On Wednesday, July 3rd 2013 at 11:00 a.m., the Black Contractor’s Association celebrated the graduation of their YouthBuild participants. During the program Southeastern San Diego community youth had constructed a home for a low income family; installed solar panels on low income homes; achieved their high school diplomas or equivalent, obtained employment in high growth industries, earned their Pre-Apprenticeship Certified Training certificate and entered into college.
The Black Contractors Association Celebrates Their YouthBuild graduates as They Move on To College and Employment
Film Review: Fruitvale Station
Michael B. Jordan in Fruitvale Station.
Fruitvale Station ***1/2
By Dwight Brown
NNPA Film Critic
If you don’t live in the San Francisco Bay Area, you might only know the rudiments of this tragic event and subsequent upheaval: Black man, in handcuffs, shot in back by White police officer in Bay Area Rapid Transit train station. Protests. Riots. Unrest. This thoughtful, methodical and contemporary allegory, which is based on a true story, carries the weight of a Greek Tragedy. The film reveals as much about the incident as it does about our complex attitudes towards race.
Oscar Grant (Michael B. Jordan), an aimless 22-year-old, lives in the East Bay. He has not lived a perfect life. Done a little time for a little crime. Fathered a daughter, Tatiana (Ariana Neal), out of wedlock with his Latina girlfriend Sophina (Melonie Diaz). Lost his job because he couldn’t show up on time. He’s dabbled in drug dealing and has a hair-trigger temper he’s learning to control.
On the other hand, he loves his daughter. Has a strong relationship with his tough-love mom Wanda (Octavia Spencer). Is buoyed by his extended family. His sister wants to borrow money, and though he is dead broke, he tries to help. And his heart is in the right place the day a stray dog is hit by a car and he carries it to the side of road as if it was his own.
It’s 2008. December 31st, New Year’s Eve. Seems like Oscar is finally focusing on finding a job, being faithful to Sophina and leaving his drug life behind. He’s got a new attitude and great expectations for 2009. Just one more night on the town, what could it hurt? He, his buddies and Sophina plan to head into San Francisco for the festivities.
It’s been said that nothing good ever happens after midnight. It’s the reason moms keep their sons home at night. Wanda, afraid her son and his friends will drive drunk, insists they take the train. BART. It’s a good idea that only fate could make regrettable. Mom, “I told him to take the train. I told him to take the BART I didn’t know they would hurt my baby.”
Oakland born writer/director Ryan Coogler, whose previous credits include short films, takes a big step into the feature film world with this ambitious, well-realized urban drama. His script lays the blueprint. It’s perfectly detailed. With deftness he sets Oscar’s persona in cement. You know he’s an imperfect human being. Neither a saint nor a sinner. He’s a son without a father, an adolescent struggling with direction. Think Tupac. Think of the kid down the street. He’s surrounded by love (mom, Sophina, Tatiana, various uncles). He’s equally courted by crime, drugs and gang violence. His choices are crucial; the difference between life and death.
The other character Coogler develops with great success is Wanda; a mom who doles out her love and acceptance balanced with strict parental discipline. One of the film’s strongest moments is a prison visiting room scene when Oscar gets in a tiff with a fellow con who rankles him. The two young bulls paw the ground and are ready to ram heads when mom takes control. She gets up and leaves, “I’m not coming here again. If you want to put yourself through this…Not me.” And she doesn’t return.
Coogler’s direction is steeped in realism. No New Jack City swing. No Boyz ‘n The Hood melodrama. It feels like you’re wandering the streets of Oakland, aimless, searching for a clue to life. The interactions between the characters seem like everyday occurrences. Fights and make-ups with Sophina are normal as rain. Civil communications with White, Black and Latino people are routine. The death of Oscar Grant is unique because fellow passengers captured it on cell phones. Wisely, Coogler starts the film with some of that haunting footage. As the director leads you up to the film’s climax, you are hopeful, even though you know the inevitable.
The filmmaking does have flaws: Sometimes the dialogue seems overly prophetic. On New Year’s Eve, Tatiana tells Oscar, “Don’t go, I’m scared for you.” If those words were actually said that night, so be it. In this film, they sound too contrived. Also the film ends abruptly, like it only gets to Act II. What happens after the incident is surly as significant and worthy of unveiling as what comes before it. How the subsequent protests, riots and demonstrations lead specifically to justice of any kind is the missing coda.
Michael B. Jordon honed his talent on series like The Wire and Friday Night Lights. His performance seems natural but that doesn’t mean it was easy to achieve. It’s subtle, deep and fiery. Octavia Spencer is up to the challenge of playing mom. Her expressive eyes and amiable manner mix eloquently with a tough undercurrent. This brilliant, performance is the antithesis of her clownish, over-the-top portrayal in The Help. This should be her signature role.
Under the guidance of cinematographer Rachel Morrison, the BART trains look like urban snakes, vipers speeding along tracks and devouring humans at each station. The costumes are unnoticeable (Aggie Guerard Rodgers) and that’s a compliment. The music doesn’t interfere (Ludwig Goransson). The production design (Hanna Beachler) exhibits low-income apartments and prisons with stark visuals.
At that moment when words are said and irrevocable mistakes are made it’s a shocking, immensely disturbing experience. You will leave the theater emotionally devastated. Grief-stricken. Angry. It’s the mark of a very strong piece of filmmaking and a very sobering reminder that life can vanish in an instant.
Visit film critic Dwight Brown at DwightBrownInk.com.
The Crisis of Black Males is a National Problem
WASHINGTON (NNPA) – The failure to invest in Black males threatens America’s real-world economic future and national security, experts say.
“We have to realize that we are moving backwards and the country has to realize that the greatest national security and economic security threat is not from some outside enemy, it is from our failure to invest in these children and spending all this money on prisons instead of schools,” said Marian Wright Edelman, president of the Children’s Defense Fund, a nonprofit organization that advocates for children with a focus on poor and minority children. “The Black community has to raise a ruckus nobody is going to do it for us.”
David Banks, president of the Eagle Academy Foundation, said leaders don’t realize the gravity of marginalizing Black males.
“They have to begin to understand, economically, that their failure to invest in this represents their own demise,” said Banks. “This country will not continue to be globally competitive if they’re wasting this human capital. It’s not going to work.”
According to a statistical profile compiled by Educational Training Services and the Children’s Defense Fund, Black males enter high school with great expectations, only to see them dashed in resource-starved classrooms.
“As African American students begin 9th grade, 62 percent of them expect to attain at least a bachelor’s degree. However, only 18.5 percent of Black men between the ages of 25-29 reached that goal in 2012,” according to the ETS/CDF profile.
A 2012 study by The Schott Foundation for Public Education found that barely half (52 percent) of Black males who started ninth grade in the 2006-2007 school year graduated on time. According to the study, 78 percent of White male students graduated in four years that started in the 2006-2007 school year.
The profile notes that, “Over the course of the childhood, two out of three Black children (66 percent) born from 1985 through 2000 were raised in neighborhoods with at least a 20 percent poverty rate, compared to just 6 percent of White children.”
Many researchers say that economic and educational disparities force Black males to make tough life decisions without desperately needed parental guidance.
“They come in behind the curve and keep losing ground,” said Edelman. “Then, they have schools that are separate and still, mostly, unequal. They’ve got the least experienced teachers.”
Edelman said that kids that need the most should get the most, but it’s just the opposite.
According to the Educational Testing Service profile, “18 percent of Black secondary school students attend high-poverty schools compared to 2 percent of White secondary school students.”
And when minorities make up 90 percent of the student body, those schools spend $733 less per student annually than schools where 90 percent of the students are White.
“In high schools with a student population that is at least half Black, 25 percent of math teachers do not have a college degree in math and are not certified to teach math. For predominately Whites schools, this figure is 8 percent,” the profile reported.
Twenty-five percent of Black students go to schools that are dubbed “dropout factories,” where less than 60 percent of 9th graders are enrolled in the 12th grade four years later. Five percent of White students attend such schools.
Edelman said that the lure of the streets coupled with the absence of enough positive opportunities and good role models pose unique challenges for young Black men at a time when, like most teenagers, they are testing the limits.
“They navigate to gangs and peers for family and on top of that, they have all of these external cultural messages from the TV and the Internet about violence,” said Edelman. “You have to have all of this bling and you don’t have the means to get it, because there are no jobs.”
According to the latest jobs report, Black youth (16-19 years of age) face a 43.6 percent unemployment rate compared to White youth at 20.4 percent.
“It’s the absence of mediating adults in our churches, in our families, in our neighborhoods, we’re scared of these kids you overlay that with drugs and violence and guns everywhere and you’ve got a pretty combustible thing,” said Edelman.
The ETS/CDF profile stated: “Black male high school students are twice as likely as their White peers to report that they did not go to school because they felt unsafe at school or on their way to and from school on at least one day during the 30 days before the survey.”
The profile continued: “In 2010, there were 3.5 more White males ages 15-19 than Black males of the same age. 114 White young men were killed in gun homicides, while 903 Black young men lost their lives in gun homicides.”
During a recent conference, a number of programs focused on high school-aged young Black men were held up as models for success. One program led by David Banks in New York City features a network of all-boys public schools and has managed to improve graduation rates among young Black males.
According to their website, “The Eagle Academy Model is a maximized educational approach to nurture the ‘whole’ child so that each Eagle Academy student is successful in the classroom and in life.”
The academy teaches the young men the importance of holding each other accountable “as students, as family members, and as engaged citizens in their communities.”
David Banks, president of the Eagle Academy Foundation said, “It’s the kind of culture that we have been able to build that helps young men really understand who they are.”
Banks said that getting parents engaged in the educational process often meant doing things like scheduling weekend meetings with parents may be less convenient for teachers, but it works for parents who are extremely busy, sometimes single, juggling jobs and chores at home.
“We figured out how to get parents to really be involved and to buy-in and that’s critically important when it comes to young men and how you get them to be fully engaged in their own education,” said Banks. “Wednesday night meetings at six o’clock and seven o’clock are good for school people, but they’re not good for parents.”
Banks said that Saturday morning meetings when you start on time and end on time appeal to parents.
School officials say that The Eagle Academy in Bronx, N.Y. boasts an 87 percent graduation rate.
The Children’s Defense Fund also offers summer enrichment programs that provide positive mentoring and role models for at-risk youth and works to foster constructive attitudes towards learning, increased parental and family involvement.
Currently, CDF operates 197 Freedom School programs that serve 12,000 children in 29 states.
The profile compiled by Educational Training Services and the Children’s Defense Fund reported that, “Over the course of his or her lifetime, a single high school dropout costs the nation approximately $260,000 in lost earnings, taxes and productivity.” And because high school dropouts often end up behind bars, the failure to invest in young Black men drains resources from the cradle to the prison.
Banks added, “So, even if you don’t love these little Black boys but if you love your own economic condition you’ll recognize that you have to invest in them to protect your own investment.”
Black Unemployment Rate Rose Slightly in June
WASHINGTON (NNPA) – The Black unemployment rate rose to 13.7 percent in June, up from 13.5 percent in May as the economy added 195,000 jobs, exceeding most expectations. The unemployment rate for Whites barely improved to 6.6 percent in June from 6.7 percent in May.
After falling for four straight months, the unemployment rate for Black women, 20 years and over, rose sharply to 12 percent in June from 11.2 percent in May. The jobless rate for White women also increased to 6 percent in June from 5.8 percent in May.
The jobless rate for Black men over 20 years of age, fell to 13 percent in June from 13.5 percent in May. The unemployment rate for White men fell to 6.2 percent in June from 6.4 percent mark set in May.
The unemployment rate for Black teens (16 to 19 years-old) rose to 43.6 percent in June and the unemployment rate for White teens dipped to 20.4 percent.
The Federal government shed 5,000 jobs in June, continuing a 12-month trend that disproportionately affects Blacks, because of the rate of employment for Blacks in the public sector tends to be higher than in the private sector.
Despite beating most expectations for job creation in June, researchers at the Economic Policy Institute (EPI), a non-partisan think tank focused on the economic policy needs of low- and middle-income workers, say that the job growth is not nearly enough to have a significant impact on the national unemployment rate.
Heidi Shierholz, an economist for the EPI, wrote in a recent post on EPI’s website that even if the economy had grown by 340,000 jobs per month, it would still take 2.5 years to close the gap in the labor market.
“Getting the kind of job growth we need would take a radical shift from policy makers,” wrote Shierholz. “Absent that shift, we can expect to see elevated unemployment for years to come—which represents an ongoing disaster for the U.S. workforce.”
More than 2.5 million Blacks are unemployed, according to the Labor Department’s latest jobs report, and the Obama administration’s lack of focus on the Black unemployment rate has drawn the criticism of Black leaders. The 13.7 Black unemployment rate is higher now than when President Obama took the oath of office in January 2009.
“Despite the high level of African American unemployment there hasn’t been any targeting,” said Julianne Malveaux, an economist and former president of Bennett College for Women in Greensboro, N.C. “When you look at populations that have been disproportionately affected, you’re looking at African Americans, you’re looking at African American men, you’re looking at inner-city inhabitants. Those are the people that deserve targeting.”
Some economists say that there are steps President Obama can take to mitigate racial disparities in hiring and employment that don’t involve getting into another protracted fight with members of Congress who seem determined to block any jobs program that comes out of the White House.
“One thing the president can do is accelerate, deepen, and strengthen the enforcement of anti-discrimination policies,” said Bernard Anderson, an economist and professor emeritus Wharton School at the University of Pennsylvania in Philadelphia. “That’s one thing the president can do and from all evidence, the Obama administration has been asleep at the switch.”
HARMONIOUS SOLUTIONS CELEBRATES THE ACCOMPLISHMENTS OF DR. VANGIE AKRIDGE
San Diego, CA: Harmonious Solutions hosted a Community Open House featuring the accomplishments of Dr. Vangie Akridge and partner organization My Community Huddle.Dr. Vangie, otherwise known as the San Diego Voice & Viewpoint’s “Educational Informant”, has established herself in the field of psychology and education by practicing school psychology in a local school district for the past 12 years. She also teaches at a local university and previously sat on the San Diego County Mental Health Advisory Board.
Dr. Vangie was a double major at UCLA, receiving her Baccalaureate degree in Psychology and African-American Studies before moving back to San Diego and receiving her Masters of Science and Pupil Personnel Services Credential in School Psychology. She has also secured a doctorate of psychology in the educational psychology. Dr. Vangie has also completed the Alcohol and Drug Counseling program at National University. Her vocational experience has contributed to a vast knowledge in human development, psychological processing, cognition, consultation, group and individual counseling, psychological/educational assessment, special education law, specific learning disabilities, ADHD, emotional disturbances, Autism, low incident disorders, alcohol/substance abuse, dual diagnosis and many other factors that may impair academic progression and social/emotional functioning.
Dr. Vangie opened a private agency in 2009. Located in San Diego, My Community Huddle is centrally located to residents of the metro-San Diego area. Her pleasant demeanor, expertise and unique insight quickly made Dr. Vangie San Diego’s most sought after psychologist.
Dr. Vangie is a wife and mother of three, has a passion for community and is eager to recycle her education, promote community partnering and increase the likelihood of the survival of those individuals that have been compromised (emotionally or otherwise). Her dedication to family, education and the promotion of emotional well-being makes her a great resource and advocate for building community health and education. When she is not working, Dr. Vangie enjoys watching athletic competitions and spending time with her family.
This weekend Friday, July 12–14, 2013 Dr. Vangie will be hosting the “Teen Tent” at the Annual Stand-down for Homeless Veterans at San Diego High School. “Many San Diegans do not realize that homeless veterans have families. Teens are provided limited support services and are at times looked over. During Stand Down I provide a safe place for teens to share their concerns and connect them to programs that can help them with issues at school, access to mental health services and care packages with items that have been donated from community partners and concerned citizens. My Community Huddle strives to bring the community together to fill the needs of our young people and their families,” states Dr. Vangie.
For more information regarding My Community Huddle or to connect with Dr. Vangie, please visit their website at www.MyCommunityHuddle.com.
Rotary Club of Southeast San Diego 2013-2014 Installation of Officers
San Diego, CA: Southeastern Rotarians celebrated the accomplishments of outgoing President Sydney Stewart at the Bali Hai restaurant on Shelter Island on Tuesday, July 2nd. Highlights of the 2012-2013 administration included a successful Interact Club at Morse High School, Rotaract Club at San Diego State University and distribution of dictionaries in fifteen 3rd grade classrooms throughout Southeastern San Diego and 2 schools in Mexico. Another highlight included RYLA – Rotary Youth Leaders Awards that comprise of high achieving 11th graders from Morse and Lincoln High School who experienced rigorous leadership training provided by the Southeastern San Diego Rotary Club. President Stewart was also able to secure a new meeting place for the Rotary Club of Southeast San Diego at the Jacobs Center’s Community Room located at 404 N. Euclid Ave, San Diego, 92114. The Club meets every Wednesday at 12 noon.
Pastor Wells Celebrates 40th Pastoral Anniversary
To successfully run a church takes a lot of hard work and dedication. It requires an unwavering prayer life and a willingness to yield one’s life to the service of God. A pastor sacrifices his time, sleep, finances, and so much more to the ministry. He does it all without complaint. For one man to manage a church for 40 years and still have the support and respect of its parishioners is a blessing. Pastor Walter G. Wells of Mt Erie Baptist Church has accomplished that feat. On Sunday, June 23, 2013, he and the church celebrated his 40th pastoral anniversary.
Wells Fargo Commits $50,000 to the Alliance for African Assistance
Southeast San Diego hosts All Women’s March
Even the sweltering, record breaking heat of the day could not stop almost 300 women, and some men, who marched this Saturday, June 29, 2013 in the “All Women March” to End Violence in Our Community — the brainchild of Rashida Hameed, President of Epiphany Women In Focus (EWIF). Mayor Filner himself donned the official camouflage tee shirt of the march as he ceremoniously cut the ribbon to start the women on their way. Councilmember Myrtle Cole marched front and center with the women as they walked the two mile route from Euclid Avenue and Market Street to Imperial Avenue and back, with a police escort that included the Southeastern Division Police Captain Tony McElroy. The marchers were greeted with cheers and honks from passersby’s as they chanted various slogans, “Unity In The Community,” “Education Not Incarceration,” “No More Killings, No More Murders,” Honk for Peace”, “End the Silence, End the Violence”; the latter chant a condemnation of the “no snitch rule” upheld by so many in the community.
Early Failures Create a Promising Future
Victor J. Glover sat in one of his engineering classes at Cal State-San Luis Obispo in the late 1990s. It wasn’t going well. Balancing a rigorous class schedule, along with athletic responsibilities in football and wrestling, this class wasn’t getting the time and energy it deserved. Glover failed that class. But sometimes, failure is the best avenue to success. “I took the class again and aced it,” Glover said. “My life changed at that point. I knew that I could compete. I was there because I deserved to be. I had doubt about my ability and that class changed everything. That’s part of growing.”
Glover, 37, is now a Lt. Commander in the U.S. Navy, serves as a Navy Legislative Fellow in the US Congress and is a member of NASA’s 2013 Astronaut Candidate Class. His early failure morphed into a lengthy resume full of personal and professional successes. Now, Glover awaits his opportunity to be trained to fly in space. A yearlong process full of interviews and intensive medical screening, it’s something he still hasn’t completely wrapped his mind around. “It hasn’t really hit me yet,” Glover said. “It’s like, ‘wow’. It’s overwhelming. I talk about space and I’m not joking around. I’m actually being trained to fly in space. It doesn’t even sound right.”
Glover laughed at this thought. His laughter served as a light moment barely rising behind the amount of work he had to put in to get to where he is now. He applied to be an astronaut candidate in 2008 but didn’t earn an interview. But the process became familiar to him. And like with anything else in Glover’s life, he took it as a learning experience to go back and be better. “When you fail at something,” Glover said, “own it. Find that chink in your armor and get better.”
Glover is married to his wife, Dionna, and has four daughters: Genesis, 10, Maya, 8, Joia, 6, and Corinne, 5. The first time he left for deployment as a married man, Genesis was the only child. The second time he left, all four were in the home. When asked that often asked question of, ‘Why do you have to go away?’ Glover responds with, ‘Honey, daddy has to go away so someone else’s mommy or daddy can come home. Me doing my part helps them out.’ That sense of purpose gives Glover all the satisfaction he needs. “It has challenges,” Glover said. “Going away on deployments are tough. But we just moved from Japan to Washington, DC. Our children got to experience Japanese culture for two years. So it has a lot of unique rewards.”
Glover made the decision to join the Navy while in college. An athlete at heart, he knew the professional ranks of football were not in his future but he still wanted to do something with that level of a rush, that level of excitement. Already studying to be a mechanical engineer, he saw the Navy as an opportunity. He took it, ran with it and hasn’t looked back. He only goes back now to tell young people how to take their successes and failures and turn them into progress.
“Everything you put your name on should be your best work,” Glover said. “Everybody doesn’t find what they love right away. But if you always work hard, then your normal becomes somebody else’s extra. You’re already used to pouring your heart and effort into things. That becomes your standard.”
Jim Kelly, Actor In ‘Enter The Dragon,’ Dies
Los Angeles (CNN) — Jim Kelly, who parlayed his martial arts skills into a successful but brief career in action movies, has died. He was 67.
Kelly’s former wife Marilyn Dishman told CNN that the actor died Saturday of cancer, but did not elaborate.
Kelly worked as a martial arts instructor in Los Angeles when he was tapped for his first role in the action movie, “Melinda.” But he is best known for his work in the 1973 Bruce Lee film “Enter the Dragon.”
Kelly’s appearance in the movie was brief — fans lamented he was offed too soon — but his electrifying Afro, lanky 6-foot-2 frame and his wisecracks left an impression.
Producers came calling. And he capitalized on the attention by taking on the title role in “Black Belt Jones” the following year. A spate of other roles followed throughout the 70s, most notably “Three the Hard Way,” but then dried up.
In later years Kelly took up tennis professionally, becoming a ranked player on the USTA senior circuit.
“I never left the movie business,” Kelly told The Los Angeles Times in 2010, when a retrospective DVD set of his movies came out. “It’s just that after a certain point, I didn’t get the type of projects that I wanted to do.”
see complete article here
TIME TO GET TESTED
[San Diego, CA] — In recognition of National HIV Testing Day, June 27, Planned Parenthood of the Pacific Southwest encourages men, women and young people to get tested for HIV and other sexually transmitted diseases (STDs), in an ongoing effort to promote safe and healthy living through education and testing.
“With nearly 50,000 new HIV infections each year, National HIV Testing Day reminds us that testing for HIV and STDs is an important step in stopping the spread of HIV while promoting the value of self-care and healthy living,” said Angela Reed-Smith, Senior Vice President of Patient Services at Planned Parenthood of the Pacific Southwest (PPPSW). “The reality is that more than 1.1 million people in the United States are living with HIV, yet one in five is unaware of his or her status.”
HIV infection rates are especially high among young people, African Americans, and Latinos. African Americans remain disproportionally affected by HIV. In 2010, blacks accounted for 44 percent of all new HIV infections. African-American women accounted for 64 percent of all new infections in women that same year.In comparison, 18 percent of new infections were among white women and 15 percent were among Hispanic/Latina women. In 2010, the rate of new HIV infections among black women was 20 times that of white women.
In 2012, PPPSW provided 82,759 HIV tests for men, women and young people. PPPSW has 19 health centers in San Diego and Riverside Counties that offer many preventive services including HIV and STD testing. In 2011, Planned Parenthood health centers nationwide provided over 680,000 HIV tests for men and women.
Under the Affordable Care Act, more men, women, and young people have access to HIV testing at no cost.People who already have insurance have begun to see this benefit already. Eligible, uninsured people can begin enrolling in health coverage plans under the Affordable Care Act starting October 1 for coverage that begins January 1, 2014. More information is available at plannedparenthood.org
“Practicing safe sex with proper protection like condoms and regular testing are important steps to livinghealthier lifestyles,” said Reed-Smith. “We urge everyone to get tested. Getting tested is quick and easy, and it can ensure that you and your partners remain healthy.”
Planned Parenthood’s online tool The Check offers guidance and tips about HIV and other STDs, andhelps direct people to a local health center
For more information or to make an appointment, call 1-888-743-PLAN (7526) or visit planned.org.