Hip Hop Therapy Boosts Attendance at Bronx High School

J.C. Hall, a social worker at Mott Haven Community High School, was busy after school this year with a group of students who wrote rap music. He coached them through writing rhymes, voicing them, recording and mixing music and then sharing their stories with their peers. 

At first, two years ago, the meetings were impromptu. Students who would normally be out the door at 2:30 p.m. would stay until 5:00, writing rhymes and talking about them. Hall had studied hip hop therapy, a movement in social work, to give students a chance to express themselves and get emotions under control.

"When that aptitude is built up, it actually helps with academics," he said.

Mott Haven is a transfer high school, run in partnership with the organization East Side Settlement House, for students who are overage and far behind in earning course credits. Some students enter Mott Haven with no credits at all, after two years at a traditional high school.

They are also students with significant needs socially and emotionally. Some have been incarcerated, live in a homeless shelter or have children of their own. Many work to support themselves or their families. 

Hall's after-school "program" had such a positive effect on student behavior, attendance and academics, that the school's principal, Helene Spadaccini, found money in her school budget this year to create a recording studio.

"This is basically my little counseling," said Vianna Morrison, 18. "It helps me get rid of my anger, but in a good way."

The studio has a sound-proof booth, iMac's for editing and mixing, turntables, headphones and album posters. It's a space that students take pride in.

"I just wanted to belong in here," said Amber Mckenzie, 20. She said the space, and the sessions with Hall and about a dozen of her classmates, offered a place to calm down or be angry, all without judgment.

"Say what you got to say. Go write it down and go in there and get it out," she said, pointing to the recording booth. "That's the best part — hearing yourself back." 

Ephraim Weir, 18, has worked with Hall almost every day. He wrote and recorded a rap about getting stabbed last school year. His recovery was long, he said, and required surgery.

"At one point when I was down, and I listened to this song, I started crying," he said. "It was emotional for me. I don't care if nobody likes that song. I know that's for me."

The year before he came to Mott Haven, Weir's attendance rate was just 29 percent. This year, his attendance rate was 92 percent.

In order to use the recording studio after school, students must have attended school that day and be passing their classes or showing improvement.