The Beat Within is back again to help amplify your voices and your stories. To share them with the larger community and the world. In partnership with the community, we work with high school student interns every year and here are some of their final reflections on the experience of helping to type up your writing for publication.
It takes a village of people and dedicated team work to pull of this publication every two weeks! We appreciate meeting with you every week, sharing conversations and putting all your thoughts, dreams and challenges in print for you to share. We all learn together from each other and in community we help to heal each other.
When Lisa Lavaysse first came to Urban to meet the group of volunteers for The Beat Within this Spring, she asked us a simple question to get to know us: “why are you interested in doing The Beat Within?”
At first, as I listened to my classmates rattle off answers about pursuing an existing interest or following the inspiration from a certain class, I realized The Beat Within was nothing like I’d ever done before. I had no prior exposure to service or volunteer work with incarcerated people or youth, no pre-existing notion that this is what I was interested in or wanted to do with my life.
So, I told Lisa this and said that I signed up to do The Beat Within because it was new. Because I’d never done or seen anything like it and this prospect excited me. And, even when I had done it for many weeks, opening a new document with a handful of new writing pieces continued to give me that same feeling.
Each time I read a piece, I felt like the author was giving me a window into their life. What or whom they loved, their aspirations, their regrets. Each piece provoked me to think about the world in a different way. Like what systems are in place that put this person at a disadvantage, and what the person had to overcome to escape a life they didn’t want.
I remember being particularly affected by pieces about accountability and hope. It was incredibly inspiring to hear such young people express remorse and take responsibility for their actions, while also thinking about how they can improve, move ahead, and build a better future for themselves, their family, and those around them.
Certain entries about drug addiction or our criminal justice system made me sad, because it’s hard for me to imagine a life like that. I can’t begin to imagine what kind of hardship they’ve gone through and how our institutions have let them down.
The entire experience of editing for The Beat Within made me grateful that these youth authors opened a window into their lives for me, and inspired me to think about what I can continue doing to shine a light on minority voices whose stories so often go untold.
-Grayson
Within the first few weeks volunteering for The Beat, I quickly realized the importance of transcribing these entries. My service-learning teacher has said that doing in person service will give you the best experience. But I’ve found The Beat (a volunteer job that is solely virtual) to be the most rewarding service work in my high school career.
Reflecting on my transcriptions for The Beat last year, I noted that many of the entries felt deeply personal, with some moving me to tears. This year was no different. Although many of the entries were short, they expressed emotions of grief, gratitude, and joy, among many others. Moreover, The Beat’s writing prompts always push their writers to be more observant of themselves and the people around them.
Reflecting on stubbornness, some cited close friends and family members as being examples of how to act or how not to act. As a young adult who has never been incarcerated, I can only imagine the isolation that comes with their day-to-day routine. Allowing writers to remember the love they have, even if those people aren’t physically present with them, feels important to me.
I also appreciated the writers who acknowledged the systems of oppression that affect their livelihoods. In one entry, a transcriber named Nicholas questioned who society frames as evil. They mentioned economic, social, and political elements that drive people to kill others. A quote reads, “I don’t think we are born killers, I wouldn’t say it’s an action that stems from birth. But it’s something built into us.”
After transcribing the paragraphs on my bed, I stopped my fingers from typing and blankly stared at my computer screen for a while. I began to wonder what factors in my life have stopped me from killing people or committing crime in general. I wondered if committing a crime, changes someone’s morality altogether.
I don’t think I’ve had a moment like that while doing other service work. The Beat really prompts you to think about the privileges you hold, and how those can dissolve in the blink of an eye. It also brings up privileges that can be uncomfortable to think about. I have felt sad and even guilty when transcribing some entries, and that is okay.
These entries reflect broader experiences of kids living in a cruel and unforgiving world. It is easy to judge what they say and how they say it, but difficult to consider the systems that have affected their worldview.
I am thankful to have worked for The Beat in these past two years. It has motivated me to be more involved in my local prisons and connect with people in my communities. Most importantly, it has taught me to practice empathy because you never know what people have gone through. I hope to engage in this type of work in college and beyond.
-Sophie
When I started volunteering with The Beat Within, I didn’t really know what to expect. I thought the letters I’d transcribe from incarcerated teens might be short or guarded. Instead, I was struck by how open and vulnerable they were. These young people wrote honestly about their families, their neighborhoods, their life outside of being incarcerated, and what they hoped for in the future.
Most times I transcribed these letters, their words stuck with me throughout my whole day. Whether the tone was hopeful or more sad, I was impacted by each letter. This work connected to a class I took called Voices of Incarceration, where we learned about the criminal justice system and the stories that often go untold.
Volunteering gave those lessons a human face. It made me realize how easy it is to talk about systems and policies without hearing the people actually affected by them. Transcribing these letters reminded me that listening is powerful. These teens taught me more than I expected. Not just about incarceration, but about resilience, voice, and the need to create space for stories that often get ignored.
-Zareen
Thank you, Grayson, Sophie, Zareen and all the student interns for your volunteer help and hard work. It is so inspiring to hear that your experiences have been so fulfilling and rewarding. The Beat goes on and we hope you take that spirit with you always.