Vimeo.

After multiple meetings with attorneys for both the library and the UW-Madison, we settled on a Terms of Service as a legal framework

I hope that this Terms of Service can be useful to others working with similar populations—you’re welcome to use and adapt it as you see fit. A few words of caution when doing so. As I’ve mentioned elsewhere, it’s always worth consulting your institution’s legal counsel before adopting a document like this. Additionally, for outreach programs in juvenile justice spaces, developing strong relationships across the community and organizations is absolutely critical. Sharing this art would have been impossible without the goodwill of leaders in Dane County’s juvenile justice system or the support and insight of UW-Madison professors and attorneys. Most importantly, though, find out what the participants in your programs want. For Jesse, Nate, and other workshop leaders, the desire to share the art you see here came directly from the creators themselves. After all, without them, there would be nothing to share.

 

Want More?

• Also check out the Yahara Music project on Twitter @YaharaMusic and Facebook.
• You can find more on the Yahara Music Library among Kelly’s other posts on this site.
• Download the Yahara Music Library musicians’ license and collection development policy.
• Check out the Terms of Service document that Kelly helped to create.

 

Kelly Hiser is a PhD candidate in historical musicology at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. She spent the 2013-14 year working as a Public Humanities Fellow at the Madison Public Library where she helped sort out all kinds of persnickety problems related to digital publishing. Kelly is co-founder and CEO of Rabble, a startup dedicated to empowering libraries to support and sustain their local creative communities. She currently lives in Massachusetts and tweets at@kellyhiser. 

from Library as Incubator Project http://www.libraryasincubatorproject.org/?p=15663
via IFTTThttp://www.libraryasincubatorproject.org/wp-content/uploads/2014/08/headshot-2013a-290x290.jpg