Men’s volleyball surges into Oakland high school programs

The Oakland Athletic League established men’s volleyball as a California Interscholastic Federation sport three years ago. Oakland High School, Oakland Technical High School, and Skyline High School are the first schools within the league to compete. Oakland High School has dominated the league ever since its debut back in 2015 and has been league’s only…

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High school football player Ronald Jenkins

Crack, snap, and pop. That it is all you hear on the football field as Ronald Jenkins, known to his friends and teammates as RJ, drives his shoulder into the waistline of the ball carrier for the opposing team. With a huge thud that sounds like a body breaking in half, they both hit the…

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Competing to compete: The rise of Oakland student athletes

Skyline High School football player Ronald Jenkins.

Some athletes have a strong passion for their sport, and play it recreationally. Others play their sports because they rely on them to escape the stress of their daily life. And still thers depend on their performance to land them an athletic scholarship, and compete within the Oakland Athletic League hoping to get recruited to college…

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Genesys Works matches high school students with tech internships

Allan Qin drinking coffee at Peet's Coffee & Tea, where he interns as part of a Genesys Works program for high school students. Photo by Nina Zou.

Unlike most of his classmates at Skyline High School in Oakland, Allan Qin, a shy 18-year-old, finishes class at noon and goes straight to work at the Emeryville headquarters of Peet’s Coffee & Tea. His day is just getting started. A high school senior, Qin has been working at Peet’s in technological support for more than five months. Opportunities for low-income students to find work are hard to find, and meaningful work is even more rare.

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Civil rights complaint resolved at Skyline High School

In early March, Skyline High School and the Oakland Unified School District resolved a complaint filed by the high school’s Black Student Union nearly a year ago. The resolution could change how students file complaints, allow random audits of students’ class schedules, offer training for teachers on how to deal with complaints of racial discrimination,…

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Oakland’s first Youth Poet Laureate finalists announced

Now that the finalists in Oakland’s first Youth Poet Laureate competition have been announced, the poets have until September to hear the final results after the last panel of judges make their decision. While waiting to find out who will be named the first Youth Poet Laureate, the finalists are preparing for the first group performance at the Art & Soul Festival this summer in Oakland.

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School board hears grief over shooting, examines budget

Superintendent Tony Smith listens as a member of the public speaks against the OUSD police shooting of a 20-year-old man on Saturday.

Teachers in Oakland can expect a 2 percent raise next year, but that was the only positive budget news from Wednesday night’s school board meeting. The district is expecting to lose more of its state funding this year, is running low on much of its one-time-use federal funding and continues to struggle with low enrollment.

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