Education
Taking math class online, designing video games, working with NASA scientists to launch experiments in space—these are things students at the Urban Promise Academy (UPA) can do with the 210 laptops the Oakland Unified School District provided for the school this year.
A Bay Area collective, Nerds for Nature (N4N), is trying to bridge the gap between techies and nature enthusiasts by designing low-cost equipment—like underwater robots and eco-drones—used to monitor the environment. Comprised of amateur scientists, engineers, ecologists, environmentalists and GIS professionals, N4N gathers once a month in either Oakland or San Francisco to discuss new Do-It-Yourself projects. Victoria Bogdan, an environment law student, co-founded the group after she noticed a lack of tools designed to protect the environment. “Technologists really…
In a 5 to 0 vote, the Oakland Unified School District (OUSD) Board of Education approved the first “lab” charter school in Oakland on Wednesday night. The school’s site is yet to be determined, but it’s designed to apprentice novice teachers and feed them back into OUSD’s public schools.
The Kapor Center, an organization trying to close what staffers call “the gap” between those who can access information, education and technology and those who can’t, are relocating to a new home.
Elementary students stand in line at Oakland’s Stonehurst Campus Kitchen, facing a critical question that will define the next thirty minutes of their lives: burger or chicken salad?
To help combat the spread of the flu, in October, the Alameda County Public Health Department will launch their Shoo the Flu campaign and offer free vaccinations to children in 110 public schools throughout Oakland.
Mills was the first U.S. women’s college to create a formal written admissions policy that includes transgender and gender fluid applicants. The policy went into effect this semester and the changes are making waves among Mills students and alums, as well as other women’s colleges around the county.
Local health officials are urging parents to immunize their children against pertussis—the scientific name for whooping cough—and other vaccine-preventable diseases. But that is a tall order in a region where some families still have limited access to healthcare, and more parents are filing Personal Belief Exemptions.
As Vicky Chen, the teen librarian at the Rockridge Library Branch, attempted to settle the chaotic rush of middle school students visiting the youth section after school, a student suddenly asked, “Ms. Vicky, how can a book be banned?” Chen, along with other Oakland librarians, highlighted banned books at their respective branches by creating displays for Banned Books Week, which ran from September 21 to 27, an annual event that celebrates the freedom to read. At the Rockridge branch, Chen’s…