By Dianne Anderson In the countdown to March 5, local education candidates are taking a stand on the issues facing their communities, reminding voters they don’t need a stamp, just fill in the circles and send their ballots early – or at least on time. Voters are looking to candidates to deal with concerns of equity ...

By Dianne Anderson For years, local educator Dr. Kirk Kirkwood has been watching the data points, worrying that the needle for Black student achievement has hardly budged for the better, specifically around mathematics. It’s almost as alarming as the academic apathy around the numbers that keep showing deep disparities in education between Black and white ...

By Dianne Anderson Willful defiance suspensions and expulsions that expanded the bulging prison population may ease up a bit under a recent law passed by Gov. Newsom, which comes as good news for local parents and organizations that have pushed against unequal discipline for Black children for decades. “In 2014 there was a lot of ...

By Dianne Anderson Straight from city plot to plate – nothing beats local organics. Local kids and families are working the land, now in full bloom without pesticides. Ms. Sheila G. said that her nonprofit Adventures to Dreams Enrichment gave away bags of produce earlier this month filled with carrots, tomatoes, lots of different varieties ...

By Dianne Anderson Good grades are almost everything, and it all starts with parent engagement, student summer programs, and HBCU tours that are now in full force through the Long Beach Unified School District’s Black Student Achievement Initiative. For Elyssa Taylor-Stewart, testing is on the periphery of successful outcomes for one of her jobs as ...

By Dianne Anderson Career pathways, self-care and mental wellness resources, cultural awareness and human relations are a few topics local teens will ponder, along with other grown-up questions on their to-do list, like how to get a good job with the city. The new Teen Academy is set to launch at each of the Long ...

By Dianne Anderson If Black students can benefit from their fair share of the latest COVID Relief funding, then some relief may be in store from the academically, social-emotionally barren year. Summer school programs are set to open in real time, and Long Beach educators hope to see students back in their traditional classrooms as ...

By Dianne Anderson In her worst childhood nightmares, Cynthia Terry could have never imagined the things that have become a daily reality for today’s kids. Back in her day, all she had to worry about was tending to her schoolwork, maybe some chores, and then a little time for play. “We never had to watch ...

By Dianne Anderson Even on a slow day, hundreds of parents are now watching the Long Beach Unified School Board meetings, which is exponentially more than what was happening pre-pandemic. For all the havoc that COVID-19 has wrought on the community, there is still some room for optimism. “Before the pandemic, at the board meeting ...

By Dianne Anderson Ammons Smith, a senior at Long Beach Unified School District, isn’t dealing with the uncertainty facing many of his peers these days. All of his core classes are finished. He has cleared major hurdles, all set to graduate and ready to move on to bigger things, even despite the school shut down ...