#LAUSD Black Students

[fightforthesoulofthecities]

Building a Movement In the Face of a Terrifying Time

[vc_row][vc_column][vc_column_text] Building a Movement In the Face of a Terrifying Time The recently concluded elections are terrifying. Donald Trump won more than 60 percent of the white vote with an explicit plan to attack immigrants and bring the police against “left wing” people. He is moving to dismantle some of the already fragile rights we have and already hostile government agencies that…

[lalaleftie]

End the Contract:

Kick Sheriffs Off LACCD Campuses 

The Los Angeles Community College District gives over $25 million a year to the LA Sheriff’s Department. That’s money that would be better spent using known crime-prevention strategies rather than a heavily armed, militarized police force of known gang members. 

Violent gangs have been the norm in the ranks of the LA Sheriff's Department since at least the 1970s, and their stronghold on the department has continued throughout its violent history. LASD gangs have been implicated in the beating of journalist Ruben Salazar and more recently the killing of Andres Guardado, a Salvadorian-American teenager who was shot while running away from LASD officers in the summer of 2020. According to expert testimony, they killed Guardado during an initiation into the Compton Executioners gang. 

There are at least six known gangs within the LA Sheriff’s Department, each one defined by the station they work in and the tattoos they brandish signifying their membership. Wannabe gang members violently attack community members they are “sworn to protect” while “chasing ink,” and officers who are not initiated are often harassed and bullied. 

It’s no secret that city and state police forces target black and brown community members, and college police are no different. Although LACC records were not immediately available, UCLA police logs show that campus police disproportionately stop and arrest black and brown students at a far higher rate than the school population. And this epidemic of over-policing extends into all levels of education. According to the ACLU, black K-12 students are suspended and expelled at a rate three times higher than white students, and students who are expelled are three times more likely to end up in juvenile detention centers, leading to what many call the school-to-prison pipeline.  

With all of this over-policing, US law enforcement still overwhelmingly fails to prevent or solve most crimes. Studies confirm US police solve only 2% of major crimes reported. Most cities spend between 25 and 40% of their municipal budgets on police; Los Angeles spends even more at 53% of the city budget . With all of their $25 million, they couldn’t solve the murder of a former LACC student who was stabbed on campus in a parking garage. We have to wonder, where is all that money being spent?

So if policing isn’t working, what can we do instead? 

The 2020 uprisings against police brutality have led many educational institutions to rethink public safety. The University of San Diego now offers a master's degree in Restorative Justice, an alternative to carceral forms of punishment. RJ draws in the community for healing and accountability, and focuses on rehabilitation over incarceration. And the Police Free LAUSD Coalition, including ACLU SoCal, the UCLA School of Education and Information Studies, Black Lives Matter LA, United Teachers Los Angeles and others, calls for a five point plan that looks to support the needs of students, families, and communities and counters the need for police presence in schools by “incorporating trusted mentors, role models,

and counselors in the lives of youth.”

In our current model for policing, violence begets more violence. Even non-violence begets violence. We shouldn’t trust a violent gang to protect LACC students and we should instead invest in proven community-focused alternatives that would actually keep students safe. 

[utlanow]

This past Monday, the 35,000+ members of the United Teachers Los Angeles demonstrated in rallies across Los Angeles demanding the District bosses stop delaying on bargaining our full Beyond Recovery platform that seeks to address the crises in our public schools by: 🧑‍🏫 Establishing a living wage for educators 🏫 Reducing Class Sizes 👩‍⚕️ Fully Staffing Schools with nurses, librarians, counselors, and therapists 🎓Supporting for our Black Student Achievement Program 🏡 Building Affordable Housing for Students 🌳 Passing a Green New Deal for Public Schools

When it comes to ensuring educators have enough to live, ensuring our students are receiving the best education, and our communities are being taken care of, there is no time to lose. Be in solidarity with us by demanding LAUSD Superintendent Carvalho bargain with us: https://actionnetwork.org/letters/tell-lausd-to-bargain-the-entire-beyond-recovery-platform

[jennymanrique]

“We recognize that many students have experienced the trauma of the pandemic”: Superintendent Tony Thurmond

The California Superintendent of Public Instruction said that in tandem with a mask mandate, massive rapid tests, and improved ventilation systems, schools in the state will implement more mental health services after the reopening.

More than 450,000 students from the Los Angeles Unified School District (LAUSD) returned to school this week, amid fears from parents and teachers about the inability to vaccinate children under 12 and the spread of the COVID Delta variant.

During a briefing hosted by Ethnic Media Services and California Black Media, California State Superintendent of Public Instruction Tony Thurmond asserted that the district has implemented all “safety and COVID mitigation measures” to resume in-person instruction.

“The state allows independent study for those who have a medical need or need an alternative to in-person instruction. But we have learned that our students have suffered from a lack of educators and peers, while mental health needs have increased and our learning gaps have been exacerbated,” said Thurmond, speaking from the campus of the Girls’ Academic Leadership Academy (Gala).

Students of color and low-income students have been the most affected by the pandemic not only in terms of loss of human life within their families and the trauma that this entails but also because of their difficulties in accessing virtual education. One million students in the district still lack access to high-speed internet. Thurmond said California is creating “infrastructure for more broadband” in rural and border communities.

“We recognize that many students have experienced the trauma of the pandemic,” Thurmond said. “There is more than $4 billion available for mental health services for youth up to age 25, more than $3 billion for community schools to have comprehensive mental health support, and support for families with universal meals.”

Other initiatives include hiring more staff to work with students in literacy programs, one-on-one tutoring, professional development, special education, and multilingual learning.

The superintendent acknowledged that “our families are skeptical and scared,” but he invited them to “translate that fear into action” by vaccinating their children and relatives older than 12. He said that last week the district contacted 500,000 California households ​​to spread a message in several languages: vaccines are available and free for everyone regardless of immigration status or health insurance. They have even awarded $100 gift cards to some of those vaccinated. “While (vaccines) are new to most of us, they are not new to scientists,” Thurmond reiterated.

Messengers such as California General Surgeon and pediatrician Nadine Burke Harris, labor rights leader Dolores Huerta, activist Karen Korematsu, daughter of Fred T. Korematsu, who was detained at a Japanese internment camp, and former professional basketball player Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, have been talking about the importance of people across all racial groups and backgrounds getting a vaccine. They’ve also been reminded that the ability to take time off from work to get vaccinated and recover from the shot is guaranteed by California state law.

Not only does the district require mandatory masking for all students and staff on school campuses, but with the support of Governor Gavin Newsom, Thurmond’s office has facilitated more than 100,000 rapid COVID tests for LAUSD and five million in total for all California schools. These tests give results in 15 minutes, allowing to safely and immediately quarantine those positive. Other traditional measures such as the use of hand sanitizers and a 3-feet distance between students in classrooms are also encouraged.

“We’ve given money to our schools to support outdoor classrooms, air purification, and air filtration systems, improving ventilation, and access to PPE (personal protective equipment).” Thurmond mentioned that his office is working with schools affected by fires and natural disasters to supporting families in the area.

Due to fears that some students have of going back to school because of the hate crimes that have occurred since the beginning of the pandemic, especially in the Asian American community, Thurmond launched an initiative called “education to end hate” that provides implicit bias training to educators.

“During the pandemic, we created a new guide for how school districts can create their own ethnic studies curriculum, so students of color can learn about the contributions of their ancestors to make this a great state,” said the superintendent.

“Acknowledging that our system hasn’t done enough for all students, this is our moment to build it better, to ensure equity at the center… We have the way to begin the work that we need to close those learning gaps that we were dealing with historically, and the ones that have been exacerbated by the pandemic,” he concluded.

Originally published here

Want to read this piece in Spanish? Click here

[arcticdementor]

Part III of my series about the changing face of L.A. Click for Parts I and II.

I ended Part II with a look at how L.A. County’s Hispanics are habitual nonvoters. Let’s pick up seamlessly from there, in Compton. Compton used to be so black (over 85%) that at my high school we had a litany of “Compton so black” jokes.

…

Today, the birthplace of “gangsta rap” be not black at all. At last count (prior to the 2020 census), it was 68% Hispanic and 27% black, and I’d bet my house that the new figures will show that the Hispanic number has risen beyond 70% and the black has dropped below 25%.

Compton so Mexican its city hall’s a Home Depot parking lot.

Now dig this: In a city that’s roughly one-quarter black and almost three-quarters Mexican, of the eight elected officials (mayor, city attorney, city clerk, treasurer, and four councilpeople), only one is Hispanic. All the rest are black. And it gets better. That one Hispanic councilman won his election by just one vote, and our Soros-backed DA is prosecuting the guy for fabricating the one vote that put him over the top. Turns out the bean only ran because a black guy who’d lost his primary made a deal with him to run in his stead in exchange for giving the failed black candidate a lucrative city commissioner position if he won, and together they faked the winning vote.

Can you wrap your brain around that? The city is 70% Hispanic, and the only Hispanic council member, who only ran because a black dude made him, won by just one vote, and that vote had to be faked.

Get my point now about Hispanics not voting?

I mean, imagine a city that’s 70% black, but only one out of eight city officials is black. And then the county DA tries to nullify the vote that got that one black elected. There’d be riots! Neighborhoods would be burned to ash. Don Lemon would be screaming about “equity,” and the Biden Justice Department would be investigating the DA.

But Mexicans don’t care. They’re fine with letting the black minority pretend to be da Emperor Jones. That’s how little participatory democracy matters to them. And Dems have no desire to “enfranchise” Compton Mexicans because blacks are their most reliable and manipulatable minions. Never trade a slave for an independent contractor. Plus, as I discussed last week, when Mexicans do vote, it’s all over the map. As Newsweek contributor Richard Hanania pointed out regarding polls that show California Hispanics divided 50/50 on the Newsom recall (blacks are 65/35 against it), “I feel like it’s fun living in a state with many Mexicans because you get a wildcard aspect to politics. Keeps things exciting.”

…

So what we know is that Mexi voting ambivalence is resilient. Would it be equally resilient to rightist coercion? Who knows; no rightists out here are testing the waters. The Hispanic rejection of affirmative action was due in large part to a general dislike of blacks. And in February when the black- and Jew-run L.A. school board defunded all campus police and redirected the $25 million LAUSD security budget to a program to fund the education of only black students, the discontent among L.A. Hispanics was palpable. Blacks make up barely 8% of LAUSD students (Hispanics comprise over 70%). Hispanic Twitter exploded with fury over the “black-only” payday coming at the expense of campus security, and the L.A. Times was forced to admit that Hispanic support for campus cops was massive, especially compared with support from non-Hispanic whites (a whopping 67% to 54%).

So did our local “Republicans” try to make hay out of that? Of course not, because to do so would risk offending blacks, and the GOP establishment has sworn a blood oath that it shall never allow itself any forward motion that might jeopardize its (zero) chance of “winning the black vote.”

There could literally be one black man left in L.A., and the GOP would sacrifice everything for his favor.

…

So, our Mexicans are untested, and our rapidly decreasing blacks, our gradually increasing Asians, and our moneyed and influential secular Jews are a lost cause. What about our non-Jewish non-Hispanic whites?

Ay yi yi, they’re the woist of all. The leftist ones represent the bottom of the barrel of self-hating “please genocide me before I enslave again,” “I hope my son goes tranny so that my foul DNA might dead-end with my progeny’s amputated penis” wastes of space. The mostly non-Jewish white upscale deep-blue city of Manhattan Beach, for example, is filled with self-flagellating WASPs who spend their time trying to make their safe city less safe by “giving land back” to blacks who were supposedly racisted out of town in the 1920s.

And now Manhattan Beach is regularly visited by black criminals, from serial rapists to boardwalk thieves to a home-invasion attempted murder just a week ago. I’m sure the guilt-ridden Robin DiAngelos of Manhattan Beach excuse these crimes as justified reparations owed to noble negroes.

…

Worse still, our “rightist” whites—those who choose to be activists—are just plain batshit crazy. Our MAGAs are violent, self-destructive, foolish, and dim-witted (I’ve covered this before, and I’ll be revisiting it next week in a column that’ll post on the eve of the gubernatorial recall).

…

In largely red Beverly Hills (and surrounding Westside areas), the Persian, Israeli, and Orthodox Jews, who are not suicidal, are holding the line against the violent crime and property crime that still disproportionately come from blacks (ironically, as the county’s black community shrinks, the thugs are forced to venture beyond their comfort zone in search of victims, rather like how bears become more bold as their natural habitat shrinks). But what of the areas that are largely Hispanic? Well, our Hispanics (as the Times pointed out) have a more positive view of police than our whites. That’s something often overlooked by those who claim to study criminality in racial or ethnic groups. It’s never just about criminality; it’s also about acceptance of policing. Whites who dismantle the criminal justice apparatus are as much to blame for rampant criminality as low-IQ thugs. Portland is an example of how poisonous such whites can be; violent crime in that city isn’t the result of a huge population of blacks but a huge population of self-hating anti-cop whites.

…

Our Hispanics occupy a middle ground: between black and white on the criminality scale (not as high as the former, not as low as the latter), but better than both groups on acceptance of policing. Half of L.A.’s cops and sheriff’s deputies are Hispanic, and our sheriff, Alex Villanueva—an unapologetic kick-ass crime fighter—survived the George Floyd purge last summer because his fellow Hispanics backed him against the blacks and whites who sought his ouster.

A county can weather criminality if it allows rigorous enforcement. L.A. had a lower murder rate than it does today back when there were more blacks but also more enforcement. Now that blacks, leftist whites, and secular Jews have decided that enforcement equals genocide, the last hope for the county lies with the Westside Persian/Israeli/Orthodox Jews and the Eastside beans.

There’s a logic to this, as those groups mingle more than you might think. Be it as nannies, gardeners, construction workers, warehouse personnel, or restaurant staff, the Westside is where many Mexicans go to work every day.

As one of those Westside Jews (though an outlier, as I’m “red” without being Persian, Israeli, or Orthodox), I would absolutely throw in with the beans as opposed to the leftist whites or the MAGA whites. Both groups, like blacks, have become suicidal. And suicidal people are dangerous.

Yes, Mexis have gangs, and you don’t want to walk down certain Eastside streets at night. Big shit; no one has reason to except those who live there. In the 1970s those areas were worse when they were black.

But Mexicans do the scut work around here, they don’t riot when one of their own is arrested (indeed they arrest their own), and they aren’t dangerously self-destructive.

I’ll take it.

Not that I have a choice; it’s the way it’s gonna be, demographically, whether I like it or not.

But it’s not the worst-case scenario, or even the second-to-worst. And these days that’s good enough.

[cuethetommo]

LOCAL POLITICS (WHAT I LEARNED WHEN I MOVED TO LA)

I’m putting this out here for other folks in the US who also maybe don’t know how local politics work. I’ll tell you, before I moved to Los Angeles, I didn’t realize how much impact we can actually have.

I grew up white, middle class, in Suburban Detroit. (That’s for context). And I really thought that federal politics were it. That the President and Congress were the important pieces. Then I got to college and realized that federal electoral politics are largely shit. That the US Imperial Project is real and that Empire protects itself. The caveat to that is that I also listen to Black organizers when they say, “if our vote didn’t matter, they wouldn’t work so hard to take it away.” So, this isn’t a missive on not voting. Vote, and work your ass off to make sure that you are impacting voter suppression in every way you can.

But this is a point about LOCAL politics. And I say this as someone who just learned this shit in 2017 from work with BLM. Not as some teacher on a mountain top.

The Los Angeles City Council decides on the LAPD budget.

The Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors makes choices about jails and the sheriff’s department. They have MASSIVE impact and there are 5 of them. Most people can’t name their supervisor. They do other things too, but I know more about them because of the moves around decarceration.

The School Board is 7 people who make choices for 600,000 LAUSD (Los Angeles Unified School District) students. They make choices about the contract with the LAPD to have officers on school grounds. They make budget choices and negotiate with UTLA (the LA teachers union). They impact kids.

I say all of that to say, these people can be impacted by letters, town hall meetings, emails, tweets, etc. And these structures exist in a similar fashion for all US cities.

If you want to get involved in abolition work, in support of the Movement for Black Lives, get involved in your LOCAL community. Look up your BLM chapter, if you’re white look up your SURJ chapter. Organize with other people. These needles can and ARE moving.

The other BIG benefit is that it doesn’t matter what the White House says. The LA City Council doesn’t actually take orders from the White House. 

[bonesfool]

Hey everybody, I’ve been considering opening charity commissions for a while but I finally got my shit together and researched a bunch of organizations I feel comfortable supporting. DM me if you have any questions.

You can find more examples of my art here and here: 

Note: I do not draw NSFW, furry or mecha.

Image description and description of all organizations below the cut.

[Image description: Text reads “Commissions for Charity: send me a receipt for one of these organizations!” Then lists different prices: ($3-7 for a sketch, $8-15 for line art, $16-29 for line art + colors, $30+ for full color portrait). Text on the side reads “Organizations” and has a list of acceptable organizations for donation (the list of these can be found below the image description). There are several disclaimers, the first one reading “Prices are negotiable, give what you can (however due to the effort going into full color portraits, the minimum of $30 is non-negotiable)” the second one reads “If you have an alternated organization you would like to donate to, let me know. I like to do my own research on an organization before supporting them.”]

The Audre Lorde Project: New York community organizing center run for and by LGBTQ+ people of color.

Black and Brown Workers Cooperative: Philadelphia area cooperative of black and brown workers fighting for tenants, un-organized and organized laborers, and HIV pos people.

Families Belong Together: A collection of organizations fighting for legal justice for immigrants, focusing on reuniting families that have been separated by ICE camps.

Lake Street Council: A council of small businesses in the Lake Street area, Minneapolis, which was heavily affected by protests. Working on community building and run almost entirely by business owners and community members of color.

Local Chapter of Food Not Bombs: A volunteer-run international anarchist group focusing on feeding communities affected by food deserts, homelessness, and poverty. Link will help you find closest local chapter.

Local Bailout Fund: Collects funds to pay the bail of protesters and other other people being held in holding cells until their court date. There are many resources to find a bailout fund close to you, but consider donating to cities like Minneapolis, Atlanta, Louisville, Philadelphia, New York, Portland, Chicago and LA which have had mass arrests in response to protests, if you don’t live in an urban center.

Marsha P Johnson Institute: Human rights advocacy group run for and by trans and GNC people of color.

The Okra Project: New York and Philadelphia area group focusing on feeding trans and GNC black and indigenous people of color and preserving the food cultures of the African Diaspora.

RAICES: Mainly Texas focused legal group advocating for the rights of immigrants and refugees.

Reclaim Our Schools Los Angeles: Coalition of parents, teachers, and students in the LA area working to improve LAUSD schools to be better environments for students of color and their families.

Reclaim Philadelphia: Philadelphia political group fighting against gentrification, police brutality, corporate politics, housing injustice, and privatized healthcare. 

Red Umbrella Fund: International sex worker advocacy organization, run almost completely by former or current sex workers, many of whom identify as queer. Work to provide legal aid to sex workers and help unionize different groups of sex workers across the globe.

Unicorn Riot: An anarchist news publication that has been providing comprehensive coverage of protests and warning protesters of advancing law enforcement during protests.

Victim Memorial Fund: There are many memorial funds for various families of victims of police brutality. Link goes to a carrd of various memorial funds.

[blackkudos]

Charles Drew

Charles Richard Drew (June 3, 1904 – April 1, 1950) was an American surgeon and medical researcher. He researched in the field of blood transfusions, developing improved techniques for blood storage, and applied his expert knowledge to developing large-scale blood banks early in World War II. This allowed medics to save thousands of lives of the Allied forces. As the most prominent African American in the field, Drew protested against the practice of racial segregation in the donation of blood, as it lacked scientific foundation, and resigned his position with the American Red Cross, which maintained the policy until 1950.

Early life and education

Drew was born in 1904 into an African-American middle-class family in Washington, D.C. His father, Richard, was a carpet layer and his mother, Nora Burrell, trained as a teacher. Drew and three of his four younger siblings grew up in Washington's largely middle-class and interracial Foggy Bottom neighborhood. From 1920 until his marriage in 1939, Drew's permanent address was in Arlington County, Virginia, although he graduated from Washington's Dunbar High School in 1922 and usually resided elsewhere during that period of time.

Drew won an athletics scholarship to Amherst College in Massachusetts, from which he graduated in 1926. An outstanding athlete at Amherst, Drew also joined Omega Psi Phi fraternity as an off-campus member; Amherst fraternities did not admit blacks at that time. After college, Drew spent two years (1926–1928) as a professor of chemistry and biology, the first athletic director, and football coach at the historically black private Morgan College in Baltimore, Maryland, to earn the money to pay for medical school.

Drew attended medical school at McGill University in Montreal, Quebec, Canada, where he achieved membership in Alpha Omega Alpha, a scholastic honor society for medical students, ranked second in his graduating class of 127 students, and received the standard Doctor of Medicine and Master of Surgery degree awarded by the McGill University Faculty of Medicine in 1933.

Drew's first appointment as a faculty instructor was for pathology at Howard University from 1935 to 1936. He then joined Freedman's Hospital, a federally operated facility associated with Howard University, as an instructor in surgery and an assistant surgeon. In 1938, Drew began graduate work at Columbia University in New York City on the award of a two-year Rockefeller fellowship in surgery. He then began postgraduate work, earning his Doctor of Science in Surgery at Columbia University. He spent time doing research at Columbia's Presbyterian Hospital and gave a doctoral thesis, "Banked Blood," based on an exhaustive study of blood preservation techniques. He earned a Doctor of Science in Medicine degree in 1940, becoming the first African American to do so.

Blood for Britain

In late 1940, before the U.S. entered World War II and just after earning his doctorate, Drew was recruited by John Scudder to help set up and administer an early prototype program for blood storage and preservation. He was to collect, test, and transport large quantities of blood plasma for distribution in the United Kingdom. Drew went to New York City as the medical director of the United States' Blood for Britain project. The Blood for Britain project was a project to aid British soldiers and civilians by giving U.S. blood to the United Kingdom.

Drew started what would be later known as bloodmobiles, which were trucks containing refrigerators of stored blood; this allowed for greater mobility in terms of transportation as well as prospective donations.

Drew created a central location for the blood collection process where donors could go to give blood. He made sure all blood plasma was tested before it was shipped out. He ensured that only skilled personnel handled blood plasma to avoid the possibility of contamination. The Blood for Britain program operated successfully for five months, with total collections of almost 15,000 people donating blood, and with over 5,500 vials of blood plasma. As a result, the Blood Transfusion Betterment Association applauded Drew for his work.

American Red Cross Blood Bank

Out of Drew's work, he was appointed director of the first American Red Cross Blood Bank in February 1941. The blood bank being in charge of blood for use by the U.S. Army and Navy, he disagreed with the exclusion of the blood of African-Americans from plasma-supply networks. In 1942, Drew resigned from his posts after the armed forces ruled that the blood of African-Americans would be accepted but would have to be stored separately from that of whites.

Academic career

In 1941, Drew's distinction in his profession was recognized when he became the first African-American surgeon selected to serve as an examiner on the American Board of Surgery.

Drew had a lengthy research and teaching career, returning to Freedman's Hospital and Howard University as a surgeon and professor of medicine in 1942. He was awarded the Spingarn Medal by the NAACP in 1944 for his work on the British and American projects. He was given an honorary doctor of science degree, first by Virginia State College in 1945 then by Amherst in 1947.

Personal life

In 1939, Drew married Minnie Lenore Robbins, a professor of home economics at Spelman College in Atlanta, Georgia, whom he had met earlier during that year. They had three daughters and a son. His daughter Charlene Drew Jarvis served on Council of the District of Columbia from 1979 to 2000, was the president of Southeastern University from 1996 until 2009 and was a president of the District of Columbia Chamber of Commerce.

Death

Beginning in 1939, Drew traveled to Tuskegee, Alabama to attend the annual free clinic at the John A. Andrew Memorial Hospital. For the 1950 Tuskegee clinic, Drew drove along with three other black physicians. Drew was driving around 8 a.m. on April 1. Still fatigued from spending the night before in the operating theater, he lost control of the vehicle. After careening into a field, the car somersaulted three times. The three other physicians suffered minor injuries. Drew was trapped with serious wounds; his foot had become wedged beneath the brake pedal. When reached by emergency technicians, he was in shock and barely alive due to severe leg injuries.

Drew was taken to Alamance General Hospital in Burlington, North Carolina. He was pronounced dead a half hour after he first received medical attention. Drew's funeral was held on April 5, 1950, at the Nineteenth Street Baptist Church in Washington, D.C.

Despite a popular myth to the contrary, once repeated on an episode ("Dear Dad... Three") of the hit TV series M*A*S*H, Drew's death was not the result of his having been refused a blood transfusion because of his skin color. This myth spread very quickly since during his time it was very common for blacks to be refused treatment because there were not enough "Negro beds" available or the nearest hospital only serviced whites. In truth, according to one of the passengers in Drew's car, John Ford, Drew's injuries were so severe that virtually nothing could have been done to save him. Ford added that a blood transfusion might have actually killed Drew sooner.

Legacy

In 1976, the National Park Service designated the Charles Richard Drew House in Arlington County, Virginia, as a National Historic Landmark in response to a nomination by the Afro-American Bicentennial Corporation.

In 1981, the United States Postal Service issued a 35¢ postage stamp in its Great Americans series to honor Drew.

Charles Richard Drew Memorial Bridge, spanning the Edgewood and Brookland neighborhoods in Washington, D.C.

USNS Charles Drew, a dry cargo ship of the United States Navy

Parc Charles-Drew, in Le Sud-Ouest, Montreal, Quebec, Canada

In 2002, scholar Molefi Kete Asante listed Drew as one of the 100 Greatest African Americans.

Numerous schools and health-related facilities, as well as other institutions, have been named in honor of Dr. Drew.

Medical and higher education

In 1966, the Charles R. Drew Postgraduate Medical School was incorporated in California and was named in his honor. This later became the Charles R. Drew University of Medicine and Science.

Charles Drew Health Center, Omaha, Nebraska

Charles Drew Science Enrichment Laboratory, Michigan State University, East Lansing, Michigan

Charles Drew Health Foundation, East Palo Alto, California, 1960s-2000, was the community's only clinic for decades.

Charles Drew Community Health Center, located in Burlington, NC near the site of the old Alamance County hospital.

Charles Drew Pre-Health Society, University of Rochester

Charles R Drew Wellness Center in Columbia, South Carolina

Charles R. Drew Hall, an all-male freshman dorm at Howard University, Washington D.C.

Charles Drew Memorial Cultural House, residence at Amherst College, his alma mater

Charles Drew Premedical Society at Columbia University, New York

K-12 schools

Charles R. Drew Middle School & Magnet school for the gifted, opened 1966 Los Angeles Unified School District https://drew-lausd-ca.schoolloop.com/

Charles R. Drew Middle School Lincoln Alabama operated by Talladega County Schools

Charles R. Drew Junior High School, Detroit, Michigan

Dr. Charles R. Drew Science Magnet School, Buffalo, NY

Charles R. Drew Elementary School, Miami Beach and Pompano Beach, Florida

Bluford Drew Jemison S.T.E.M Academy, Baltimore (closed in 2013)

Bluford Drew Jemison STEM Academy West, a Middle/High School in Baltimore, Maryland

Dr. Charles R. Drew Elementary School, Colesville, Maryland

Charles Drew Elementary School, Washington, DC

Charles R. Drew Elementary School, Arlington, Virginia

Dr. Charles Drew Elementary School, New Orleans, LA

Charles R. Drew Charter School opened in August 2000 as the first charter school in Atlanta, Georgia. This is the setting for the 2015 Movie Project Almanac.

Dr. Charles Drew Academy, Ecorse, MI

Charles R. Drew Intermediate School, Crosby, Texas

Dr. Charles Drew Elementary School, San Francisco, Ca.

Charles Richard Drew Intermediate School / Charles Richard Drew Educational Campus, Bronx, New York

[fightforthesoulofthecities]

A National call to Defend the Black Student Achievement Plan and the Civil and Human Rights of 50,000 Black Students in the Los Angeles Unified School District

A National call to Defend the Black Student Achievement Plan and the Civil and Human Rights of 50,000 Black Students in the Los Angeles Unified School District #BSAP #DefendBSAP #EndWarOnYouth #PoliceFreeSchools

[vc_row][vc_column][vc_column_text] A National call to Defend the Black Student Achievement Plan and the Civil and Human Rights of 50,000 Black Students in the Los Angeles Unified School District Media Contact: Channing Martinez, co-director LSCS and member of BSAP steering committee channing (AT) thestrategycenter (DOT) org Akunna Uka, LSCS director of volunteer programs and member of BSAP…

[soulvomit]

OK, so... as an ex-Angeleno Gen Xr who grew up in the 818 in the 70s and 80s, I can’t comment within a lot of the Gifted/Talented Discourse at all. Because I feel sometimes like the LAUSD of the 80s is... just... it’s just... a thing, you know? The LAUSD was a product of Los Angeles-specific demographics and politics and ideologies and things that happened there don’t necessarily map to the experience of giftedness elsewhere, but don’t necessarily *not* map to the experience of giftedness elsewhere. I can’t even really analyze it or pick it apart. It’s just not as simple, in this one case, as “gifted equals white.” Nah that was private school, m8. I will say that “gifted kids” I knew did grow up to be their own social space and that there is considerable overlap in this space with social worlds I was in, and that I was one of these “GT” kids for a while. And I will say that yes, lots of kids I’ve known who were identified as “gifted,” ended up fucked up by it. Not by being in challenging academic space, or extra expectations - I think that there is a difference between having those expectations because you’ve grown up in a whole social space that uniformly and consistently has those standards (though that can be fucked up, too, especially if you just can’t keep up for whatever reason) and having those expectations because you’ve grown up in a social space of being entitled due to  inherent individual specialness and that the world will fall together if only one day people see how very special you are! (Don’t you dare @ me. If you read my blog then you KNOW I am talking about my own life here.) There’s growing up a model minority, and there’s growing up a privileged “indigo child/kid genius” (because this was a growing meme in privileged culture spaces) and as a Jewish child of a hippie family, those two things are just not the same thing at all, and each has their own unique baggage. There isn’t a single gifted experience and what “gifted” means at an institutional level may depend upon how a specific locality deploys their program and what kind of creative accounting they are attempting to do. I suspect what a lot of people are talking about here, and pushing back on, is the “indigo child/wunderkind” narrative of gifted, and the label “gifted” itself and  its association with “specialness” culture. And yes. Those kids end up really fucked up (present company included). They’re often subject to all kinds of expectations without any actual social preparation - beyond entitlement, and beyond the idea that they’re expected to perform miracles.  And there was a lot of class consciousness element in gifted, too. Because in Los Angeles of the 80s, where did *wealthy* kids go to school? It’s sure as fucking not the LAUSD! Yep! They went to private school! Do you have ANY idea how many private schools there were in LA in the 80s? Seriously? Also, there was a *huge* amount of creative accounting involved with gifted programs and if anything it was the LAUSD’s attempt to make poorer schools look better-performing than they were, by bringing in higher performing students from other areas.   True fact, you could almost never get into the program in your own “home” school, ever, at least not when I was in the LAUSD. The gifted students were brought in from Northridge, Sherman Oaks, etc, and then a select group of higher-performing poorer kids were bussed to *those* schools. Part of the problematica is that the racial and class and cultural dynamics of the San Fernando Valley of the 1980s are pretty much specific to that time and place, and when people say “gifted kids are just white kids” all I can think is nah because the working class white parents were doing white flight and the upper middle class and wealthy white parents didn’t even send their kids to public school. Gifted programs I was in tended to be hugely non-black, non-Latino POC (but mostly children of first generation American professionals) and or Jewish, with maybe just a few non-Jewish white kids.   

[vicqui]

Black and Proud! The Inspo for this collage I made using a student’s drawing of herself and a piece of red and white toile I found at “Council Thrift Shop”. It still brings back excellent memories! #lausd #childrenillustration #councilthriftstores (at Los Angeles, California) https://www.instagram.com/p/CosZh7ZPTlS/?igshid=NGJjMDIxMWI=

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CAL ED MATTERS

California’s COVID-19 School Closures Undermined Learning

Whether California’s schools should remain open or be closed was a hot issue when the COVID-19 pandemic was raging in 2020 and 2021.

Although medical authorities quickly concluded that children had a much smaller risk of being infected or experiencing severe effects if infected, California schools were mostly closed, in large measure because teachers and their powerful unions insisted on it.

With schools closed, local administrators scrambled to provide on-line classes, what became known as “zoom school,” but they were poor substitutes for the real thing — especially for English-learner students and those from poor families.

Those children — roughly 60% of the state’s nearly 6 million public school students — were already trailing their more privileged contemporaries academically when the pandemic hit. The closures made it worse, for obvious reasons.

They tended to lack internet access and proper equipment for on-line classes. Their parents were often compelled to work outside the home to make ends meet, so kids were often left to fend for themselves. Absenteeism from on-line classes was widespread.

Affluent parents, particularly those who could easily work from home during the pandemic, made certain that their kids attended on-line classes, helped them with their school work, formed informal collaboration groups and/or hired tutors. Thus, the ill effects of closures were mitigated. And, of course, private schools, such as the one Gov. Gavin Newsom’s kids attend, either remained open or minimized closures.

For months, politicians from Newsom downward quarreled over how the schools should function and angry parents formed the core of a movement to recall him from office. Newsom survived the recall, but the educations of millions of kids did not, as new data confirm.

While the state Department of Education has not released 2022 academic test data that would allow comparisons with pre-pandemic results, individual school districts are doing so and the numbers from the state’s largest school district, Los Angeles Unified, are stunning.

About 72% of the district’s students are not meeting state standards in math and 58% are behind in English, essentially wiping out five years of progress that it had recorded prior to the pandemic.

“The pandemic deeply impacted the performance of our students,” LAUSD Supt. Alberto Carvalho said. “Particularly kids who were at risk, in a fragile condition, prior to the pandemic, as we expected, were the ones who have lost the most ground.”

While the district released gross data, it did not break down the test results by ethnic or economic subgroups. The Los Angeles Times, however, gleaned the detail from a school board document marked “not for public release.”

Why the secrecy? Apparently it was to mask the particularly disturbing data about Black and Latino kids.

“About 81% of 11th-graders did not meet grade-level standards in math. About 83% of Black students, 78% of Latino students and 77% of economically disadvantaged students did not meet the math standards,” the Times reported.

We won’t know how the state as a whole fared until — and unless — the Department of Education finally releases 2022 complete “Smarter Balance” test results. But there’s no reason to believe that what happened — or, more accurately, what didn’t happen — in Los Angeles isn’t also true of other systems, particularly those with large numbers of at-risk students.

The educational deprivation that California inflicted on its kids is not only shameful, but will reverberate for decades. Children who fail to master the basics of education in lower grades will be ill-prepared for high school and post-high school training and education. If they are not prepared to take their place in the work force, the state’s economy will suffer. *Reposted article from the Times of SD by Dan Walters of CalMatters, September 18, 2022

[kicksaddictny]

Adidas x Iovine And Young Academy x Pensole Launch Partnership To Inspire The Creative Mind Of Students From Marginalized Communities

Today’s students are imagining a world and career path far beyond what traditional systems are set up to provide. Design and creative hobbies have become more than just that – they are an opportunity for youth to explore a future that can become a career. Adidas is proud to support the Iovine and Young Academy and PENSOLE founder Dr. D’Wayne Edwards in an expanded partnership to create opportunities for students to embrace creativity and see expanded possibilities for their future.

“This partnership marks an ongoing chapter to offer the next generation of creative thinkers and dreamers the skills to shape the future of design. Despite someone’s background or economic standing, kids bold enough to dream big should be provided with equitable access to education,” said Edwards, PENSOLE Founder. PENSOLE was established in 2010 by Edwards to give talented young design students—regardless of socioeconomic background—an opportunity to learn from the industry’s best.

This past fall, in partnership with the USC Iovine and Young Academy, students participated in a series of “Wood U” workshops, working with adidas and Inglewood native, D Smoke to design an apparel and footwear line driven by longevity, ambition, power and love, that will launch in select LA stores on 2/7.

The Iovine and Young Academy was founded by Jimmy Iovine and Andre “Dr. Dre” Young in 2013 to give young, creative disruptors the tools and inspiration to develop as leaders, innovators and entrepreneurs.

In partnership with Jimmy Iovine and Dr. Dre, LAUSD will launch a new high school (currently known as Regional High School #1) whose curriculum will build on the Academy’s unique approach that combines  design, business, and technology with hands-on, real-world learning. Together with adidas and PENSOLE, the partnership will give young students of color who are passionate about design unparalleled access to future careers and opportunities.  

“Adidas has long been involved in the Los Angeles area and its community. As part of our commitment to continue to support communities and our youth, we’re proud to be part of these new partnerships to advance opportunities for students from communities who are historically underserved,” said Ayesha Martin, adidas Senior Director, Communities & Social Impact. “We’re bringing together the absolute best in sport, business and design – first working with students in the Los Angeles area and then with others around the country through adidas Community.”

More details on the partnership, including a launch video narrated by Inglewood native and two-time GRAMMY-nominated artist, philanthropist and entrepreneur D Smoke, are available at www.adidas.com/us/wood_u

Join the adidas Community platform to explore the Wood U curriculum and other workshops at community.adidas.com. The goal of the platform is to increase diversity within our industry and society by providing access to mentors, curricula and events for under-represented youth - invaluable tools and resources to enable them to become change-makers. adidas Community is a platform and a mindset, a new classroom and window into the world, a space for collaboration and connection, a chance to create the future, starting now. When we have the ability to see possibilities for our youth, we shape a better future together.

SUPPORTING INGLEWOOD AREA ENTREPENEURS

As part of a deeper commitment to the L.A. community, adidas is working with Pharrell’s Black Ambition organization, a non-profit working toward closing the opportunity and wealth gap through entrepreneurship by investing in Black and Latinx founders. South Los Angeles-area mentors will host a series of workshops at the end of January ranging from crowdfunding tactics to sustainable practices for local communities. The week will culminate in the opportunity for Black and Latinx entrepreneurs to pitch their business ideas to Pharrell’s Inglewood Prize competition for funding consideration.

[sandyhookpromise]

LAUSD has used data findings on social awareness to establish an ongoing partnership with Sandy Hook Promise, a nonprofit established after the Sandy Hook school shooting. Through that organization's "Start with Hello" program, one LAUSD school received training on actions that children, teenagers, and young adults can take to strengthen social connections. Students have embraced the program: every Friday, members of the Black Students Union greet every student by name as they walk onto campus as a means to tighten the bonds between students and create a more inclusive atmosphere.

[arcticdementor]

The head of the Los Angeles teachers union said “there is no such thing as learning loss,” despite evidence of massive educational declines due to a year of remote learning.

Cecily Myart-Cruz, president of United Teachers Los Angeles, told LA Magazine that “It’s OK that our babies may not have learned all their times tables. They learned resilience. They learned survival. They learned critical-thinking skills. They know the difference between a riot and a protest. They know the words insurrection and coup.”

When schools shut down in early 2020 due to coronavirus, the union demanded that teachers not have to teach remotely for more than four hours a day, despite receiving pay for a full day. Teachers often simply posted assignments that students were expected to download and complete on their own.

Nearly two-thirds of students largely ignored this version of school, and almost none of the district’s 229,000 elementary school students logged on at all, LA Magazine reported.

…

In calling for schools to be closed completely last school year, the union focused more on far-left politics, writing that “The COVID-19 pandemic in the United States underscores the deep equity and justice challenges arising from our profoundly racist, intensely unequal society.”

They demanded to “defund police,” make housing a human right, and institute a moratorium on charter schools, which are popular with racial minorities but which the union said could “drain resources” from the union members’ employer.

The superintendent, Austin Beutner, quit on June 30, writing in his resignation letter that “UTLA leadership were asked to consider all the different ways to [return to classrooms] with full pay… They would not agree to any of these.”

Parents filed lawsuits (one alleged that “UTLA and its president Cecily Myart-Cruz have held the current well-being and future prospects of LAUSD students hostage”) and demanded the recall of school board members.

But Myart-Cruz gloated: “You can recall the Governor. You can recall the school board. But how are you going to recall me?”

…

As remote learning widened the racial gap when it came to academic performance, Myart-Cruz insisted that calls to provide school to children were racist.

She claimed she was being “stalked by wealthy, white, Middle Eastern parents.” A UTLA staff member contacted one parent, Maryam Qudrat, who wanted her child to at least receive more hours of Zoom classes, asking “pointed questions about her racial background,” LA Magazine reported.

For the school year beginning this month — the third school year affected by coronavirus — the union insisted on a virtual option for those who want it, which experts believe will be used largely by blacks and Latinos and which clearly leads to worse academic results than in-person learning.

Even within the union, Myart-Cruz’s claim to a mandate is thin: only 16 percent of the union’s 33,000 members voted in its 2020 officers election.

Yet the teachers union is astonishingly powerful. Its electoral efforts in ordinarily low-turnout races make politicians afraid to cross it. Voters have elected union officials as school board members, including Myart-Cruz’s romantic partner, who is an Oakland school board member.

In the first quarter of this year, the California Teachers Association, the UTLA’s statewide affiliate, spent $2.85 million on lobbying, more than twice as much as the second- and third-biggest special interests, which were both oil companies.

The magazine quoted a former school official who refused to give his name because he was “scared” of the union. “UTLA is not a normal union,” he said.