A quick plug for one of my good friends, Chicago-based photojournalist Rene Edde. Giving a voice to the voiceless is a goal that many journalists aspire to, and Rene is doing just that with her work through Americorps on teenmomshoutout.org.

According to the site, TeenMomShoutOut is “a safe space for pregnant and parenting teens and their supporters to talk about issues that affect their community.” Rene set up a WordPress MU blog, aggregating the latest posts from individual blogs on the main page. The site gives pregnant teens and teen mothers a place to express themselves and use writing/blogging as a cathartic exercise. Already there have been posts about Charisse preparing a child for the realities of life, Blake wanting more for her child than she currently has for herself, Tiffany being following by a suspicious man and Verenice write about the importance of family in her life.

I am excited to see what other stories (and forms of storytelling) come out of this project.