• COVID-19 Resources
  • About
  • Subscribe
  • Promotions
  • Advertise
  • Contact Us
  • May 25, 2025

Milwaukee Courier Weekly Newspaper

"THE NEWSPAPER YOU CAN TRUST SINCE 1964"

  • News
  • Editorials
  • Education
  • Urban Business
  • Health
  • Religion
  • Upcoming Events
  • Classifieds

Share:

  • Click to share on Facebook (Opens in new window) Facebook
  • Tweet
  • Click to email a link to a friend (Opens in new window) Email
  • Click to print (Opens in new window) Print

Fighting for Justice with Music

July 8, 2017

By Nyesha Stone

Three Midwest cities came together for one reason: to make a difference. True Skool teamed up with other organizations like their’s in Chicago and Detroit to create the, “Youth Fighting 4 Justice” (YF4J) vol. 1 mixtape.

Creative Development and Outreach Director of True Skool, Fidel Verdin worked with two to three other organization leaders to produce this mixtape. The process began in February/March of this year when True Skool met with Community Justice Network for Youth (CJNY) to share ideas on how to highlight the youth’s work around the justice system. That conversation lead to True Skool going to Chicago to meet with an organization similar to True Skool to talk about the similarities the two cities have in common—police issues, lead in water and more.

CJNY is a national youth program that funded the “YF4J” mixtape. They brought Detroit into the project. These three cities are all more alike than different, so it only seemed right to work together to create music that could make a difference, according to Verdin.

“It’s always time for justice,” said Verdin and this mixtape tries to prove that.

A collective of different groups came together, with the youth at the lead of the discussion, to discuss how they could all work together. The youth came up with the idea of the mixtape, and then every task and role was assigned to different people—from the artwork to the mixing and mastering, everyone had a job.

To make it on YF4J certain criteria had to be met. After constant discussions and rewording, the criteria came down to this: artist had to be 30 or under, the material had to touch on experiences related to the justice system, police contact or how to fix the problem and no explicit lyrics.

Jene Tate, program assistant and public ally fellow of True Skool and previous True Skool participant, felt it was important to create this mixtape to give the youth a voice.

“We’re all fighting for the same thing,” said Tate.

Tate wrote and recorded track #4 “Growing Pains” on YF4J. He didn’t write the song specifically for the mixtape, but once he was told what the mixtape was about he knew his song passed the criteria test.

Anyone who fit the criteria could send in their music to hopefully be selected.

In Detroit, on June 17 at the Allied Media Conference, Milwaukee, Chicago and Detroit had the YF4J’s release party. On that day, the mixtape was now available to be downloaded for free. There’s even a domain dedicated to the mixtape, and they plan on having two more release parties—one in Milwaukee and one in Chicago. Milwaukee’s release party will be sometime after True Skool’s block party on July 29. Chicago’s release party will take place sometime in fall.

These three cities plan on creating more mixtapes and getting other regions of the states’ input as well. This is only the beginning of Youth Fighting 4 Justice.

Share:

  • Click to share on Facebook (Opens in new window) Facebook
  • Tweet
  • Click to email a link to a friend (Opens in new window) Email
  • Click to print (Opens in new window) Print

Popular Interests In This Article: Community Justice Network for Youth, Fidel Verdin, Jene Tate, Mixtapes, Music, Nyesha Stone, True Skool, YF4J

Read More - Related Articles

  • Milwaukee News Company Secures Partnership with Amazon
  • Mokoomba: The Band from Victoria Falls
  • As COVID-19 Tore Us Apart, Black Music Kept Us Together
  • C-Mill$ Dedicates Sophomore Album to Milwaukee’s Hip Hop Mom with “Long Live Mama Mills”
  • Meccah Maloh Stays Busy in the Studio and Preps the MKE Pad Masters for New Season
Become Our Fan On Facebook
Find Us On Facebook


Follow Us On X
Follow Us On X

Editorials

Lakeshia Myers
Michelle Bryant
Dr. Kweku Akyirefi Amoasi formerly known as Dr. Ramel Smith

Journalists

Karen Stokes

Topics

Health Care & Wellness
Climate Change
Upcoming Events
Obituaries
Milwaukee NAACP

Politicians

David Crowley
Cavalier Johnson
Marcelia Nicholson
Governor Tony Evers
President Joe Biden
Vice President Kamala Harris
Former President Barack Obama
Gwen Moore
Milele A. Coggs
Spencer Coggs

Classifieds

Job Openings
Bid Requests
Req Proposals
Req Quotations
Apts For Rent

Contact Us

Milwaukee Courier
2003 W. Capitol Dr.
Milwaukee, WI 53206
Ph: 414.449.4860
Fax: 414.906.5383

Copyright © 2025 · Courier Communications | View Privacy Policy | Site built and maintained by Farrell Marketing Technology LLC
We use third-party advertising companies to serve ads when you visit our website. These companies may use information (not including your name, address, email address, or telephone number) about your visits to this and other websites in order to provide advertisements about goods and services of interest to you. If you would like more information about this practice and to know your choices about not having this information used by these companies, click here.