Los Angeles County Office of Education Superintendent Arturo Delgado and Supervisor Ridley-Thomas in a classroom at the Harris County Youth Village.
Los Angeles County Supervisor Mark Ridley-Thomas and Los Angeles County Office of Education (LACOE) Superintendent Arturo Delgado visited classrooms in Houston, Texas’ juvenile detention facilities Thursday (Feb.16) in an ongoing effort to study innovative programs that may be models for reforming education in Los Angeles’ youth camps and halls.
Los Angeles County’s youth probation system is currently being monitored by the U.S. Dept. of Justice due to dangerous conditions in the camps, and the county in 2010 settled a lawsuit filed by the American Civil Liberties Union alleging the failure to provide a constitutionally adequate education to youths at the Challenger Camp in Lancaster. Under the settlement terms, LACOE and the Probation Dept. are now working to improve education at Challenger Camp.
Supervisor Ridley-Thomas, however, believes schooling in the county’s youth probation facilities is in urgent need of an overhaul. “There are bright spots in our camps due to the above-and-beyond effort of many dedicated Probation and LACOE staffers; but as a whole our system needs to look and act more like a school system than a prison system,” Ridley-Thomas said, “we have a long way to go.”
A math teacher in the Harris County Youth Village uses a multimedia “smart board” to instruct a student preparing for the GED exam.
In Houston, Delgado and Ridley-Thomas visited the Harris County Youth Village, where boys and girls in custody attend classes in a dedicated school building. Along with class sizes typically smaller than ten students, youths in custody are taught using contemporary technology – students use laptop computers in the classrooms and each room features a “smart board” multimedia blackboard.
More than 80% of students who take the GED high school equivalency exam in custody pass the test and move on to a local community college. The Youth Village also uses a computer-guided reading program being studied for use in Los Angeles County. Along with academic innovations, youths in custody participate in a student government that meets weekly to manage their residential life.
Supervisor Ridley-Thomas had previously visited the Maya Angelou Academy at New Beginnings, a revolutionary school program serving Washington, D.C.’s juveniles in custody.
Both the Harris County probation schools and Washington, D.C.’s probation schools teach students using the “Freedom Schools” model developed by the Children’s Defense Fund. Freedom Schools promote reading and self-esteem through an academically rigorous curriculum that also stresses civic engagement and social action. Outside of probation camps, Supervisor Ridley-Thomas has brought Freedom Schools summer programs to churches and community centers in the Second District, serving more than 500 students to date.
“The best practices in classrooms outside the locked gates of probation camps need to be brought inside,” Ridley-Thomas said. “A new LACOE superintendent, Arturo Delgado, and a new Chief Probation Officer, Jerry Powers, are on board, and they are eager to make the changes we need to make sure our youths use their time in custody to move ahead as students, not fall behind as prisoners,” he said.
Recent news reports on the County’s beach ordinance largely have been either misleading or inaccurate.
No, the Board has not cracked down on Frisbee-throwing and beach balls. No, we are not trying to outlaw fun. Rather, we lifted a long-standing ban on those items to facilitate their use. To that end, the County Department of Beaches and Harbors came up with a sensible policy to give lifeguards some leeway in keeping the public safe during our busiest seasons.
Click here for the release from the Department of Beaches and Harbors, and click here for a news report by the L.A. Times, which gets the story right.
For the next 12 days, Rave Cinemas Baldwin Hills, part of the Baldwin Hills Crenshaw Plaza in Los Angeles, will host the 2012 Pan African Film Festival (PAFF). This year, the annual festival, which runs from February 9-20, celebrates its 20th Anniversary with a dynamic line-up of screenings, special guests, and surprises. For nearly two weeks audiences will explore the lives of people of African descent through the eyes of Black filmmakers from the United States, Africa, the Caribbean, South America, the South Pacific, Europe and Canada. In total, more than 130 films made by or about people of African descent will be screened. The festival kicks off Thursday night with the much anticipated movie “Think Like a Man” based on the book and New York Times Bestseller Think Like a Man, Act Like a Lady by radio host, comedian, and actor Steve Harvey. A slew of movie screenings from around the world continues at Baldwin Hills Rave Cinemas for the next 11 days. Among the offerings are the films: Slavery By Another Name; a documentary based on the Pulitzer Prize-winning book by Wall Street Journalist Donald Blackmon; Woman Thou Art Loosed: On the 7th Day, the sequel to Pastor T. D. Jakes’ award-winning film: Woman Thou Art Loosed, and two movies from Nigerian actor-turned-producer Hakeem Kae-Kazim – Man on Ground and Inside Story. Man on Ground tells the story of two expatriate Nigerian brothers and their journey to heal their relationship amidst violence and political turmoil. Inside Story is a drama about one man from Kenya and his struggle with HIV while persuing his dreams of a professional soccer career. Kae-Kazim stars in both films.
Kae-Kazim, became acquainted with Los Angeles a decade ago, when his first film, God is African, premiered at the Pan African Film Festival. Since then he has entered the Hollywood mainstream and has starred in Hotel Rwanda, the television crime-drama “24”, Pirates of the Caribbean: At World’s End and X-Men Origins: Wolverine.
“I’m from Africa, so what’s important for me is that our voice, the African voice, has an opportunity to be seen in America. That African voice is an honest voice,” said Hakeem Kae-Kazim.
History of the Pan African Film Festival
The Pan African Film Festival is a non-profit corporation founded in 1992, by award winning actor Danny Glover, Emmy Award winning actress Ja’Net DuBois, and International legal, cultural and political consultant Ayuko Babud. Widely regarded as the most prestigious Black film festival in the nation, the Pan African Film Festival is dedicated to the promotion of tolerance, ethnic and racial respect through film, art and creative expression. The goal of the Pan African Film Festival is to present and showcase the broad spectrum of creative work and reinforce positive images of the Black experience.
For more information of Pan African Film Festival screenings, please visit:
The Los Angeles County Metropolitan Transportation Authority (Metro) recently unveiled its latest poster showcasing Whittier for its Through the Eyes of Local Artists poster series.
For this poster series, Metro commissioned local artists to create original artwork to visually portray the regions that make up Los Angeles County. The posters, which can be seen on 250 Metro trains and 2,400 buses, spotlight various regions and cultural landmarks of Los Angeles, from the Watts Towers to the parkland of Griffith Park and every community in between. Since the first poster featuring the parades and festivals of Pasadena debuted in 2003, the series continues to feature the iconic symbols of each region. The goal of the series is two-fold: first, to create a pleasant and visually stimulating environment for passengers and second, to increase ridership. Metro recognizes that art creates a sense of place and seeks to use art to encourage the public to use the transit system to travel to the many diverse neighborhoods in Los Angeles County.
Through the Eyes of Local Artists has generated national recognition from Public Relations Society of America, Outstanding Achievement How Magazine, Pasadena Museum of California Art, Illustration Magazine, Transportation Marketing and Communication Association, Print Magazine Regional Design and the LA Society of Illustrators.
Five communities in the Second Supervisorial District are showcased in Through the Eyes of Local Artists. They include: Leimert Park, Watts, Exposition Park, Compton and Gardena. Now in its 10th year, the next installment of the series will feature Inglewood, Claremont, Pico Rivera, and San Fernando.
As a special highlight of the program, two of Los Angeles’ most prominent labor leaders, Maria Elena Durazo, Secretary Treasurer of the LA Federation of Labor, and Laphonza Butler, President of SEIU Long Term Care Workers Union, made a special presentation to Rose Mary Gudiel, the San Gabriel Valley woman who, with the assistance of community and labor organizers, successfully averted foreclosure on her home by camping in her own house. After the plenary session, participants had the opportunity to attend a variety of workshops ranging from topics such as health, public safety, and economic development. Following the breakout sessions, attendees were able to take advantage of a resource fair with more than 40 booths containing information about County and community services.
The Summit ended with a luncheon entitled Empowerment Connections hosted by ABC 7 traffic reporter, Alysha Del Valle. Aside from the delicious food, generously donated USC President C.L Nikias, the luncheon featured entertainment from local band The Bricks, and special presentations from community leaders in the Second Supervisorial District.
“Apathy is the most serious threat to democracy,” said Supervisor Ridley-Thomas. “Vehicles such as the Empowerment Congress serve as a platform that allows people to collectively come together to solve the concerns in their individual communities.”
The dynamic coalition of neighborhood groups, residents, nonprofit organizations, businesses, religious institutions, and community leaders served as a model and precursor to the City of Los Angeles’ Neighborhood Councils, and now serves over 2.5 million residents in the Los Angeles County Second Supervisorial District, from Koreatown south to Carson, Playa del Rey to Compton.
The Empowerment Congress’ tried and true methods of civic engagement have garnered national attention. This year, the W.K. Kellogg Foundation and the non-profit Community Partners organization, launched the Community Engagement Leadership Institute, bringing together teams comprised of civic and business leaders from Hawaii, Michigan, Minnesota, New Mexico, New York, Washington and Wisconsin for a three-day institute where they studied the civic engagement model. The program was designed to help participants develop strategies to improve their respective community and public policy outcomes by using the practices, techniques, and tools that have been most effectively applied by the Empowerment Congress since 1992.
2012 has been called “The Year of Empowerment.” Each month will focus around a specific policy area of interest to the second supervisorial district and will feature educational, engaging, and interactive programming. For more information and to get involved, please visit http://empowermentcongress.org/.
