L.A. will keep its parks open until midnight if you promise not to join a gang. Summer Night Lights is a new city program that runs Wednesday through Saturday, from July 4 through Labor Day. These late hours are meant to keep kids busy with extracurricular activities like kickball so they don’t get bored and start doing bad things. They even have hip hop classes and DJ lessons! Great success!

The question has finally been answered: Kids join gangs because the parks close too early.

Photo of Glassell Park “art” from optionthis’ photostream

There was only one thing on my mind as this past week began: “Will I be getting laid off?” My question was answered this past Tuesday, when the LAUSD Board sat down and released their budget.

It appears that I will not be getting laid off this year; 500 clerical jobs will be cut instead. My disdain for the LAUSD bureaucracy is well-known. While I feel bad that any person must lose their job (especially in this economic climate), I know that the silver lining is that LAUSD might start hacking off bits of its bureaucracy. I joke with my friends and family that LAUSD can finally lay off positions like, “Stamp Licker”, “Phone Dialer”, “Pencil Sharpener,” and (my personal favorite) “Everyone on this list.”

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Sixteen-year-old Angeleno Zac Sunderland sets sail today on a trip around the world… alone. His goal is to become the youngest person to ever sail around the world alone, a record currently held by Australian David Dicks who was 18 when he completed his 1996 voyage.

Reading the article I immediately thought of Robin Lee Graham, who sailed around the world alone when he was 16, but took five years to do it. Graham is an autodidact whose book Dove relates his voyage and follow-up Home is the Sailor tells of his choice to quit Stanford after a year and become a homesteader in Montana.

I can’t wait to read Sunderland’s book (assuming that he writes one). And personally, I’m hoping he’ll skip the standardized tests. He is getting an incomparable education–why should he prove that he knows how to take a test?

Bon Voyage, Zac!

A few months back I did a post regarding the Monrovia High School Urban Art Club and their mural program.  I managed to worm an invitation to watch them produce their latest one for the Class of 2008′s graduation.   What you see here is is the final product.  It took more than a few hours over a few days to produce the mural.  To see how they got to the final product you need to make the jump. Read the rest of this entry →

As the school day begins, teachers across Los Angeles will be going on strike for a single hour. Instead of signing in and walking into school, they will be gathering in front of their schools and informing parents of the impending California budget cuts– cuts which are threatening thousands of teacher positions across the district.

Officially, LAUSD has come out against the strike action. They have stated to newspapers that they want to see “teachers in the classroom” and that they are “concerned about student safety.” But, while teachers began planning the strike action months ago, LAUSD dragged its feet taking the teachers to court. LAUSD only filed for a temporary restraining order last Thursday. A judge denied the request, and LAUSD retaliation seems extraordinarily unlikely at this point. After all, they’re concerned about the fall out. United Teachers LA has vowed to fight any lay-offs: which means LAUSD and the Governor should be biting their nails and shaking in their boots.

My friends at charter schools tell me that they will not be participating: their higher-ups informed them a few weeks back that any budget cuts will be absorbed by the administrators and that teachers will not feel the pinch. Their unions remain mum on the situation. I don’t know if any other districts will be participating. (Do you know, gentle reader?)

This strike could only signal the beginning. UTLA estimates that nearly all its members will be participating today.

LAUSD votes on its proposed budget for the coming year next Tuesday.

Ken Kesey said it best: You’re either on the bus or off the bus.

This Saturday that bus takes you on Esotouric‘s “Visionary Hollywood Bus Tour” with Erik Davis.

Do I need to remind you LA history is just crawling with rich occult/esoteric/fringe religion heritage? Here’s a way to learn all about it, and get a picnic lunch to boot.

With author Erik Davis as guide, the tour offers, among other things, a picnic lunch on the lawn of the The Aetherius Society and a stop at the Philosophical Research Society (PRS), the organization and historic Mayan-inspired building created by occult luminary Manly P. Hall, subject of the upcoming Process biography Master of the Mysteries.

Saturday June 7
10:45am-3:45pm
departs from Skylight Books in Los Feliz

Buy Tickets Online: $64/person, lunch included
MORE INFO: visit http://www.esotouric.com or call 323-223-2767
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I, and others here at blogging.la, have often commented on the sad state of affairs at LAUSD. While some readers have blamed the teachers for not caring enough, not being engaging, or not working hard enough (?!), the story of Karen Salazar might persuade these individuals that, indeed, the problem is not with the underpaid teachers at LAUSD schools, but rather with the bureaucracy which is keeping them from developing successful students.

Karen Salazar is an English teacher at Jordan High in Watts. By the accounts of her students, seen here in this YouTube videoand this YouTube video, Ms. Salazar is an inspirational educator, going above and beyond the curriculum. This, apparently is the problem.

In an email I received from a colleague familiar with “Students 4 Salazar”, he states that:

Salazar has been visited and “observed” by the administration over 15 times in the past year. During one of the visits, an administrator criticized her for having students read The Autobiography of Malcolm X, a LAUSD approved text. When she objected to this criticism, she was told that her teachings where too “Afro-centric.” She was then told that the school would not renew her teaching contract for the upcoming school year.

Students are staging a protest Thursday, June 5 outside Jordan High at 3:15 pm.

Jordan High School

2265 E 103rd St

Los Angeles, CA 90002

(323) 568-4100

More details after the jump.

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The 6th Annual Feria del Libro: A Family Book Fair will be happening this weekend at City Hall in Downtown Los Angeles (Yes, I do have to write that because once I told me friend to meet me at City Hall meaning Downtown, but he went to West Hollywood since that’s where he lives. Sigh.). The event’s focus is not only to introduce and entice kids into reading, but to do it in a “culturally relevant” way.

I went to this book fair in 2004 and it was pretty neat to not just read and buy books about Latino, black or Asian kids, but to also there are children’s books in various languages. One of the nice tie-ins to this event is the Million Words Challenge, a county-wide literacy-advocacy program that encourages children to read a million words outside the classroom. In this all day event, you’ll have the opportunity to meet various authors, discuss literacy with them and local elected officials. There’ll also be hands-on educational interactions, music and of course, people dressed as characters from your favorite children’s books.

My daughter a junior at MHS.  She came home the other day with “Dad if we buy the teacher a National Geographic DVD I get extra credit and can raise my biology grade an entire level”.  What?

Yup, pretty easy deal.  There are a few strings attached.  Namely besides buying one of the DVD’s from the mans impact on earth series she needed to do a study guide and a test.  Still for $19.99 plus tax that’s a decent return on the investment.   Now we actually may see an A in a class she has struggled in even with the help of a tutor.

But please, don’t tell the teacher if she had asked we would have just gotten it for the class without strings.  We do that in my house.

Cruel timing! LAUSD makes the final bloodmatch in our “64 Worst” series during the same week as California’s Day of the Teacher.

As I have mentioned before, state budget cuts are threatening most school districts—not just LAUSD. The California Teachers Association has provided a list of protests and rallies being held statewide to bring attention to this matter.

Actions being held locally include those by United Teachers Los Angeles, who will be picketing before and after school to make parents and community aware of the budget cuts. Teachers from Burbank, Pasadena, Whittier, Downey, Long Beach, and all over Orange County will be gathering at schools, civic centers, and city halls in protest.

A short list of ideas for Teacher Day, after the jump!

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USC’s Interactive Media division sounds fascinating, and I’m sure that this weekend’s exhibit of graduate thesis projects will be as well. As the school describes it, “these eleven unique projects are an eclectic mix of new explorations in interactive media featuring a very wide range of play scenarios and themes. These projects promise to move you, entertain you and make you think.” There are a few that sound especially interesting to me, like Mike Brazil’s “RagnaRøkk:”

RagnaRøkk is an experiment in trying multiple ways of combining music and traditional gameplay. The player uses a Guitar Hero controller to navigate through the gamespace, fight enemies, cast spells, and solve puzzles. Throughout the game, the actions of the player have musical repercussions, serving to pull the player deeper into the experience.

And my friend Marc Tuters’s “S(t)imulation:”

S(t)imulation is the practice component of a thesis that explores philosophies of consciousness within the electronic arts. A site specific installation, the piece centers around a 12-foot mural painted in a surrealist/cubist style. Based on the realtime input of the viewers contemplation, a scale image of the mural is processed and projected back onto the painting’s surface, augmenting it with light to reveal its multiple dimensions.

The exhibition also features projects from Paul Bellezza, Jorge Mora Fernandez, Scott Gillies, Matt Korba, Anthony Ko, Victoria Moran, Garrett Rodrigue, Mike Stein and Jesse Vigil.

MFA Thesis Exhibition
May 10-15, 2008 | 12-8 PM (Opening Reception, Saturday, May 10, 2008 | 5-9 PM)
555 W 23rd Street, Los Angeles, CA 90007

Wild Rose Elementary isn’t much different than any other public school in the state. Faced with possible budget cuts and the need for fund raising as discussed here in Metblogs this last week they are taking the steps needed to ensure they can continue to have art education in their class room. They are working on ceramic tiles that will be sold at a silent auction later this month. The 20 students doing the tiles were drawn from a random drawing at last week’s assembly.

Ms Stacy Ayers arrived last year at Wild Rose Elementary taking over the job as principal. The school had just received its California Distinguished School designation and she looked to build upon that and make the school better. According to Ms Ayers “I knew finding money was going to be a problem, the budget is limited and you have to know where to look. Sometimes you have to find money outside the budget and need to know where to turn to find it.”

She found ways to raise the funds with the help of the PTA and was able to bring art classes to the students as part of their curriculum. A good start but even those efforts needed more fund than she and the PTA could find. They turned to the community to find a way to fund the coming school year.

For more on where Ms Ayers and the kids at Wild Rose found help you have to make the jump. Read the rest of this entry →

In the midst of the worst of times for the Los Angeles Public Library system, some West Side libraries still feel like they are thriving. In particular, the Santa Monica Public Library is a large, bright, inviting indoor/outdoor space surrounding a central courtyard featuring the Bookmark Cafe, where patrons can sit in the sun or the shade, go online, and enjoy some pretty good food. The Santa Monica Public Library also boasts dozens of computer terminals, private reserved study rooms, underground parking, and free WiFi.
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With the California Governor proposing up to $5 billion in cuts to the education budget, the LAUSD activists are busy working to increase awareness of the issue.

The governor has proposed a 10% cut across the board for all departments and agency in the state—including education. This may be one of the few things LAUSD and UTLA can agree on—cutting education funding is a very bad idea. Also remember: school districts all over California are being affected.

This Sunday, LAUSD teachers will be driving from downtown LA along Sunset Blvd to a middle school in Brentwood near Schwarzenegger’s home. They will be trailed by media and they are sure to be a rowdy bunch, honking and waiving signs.

Support your educators! According to this article in the Mercury News, most people are against cutting the education budget, yet they do not want an increase in taxes. Do the next best thing: call your legislators and representatives and give ‘em a piece of your mind.

The teachers’ union has also discussed the possibility of a one-hour strike during the first week of June.

Sunday May 4 3:00 p.m.

Miguel Contreras Learning Complex

Caravan to: Paul Revere Charter Middle School

(Near the Governor’s Brentwood home)

1450 Allenford Ave.

Brentwood CA.

Map of Caravan Route

Find your legislator by zip code

Picture from a Senior Care Center on El Segundo Blvd. in South LA.

Here’s what’s wrong with LAUSD:

This is $12.12 of my son’s own savings.

He’s taking it in this morning to donate it to his own elementary school .

Budget cuts handed down by Gov. Schwarzenegger and poorly managed by LAUSD have forced our school community to go begging for $180,000 from parents and family members to continue paying the salaries of three vital staffers in charge of computer training, curriculum development and gifted education.

Public education is failing because we’re letting our leaders get away with misspending our taxes on other crap.

I guess education just doesn’t matter.