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Covenant House Georgia Executive Director Dr. Alie Redd came across two residents of the shelter in the weeks following the brutal death in police custody of George Floyd in Minneapolis. Both young Black men, ages 19 and 22, had participated in the massive street marches in Atlanta calling for racial justice, but they worried what would come of them.

“It’s almost like they were in shock. They appeared to be very disconnected and spoke of major feelings of hopelessness, that they don’t have a voice, and that even though these protests are going on, there is a big disconnect about what that really means for their future,” she said. 

Dr. Alie shared this story during a recent Covenant House International (CHI) telephone town hall. She, along with Dr. Kenneth Ginsburg, health director of Covenant House Pennsylvania, and Kevin Ryan, president of CHI, spoke with Covenant House supporters about the two viruses currently stalking the cities where we serve: the coronavirus and systemic racism.

“We’ve seen that most of the kids in our care are young people of color, and this moment demands of us that we ask ourselves why. Why is it that so many of the young people Covenant House serves, who are experiencing homelessness, are children of color? What is it about systemic racism that puts young people of color at greater risk of homelessness?” Kevin asked.

Dr. Ken noted that while events like the murder of George Floyd and other Black men and women garner more headlines, it’s the everyday acts of discrimination and bias, both explicit and implicit, that cause the greater harm. 

“The silent issues around systemic racism actually have a greater impact psychologically and biologically than, really, the things we think of as racism,” said Dr. Ken, who also practices adolescent medicine at The Children's Hospital of Philadelphia and is a professor of pediatrics at the University of Pennsylvania School of Medicine. Black youth and young people of color are especially vulnerable to those impacts, he said. Adolescence is a key moment when we as human beings begin to wrestle seriously with questions of identity.

“The question every adolescent has to ask themselves as they get ready to launch into adulthood is who am I. And as they ask that question, they are searching everywhere for answers, looking for clues to begin to build their sense of self and self-worth. When the answer is ‘I am somebody that is held to low expectations,’ ‘I am someone who people cross the street to avoid when they see me,’ ‘I am someone who people expect the worst of,’ that is poison to the emotional development of a healthy identity,” Dr. Ken said.

“But what’s really important to understand is that racism doesn’t just affect the way you see yourself; that would be bad enough. It changes the way systems see you and interact with you, and the resources that are available to you, and the plans and strategies you are funnelled into,” he said.

For instance, Dr. Ken added, if you are a young person who has had a hard life because of abuse or other adverse childhood experiences—like most of the young people in our care at Covenant House—your brain becomes hardwired to be hypervigilant to danger and to protect yourself from it. A health care provider may diagnose you with depression or PTSD, which would get you compassionate care. Or they may say you have an anger problem—that you, not what happened to you, but you are the problem, and funnel you toward punitive systems.

Understanding systemic bias sheds light on the reactions of the two young men Dr. Alie spoke of. Both of them are residing at Covenant House Georgia and working to overcome the trauma associated with their experiences of homelessness. They’re figuring out whom they can trust and whether the global movement for racial equity will truly produce systemic, meaningful change that will allow them a clearer path toward realizing their own dreams.

Dr. Alie said the staff at Covenant House Georgia have opened up multiple avenues of conversation with their residents. In those conversations, she said, “When we’re listening, we’re listening with our hearts, with our minds, with our body language, because all of these things are important to be able to truly listen to what a person is saying.”

“What is important also in developing those listening skills is that you’re watching for what’s not being said, what are people fearful to talk about, and once we receive that information, what are we doing about it; how are we acting; what are we putting into motion?” she added.

What Covenant House does, Dr. Ken said, is the direct opposite of what the youth, because of their experiences, are “hardwired” to expect from adults. “When they expect to have their emotions devalued, we embrace them, we elevate them,” he said. “We hear their emotions, we celebrate them, we allow them to process. Above all, when they expect adults not to protect them, not to keep them safe, we let them know that we are committed, fully and totally, to their safety.”

Do that often enough, he added, and you can help a young person facing homelessness, a young person of color facing homelessness, to “rewire” their expectations of themselves and begin to trust that there are adults out there who want them to thrive.

Why should any adult care about a young person facing racism and homelessness? Kevin reiterated a line from Dr. Ken’s book, “Reaching Teens.” 

“We belong to each other,” he said. “Our mission is unconditional love and absolute respect … and it invites us to go further, to identify every single impediment in the path of young people who are facing homelessness and learn again what we need to do to make sure that never again does a young person need to sleep on the street and fend for themselves.”