By Cheryl Brown –

The devastating 7.0 earthquake that hit Haiti sent shockwaves around the world and poured in millions of dollars that has yet to get out of the bottleneck of bureaucracy. It has been a week since the devastation killed thousands and the recovery is still bringing out people alive but in need of help that too often is not there. Many hospitals, doctor, nurses and other first responders were buried in the rubble.

Haitian born Gary Thomas, a resident of the Inland area for 33 years and a US citizen, tells the story of losing his family members to the earthquake. Losing them is difficult he relays but them not having the last rites is something he said will be with the family for years to come.

It is a double hit.

He said that his uncle, the man who raised him when his father left, didn’t have a chance. The two story wood house fell and everybody got out except the mother-in-law and a cousin.

Unlike the reports it only took two hours for their rescue. One of the cousins, Jean Rene Delsoin lived on a hill and was not as affected came to rescue the family and took them to his house. It took him two days to travel 25 miles because of the condition of the roads. Thomas had just called another cousin, whose mother felt the shocks and died of a heart attack. His ½ sister lost her older brother, Dr. Tico, when the clinic he worked in collapsed, everyone including the doctors were killed. One cousin, Antonio Boicasis lives in the states with his daughter but went home to visit was hit by a car, had hip surgery and could not get out of the bed at home when the earthquake hit he too was lost.

Cousin Jean Rene rescued 20 people at his home but the food he has left has to be rationed. He said that the market it also rationing their food and that prices are very high.

“The Red Cross is good. They have been in Haiti for a long time they know who to get the help to,” said Thomas. A devout Catholic, he said, “our culture dictates certain things,” and when that is broken they have heartache and don’t know what to do.

He asked for donations to the Red Cross or Pomona First Baptist Church and prayers for people.

“It has been over a week and now more that ever the people of Haiti need our help. We must not turn a blind eye to the untold suffering just off our shores,” said Congress Member Barbara Lee, in a resolution to be considered on the House Floor.

On the eve of President Obama’s first State of the Union address, many still see hope for America

By Chris Levister –

A year after his historic election as the nation’s first African-American president, Barack Obama is at a crossroad. In his State of the Union address Wednesday, President Obama aims to deliver a game changing message, one capable of convincing Americans that his policies will create jobs, curb spending, restore prosperity and encourage national unity.

Obama supporters Harry and Elysa Davis worry that with the brutal defeat in Massachusetts, voter discontent over his healthcare overhaul running high and the recession’s effects cutting deep, the president’s trademark message of hope may fall on deaf ears.

Consider the poll last week by the Washington Post and ABC News. People were asked a standard question about how much confidence they had in President Obama to “make the right decisions” for the nation’s future.

53% reported “just some” and “none at all”.

So much for polls! Here on the campus of Cal State University San Bernardino a knot of African-American students are discussing the findings of two new polls released this week that show Mr. Obama is still viewed as the most trusted political figure to solve the nation’s problems.

“We are at a strange moment. People are angry and frustrated. People who don’t have jobs need someone to blame, said Gregg Khalsa. “It took George W. Bush eight years and two elections to trash this country, now people expect President Obama to fix the mess in less than a year. It’s not fair.”

The wide–ranging Public Strategies Inc. survey indicates that while trust in government continues to slip, 54 percent of voters still have faith in the president, if not the party he represent.

Yet another study released this week found that despite the bad economy, Black’s assessments about the state of Black progress in America have improved more dramatically during the past two years than at any time in the past quarter century, according to a comprehensive Pew Research Center survey on race.

Students gathered at an Obama Phone Bank believe Mr. Obama’s election as the nation’s first Black president appears to be the spur for this sharp rise in optimism among African-Americans.

“From race relations to local community engagement people are taking their concerns and ideas to town hall meetings, to the streets and back to the dinner table,” said Khalsa who is biracial.

The Pew telephone survey of 2,884, including 812 African-Americans was conducted from October 28 to November 30, 2009.

In the teeth of what may be the deepest recession since the Great Depression, nearly twice as many Blacks now (39%) as in 2007 (20%) say that the “situation of Black people in this country” is better than it was five years earlier.

An overwhelming share of Blacks – 95% -- have a favorable opinion of President Obama. This number has remained in the stratosphere among Blacks throughout his first year in office.

Among whites, Obama has seen his popularity ratings decline significantly from a high of 76% just before he was inaugurated to 56% in the current survey.

When it comes to employment rates, Blacks have been hit harder than whites by the recession and so-far jobless recovery. But when it comes to perceptions about the economy, the opposite is true: whites have turned sharply negative since the recession began, while Black perceptions have held steady.

“Beyond the naysayers, religious fundamentalists, blogs, cable TV shows (birthers, truthers and tea partiers) there is hope for America, said Khalsa.

“There were no polls during the Great Depression – still people saw the need to come together as a country. So like that era of uncertainty - this too will pass.”

By Ashley Jones –

On January 21, 2010 California Black Media (CBM) hosted its 9th annual Legislative Day in the State Capitol to give California legislators the opportunity to connect with the CBM owners and address a number of critical issues facing the ethnic print industry as well as key issues that affect African American communities of California.

Click here for more photos from the event

Click here for more articles at the CBM Website

This year, the coalition met with various state departments including the California Department of Water, CA Dept. of Education, Governor Schwarzenegger’s staff on legislation, and Assemblymember John Perez, Speaker-Elect of the California Assembly. Following their Legislative visits, CBM hosted a public reception in honor of California’s Black Elected Officials in Northern California.

During the reception, CBM unveiled their first online directory of Black elected officials in the State of California. The directory offers a comprehensive listing of Black Elected Officials currently serving in the State from congressional representatives, state legislators, county officials, mayors, city council members and school board members positioned within California’s 58 counties. The directory can be accessed through the CBM website: www.calblackmedia.com.

State’s top teachers say law de-professionalizes teaching and stifles classroom creativity

By Chris Levister –

At its 2002 signing President George W. Bush memorably hailed the No Child Left Behind Act as a knock out blow for the “soft bigotry of low expectations”.

The landmark legislation had strong bipartisan support and was generally viewed as a necessary step to close the achievement gap between rich, poor, Black and White, and bring all students to grade level proficiency in math and reading by 2014.

Eight years later California’s best teachers say the law is not making the grade, saying it deprofessional izes teaching and stifles classroom creativity.

The study “Does the No Child Left Behind Act Help or Hinder K- 12 Education,” released Tuesday, was conducted by UCR researchers Steven G. Brint, sociology professor and associate dean at UC Riverside and Patrick Guggino who earned his Ph.D in education from UCR in 2008. The researchers surveyed 740 national board certified teachers in California. National Board Certified Teachers are highly accomplished educators who meet high and rigorous standards.

They found that 84 percent of those polled see NCLB in an unfavorable light as too inflexible, too arbitrary and too punitive.

“That unfavorable view stems primarily from their perception that the legislation is not helping them reach students as individuals,” said Brint.

He said the study indicates that teachers believe the act sets unrealistic goals, fails to use the skills and experiences of teachers and is not helping them teach creatively in ways that engage students.

Survey respondents reported that instruction time in their schools had been reduced in subjects such as science, music or art time for reading and mathematics – the two core subjects tested for No Child Left Behind.

Ironically, the law requires teachers to adhere to strict standards of professionalism, but teachers say that following a script mandated by the govern- ment actually makes them feel less like professionals. NCLB proponents and critics alike agree that the law’s greatest accomplishment has been shining an unforgiving spotlight on substandard schools and demanding that they do better. Brint said that teachers favored the greater focus on accountability.

“But they want accountability that has real results. Who can argue with achievement goals, not tolerating failing schools or unmasking low achievement of minorities and special education students, the rub centers around how the law seeks to achieve these goals.

Under the law’s most visible stipulation, states must test public school students in reading and math every year from third through eighth grade, plus once in high school, and reveal the results for each school or face a loss of federal funds.

Brint said there is a perception of fear and retaliation for failure among some teachers in low performing schools. “They’re under a lot of pressure.

Their jobs could be in jeopardy.

They talk about the crushing effects of finding their schools labeled failures,” said Brint.

No one likes to talk about the fate of failing schools that continue to flounder. Under NCLB, such schools face escalating interventions.

If they miss performance goals two years in a row, they must offer students a chance to transfer out. After three years, they must provide tutoring services. After five years of failure, the law says the school must be restructured, which means replacing the staff, converting to a charter school, having the state or a private company take the reins or some other intervention.

California has some of the toughest K-12 curriculum standards in the nation teachers and many administrators despair of hitting the 2014 goal. “Today we don’t have any of our schools with 100% student proficiency, and I will predict that we won’t by 2014,” said Jack O’Connell, California’s superintendent of public instruction.

“You have to question the accountability system when 100% of your schools are going to be failing by definition.” President Barack Obama himself denounced NCLB during the 2008 campaign, charging that it had caused schools to "teach to the test" and to abandon a well-rounded curriculum that includes physical education, art, and music. The law, Obama charged, was designed to punish schools, not to improve them.

Once ardent NCLB supporter Victorville teacher Charisse Mitchell has seen her fourth grade class size grow, while watching teacher and student morale plummet.

“NCLB is like a Russian novel: pastoral, at times uninspiring,, inflexible, complicated, and in the end, everybody gets killed.”

She believes there are three parts to the education equation: improving the quality of instruction, engaging students in an interactive learning environment and encouraging talented young people to pursue education as a career.

“Undermining school morale by imposing unrealistic and unfairly implemented standards will make it difficult to achieve the imperative that we get public education right in this country.”

Still Mitchell says ask almost any teacher, school administrator, education policy maker or thinktank wonk about NCLB, and you’re guaranteed to get at least one sunny metaphor about how the law opened a window, raised a curtain or otherwise illuminated the plight of the nation’s underserved kids. This is NCLB’s biggest achievement and the best reason for making it work.