The Year Book
Shabazz High'19
This photo series follows the last few weeks before the summer break as the students of Malcolm X Shabazz High School in Newark, New Jersey, prepare for their annual talent show. Shot in 2019 before the COVID-19 pandemic, these photos capture what life looked like for Black youth in America before the pandemic. Some of these students were seniors at the time, with plans and dreams that all came to a sudden pause that seemed unending. Only recently, just three years after the global quarantine, are we returning to normalcy similar to the time these photos reflect. I look back on these photographs a lot, wondering what happened to some of the students I got to know over those short few weeks.
After school, students of all grades found their clicks and took to the halls to practice and plan for their performances for the upcoming spring talent show: chatter and cheers filled the hallways as music from the marching band reverberated throughout the school.
The night of the talent show, a classroom on the second floor becomes the unofficial headquarters for the design club, where students prepare to make their fashion runway debut.
