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A photographer captures life inside Chicago Public Schools
Jael Augustin, Ogden International High School, 2019.
Melissa Ann Pinney
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Melissa Ann Pinney
Melissa Ann Pinney photographed the everyday moments of adolescence inside Chicago Public Schools during a seven-year artist residency. Her series Becoming Themselves portrays students, especially those marginalized and underrepresented, as they navigate identity, community and the many transformations of growing up.
We interviewed Pinney about the making of her series and the stories behind some of her favorite images. The interview has been edited for clarity and length.
Mila Cardenas and Alvin Truong, Senn High School, 2023.
Melissa Ann Pinney
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Melissa Ann Pinney
Antonio Epps and his walking stick, Senn High School, 2025.
Melissa Ann Pinney
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Melissa Ann Pinney
What drew you to photograph inside Chicago Public Schools?
I was invited by Artists in Public Schools, an organization that pairs artists for residencies in schools all over the city, to photograph Bell School and Ogden International Schools. It was an incredible opportunity to photograph and immerse myself in often overlooked communities of children and teens in Chicago.
Since I was in my teens and photographing my own family, childhood and adolescence has been a focus of my work. Girl Ascending, my 2010 monograph, explored the social lives and coming-of-age rituals of my daughter, Emma, her friends and teammates. The possibilities inherent in widening the scope of my work beyond these established personal connections was exciting.
Asmah Mohammad Zakaria and Arshia Tahir, Senn High School, 2025.
Melissa Ann Pinney
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Melissa Ann Pinney
Hireath Magee, a 2022 graduate of Ogden International High School, in Chicago, 2024.
Melissa Ann Pinney
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Melissa Ann Pinney
When you first started, what kinds of images or stories did you hope to capture?
I’m interested in photography as a process, one of paying close attention to the richness and mystery already present in the everyday world. I capture what’s happening in the moment, and the story reveals itself afterwards in contemplation of the work itself.
This is an opportunity to make what I think of as real pictures — images that reward sustained and repeated viewings and eschew stereotype and cliché. I had no idea what to expect in the schools, but through trial and error, I found opportunities to make pictures as I became part of the school community. I never know what the students will do next — their beauty, their compassion and their conflicts are unrehearsed. The teens collaborate in the art-making by welcoming me into their world.
My photographs are both documents of a time and place and works of art. References to contemporary culture, to history and to ideas of representation are all embedded in the pictures. When I began photographing students in three different Chicago public schools, I had no idea of what was to come — how the project would evolve and shift through an ongoing global pandemic, a renewed focus on systemic racial and gender inequities and rampant gun violence. Now it’s a document of a historic time.
Emilio Castelan, Senn High School, 2024.
Melissa Ann Pinney
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Melissa Ann Pinney
Kevin Cooper, Senn High School, 2023.
Melissa Ann Pinney
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Melissa Ann Pinney
How much time did you spend working on Becoming Themselves?
This project is ongoing and still evolving since 2018, when I started photographing in Bell School. In Their Own Light was the first book of my early pictures from an elementary, middle and several high schools. In Becoming Themselves, I focus solely on two high schools — Ogden International High School and Senn High School — between 2019 and 2025.
Halloween, Senn High School, 2023.
Melissa Ann Pinney
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Melissa Ann Pinney
Khadijatou Sohna and Alyanna Manibo, Senn High School, 2024.
Melissa Ann Pinney
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Melissa Ann Pinney
What was the most challenging part of this project?
It is very hard to witness the grief and ongoing trauma many students experience as part of their everyday lives, especially when we hear that a student in the community has been shot and killed. Tragically, eight students I photographed died that way. The trauma of gun violence reverberates everywhere.
A flag football team, Senn High School, 2024.
Melissa Ann Pinney
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Melissa Ann Pinney
Homecoming pep rally, Senn High School, 2022.
Melissa Ann Pinney
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Melissa Ann Pinney
Lizzie Williams, Senn High School, 2021.
Melissa Ann Pinney
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Melissa Ann Pinney
What’s the story behind one of your favorite photographs?
With her My Little Pony leggings and arms loaded with jewelry, Lizzie Williams clearly stood out in the hallway crowded with students at their lockers gathering their coats and bags. I introduced myself and asked if Lizzie wanted to make a portrait. We went to the old gym for its brilliant light and huge south-facing windows. In the midst of working out Lizzie’s pose and position, the boys basketball team starting running laps around the gym, casting shadows onto the wall where Lizzie stood. At first I was annoyed by this unexpected disruption, but I soon realized that, far from an unwelcome distraction, the shadows suggest another level of mystery and complexity. I’m grateful for serendipity!
The DePaul University Art Museum added this photograph and six others from the project to their permanent collection last spring. A class of Senn students, many of whom are represented in the photographs, took a field trip to the museum to see the works.
Jae Nguyen, Sal Vega and Audrey Harmon, Senn High School, 2025.
Melissa Ann Pinney
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Melissa Ann Pinney
Kho’vya Greenwood and her brother, Coby, at Kho’vya’s prom send-off celebration, Chicago, 2022.
Melissa Ann Pinney
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Melissa Ann Pinney
Were there any moments that surprised you during the process?
Many moments surprised me.
One day early last fall, a student I hadn’t met before asked me to take his picture. I was happy to do so and we found a place by the windows with some light. When I looked through my lens, I suddenly recognized Axle, a student I’d first met two years before, when he transferred to Senn. I had photographed him several other times. Axle had transformed himself radically with a new short hair cut and different style of dress.
I am always surprised and moved when a student tells me that the project made a positive impact on their life. Travion Williams, at Ogden International High School, said he was shy, self-conscious and unsure of himself when we made his portrait in 2019. Travion’s portrait was one of the 84 portraits installed on panels in the school’s front lobby in the summer of 2020. Classes would be completely online that fall, but outdoor sports were still allowed. When the cross country team started practicing, Travion discovered that his friends and teammates recognized and admired him. It changed the way he saw himself.
It’s rewarding when I’m told by a student that my work is important to them. As my ties to the community have deepened — I’ve come to understand the meaning this project holds for me and for the students themselves, who tell me they feel truly “seen” by participating in the project. The students have profoundly affected the ways I understand the lives of others; my relationships now transcend school to include family events, parties and baby showers. I couldn’t have predicted the strong connections I would develop with some of the students, who keep in touch even years after they’ve graduated.
When I brought Sophiat Agboola a print of her portrait, she told me it was inspiring. Surprised, I asked in what way it was inspiring and to whom — I couldn’t guess. Sophiat said she had occasionally been made fun of for wearing her natural hair; her portrait had given her the confidence to do so.
Of course, the pandemic surprised me. And the fact that a project I expected to last one year could still be challenging and rewarding after seven was a complete surprise, too.
Jo Gonda and Andrew McDermott at prom, Senn High School, 2024.
Melissa Ann Pinney
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Melissa Ann Pinney
Jakolbi Lard, at prom, Ogden International High School, 2019. Lard was shot and killed in Chicago in January 2022.
Melissa Ann Pinney
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Melissa Ann Pinney
Do you have any memorable anecdotes or encounters from your time in the schools ?
I photographed Jakolbi Lard only once, at prom in 2019, drawn by the broken heart he had shaved in to his hair. In January 2022, I learned that Jakolbi had been shot and killed. Jakolbi’s death and the passage of time bring a different perspective to the broken heart shaved into his scalp. Now I see the wings formed by the mirror frame behind Jakolbi’s back. Jakolbi’s mother, Patricia Lard, told me that rather than being heartbroken, he was the heart-breaker. She brought Jakolbi’s daughter, Jamyah, to an exhibition that included Jakolbi’s portrait in 2023. She believes that exhibiting Jakolbi’s portrait honors his life. Ms. Lard thanked me for “… seeing in her Sun (sic) what the world did not.”
Shamaiya Mitchell and Stephon Wright, Senn High School, 2023.
Melissa Ann Pinney
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Melissa Ann Pinney
The last day of school for the class of 2025, Senn High School, 2025.
Melissa Ann Pinney
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Melissa Ann Pinney
Has working in schools changed how you think about education or childhood?
The students have a lot more agency than kids in my generation or even my daughter’s generation did. These students are free to define themselves through their chosen teams and clubs, their dress, sexual orientation, pronouns and sometimes taking on a new name. There’s a freedom in the acceptance and allowance for difference I see and a closeness in the physical camaraderie between many of the students.
I started reading the news more closely when I began this project. CPS (Chicago Public Schools) and the CTU (the Chicago Teachers Union) are frequently in the headlines. It’s clear that Chicago’s past is linked to its present by a history of events affecting the city in housing, education, racial and gender equity and immigration. All of these issues flow through the permeable wall between the city and the public schools.
DeJa Rae Reaves, a 2022 graduate of Ogden International High School. Reaves was shot and killed in April 2023, her freshman year at North Carolina A&T.
Melissa Ann Pinney
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Melissa Ann Pinney
What do you hope viewers take away from seeing these images?
I hope these pictures encourage a deeper consideration and appreciation of the radiant young people in our public schools that goes far beyond the stereotypes. I intend these portraits to honor and commemorate those who are vulnerable and often underrepresented.
Melissa Ann Pinney is an artist based in Chicago. You can see more of her work on her website, MelissaAnnPinney.com, or on Instagram, at @melissa_ann_pinney.
new video loaded: Mamdani Leads in Latest Polls
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Mamdani Leads in Latest Polls
Three new polls show Zohran Mamdani leading the New York City mayoral race. The two other major candidates, Andrew Cuomo and Curtis Sliwa, made their last appeals to voters before election day.
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“I do not believe the city of New York has a future if Zohran Mamdani is elected mayor.” “I voted for Andrew Cuomo. I’m not a huge fan. I think he has a past. I was here, obviously, when his father was here. You know, with politics comes imperfection.” “His ideas about free transportation, his ideas about child care, his ideas about just the diversity of the city and the importance of diversity. It’s a wonderful thing.” “I voted for the first time. It was very exciting. Just the feel of like, going in there, voting for the first time. They shouted like, ‘Hey, first-time voters!’ So that added to the excitement of everything, and I was just happy to do my part.”
By McKinnon de Kuyper
October 30, 2025
A sub-surface atomic test is shown March 23, 1955 at the Nevada Test Site near Yucca Flats, Nev.
AP/U.S. Atomic Energy Commission
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AP/U.S. Atomic Energy Commission
President Trump said on Thursday that the U.S. would begin testing nuclear weapons again for the first time in decades.
“We’ve halted many years ago, but with others doing testing I think it’s appropriate to do so,” the president told reporters aboard Air Force One.
Experts say that the resumption of testing would be a major escalation and could upend the nuclear balance of power.
“I think a decision to resume nuclear testing would be extremely dangerous and would do more to benefit our adversaries than the United States,” said Corey Hinderstein, vice president for studies at the Carnegie Endowment for Nuclear Peace.
Here’s what a test would involve, and why the president might be calling for one now.
There’s currently only one place America could test a nuke — near Las Vegas, Nevada
The Nevada National Security Site, approximately 60 miles northwest of Las Vegas, is currently the only place where America could test a nuclear weapon, says Robert Peters, a senior research fellow for strategic deterrence at the Heritage Foundation.
The Nevada site is around 1,300 square miles in size, larger than the state of Rhode Island. Starting in the 1950s, scientists conducted atmospheric nuclear tests at the site, but from 1962 to 1992, testing was done underground.
Today, testing would likely be done in “a complex of deep underground mineshafts,” Peters said.
Scientists dig a deep shaft either directly below ground or into the side of a mountain. They then put a nuclear device in a chamber at the end of the shaft and seal it up. The detonation is contained by the rock, reducing the risk of atmospheric fallout.
Although underground testing is far safer than atmospheric testing, it still carries risks, said Hinderstein. In the past, some radioactive fallout has leaked from test shafts. Additionally, the test could shake buildings as far away as Las Vegas, and Hinderstein said some of the newer buildings in Vegas could even be at risk of damage.
“All of these big highrises — including Stratosphere, including the Trump Hotel,” she said. “They’re not designed for massive, significant seismic activity.”
America’s last test in Nevada was over 30 years ago
At the end of the Cold War, the nation’s major nuclear powers declared a voluntary moratorium on nuclear testing. Russia, then the Soviet Union, tested its last nuclear weapon in 1990, the U.S. conducted its final test in 1992, and China conducted its last test in 1996.
The U.S. conducted hundreds of underground tests in Nevada. Each massive explosion created a subsidence crater visible at the surface.
NNSA/NNSS
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NNSA/NNSS
The voluntary test moratorium has been in place as part of an effort to maintain nuclear stability. The U.S currently uses scientific experiments and supercomputer simulations to make sure its bombs still work.
Last year, NPR was one of a handful of organizations granted rare access to the top-secret underground tunnels where the tests take place. Scientists working in the tunnels said they were confident they could continue to ensure the safety of America’s nuclear weapons without testing.
Although a full-scale nuclear detonation would be “complementary” to current experiments, “our assessment is that there are no system questions that would be answered by a test, that would be worth the expense and the effort and the time,” Don Haynes, a nuclear weapons scientist from Los Alamos National Laboratory told NPR as they walked through the tunnels.
Indeed Hinderstein says, preparing for a nuclear test is no small matter. While a basic demonstration test could be done in approximately 18 months. Conducting a test that would produce scientifically useful data would likely take years.
In this photo taken from video distributed by Russian Defense Ministry Press Service on Wednesday, Oct. 22, 2025, the crew of the Bryansk nuclear submarine of the Russian navy prepares to conduct a practice launch of an intercontinental ballistic missile during the drills of Russia’s nuclear forces.
AP/Russian Defense Ministry Press S
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AP/Russian Defense Ministry Press S
Trump’s announcement is likely reacting to some recent tests by Russia
On Sunday, Russia announced it had conducted a successful test of a new nuclear-powered cruise missile. Then on Wednesday President Vladimir Putin announced the successful test of another doomsday weapon — a nuclear-powered underwater drone, which Russia says can be used to attack coastal cities.
Trump never called out Russia by name, but he did suggest recent testing was behind the announcement. “I see them testing,” he said aboard Air Force One, “and I say, ‘Well if they’re going to test I guess we have to test.’”
While testing nuclear-powered weapons is not the same as testing nuclear weapons themselves, Russia’s tests are highly provocative. They come just months before the expiration of the last nuclear treaty between the U.S. and Russia, designed to put limits on their arsenals.
The back-and-forth has all the hallmarks of the start of an arms race, noted Jon Wolfsthal, the director of global risk at the Federation for American Scientists.
“We saw this play out throughout the Cold War through nuclear testing, nuclear deployments, nuclear investments,” he said.
Many experts warn that now is not the time to resume nuclear testing
Hinderstein, who served as a deputy administrator of the National Nuclear Security Administration, the agency responsible for America’s nuclear weapons, from 2021-2024, said that a decision to resume testing would not be in America’s interests.
At the end of the Cold War, the U.S. had conducted more than a thousand nuclear tests — far more than any other nation (China, by comparison had conducted just 45).
Other nations, “have more to gain by resuming nuclear testing than the United States does,” she said.
Testing would likely be expensive adds Paul Dean, vice president for global nuclear policy at the Nuclear Threat Initiative. “The cost estimates I’ve seen have been at around, ballpark, $140 million per test,” he said.
“It’s not necessary to conduct a nuclear explosive test right now” agreed Robert Peters of the Heritage Foundation. But he added. “But there very well be compelling reasons to test in the coming months and years. That’s how bad things are getting.”
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A photographer captures life inside Chicago Public Schools
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