Teens Hold Town Hall On Cultural Awareness

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DALLAS (CBSDFW.COM) - With racial tension and culture wars affecting the political landscape and everyday life, dozens of teens gathered for a town hall at The Black Academy of Arts and Letters in Dallas Saturday to have a frank and open discussion about a wide range of issues.

With adults kept to the sidelines, the group of students didn't hold back when asked to tackle some of the most sensitive subjects.

"I'm terrified actually.  There is part of my generation that you have what we're doing now who actually care about differences, and we want to make a change in the world, but then there are other people in my generation that just absolutely don't care," high school senior Chrystal Marshall said.

For the last few weeks students have come together informally to talk about issues like police shootings, sexuality, and ethnic tensions.  This was the culmination of a program organizers called, Healing Differences.

The goal was to prompt an open dialogue among young thinkers and future leaders in the community.  Topics focused on stereotypes and cultural awareness, and students were encouraged to speak candidly.

"Black people believing that they should only use the word within their group, then they're in a way segregating themselves the way that the word did before," high school freshman Bryson Stevens said.

With political town halls becoming such a regular part of this election year, organizers wanted this to be a forum specifically for young people to have an important voice.

"It just shows people really thinking about these kind of things and like shows what people know and what people don't know about how life works really in America," high school senior Cameron Rockwell said.

With The Black Academy of Arts and Letters founder Curtis King helping to keep the debate on point, many agreed today's political candidates could learn from these young people.

"I think if they were more open to listening to everybody like we were in here, I think it would be a lot more civil," Stevens said.

Students were chosen from schools across the metroplex to participate.  Organizers tell us some of those students have already made plans to bring the format back to their home schools for future town halls.

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