Education
Hella Damn Squirrels has been in full operation since 2013. The group only consists of two people, Hale and her boyfriend Toppano, partners in squirrel photography from the very beginning. They focus solely on the squirrels at Lake Merritt: Toppano, the squirrel feeder and “wrangler” of the duo, brings them over with the bag of walnuts and Hale, a professional photographer, snaps their photos to be posted on social media.
Darius Aikens, a junior at Oakland High School, and Bianca Ramirez, a sophomore at Fremont High School, are student directors for the school board for the 2015-2016 school year. They attend all board meetings and act as intermediaries between the board and the All City Council, the district-wide student union.
At the superintendent-parent forum on Saturday morning, parents, teachers and district officials gathered at West Oakland Middle School to discuss new changes for teacher recruitment and retention strategies in Oakland Unified School District (OUSD).
2015 brought another group of student reporters to Oakland North, and they covered the daily news of a changing city: The rising cost of rent and concerns about gentrification, the debate over raising the minimum wage, a controversial plan to ship coal through the Port of Oakland, efforts to stem crime and the lives of those lost to gun violence, the fate of refugees who have resettled here. But they also dug deep into stories about the people, places and ideas that…
Founded in April 2009, the Ger Youth Center is a non-profit organization based in Oakland dedicated to preserving and promoting traditional Mongolian visual and performing arts, culture and language among Bay Area Mongolian and Mongolian-American youth. Its flagship program, the Bi Mongol — or “I am Mongolian” — School operates out of the Oakland Asian Cultural Center. The school offers biweekly classes in art, dancing, Mongolian language, chess, and more. The Ger Youth Center also coordinates a variety of cultural events open…
Cal’Vion Evans, an eighth grader at Roots International Academy, begins slowly, tapping the cymbals and toms with two wooden drumsticks. The drum set rests on a mini-stage, a short platform covered by a rug and flanked on either side by guitar stands, each with about 10 guitars leaning in. Cal’Vion speeds up gradually, his head movements changing from a gentle nodding with the music to a swivel as his drumming becomes faster and more furious. Then he slows back down,…
The school district’s recently-approved Central Kitchen, Instructional Farm and Education Center Project is an effort to improve the quality of school meals in Oakland by creating a modern facility equipped to prepare thousands of nutritious meals every day. It will be located at the Marcus Foster school site in West Oakland, which formerly housed the Marcus Foster Middle School and later offices for the Programs for Exceptional Children. In addition to being better-equipped to serve fresher and healthier foods for students, the new site will offer educational programs and even a farm for students to help grow the food that may one day end up on their plates.
The blender roared to life, shredding kale, mint, strawberries, bananas and ice into a delicious concoction. Anthony Forrest, the smoothie maker, handed cups of the nutritious potion to the students surrounding him in the school garden at Fremont High School in East Oakland. Forrest and his colleague Vernon Ray Dailey both work for Planting Justice, a nonprofit advocating for locally grown food, food education, jobs and shared green spaces. Forrest and Dailey are not secretive about their past: Between the…
The Mills College administration announced in a press release Monday that the school will continue to offer an undergraduate dance major.