OneJustice legal fellow Maureen Slack and Orland Unified’s Neli Peña at a planning meeting for the March immigration fair.
Scared.
That’s how attorneys and immigrant rights advocates were describing their clients in the weeks preceding the inauguration of a president whose campaign was laced with hostile anti-immigrant rhetoric.
As a candidate, Donald Trump talked about massive deportations and vowed to end Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA), a program that has brought relief to hundreds of thousands of young adults who were raised in this country without legal status.
The best antidote for fear, say rights advocates, is preparation. In California cities, immigrants can usually find a qualified organization that offers free or low-cost services – including legal consultations and know-your-rights forums. But in rural California, those kinds of resources are often rare or nonexistent.read more
OAKLAND, Calif. – November 1 marks the start of the month-long application season for the University of California. And the administration is determined to build on its momentum in expanding enrollment for California’s diverse communities.
That was the message from UC President Janet Napolitano, who spoke at a recent briefing for Bay Area ethnic media.
Napolitano began the briefing by reminding reporters that applicants to the 9-campus system would for the first time be allowed to use previous year tax filings to submit their Free Application for Federal Student Aid, or FAFSA form.
“For many families, FAFSA is the gateway to financial aid,” said Napolitano, noting the change is particularly important for first generation college students and their families who may be less familiar with the college application process.read more
Chef Thomas Rider prepares Strawberry Caprese Crostini with local strawberries.
He stood before a crowd of college students and alumni. On the table in front of him was a basket full of fresh fruits and vegetables displaying the colors of the rainbow. A grey Chico State Wildcats baseball cap sat on his head, and his black chef’s jacket was lined with red trim and embroidered with his name and title on the front.
It read: “Thomas Rider, Executive Chef.”
“I’m on the Food Network at Chico State,” he said, receiving chuckles from the audience.
On the rainy Thursday evening before spring break more than 60 students arrived at CSUC’s Bell Memorial Union to watch Rider—the executive chef for Associated Students—put on a show.
“There’s no magic here tonight,” Rider joked. “Just simple ingredients to make delicious food.”
The demonstration was the fourth installment of “Adulting 101,” an eight-part workshop hosted by Student Life and Leadership, the Career Center and the Alumni Engagement Office.
Those in attendance for Rider’s presentation first walked by a small, round table set up with a jug of water, granola bars, fruit snacks and cookies as they made their way to a seat. There they found recipe cards detailing the night’s three courses: Strawberry Caprese Crostini, Farmer’s Market Salad and Pasta with Oyster Mushrooms and Greens.
Rider’s inspiration for the menu came as he contemplated how to make his presentation “adult.”
“Here in Chico, we live in this wonderful agricultural mecca,” he said. “We’re surrounded by fields and livestock and all kinds of delicious things.”
A majority of the food Rider used came from either the Saturday morning Chico Farmers Market or the North Valley Food Hub to show students that supporting local farmers and business is a mutually beneficial decision.
“That was my approach—to try and elicit a community teaching method,” he said.
During the demonstration of the first course Rider roused a chorus of “oohs” and “ahhs” when he held up a bright red strawberry the size of his palm.
“Where can I get those fat strawberries?” an audience member inquired.
Rider told the man he’d picked them up from the local Farmer’s Market and received a dissatisfied response.
“But those are like 10 bucks.”
Audience members debated whether or not the product was worth the price. Some felt that it was too expensive, but many agreed that they would hand over $10 for the strawberries.
Rider then quickly informed the crowd that he was able to buy enough food for the event to feed about 60 people and spent less than $100 in doing so. The price didn’t include certain items—the pasta used in the main course, for example—but Rider stressed that buying fresh fruit and vegetables from local farmers isn’t as expensive as one might think.
As he cooked, Rider answered many more questions about the different types of vegetables he was using while explaining the steps of the recipe in detail. Audience members were able to try a sample of each course after watching it be prepared.
The first course was a play on a Caprese salad — it usually consists of fresh mozzarella, tomatoes and basil and the colors of the ingredients are meant to resemble the Italian flag. Rider took inspiration and created his Strawberry Caprese Crostini: strawberries, queso fresco and basil, drizzled with balsamic vinegar and served over slices of toasted baguette.
Rider’s Farmer’s Market Salad featured fresh, crisp greens and vegetables all locally grown. He shared techniques for how to prepare the dish, including tearing the greens with one’s hands instead of using a knife to prevent bruising and discoloration.
Rider was surprised at the number of people who showed up and was happy to share his knowledge.
“It was really positive; the crowd was engaging,” he said. “Food is my life. Anyone who is interested is a bonus to me.”
One audience member with interest was Danie Schwartz, a recent Chico State graduate who is on the Alumni Association Board of Directors.
“[The demonstration] was informative and easy enough that the average person could do it,” she said.
The Adulting 101 program came about with the help of Mary Wallmark, the program coordinator for Student Life and Leadership. A big audience that Wallmark wants to reach is young alums—a target group that was reached with Schwartz, who attended the food workshop to show support for her alma mater.
Wallmark and others joined together when they saw a need for programs that provide students with skills that they can’t receive in the classroom. “You’re not going over banking in a class,” she said. “But this isn’t just about money management; these are life skills.”
Adulting 101 got its name from being what Wallmark describes as a “funny concept.” She stressed that the ultimate goal is the accessibility factor for students. “You don’t have to be perfect when you come to this stuff,” Wallmark said. “This is your life. We’re all trying to do our best; we all have different levels of skill.”
Workshops that preceded the one on healthy cooking included discussions on basic finance, budgeting skills and identifying personality styles. Wallmark said there was high interest in the series even before the first workshop was held, allowing them to expand their ideas beyond original plans. The series was planned to start off with basic concepts and progress in difficulty with each workshop building off ideas addressed previously.
Program coordinators grouped budgeting skills with healthy cooking to demonstrate that it doesn’t take much money to eat fresh foods rather than sticking to food out of a box or can.
This will be just one aspect that is added next school year when the series is expanded from eight workshops to 16. Wallmark said the plan is to include a healthy cooking presentation both semesters and she has already recruited Rider to lead the presentations again. She hopes to help students better themselves in all aspects.
“The more you can manage your life the easier it is to be academically successful,” Wallmark said. “If we’re not going to do this—who will?”
Gabby Miller is a Chico State senior majoring in public relations who wrote this story for the Magazine Writing class. As a student journalist, she’s covered a wide range of topics, some of which you can find on her blog.
Diana Chavez: “Fair View changed my life around in a lot of ways. I felt people cared about me.”
by Leslie Layton
During her freshman year at Chico High, Diana Chavez ditched all but about 20 days. “We’d go to the mall, do anything to fill up the day,” she said of herself and a friend. “Then we’d go back to school to get picked up.”
Chavez enrolled at Fair View continuation high school in fall 2009 after failing her freshman year classes. There, she was able to make up lost credits and get on track with emotional and academic support from school staff. Chavez will graduate from Fair View May 23 with plans to attend Butte College next fall.
Chavez’s story of failure and recovery follows an arc commonly heard at Fair View, a four-year high school that has managed to thrive in an era of austerity in public education — even while some California school districts roll back continuation school services.
The school’s redemption-is-possible mantra is reflected in the success stories students and alumni often tell. Local educators say those stories show what continuation programs — which usually serve a high percentage of disadvantaged students — can accomplish under strong leadership and with funding and community support.
That view is reflected in a new study released this month by the California Alternative Education Research Project. The study says that the state’s continuation schools are, as a whole, failing to provide critical services, with the exception of some “beating the odds” schools that are providing “important opportunities and resources for a vulnerable population of youth.”
By state law, most school districts must make credit-recovery programs available to students who are in danger of not graduating, even if it’s in a neighboring district. California’s continuation schools emerged to provide that coursework, and are encouraged to offer small class sizes and make counseling, tutoring and vocational training available.
The schools are required to offer only 15 hours of instruction a week — a school day that is only about three periods — and receive state funding to do that. But the new study, “Raising the Bar: Building Capacity,” says that successful schools visited by researchers “employed a range of strategies to expand learning time.”
In rural Northern California, some small school districts say the cost of continuation schooling has become impossibly expensive, and they’re dismantling programs or reducing their size. In California as a whole, the number of schools has been declining, according to the most recent state data that’s available.
“It does cost a little bit to have a continuation high school,” said Maureen Fitzgerald, assistant superintendent for business services in Chico Unified School District, which runs Fair View. “More one-on-one counseling services are needed, there’s more truancy, class sizes are lower.”
Like other continuation high schools in the state, Fair View struggles to offer extended school days as the district balances the needs of its neediest students with revenue shortfalls.
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During the past five years, Fair View has lost six teaching positions. But the 44-year-old school has a back story: During the past two decades, school administrators fought program cuts and worked methodically to build community support and win state and federal grants. Fair View evolved into an alternative high school that students can enter as early as ninth grade.
“I grew up hearing bad things about Fair View,” said Cynthia Bryant, who is from a Chico-area farming family and the mother of a graduating Fair View student. “The pregnant moms, the druggies, the juvenile delinquents… it still kind of has a little of that reputation, but now it’s really for students who need a different kind of education.”
Bryant’s 16-year-old daughter Sydney had struggled in larger classes at traditional schools. At Fair View, Sydney took advantage of the nine-period day to earn extra credit. She’ll graduate early next week and attend the San Francisco Art Institute.
Most Fair View classes have 20 to 25 students who are encouraged to work at a pace that ensures success. School social worker Nancy Medina takes students to internship interviews, assists with college applications, and tutors. Beyond their core required courses, students can take electives, such as martial and culinary arts.
There are no Advanced Placement or foreign language courses; math options are Algebra Readiness or Algebra I. “I like to think our curriculum is Butte [community] College prep,” said Principal David McKay.
McKay himself was at one time in danger of losing his job — he was then vice prinicpal — several years ago when CUSD was eliminating administrative positions in an effort to balance its books. Fair View’s principal at the time, Bernie Vigallon, says he told his superiors that he couldn’t run the school by himself because students were arriving with so many needs.
“We had more knowledge of substance abuse, weed was becoming legalized, there was the economy… a whole series of things happened in the last 10 years that meant that a lot of parents couldn’t continue to parent,” Vigallon said.
McKay’s position was spared.
About 100 young people — all of whom were at one time at risk of not completing high school — will graduate Wednesday from Fair View or from an independent study program on the Fair View campus. About half will continue to college, most of whom will be first-generation college students, McKay said.
Increasingly, students come to Fair View as ninth or 10th-graders. Last fall, demand for those slots was so high that some parents were asked to wait for an opening, and in October, Fair View restructured its admissions procedure.
Many continuation schools serve only juniors and seniors who have fallen behind, and in some cases, districts are closing down separate sites altogether and moving the programs into classrooms at comprehensive high schools.
That worries Joe Stits, secretary of the California Continuation Education Association, who says that sending students back to a campus where they’ve had run-ins with security staff or administrators may not help keep them in school.
Josiah Breevaart sought out Fair View, but not because he had been in trouble. An African-American, Breevaart said he’s been more successful in the small classes and likes the school’s racial diversity. During the past school year, Breevaart commuted several hours a day to and from Fair View, taking two busses from his home in the foothills community of Magalia.
Fair View is one of the most diverse schools in its governing district. Only half of its students identify as white, and 81 percent qualify for free and reduced lunch programs. More than 50 percent of Fair View’s students live with someone other than their parents, McKay said.
Chavez said her mother kicked her out when she was 16 and she moved in with her grandmother. Her chaotic home life often made it difficult for her to get to school on time, so Fair View pushed back her school start time.
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Fair View administrators say the school’s extended day is crucial to its ability to work with students like Chavez, who need scheduling flexibility, tutoring or a place to do school work. But Chico Unified is now scrambling to fund the extended day in 2013.
The school has been running its afternoon program until 6 p.m., funded by a 21st Century Community Learning Centers grant that runs out in December. Fair View recently lost its bid for new funding; CUSD’s John Bohannon, director of alternative education, said the extended day was out-ranked by other high school programs in the state that applied for the competitive grant.
“These are the things that make this difficult — finding ways to continue to fund the programs that help make a school successful,” Bohannon said.
CUSD says it’s committed to its alternative education “pathway”; it now runs four alternative programs, including Fair View, on a campus that once housed an elementary school.
But administrators admit that the alternative ed track runs on innovative thinking. Fair View, for example, has developed a list of more than 40 local businesses and non-profits that have signed on as “community partners.” Those organizations and agencies provide scholarships, internships and financial aid to students who may need groceries or shoes.
The community partners figure prominently in plans to build a facility for construction classes on the Fair View campus that was approved May 17 by the CUSD Board of Trustees. Now, McKay said, they’ll be tapped to help maintain an extended school day. But he warns that the afternoon program is “not going to look the same.”
Four years ago, the California Alternative Education Research Project produced a study showing that continuation schools have come be viewed as a “cornerstone of the state’s drop-out prevention strategy.”
In the 2012 study, authors Jorge Ruiz de Velasco of UC Berkeley and Milbrey McLaughlin of Stanford say that successful continuation schools offered expanded learning time, but the “quality and range of learning time… was determined solely by the accident of local resource availability and the self-determined level of effort at individual sites.”
In her spare time, whenever that is, Professor Sara Cooper has taken on the modest task of building a footbridge between two nations with icy relations. Cuba is far closer to the U.S. mainland than any of the Hawaiian Islands, but to most Americans, far more a mystery.
The footbridge is a non-profit book press, Cubanabooks, which Cooper launched in May 2010. Cubanabooks today released its second book in this country, a bilingual edition of “Disconnect” — in Spanish “Desencuentro” — by Cuba’s popular Nancy Alonso. Without Cubanabooks, Alonso’s short-story compilation probably wouldn’t have made it across the Florida Straits.
For the past 52 years, the United States has had a tough embargo against Cuba in place that limits trade and restricts the ability of Americans to travel to an island that is no further from Key West, Fla., than is Sacramento from Chico.read more
