ver the past two years I have spent a great deal of time in Harlem doing community service work. During that time I made friends with many of the children and their parents living in Harlem. I saw first hand the hard core poverty in which they are forced to live. Children play cops and robbers by frisking each other and reciting Miranda rights. Mediocre teachers try to protect the children by limiting the horizons of their dreams, and hope is often theoretical concept.

Rhonda Brown is a six-year-old girl who currently lives in a foster home. Rhonda's mother is, addicted to, crack, and used to abuse her regularly. Recently I was with Rhonda in what the children call their "back-yard" (s vacant lot with two burned Out Cars, broken glass, dead rats and empty crack villas). She was leading me around by the hand showing me what to take pictures of, when I started to walk off into a corner to talk with another child. "Don't go in there Rhonda shrieked. I asked her why. "Because I saw a girl get raped there once," she said.

Growing up in inner city is difficult, terrible experience that no child ought to endure. I want to continue photographing Harlem and spend a week documenting the life of one child, so people can see, feel and understand what kind of hell these bright young children have to grow up in. What's happening in the inner city is not acceptable, and it needs to change. I want people to share what I have felt and feel the same need for change when they see my photographs. I want to make a difference.