Dads on Duty

When gang violence spiked, parents at a Louisiana high school said "Not on our watch”

- Caroline Fanning

ON THURSDAY, SEPTEMBER 16, 2021, just weeks into the school year, two groups of boys brawled across the courtyard at Southwood High School in Shreveport, Louisiana. The following day, two groups of girls picked up where the boys had left off. In a mere two days, 23 students were in police custody. One was charged with battery for allegedly hitting an assistant principal. Another student was charged with threatening a resource officer and a staff member.

When a school administrator told her former classmate Craig Lee, a business owner and community activist, that gang tensions were rising, Lee wanted to do something. He contacted Michael La'Fitte, a fellow activist, who had an 11th-grade daughter at Southwood. That Sunday, the two held an emergency meeting with parents and the principal. By the end of the four-hour session, a group of the fathers in attendance had decided it was time to make their presence known on campus.

“We're dads,” La'Fitte told CBS News. “The best people to take care of our kids are who? Are us."