United States
British undergraduate international student at Columbia University in the City of New York
Interests include podcasts, broadcast journalism, social justice and gender and identity
Prev. UK News intern at Financial Times and columnist and op-ed associate for Columbia Daily Spectator
As more US states decriminalise the drug for medicinal or recreational use, Liberty Martin looks at the way America's black community has been excluded from profiting from the lucrative trade. Produced by Liberty Martin. Music credit: David Sappa Get alerts on News podcast when a new story is published
Wanda James' younger brother Rick Barnes was 17 years old when he was arrested for selling four ounces of marijuana and imprisoned for four-and-a-half years. In 2012, 15 years after he came out of jail, Colorado had legalised marijuana for recreational use and his sister had become the first black woman to open a cannabis dispensary in the state.
The north London suburb of Burnt Oak has one of the least attractive high streets in Britain. Last year, it ranked 995 on a list of 1,000 retail destinations compiled by the commercial property agency Harper Dennis Hobbs. Burnt Oak's high street once boasted a market, several banks, a school uniform shop, a book shop and shoe shop.
For generations, ambitious young Americans flocked to the country's biggest cities, looking for opportunity in commercial hubs like New York, Los Angeles, Chicago and San Francisco. But the generation who came of age around the year 2000 is breaking the mould.
"What school did you go to?" A fellow British international student I'd just met asked me the question. To the untrained ear, this seems like a simple thing to ask; but in reality, it belies the classism tied to applying to Columbia as an international student, particularly from the U.K.