Hakim Crampton

Hakim Nathaniel Crampton is an award-winning poet, an author of eight books, and a national juvenile justice/youth violence prevention specialist and motivational speaker from Jackson, Michigan. He emerged as a prisoner rights advocate while serving a 45 year sentence for a 1991 wrongful arrest and conviction. Fifteen years later Hakim won his freedom with the assistance of the Wisconsin Innocence Project. Since his release in 2006, he has been a leading activist within schools and juvenile centers across Michigan, pushing to disrupt the school-to-prison pipeline and help youthful offenders successfully transition into adulthood after contact with the juvenile justice system. As a poet and motivational speaker, Hakim created a Hip-Hop Based English Language Arts Pedagogy to engage black students in reading and writing within a classroom setting.

Hakim has received over a dozen awards for community service. As the Founding Director of A.M.E.N. 4 Youth he works with youth and young adults by providing on-site academic mentoring and instruction through the highly innovative project S.L.A.M. Lyrical Education Curriculum Series. His greatest hope is to see a future where black males are no longer at risk of complete societal segregation through incarceration and social discrimination.