Photo Project with Students at GW highschool

Super Hero vs Alter Ego Photographic comics

While working on a photo project with stundents at George Washington High School, in North East Philadelphia, myself and the english instructor Marcus, along with  the students and a little inspiration from a super hero comic student program in New York City.  We teamed up together to help each student see the super hero in them.  Each student developed there on super hero, wrote a story about what there realistic super hero powers are and created costumes and photographed scenes for the cover of each comic book.  It was an amazing 8 weeks with the students.  If you watch the video slide show below you can get a snippet of the unedited photos. :)  I love GW Students of Philly!

Love Beauty Joy

A youth educational multi media project, that I had the opportunity to direct and produce.

NOLA Inspiration

While in New Orleans, not only was the culture, and history an inspiration, but a really special friend who is also a photographer and writer L.Kasimu Harris, he was a wonderful tour guide, and took me to all the amazing jazz spots, and explained the true culture of New Orleans to me. check out visions and verbs.com to see some of his work, because his work is pretty amazing. 

Stylist, Make-up artist, hair dresser- wait a minute I thought I was the Photographer

This was a busy day for me, I did hair, make-up and took photographs for Jessie and  Svens wedding.  2 weeks before the wedding, I helped the Hatian bride find her dress.  It was a beautiful day as Sosua La Playa. Congrats Sven and Jessie!

Karise Occupied Wallstreet for a day!

As I turned down wall street looking for what the media said to be this filthy over crowded park with a plethora of individuals protesting, I actually walked into a cozy neighborhood of tents, cardboard boxes, and an eccentric mass of individuals shattering out for equal rights, giving away free tshirts and looking for donations to support the CAUSE. Being on wall street opened my eyes, making me realize, I am only 1% away from being homeless, I am 99% of the population dealing with no jobs, inflation, school debt.

It makes me think of the famous line in the move School dayz by Spike Lee, “WAKE UP, WAKE UP”.  Wake up America!

Enjoy the photos, and donate your time, energy or money to the cause.

Prometheus Radio Project

I was am recently featured on Cheyney Universities Website, for my internship at Prometheus, while I was there, I learned so much about radio waves, community radio projects, and congress, O BOY!!!!!! yes this was a 501c3 I was working for, it was loads of fun and I enjoyed working with everyone to make sure we were able to publish the bi-monthly news letter.

Pintura en La Playa with "The Domincan Dream

This was a beautiful Sunday in the Dominican Republic, where I implemented one of my lesson plans to help a fellow volunteer teacher out, she wanted to find a way to connect with her students so I went out and got the girls gift bags full of colored pencils, markers, stickers, and of course lip gloss. “lol” all little girls love lip gloss. Then I made sure to get lots of drawing paper, and paints so that they could explore their imagination as much as they would like.  It was an excellent day. Charline was pleased because she felt closer to her girls and I felt great because we all explored our thoughts and were able to express ourselves creatively and discuss them afterwards.

Heres a little sneak preview into our day.

The Dominican Dream Project

SO I have be living in the Dominican Republic for some time now, volunteering at "The Dominican Dream Project" teaching art, assisting in the english class and working on a human rights project with Mariah a full time volunteer.  This school was built for children to  have opportunity, to learn and expand there minds.  Once I saw The Dream Site, and these statistics i chose to volunteer part time while finishing up graduate school.

 In a 2008 study of academic achievement for third and sixth grade students, the Dominican Republic came in dead last in the areas of Math, Reading and Science, significantly lower than the other 16 Latin American countries participating (UNESCO, SERCE 2008).
The Dominican Republic’s public investment in education is 2.3% of their Gross Domestic Product, which ranks 122nd out of 132 countries. (UNESCO).
85% of poor Dominican parents have never completed primary education.
In the Dominican Republic, “according to a cohort analysis, of 100 children entering formal education, only 75 complete grade 4; 63 complete grade 6 and only 52 complete the 8-year primary level. This situation is even worse in rural areas where most schools stop at grade 5.” [OECD 2008]
The High School Enrollment Rate is 61%. (UNESCO)
An estimated 40 percent of the population is under 15 years old.
The Dominican Republic was ranked 101 out of 177 countries in terms of literacy.
The HIV/AIDS rate among the adult population in the DR is 1.1%, although it is much higher in batey communities.
The primary school dropout rate in the Dominican Republic is 14%.
Only 12% of low-income students who start high school will complete their studies, compared to 62% of those from higher income brackets in the DR.
As of 2008, the Dominican Republic’s population of over 9 million included (unofficially) more than 800,000 Haitians. Bateys such as Caraballo are experiencing a great increase in Haitian residents since the January 2010 earthquake.

Data from UNICEF, World Bank, United Nations, OECD, Wikipedia, USAID Basic Education and Policy Support and American Association of Fundraising Counsel, UNESCO, Programa de Promoción de la Reforma Educativa de América Latina y el Caribe (PREAL), December 2006; United Nations (UN), 2005; United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF), 2004; Joint United Nations Programme on HIV/AIDS (UNAIDS), 2008.

Anyway if you want to know more facts, Go to www.dominicandream.org you can also find out how to volunteer and donate funds to the school.

Pics soonnnnnn!!!!

Caye Caulker Belize City

Belize ( Caye Caulker) the place where there's a cool breeze, long days and short nights, clear blue oceans and where the heat is just right for most of the day, but watch out from 1-3pm, because that is when it is very hot.

Caye Caulker is about a 40 min water taxi ride, outside of Belize City, I had the opportunity to go there to take photos. It is a fun peaceful island, while there you are able to , para sail, fish, scuba dive, and you can even snorkle with the sting rays with the "Rhasta Man", Ross creek who is located near the dock, he will take you on a Rasta cruz right to the coral reef.

There are several little hotels, or Bed in Breakfast spots all over the little island, however if you are working on a budget there's a hostel called "Yuma's House" right near the beach, it is very inexpensive per day.  I stayed at Paridisio, its a 1 bedroom apartment with a full kitchen, and a pull out sofa bed, very adorable clean spot, with great management, and wonderful drinks.  Paridiso sits right near the Ocean, so you can feel the breeze flowing through your windows, and here the currants peaceful lullaby song.

Caye Caulker is just a peaceful, quite island, with sweet people that sale handcrafted trinkets, and delicious home made food.

What an Amazing place to relax!