Thinking Big

Thinking Big -Thursday, June 25 2009


One young man has begun taking classes at Morehouse College this past school year, and he is quite an unlikely freshman. At the ago of 14, Jeremy Lee was convicted on an armed robbery charge and sentenced to four years in youth detention. However, he made up his mind to finish high school while he was locked up. The year he graduated high school, Jeremy was the only juvenile inmate to get a traditional diploma from the youth facility in Georgia.

Jeremy was accepted to Morehouse where he is majoring in biology with hopes of becoming a neurosurgeon. Jeremy talks with Dick Gordon talks about his journey from jail to higher education, and the struggle he's still facing to realize his dreams.

* Learn more about Jeremy's inspiration, Dr. Ben Carson

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ANITA 2008 HARRY CHAPIN MEDIA AWARD WINNER FOR RADIO!!

Hi you all,
Wow, I just won an award that will take me to New York's Time Square in September!
The award is being presented by The Harry Chapin Foundation.
It is for a story produced in 2008 about a family who squatted in a foreclosed home after they became homeless.

Learn more about the Harry Chapin Award
http://www.whyhunger.org/programs/3-newsflash/842-harry-chapin-media-awards-winners-announced.html


HEAR THE INITIAL BROADCAST AND FOLLOWUP SHOW BELOW!!

A New Life in a Foreclosed Home

(1st INTERVIEW)

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Rmega Tsafari - larger >> (photo by Noelle Theard)

Foreclosures nationwide have led another trend: squatting. Empty homes are increasingly occupied by people who don't own them.

Rmega Tafari and her family were homeless. Then they found a foreclosed home - an old crack house. They cleaned it up, and made a deal with a neighbor for water and electricity. Even the bank allowed them to stay, but only temporarily. It all ends on Monday - the Tafari family has been asked to leave. Rmega talks to Dick Gordon about the pressures that led her to squatting, and the uncertain future that she and her family now face.

• Rmega captured these photos inside the vacant foreclosed house they're calling home.
  
• Learn more about Take Back the Land, an organization that identifies vacant, foreclosed homes for the homeless.

Music heard in this story: "That Hump" by Erykah Badu for the album Amerykah Pt. 1 (4th World War)

***
Follow-up: New Life in a Foreclosed Home

(2nd INTERVIEW) * Please fast-forward

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Rmega Tafari - larger >>

We received dozens of emails about Dick's conversation with Rmega Tafari, a woman squatting in an abandoned foreclosed home with her family. When Dick last spoke to Rmega, the bank that owned the home had asked her to leave.

Dick checks in with Rmega to find out what's happened since: she and her family have moved to Tallahassee where life is much better. Dua, Rmega's 4-year-old son, also shares his thoughts on the home they're renting and their new garden.

VASCO'S HEART & A LONG RIDE HOME

DOUBLE FEATURE!!
Friday, June 12 2009 -VASCO'S HEART

Vasco- - Day 1 in the U.S. >>More

When columnist Cathleen Falsani won a trip to Africa in a raffle, she planned to veer off the tourist track, do some writing. She never imagined that a young boy would steal her heart the moment he sat in her lap. Cathleen learned that the boy, Vasco, had a serious heart condition, but could not afford medical attention.

After Cathleen returned home and wrote about Vasco in her newspaper column, she found herself engaged in a massive project to bring Vasco from his home in Malawi to Chicago for a heart surgery.

Cathleen Falsani

The surgery successfully took place on Wednesday. Cathleen talks to Dick Gordon about how her relationship with Vasco has changed her life.

• Follow Vasco's Heart Surgery and Recovery
• Read Cathleen's Chicago Sun-Times Column

A LONG RIDE HOME

Chuck Walkley

You know we often turn the second half of the show over the you. We like to hear the stories that are the most remarkable in your life. Chuck Walkley's neighbor Jennifer heard Chuck's story and she told us, and we persuaded him to come in to the studio.

Chuck returned from Vietnam with a serious injury and no idea how to move forward with his life. When he got out of the hospital, he decided to hitchhike home to surprise his mother. He quickly was picked up by a state trooper who told him that hitchhiking on a highway was illegal. Then the trooper offered him a ride. Chuck was transferred from one state trooper's car to another, through thee states, until finally, sirens blaring and lights blazing, he was dropped off at his mother's door. That kindness inspired Chuck to spend the next two decades of his life as a police officer.

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