By Amy Maginnis-Honey
Krystle Martin has gone from being a graduate of the Solano Community College Actor Training Program to a superhero – and sometimes villain.
Martin, 27, is traveling the country with “Marvel Universe Live,” which begins a run Thursday at Sleep Train Arena in Sacramento.
via Solano College grad becomes Marvel superhero Daily Republic.
By Sharon Noguchi
Here are excerpts of what teachers, teacher educators and others in education say about the U.S. proposal to toughen regulation of teacher-training programs and to grade them on test scores of the students of their graduates.
“Research confirms that the most important in-school factor in a student’s success is a strong teacher … Yet today, far too many teachers report they are unprepared when they first enter the classroom after completing their teacher preparation program.”
— U.S. Department of Education. “Improving Teacher Preparation: Building on Innovation”
“What if airplane pilots said, ‘my first three years were a wreck’? We worry about the safety of people at the hands of these other professions. Why don’t we worry about children being at the hands of an adult, even a well-meaning adult, who doesn’t know what he or she is doing?”
The Solano County Elementary Spelling Bee will be held March 31 in the Joseph A. Nelson Community Center, 611 Village Drive, in Suisun City, where several dozen spellers from around the county will vie for two spots at state championship.
To date, 44 students from the county’s public and private schools, including Lilly Trinh, a Vacaville Christian Schools fourth-grader and winner of Vacaville’s recent citywide bee, are slated to compete in this year’s event.
The county bee is open to one fourth through sixth-grade student from each elementary or middle school, who has been certified as a school champion speller.
Solano County elementary and middle school students can win a bike, bike helmet and lock by entering the Bike to School Day 2015 poster contest sponsored by the Solano Safe Routes to School program.
The winning illustration will also be featured on Bike to School Day posters that will be distributed to Solano County schools to advertise National Bike to School Day on May 6.
The poster must include a slogan and an illustration to encourage fellow students to bike to school and show how biking to school is good for you and the environment. Be sure to include a bike helmet.
In addition to the first-place prize, two runners up each will receive a $100 gift certificate from a local bike shop.
By Richard Bammer
A special meeting within a regular meeting, the second interim budget report for 2014-15, and a state-of-the-school update on Will C. Wood High are on the agenda when Vacaville Unified leaders meet tonight.
After a closed session, the seven-member governing board will recess to hold a public facilities financing corporation special meeting to hear a report about the district’s certificates of participation refunding. (Certificates of participation are financial products used by government entities, such as city councils or school boards, allowing for the purchase of a share of the lease revenues of an agreement made by the government entities.)
A representative from Isom Advisors, a Walnut Creek firm which provides financial advice to a number of California school districts, will make the presentation. In short, it will show how much the district will save — notably an estimated $4.5 million — by refunding the certificates at a lower interest rate, between 0.3 percent and 3.72 percent instead of 4.75 percent and 7.25 percent, the latter being 2008 rates.
via Budget, Wood High School report on Vacaville Unified School District agenda tonight.
By Richard Bammer
When Dixon Unified leaders meet tonight, school district enrollments, projected five years into the future, and an update of the district’s administrative offices are on the agenda.
Adrian Vargas, the rural eastern Solano County district’s chief financial officer, will tell the five-member governing board that enrollments have steadily declined during the past five years, but that they will rise slightly in the coming five years.
Dixon Unified had 3,656 students in 2010 and 3,370 in 2014.
Vargas on Wednesday said a “moderate” enrollment projection indicates 3,317 students next year and 3,518 in 2019.
“It’s hard to pinpoint what enrollments will be” until students actually show up for classes in August every year, he said.
via Enrollment projections, district office building update on DUSD agenda.
By Glen Faison
Nearly 1,000 students descended on the Fairfield High School gymnasium Wednesday with a single purpose in mind: To get a taste for possible careers.
They did so through the latest iteration of a relatively new career fair at the school. It’s a collaborative effort between the Fairfield-Suisun Rotary Club, Fairfield High and the Solano County Office of Education. It’s designed to serve as a way for students to explore various career paths in different industry sectors.
Students arrived in the gymnasium in three waves of approximately 300 students each.
via Students sample industry choices during school career fair Daily Republic.
By Richard Bammer
By fits and starts, the whirring of gears and hard-rubber wheels, and the clattering of gray plastic storage bins, Heimdall, Vanden High robotics team’s 2015 competition bot, motored around a southeast Vacaville elementary multipurpose room with a mission stored in its electronic mind: Win the Central Valley Regional robotics competition this coming weekend.
In its final practice run Tuesday at Sierra Vista, coming before the face-off against dozens of other teams at Madera South High, the bot and its drivers, members of the RoboVikes, ran through a drill that meets the requirements of “Recycle Rush,” the name of this year’s game, as sanctioned by competition sponsor FIRST (For Inspiration and Recognition of Science and Technology). It is a nonprofit science-promotion group and organizer of regional and national robotics contests, casually called “varsity sports for the mind,” including the FIRST World Championships under the Edward Jones Dome in St. Louis (this year April 22 to 25).
via Vanden, Buckingham students prepare for robotics competitions.
By Susan Winlow
Curtis Aikens’ shoes were hardly noticeable.
That is, until the celebrity chef, one of the founding hosts of the Food Network, pointed them out to Armijo High School’s academic literacy – reading intervention – class Tuesday.
Both were gray. One was a Nike, the other an undetermined brand. One sported bright orange laces, the other, the same hue, just duller in color.
“It’s OK to be different,” he said.Aikens’ road from Georgia to Armijo was a quick turnaround, said teacher Sylvia Herrera.
via Celebrity chef motivates Armijo students Daily Republic.
by Keri Luiz
Benicia Unified School District truustees will have another early start Thursday as they conduct a workshop with Bob Ferguson of McPherson & Jacobson LLC, the search firm that is helping the district find a replacement for retiring Superintendent Janice Adams.
The board heard a presentation from McPherson & Jacobson Feb. 5, at which time board President Gary Wing said trustees wanted to be as transparent as possible in their selection of a new superintendent.
Discussions during the workshop will include a timeline for making the decision — Adams officially steps down at the end of the semester, in June — advertising in media venues and identifying stakeholder groups.
By John Glidden
Hoping to increase the amount of “positive” news disseminated to the community, the Vallejo City Unified School District Board of Education will be asked Wednesday during a special meeting to approve authorization for the district to negotiate a contract for a new public relations position.
The negotiation is with Joe Wolfcale for the newly created position Public Relations Consultant Specialist.
“With the successful implementation of various school programs, including our Full Services Community Schools, (Science, Technology, Engineering, Math and or Arts) STEAM programs and Wall-to-Wall Academies, it’s important that the public is continuously informed about the positive work that the district accomplishes on a consistent basis,” according to a district staff report.
via Vallejo school district asked to authorize negotiations for new PR specialist.
By Bill Hicks
The students who attend the Travis Education Center are aware of what outsiders might think of them, that the center is a place where students end up, not where they go purposefully.
The alternative high school acquires students for a variety of reasons.
It might even be that there is a different reason each of the roughly 75-person student body arrived at the center. While it might also be true that many of the students “ended up” at Travis Education Center, or that this is the perception for many people, the faculty and staff at the center will not allow anyone to look upon their students as castaways.
via True grit: Travis Teacher of the Year refuses to accept failure Daily Republic.
By Susan Winlow
Solano Community College trustees will hear a Measure Q spending plan update Wednesday and be asked to approve the new version of the spending plan. This agenda item was postponed from a previous meeting.
The update involves a proposed increase in spending totaling about $12 million for three projects:
via College looks at Measure Q project changes Daily Republic.
By Susan Winlow
“So, how many of you know how old Dr. Seuss would be if he were still alive?”
Kristen Murray, the children’s librarian at the Cordelia branch of the Solano County Library, posed the question to Nelda Mundy Elementary School kindergartners Monday as they prepared to hear some Dr. Seuss tomes from the Cat in the Hat himself.
“45.”
“1,000.”
Plus a few more numbers tossed from the mouths of 5-year-olds.
The answer: Theodor Seuss Geisel, the beloved author of such classics as “Hop on Pop,” Red Light, Green Light” and “The Cat in the Hat” would have been 111 on Monday.
via Dr. Seuss still promotes literacy through ‘Read Across America’ Daily Republic.
By Susan Winlow
Solano Community College part-time professors and teachers chose not to walk out on this first national day of recognition – National Adjunct Walkout Day – but they still want others to know about the disparity between part-time and full-time employees.
Instead of heading to the state Capitol on Wednesday, the Solano Adjunct Alliance is holding its first Adjunct Awareness Week Feb. 23-27 with fliers, buttons and wristbands, and classroom conversations with students.
Two of the complaints that Rachel Aptekar, an adjunct biology professor with a Ph.d, said are at the forefront are poor pay with fewer benefits than their full-time counterparts, and lack of job security.
via Solano part-time professors forward employment issues Daily Republic.
By Susan Winlow
Baseball great Jackie Robinson paid a visit Wednesday to Tolenas Elementary School.
Wearing a backwards navy blue ball cap and a blue and white baseball shirt, he clutched a baseball and baseball glove as he told Tolenas students five important facts about himself.
“It’s pretty fun,” he said, as he stood in the library describing his visit.
Fifty important people, including Coretta Scott King, Medgar Evers, Malcolm X, President Barack Obama and even the “Thriller” king himself, Michael Jackson, came to teach the children at Tolenas about famous black figures throughout history, including current times, in a celebration of Black History Month.
via Children tackle history during Wax Museum project Daily Republic.
By Susan Winlow
Shari Patterson drives right by a new high school in Woodland on her commute to work each day.
A closer commute, a new school – no, thank you.
“I love Fairfield High School,” said the history teacher who’s spent her entire 16-year teaching career at the school.
The feeling is obviously reciprocated as Patterson, 45, was selected as the 2015 district Teacher of the Year after being selected Fairfield High School’s Teacher of the Year.
Teaching, she said, was a natural fit for her.
via Fairfield High instructor named district Teacher of the Year Daily Republic.
By Susan Winlow
At first it was thought that flat was the new up.Demographically speaking, that is.
“Last year at this time, when we brought the projections forward . . . we started to see a trend of flattening,” said Kim VanGundy, the facilities and construction department head for the Fairfield-Suiusn School District. “We were surprised to find we have a declining enrollment.”
VanGundy presented this year’s demographic study to the governing board Thursday. The study shows a slight district decline over the next six years of 895 students. Elementary school numbers take the sharpest decline, middle school numbers see a slight uptick and high school numbers remain relatively static.
via Declining enrollment sneaks up on school district Daily Republic.
By Amy Maginnis-Honey
Larry Bluford, founder of Operation Thugs Inc., is launching a new program, “Operation Restoration: The Bullying Prevention Project.”
The two-day event, March 6-7, was spurred by the Jan. 12 assault on Bluford’s daughter.
After people read his story, Bluford began hearing from families whose children were being bullied and Operation Restoration was born. Bluford has partnered with different organizations to bring the event to fruition.
It kicks off with a revival 7:30 p.m. March 6 at City Church, 743 E. Tabor Ave., Fairfield. It will focus on the spiritual and emotional toll of bullying.
via 2-day event will focus on bullying prevention Daily Republic.
By Susan Hiland
The Solano County 4-H Presentation Day had plenty of fun and interesting things to do and see Saturday at Green Valley Middle School in Fairfield.
The key to the day’s activities is for the participants to have created a presentation about a topic of their choosing and be able to present that to the judges, according to Valerie Williams, 4-H program representative for Solano County.
This year, 80 4-H groups came to the event, bringing displays on topics like making monkey bread and radio-controlled car repair and maintenance. Participants ranged in age from 5 to 19.
via 4-H Presentation Day brings fun, education to Fairfield Daily Republic.