These days, many teenagers live half their lives on social media sites, and they're writing the rules as they go. One online trend 16-year-old Radio Rookie Temitayo Fagbenle finds disturbing is something she calls "slut-shaming," or using photos and videos to turn a girl's private life inside out.

Rebelling against your parents is the norm for most teens in America, but it’s a luxury for some young people who immigrate to the U.S. without one or both of their parents. There is no official number for how many kids this affects, but one of those teens is 17-year-old Tangeneka Taylor. Eighteen months ago she moved to the U.S from Guyana with her dad and sister. Along with having to adjust to a new country, she’s had to adjust to life without her mom.

Danielle was 13-years-old when she left her home and her mother in the Congo.  She came to New York hoping to pursue the American dream, but she wound up living in a shelter. Hear why Danielle keeps the truth about her life in America to herself - even though it means lying to her mother.

Nearly 100,000 Americans suffer from a blood disorder called Sickle Cell Anemia, a painful disease that shortens life-expectancy. Sickle cells aren’t round – they’re shaped like a crescent moon and Radio Rookie Bree Person hates looking at them. Sometimes she hates talking about them, too – but she put together this report nevertheless.

New York state has the worst four-year high school graduation rate in the country. But when you zero in on New York City, the rates are even worse, especially for black males, with only 28 percent graduating from public high school in four years in 2010. Radio Rookie Mike Brown, 18, is a young black man growing up in Harlem and being raised by a single mom.

16-year-old Temitayo Fagbenle is troubled by the fact that her Facebook newsfeed is inundated with sexually explicit photos and videos of other teenage girls that are posted, commented on, and shared countless times by her peers. Teenagers targeting and shaming each other isn’t new but in the past the messages written on bathroom stalls only scarred a girl’s reputation during high school. Kids today are rightly taught that what goes on the internet stays on the internet and can pop up at any time. Temitayo brings listeners inside the cyber world of teenagers to explore how using the internet as a tool to ruin a reputation has repercussions far beyond the schoolyard.

Staten Island was one of the areas hit hard by massive flooding from Sandy. Among the people that stayed, was the family of 17-year-old Tasina Berkey, a current Radio Rookie. Her family, like many of their neighbors, never experienced flooding like this before.

Two Radio Rookie reporters got a chance to sit down with Police Commissioner Ray Kelly to discuss the tactics of his police force and its impact in the community.

Five Radio Rookies walked the streets of the Bronx recently to learn more about how residents of the borough, which is 90 percent black and Latino, interact with the police. They then sat down the the city's police commissioner to ask him about community relations.

Growing up, my parents used to tell me to stay away from the projects. They said they were dangerous, and they’re right: about 20 percent of violent crime happens in public housing.

Radio Rookies is a New York Public Radio initiative that provides teenagers with the tools and training to create radio stories about themselves, their communities and their world.

What does it mean for young people to come out in the age of Lady Gaga?  Bebe tells her uncle that she's bisexual, but as a gay man who struggled with harassment and bullying through his whole childhood, he suspects Bebe is just trying to be cool and doesn't understand the weight of her words.  Bebe decides to take a closer look. 

To mark this week's 25th anniversary of the disaster at the Chernobyl nuclear power plant, Radio Rookies is rebroadcasting Irina Sverzhanovskaya's story about the aftermath of the accident in her own life.

The 9/11 Generation Speaks: This spring and summer, WNYC’s Radio Rookies, is holding a workshop to help young people tell stories about growing up in the New York area since 9/11. We are looking for people for whom 9/11 was, in some way, a pivotal moment in their growth. Ideally, participants will range from kids who lost family members to those impacted less directly by 9/11 and its aftermath: maybe they lived near the World Trade Center; perhaps the attacks changed their lives because of their parents' line of work or their family's religion; maybe their own convictions have been challenged or led them to take some action. We know that 9/11 affected different people in many different ways, and we hope to be surprised by some of the stories young people have to tell.

On October 13, 2001, a montage of the Radio Rookies commentaries about the World Trade Center tragedy and its aftermath aired on WNYC.

First Lady Laura Bush handed out the 2006 Coming Up Taller Awards Monday morning and WNYC's Radio Rookies program is among the 17 winners. All the honorees are young people in after school programs in underserved communities.

The United Nations General Assembly recently concluded its first special summit on Children. In an 11th hour agreement, delegates from more than 180 countries agreed on a list of world-wide goals for children's health, education, and safety. In the days before the General Assembly meeting, 400 young people met to talk about the difficulties children face in their countries. A group of WNYC's Radio Rookies sat down to talk with three teenagers, who were in town for the summit, about their experiences coming from countries wounded by war.