Category: Education

I was just thinking about all the nice moments I’ve enjoyed in life and a little time I spent in Tucson last week ranks up there among the mellower of the refreshing respites from the troubles of the world I’ve had the pleasure of taking part in.

First of all I was in my hometown and that’s always enjoyable, not to mention that I was there for a very special event, wearing the lofty title of “guest speaker,” which I took to mean I was to have a good time so that’s what I did. Why not, I was around some of my favorite people: a bunch of folks wearing sunny smiles…

The Office of Independent Budget Analysis (IBA) came out with their 179 page analysis of the mayor’s proposed budget. As you know, the mayor has proposed to rip over 7 million dollars out of the library department budget by pairing libraries which will only be open 18.5 hours per week. This is the severest percentage cut of all general fund departments.

Here are the library options which the IBA has presented to the city council, which will vote to accept or reject the mayor’s budget. This is the option that we must demand that Councilman Faulconer and all other council members support:

Option 1. FULLY RESTORE BRANCH LIBRARY HOURS TO CURRENT SERVICE LEVELS.

Posing in a picture on the desktop of my iMac are some of the most brilliant people I’ve ever known, members of MEChA, a Chicano student organization at Mission Bay High led by Luis Villanueva, a remarkable educator who constantly seeks ways to create learning experiences that are relevant to their lives. Each of them is a budding community leader and exemplary American citizen.

By Lowell Waxman

In a recent New York Times story, Rx: Read to Your Baby we are reminded that “[i]ncreasingly, research has supported the idea that children should be exposed to a language-rich environment as soon as they are born because it can significantly improve cognitive and language development and readiness for school.

Remarkably, we also learn that some pediatricians in New York City are now writing prescriptions for books for parents to read to their babies “because … pediatricians know that one of the most important things they can do to impact the long-term health of their patients is to make sure their patients are literate.”

by Kit-Bacon Gressitt / Excuse Me, I’m Writing

On Wednesday, April 13, campuses across the California State University system (CSU) hosted demonstrations — dubbed Take Class Action Day — to protest budget cuts to the Cal State system.

The rally was the first time, since landing at CSU San Marcos in January, that I sensed that protest high of my otherwise misspent youth. As I approached the gathering, shades of rhythmic rebellion synced with my beating heart as students, staff and faculty sang the praises of the inexorable right to higher education; of the state’s primal responsibility for equitable, affordable access; of rolling coins in a desperate attempt to pay steadily-increasing fees as the dastardly CSU Chancellor Charles Reed and legislators shirk that responsibility.

This week marks the one-year anniversary of the end of the March for California’s Future, a 48 day, 352-mile march through the Central Valley to the State Capitol. There, on a rainy day in Sacramento, I was one of many union folks, students, and religious and community leaders who spoke to a crowd of thousands gathered to protest the ever-more draconian cuts to education and social services.

All the way from Los Angeles to Sacramento we carried the message that California needs a government and economy that works for everyone, not just the rich.

Once again library supporters provided the majority of citizen input regarding the proposed budget, and once again, Mayor Sanders was dismissive of them. The mayor is holding two community budget hearings to explain the budget. The first one was held at Kearny High School. The fifty or so citizens who showed up were not given an opportunity to provide public testimony. We were handed a note card and told that we could ask the mayor a question about the budget.

My faith in the ability of my generation and the one following mine to actually give a damn got a major boost today when I headed down to City College at the (for the under-30 and under-employed set) ungodly hour of 8:00 for the pre-rally to a protest of the educational budget cuts proposed by Governor Jerry Brown.

First off, I’ve got to say that in general, I admire Brown’s apparent willingness to compromise on shrinking the state budget gap with equal measures of cuts and taxes …

SD Community College District Canceled Most Of Summer Session Due To Cuts

By Kendra Hartmann/SDNews.com

With budget cuts rearing their ugly head on a regular basis, news of more casualties falls on almost numb ears. The University of California, San Diego, however, is feeling the threat of tightening purse strings in a whole new way. For the students, scientists and public that frequent the Scripps Institution of Oceanography (SIO) Library, Gov. Jerry Brown’s proposed cuts could mean the end of an era: the largest library in the world dedicated to marine science will likely close this summer.

“It doesn’t make any sense that our 100-year-old unique facility should be terminated,” said Walter Munk, professor emeritus at the UCSD Institute of Geophysics and Planetary Physics and longtime SIO Library user.

Thoughts Stemming from Viewing “Precious Knowledge”

Lately, I’ve been thinking about the range of ethnicities in our country, of how all human beings innately identify with racial and cultural ties that go back ages and ages in our personal histories. Who we are was set in place in ancient times. It’s natural, the way its supposed to be.

But somehow in the mix some human beings decide that their ethnicity is the ultimate of ethnicities and looks at others fearfully and fitfully.

By Kit-Bacon Gressitt / Excuse Me, I’m Writing blog / March 20, 2011

Last Thursday, I visited a professor in her temporary office. She was perched at an oddly placed desk amid unpacked boxes, all under a light patina of dust and the discomfort of passing disorder. She apologized when I arrived — an unnecessary courtesy, albeit a noted one, but I didn’t care. She was doing me the favor of providing guidance on an analysis of The Koala, a tabloid publication that started at the University of California San Diego (UCSD) in 1982, spread to San Diego State University (SDSU) in 2004, and mutated into an edition at Cal State University San Marcos (CSUSM) this January.