No Place for Problem Children

ABC7 Chicago News story about my exhibition using an eight-projector array in classrooms on the school’s highest floor.

2018 - Present

As part of my residency with CPS Lives, I have been embedded in a public high school in Chicago’s troubled Near West Side neighborhood. I have been photographing Phoenix Military Academy since 2018.

PMA is the daytime home to more than 500 young men and women. Like most military academies, the discipline is strict. All cadets are required to assemble in formation each morning, in full dress uniform.

For many members of Generation X like myself, the notion of a militarized school is a direct assault on our anti-establishment and indie-thinking ideals.

This project documents two years in the lives of high school students within an unconventional academic structure while challenging the widespread assumptions about the purpose and function of military public schools in our society.

Here, the results speak loudly: Out of 660 schools in the Chicago Public Schools system, Phoenix Military Academy consistency ranks in the top ten for attendance levels and graduation rates.