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At City High and other schools around the state the Graduation Project is a requirement to graduate. I understand we start the project in the 11th grade (Junior Year) and continue to work on the project in the 12th grade (Senior Year). When your become a senior, it's time to wrap up your Graduation Project. A Graduation Project is a project that you make up on your own, and you work to do something that means something to you. In talking about the Graduation Project with some of the seniors who have already done the Graduation Project I have learned that it is best to get as much as you can done in your junior year, so that once you reach your senior year you're doing just a couple more activities. You want to have your senior year as your wrap up year just for the clean up work. I was also told that it can be a lot of stress, so try your best to maintain your time.

What I have an interest in doing my Graduation Project on would be the Violence in my community. Within the last year I have known of a couple of young black men that I grew up with who have been shot; some were killed and some survived. It seemed like every week someone who was close to me or that I have known was being shoot. Most of them where because of drugs, some seem to be a setup, some out of revenge, one was because this person witnessed a shooting of a friend and some were just because people were being stupid. The past year has been a horrible and sad year. In the fall there were shootings on streets that I walk down everyday.

I walk down this one street every Saturday after work. But this particular day I got off of work early and walked down the street earlier than usual. Later that night, around the time I would have been walking down that street, a friend of mine got shoot in the back of his head. So I thought that could have been me, if I would have got off work at the time I regularly get off I could have been walking down that street. Because I knew that person I would have stopped and talked to him that day, that could have been me. He survived and right now he is going through therapy.

I am very excited about this project and am interested in this topic. My concerns are that when I am working with people on this topic they will not listen to me and take what I am saying and doing as a joke. I hope that I can get my whole project finished in time. I am hoping to get most of the work done my junior year so that I am prepared to finish the project during my senior year.