Grain elevators, not skyscrapers, fill the view outside Paul Serrato’s home now that the jazz pianist-composer is back in Omaha after decades in New York City.
Serrato was a New York sideman, soloist and band leader. When not performing, he haunted clubs to see countless legends play. An avid collector, he helped himself to rare posters of great jazz lineups at iconic spots like the Village Gate in East Harlem.
He also spent untold hours composing and trying out original tunes and arrangements. He’s released nine albums on his Graffiti Productions label. He cut his tenth in February with his regular Big Apple crew. The new CD will have a fall national release.
Serrato also wrote for and accompanied underground cabaret and off-Broadway performers.
Education is a parallel passion for Serrato, who has degrees in music (Harbor Conservatory for the Performing Arts) and urban education (Adelphi University). Since the 1980s he’s taught adult ESL. He taught in various New York boroughs. Since resettling in Omaha five years ago he’s been an adjunct instructor at Metropolitan Community College’s south campus.
“I love teaching ESL. I love working with international students,” he said. “It’s taught me to respect other people, especially immigrants. I’ve always been interested in other cultures, other languages. It was a natural fit for me to migrate to teaching ESL and to pursue it to the end that I have.
“I’m a great believer in bilingual education.”
He’s distressed state funding cutbacks threaten something so impactful for students.
“There’s a tremendous amount of satisfaction in knowing we’re helping them to acculturate-integrate into the larger scene.”
He’s outraged by draconian Trump administration measures against illegal immigrants and by Trump’s own hateful rhetoric on immigration.
Serrato has immigrant students compose essays about their new lives in America. He’s moved by their stories.
“It inspires me that I can guide them and give them an opportunity to release their emotions and feelings. It’s like nobody’s ever asked them before. Some of the papers are so remarkable. They spill it all out – eloquently, too – their feelings about being immigrants, living here, the difficulties, the good things.”
Last year he organized a program at Gallery 72 in which his Omaha students read personal accounts that his New York students wrote in the aftermath of the 9/11 terrorist attacks that brought down the Twin Towers. Serrato and his NYC students were only a few blocks from ground zero that fateful day. They watched the tragedy unfold before their eyes.
“I had my international adult students write about their impressions of that day. They were from all these different countries. They wrote eloquently about what they witnessed. I saved their essays and decided to turn it into EYEWITNESS: New York Testimonies. Though they all experienced the same event, we hear it filtered through the sensibilities of their diverse cultures.”
Serrato’s “Broadway Electronic” and “Blues Elegy” compositions provided ambient music for the readings.
“I was very proud of how that event turned out. My Metro students did a great job.”
He said the international student mix he teaches “makes me feel like I’m back in New York.”
His cozy southeast Omaha home is a tightly packed trove. Framed posters and album covers adorn walls. Photos of students, family, friends and jam cats are pinned to boards. Stacks of books occupy tables.
His music life began in Omaha, where he showed early muscial aptitude and formally studied piano.
“I began doing talent contests around town. Schmoller & Mueller piano store had a Saturday morning talent show on the radio. I won first prize a couple times.”
The Creighton Prep grad was brought up the son of a single mother who divorced when he was three.
“She was a pretty remarkable woman considering what she had to go through. There were no resources in those days for single moms.”
The Chicano artist has indulged his Latino roots via study and travel. He made pilgrimages to Rio de Janeiro, Brazil to steep himself in boss and samba. His tune “Blues in Rio” originated there. A YouTube video produced by musician friend Donald Mohr features that tune matched with photos from Serrato’s Brazilian sojourns.
Bumming around Europe, he made it to Spain and grew “smitten with bullfighting’s art and pageantry.” “I began returning to Spain annually for the long taurine season as an aficionado. I’d lock up my New York apartment and fly off. My life as an artist’s model and bookstore manager in Greenwich Village made it easily possible. Such was the Boho (bohemian) life.”
His Latino roots music and world jazz immersion influences following a classical music track. He gave recitals in Omaha. Then he heard intoxicating sounds on his family’s short wave radio that changed his life.
“I thought I wanted to be a concert pianist until I started hearing recordings by Art Tatum and Oscar Peterson,
whose records were being spun out of Chicago. I was very like blown away by these great jazz pianists.
“Hearing that stuff opened up a big door and window into other possibilities.”
Harbor Conservatory in Spanish Harlem became his mecca. He earned a bachelor’s degree in music composition with a concentration on Latin music styles.
“It’s like the repository of the jazz and Latin music in New York after the World War II diaspora. It’s an incredible place. You walk into that school and you walk into another world, of Latin jazz music, which I love.”
His intensive study of Spanish has extended to Latin literature and art.
He cites congo player Candido Camero as “a great inspiration.” “He could play anything. Candido made a record, Mambo Moves, with Erroll Garner, one of my favorite pianists. They play such great duets. I’ve always loved that record. I’ve tried to incorporate some of those ideas into my own music.
“I compose pieces in the bossa style, though filtered through a New York jazz lens.”
Just as Serrato’s never done learning, he’s never done teaching,
“I love education. It’s absolutely vital to me. I’m teaching all the time, as many jazz musicians do. We’re all educators.”Visit www.paulserrato.com.
Read more of Leo Adam Biga’s work at leoadambiga.com.
Archive
DISPARATE DISCIPLINE: Black, Latino Youth 2-3 Times More Likely To Be Suspended From School
DISPARATE DISCIPLINE
Black, Latino Youth Are 2-3 Times More Likely To Be Suspended From School
©by Leo Adam Biga
Appearing in the February 2019 edition of The Reader (www.thereader.com)
The harsh practice of early childhood centers and elementary schools meting out discipline to “difficult” children through suspension or expulsion is netting more attention. Even more disturbing is the higher rate at which African-Americans and Latinos face exclusionary discipline for behavioral reasons. Special-needs kids are also more frequently disciplined than the general student population. Punitive measures applied in special ed are higher yet for kids of color.
Black boys are consistently disciplined more than any other students across the educational spectrum.
These practices and trends happen nationwide in pre-K, elementary, middle and high school settings. Nebraska’s largest school district, the Omaha Public Schools, incurred a $1.85 million penalty from the Nebraska Department of Education in 2015 for disproportionate suspension of special-ed students. A district report for the 2017-2018 academic year revealed blacks and Latinos suspended at two or three times the rate of whites within the general and special-ed populations.
In the wake of community concerns, district suspension data is slated to be discussed at the Feb. 20 OPS board meeting.
Despite studies-reports, strategies-initiatives on the issue, data show a persistent problem here and across the U.S. where there’s diverse student enrollment.
Yet some schools-centers manage misbehavior without resorting to exclusionary discipline as a matter of policy.
There’s consensus by educators, academics and parents that repeated, prolonged removals from the classroom negatively impact a child’s educational, social-emotional developmental progress. It also poses challenges to parents and families.
“There are very few parents in a position where suddenly having a child home for some amount of time is going to be easily managed. This can create significant challenges for families.” said Juliet Summers, policy coordinator for Child Welfare and Juvenile Justice at Voices for Children in Nebraska.
Jana Habrock, director of Early Childhood Mental Health at the Child Saving Institute (CSI), said, “Research and experts agree suspension-expulsion is harmful for young children. It has damaging effects on children and their relationship to school and the message it sends to them about their worth.”
“As a practical matter,” Summers said, “every time a student is suspended or expelled, learning time is lost. When the student returns to class, he or she will be a little bit behind, understand a little bit less of what the class is learning. The student may act out from boredom or lack of understanding, and the cycle repeats.
“This repeat cycle of behavioral choices, being excluded, feeling unwelcome, returning and feeling lost, can certainly foster negative perceptions about school, education and authority figures. Exclusionary discipline, particularly for young children, can have lasting impacts. If a child comes to believe he or she is unwelcome or unwanted in a classroom environment, one defense mechanism can be to decide he or she does not want to be there anyway and act out accordingly. Written or unwritten labels of ‘the bad kid’ can stick, not just with educators, but with children themselves.”
At Nelson Mandela School in North Omaha, principal Susan Toohey said, “We don’t believe in suspensions – we believe in timeouts.” Serving a suspension at home, she said, “is probably not going to be educationally fruitful and a kid gets the mindset that I’m bad.
“Doing restorative justice within the school setting – to change behavior to get the child back with peers – is much better.”
Sherwood Foundation-supported Educare centers do not use suspension-expulsion for the same reasons.
Path of least resistance
Exclusionary discipline is even more problematic when applied arbitrarily or as an expediency.
“At times, I think suspension-expulsion is used to send a message to the parent the behavior is serious,” said CSI’s Habrock, adding, “Sometimes the center or school does not know what else to do to improve the behavior.”
Resources are available to assist educators and parents.
At CSI, Habrock said, “we did not suspend or expel kids, but we also did not know what to do with kids coming in our doors that had been expelled from other programs and had significantly challenging behavior. So, we started a program, KidSquad, to support these kids and get them prepared for the behavior expectations of kindergarten and the school setting.”
Child care centers can become last resort “babysitting” options for expelled elementary school children. Age and developmental-needs differences pose problems.
“I think our program continues to exist and maintain a wait list for services because challenging behavior is hard, overwhelming and frustrating – and teachers and parents don’t know what to do,” Habrock said.
Another early childhood focused training program, Rooted in Relationships, works to prevent suspension by coaching childcare providers to use the Pyramid Model – a positive behavioral intervention and support framework – and providing information about the harm suspension practices cause.
Habrock concedes educators must “balance keeping all children safe.”
Studies and parent testimonies, however, suggest many children get thrown out of school for behaviors denoted as “disrespect,” “insubordination” and “verbal conflicts” that pose no safety risk. The severity of other behaviors resulting in suspension, such as fighting, are open to interpretation. Thus, there’s momentum around Too Young to Suspend legislation that limits suspension-expulsion to only clear threats of physical danger. Nebraska State Sen. Megan Hunt is sponsoring the Too Young to Suspend Act in LB 165. It’s been referred to the Unicameral’s Education Committee.
A mishmash of procedures in private child care centers makes standardized suspension-expulsion rules difficult. Public schools, however, have structures, policies and government funding in place that provide framework and leverage for system-wide uniformity.
“I think we have really great evidence that pushing a student out of school is not good for that individual student, and it’s not good for the rest of the students either,” said Voices’ Juliet Summers. “One of the best predictors of student achievement for a school is not necessarily the poverty or crime rate of a neighborhood but rather how strong the relationships are that parents, administrators, teachers and students describe.”
Lack of staff training and resources may explain why some kids get suspended or expelled.
“Even in classrooms where teachers have bachelor degrees in early childhood education,” Habrock said, “they often have very little hands-on experience in preventing behavior and implementing strategies to improve behavior. That is changing some in our colleges and universities, but there is still more to be done.”
As more children present Individualized Education Plans (IEPs), some disruptive behavior may be rooted in trauma requiring professional mental health intervention.
“More than one child in a classroom with these types of experiences can overwhelm the capacities of even the best teachers,” Habrock said.
Just don’t expect easy answers for “a multi-layered issue,” she and other experts say.
Adequate training and resources are only part of it.
“Making adjustments to meet the individual needs of each child is the gold standard in early childhood education,” Habrock said. “Programs in our community like Early Head Start, Head Start and NAEYC (National Association for the Education of Young Children), accredited child care programs do this really well. Those programs often have additional resources like family support workers or lower teacher-child ratios to bridge home and school to learn the individual needs of each child. Programs without those resources have a more difficult time accommodating individual child needs.”
Early Buffett Childhood Institute founding Executive Director Sam Meisels said, “Almost always a situation that could lead to expulsion of a preschooler is an environmental problem. It’s a simple thing but a not-so-simple or unimportant thing. Often a teacher doesn’t know how to structure a physical space for preschoolers. To expel a child at that age is a failure on the part of the teacher. Mostly we can figure this thing out or get some help to figure it out.”
Said Habrock, “Nearly all early childhood experts agree play is how young children learn. But with the push for academics at earlier and earlier years, we see less and less time for things like center time and outdoor play.”
Making it personal
Educators believing they’ve failed a child is one thing. Parents having their child kicked out of school is another. Tunette Powell and her husband are well-educated, good-earning African-American parents of two young boys. The couple provide a safe, stable home, and yet their sons got suspended from a Bellevue preschool in 2014.
“If you looked at our situation you would say this would never happen – and here it happened. It was a shock and a wake-up call at the same time,” Powell said.
It evoked memories of her own elementary school suspension in her native San Antonio. The experience, she said, put her behind. Since her sons’ suspension, she gets triggered whenever their school calls.
Powell, a writer and public speaker, shared her family’s story in a blog that went viral. She instantly gained a national platform to address the issue. Today she’s Parent Engagement Coach at the UCLA Parent Project and a UCLA doctoral student in Urban Schooling. Her dissertation is based on interviews with black parents, including Omahans, who’ve had children suspended.
Powell was shocked again when she discovered how embedded racialized suspension is in early education.
“We always knew about K-12. For younger children the data is very new. However, we as a nation have been capturing data about this since the 1970s, so at this point we know there’s a problem. But I don’t think people expected the disparity would also be present for children as young as 3 and 4 years old.”
She traces the suspension epidemic and the disparity of its application to when integration introduced more black children to majority schools.
“It has its roots in desegregation and, if we want to go beyond that, we have to talk about the context in which black people were brought and put here in the first place. It’s always been about social control.”
Her thesis, she said, “looks at the damage done to the minds and spirits of black parents when they have a child suspended. They’re sharing some pretty heartbreaking and emotional things about how this is impacting their lives. I call it collective trauma.”
She’s been there herself.
“It’s my life. It’s one thing to read statistics but it’s another to hear stories. And this is where black parents are especially important. We have to be sharing our stories. These parents hurt. They’re embarrassed. They’re made to feel that if my child is in trouble then they’re a problem and that means I must have given birth to a problem. That’s the way we frame right now.
“It’s not to say black kids don’t present behavior issues. But when we see the disparities we have to be honest and say it’s probably not the child that’s the problem.”
Powell echoes others that school disciplinary actions can haunt youth into adulthood.
Omaha business owner David Mitchell dealt with “the negative results of elementary school suspension” into high school, when, he said, he was finally “comfortable exploring my scholastic abilities.”
Bias
“We know it’s an embarrassment for the child,” Powell said. “We know it severs early ties with peers and teachers. It’s completely disrupting to everything about the child’s life. It stigmatizes young people. Your suspension history record follows you in school the same way incarceration does when you’re job-seeking. Teachers are likely to see you through one lens only.”
Nelson Mandela principal Susan Toohey agrees. “We all come to our work with the lens with which we were given, and some of us need to change our lens.”
“We still need a lot of work in breaking down bias and implicit bias,” Juliet Summers of Voices said. “Teachers and administrators have huge hearts for their students, but all of us walk around with implicit biases drilled into us through our culture. Educators are not exempt.”
“Implicit bias is something we see in our work,” Habrock said. “We have done some community training-professional development on cultural competence. We also address implicit bias in our consultation with teachers. This spring we will bring a national expert on this topic to provide training to the KidSquad team and others to improve our skills at addressing implicit bias and disproportionate discipline.”
In schools with diverse students but predominantly white educators, “it’s inevitable biases and prejudices will be a factor,” said Gabrielle Gaines-Liwaru.The former OPS teacher seeks to “change the culture and climate of the public education tree that seems to drop many African-American students like bad apples.”
Summers believes bias is one piece of the situation.
“Another piece,” she said, “is that black students are more likely to attend under-resourced schools in a classroom where a teacher has more students to handle, sometimes more with higher, more various needs. In those environments teachers don’t have what they need to meet any behavioral challenges with the same level of patience and grace and welcoming arms.”
Buffett Early Childhood guru Sam Meisels said, “There are problems of identification with the authority figure who looks different and is different – some children coming from minority backgrounds may not have encountered a white authority figure previously.”
Given bias is real, Gaines-Liwaru said, “Building diversity understanding and cultural empathy through appropriate professional development for educators and support staff should be every urban school district’s mandate, and it should be on-going.”
For Gaines-Liwaru, remedying the “disproportionate suspension mess and injustice” should include engagement in curriculum students “can see themselves in.” She fears “It’s easier to put kids out of the classroom, document negative behaviors and allow suspensions to ensue than to individually research and design lessons that empower students in their racial-cultural identities.”
She advocates “putting resources towards diversifying teaching staff” and “utilizing restorative justice methods that teach kids healthy social skills and behavior management techniques versus suspending them.”
OPS has made diversifying its teacher-administrator ranks a priority. It contracts with the Minnesota Humanities Center for voluntary cultural competency training. The district’s plan to reduce disproportionate suspension among special-ed students includes closer partnerships with Project Harmony and other mental health resources. OPS is also working to implement a problem-solving model called Multi-Tiered Systems of Support for Behavior (MTSS-B) to more effectively and equitably address misbehavior and discipline.
Activism-Advocacy
“It’s not enough to have blacks in leadership roles,” said Tunette Powell. “We have a tendency to be content or complacent with that. We need to really push them. If you’re leading a district struggling with disproportionally, what are you going to do about it? We have to hold people accountable. We are so far beyond symbolism.”
If there’s to be change, Powell said, “black parents need to discuss their experiences and take those to school board and community meetings. We have to become the community leaders and activists. I think people don’t want to listen to black parents because often we don’t have a Ph.D. after our names. But we can’t ignore black parents’ voices anymore.
“I wish education officials would be bold enough to say that systemically we have failed black children. It’s the only way we can move forward.”
Omaha community activist Leo Louis II held fall public forums on school suspension after black parents asked him to be an advocate in dealing with OPS.
“Often times the parent is completely unprepared for what the school has planned for their child,” he said.
He’s concerned that terms associated with adult criminal allegations, such as “assault” and “abuse,” are used to describe some young children’s misbehavior.
The forums have yielded personal testimonies about suspension and alternatives to its practice.
“it’s been my task to educate the community this is not a unique situation to individuals and individual families but a systemic thing,” Louis said. “We’re seeking allies willing to have this conversation and to put in real work toward the solutions.”
One ally, Sharif Liwaru, was fired in December as director of OPS’ Office of Equity and Diversity after forwarding an email from Louis about a school suspension forum at North High to district principals. Liwaru said he didn’t direct or invite school officials to attend but merely shared the event notice. Two previous suspension forums were held at the Malcolm X Memorial Foundation, for which Liwaru is president.
Louis led a silent protest of Liwaru’s firing at a Jan. 7 school board meeting.
The district will not comment on personnel matters.
Liwaru has not moved on from the suspension issue. He’s now executive director of the new grassroots Justice for Kids Initiative that seeks to reduce school suspensions. Organizers and supporters held a Feb. 3 launch to build awareness and raise funds.
He worries alternatives will receive short shrift as long “as educational exclusion is on the table.”
“We need to find alternatives to suspension that actually teach the appropriate behavior as an immediate response to violations and we need to have solutions that build relationships between students and teachers. Bigger than that, we have to have the difficult dialogue about racism and how it shows up here,” said Liwaru, whose wife is Gabrielle Gaines-Liwaru.
“Cooperative relationships and open communication between school, student and parent are fundamental to every child achieving his or her educational goals,” Summers said. “When a student is excluded from the school environment, particularly if strong lines of communication have not already been created, it can send the wrong message.”
School-to-prison pipeline?
Some suggest the jarring interruption of being severed from school contributes to truancy and drop-out behaviors. Once youth come in contact with law enforcement and the criminal justice system, this pattern can be a school-to-prison pipeline gateway. Former U.S. Secretary of Education Arne Duncan said so in 2014.
“You talk about setting kids on a wrong pathway – it just adds to the trauma many children experience. The science is pretty clear,” said Buffett Early Childhood Fund President Jessie Rasmussen. “These things happening in the earliest years of a kid’s life have a direct connection to their trajectory for life. It doesn’t mean we can’t do interventions later, but it’s harder, more time and resource intensive and far too often not successful.”
The skew of blacks and Latinos facing exclusionary discipline mirrors that of individuals in detention and incarceration. The U.S. Office of Civil Rights reports that schools with Student Resource Officers have much higher arrests and referrals to law enforcement for black students than white students. A permanent police presence in schools makes children far more likely to be subject to school-based arrests for disciplinary matters than a generation ago, said ACLU Nebraska Legal Counsel Rose Godinez, “A school-based arrest is the quickest route from the classroom to the courthouse.”
ACLU Nebraska recommends “positive alternatives to exclusionary punishments” to improve student safety.
It’s clear to Powell and others that the same “racialized narratives” behind over-policing, profiling and criminalizing of adult black male scours in schools, where black boys are viewed as “older or less innocent.”
“Just as communities are exploring alternatives to detention, we must consider alternatives to suspensions-expulsions which push kids out and cause them to disengage with education,” said ReConnect Inc. Executive Director LaVon Stennis-Williams. Her program works with families who have contact with the justice system. She sees a direct correlation between exclusionary discipline and delinquency.
“Often what we label as a disciplinary problem is actually the child acting out because he or she is so far behind in school that learning is not making sense,” said Stennis Williams. “Some of this might be due to learning disabilities that go unmet. I have had youth sent to my program for day reporting due to long-term suspensions or expulsions who have gone months with no educational services. So the youth will eventually quit school at an early age and spiral in and out of the juvenile justice system until reaching the magic age to be charged as an adult.”
No one wants children’s welfare to get lost in the shuffle.
“Because a child can be disruptive for your whole class, it’s easy to say in the interest of all the other kids this kid’s got to go, What we should say is that in the interest of all kids all kids need to stay,” said Rasmussen. “This is not anything about the children. This is about decisions by adults, and that’s how we have to see it.
“Our job is to promote this child’s healthy growth and development. Our responsibility is to figure out how best to do that and what they need and to work in partnership with parents to accomplish that,” Rasmussen said. “It’s more important to get the support to the parents and the caretakers than to somehow penalize children.”
Meanwhile, Sharif Liwaru sounds a note of collective remediation. “Because this is so complex,” he said, “we must all take ownership.”
Read more of Leo Adam Biga’s work at leoadambiga.com.
A firsthand account of school suspension and trauma
Black mother, 2 sons suffer the wounds of expulsion
By Tunette Powell
When I was three 3 years old, I was expelled from preschool because — as my mother remembers it — I was “acting too grown.”
I was a preschool dropout.
My elementary experience was similar. Whether it was me “acting too grown,” fighting over something silly or passing letters because I was bored, the end result was the same: I was suspended, and because my mother worked, my Aunt Linda and my grandma watched me.
It was the early 1990s, and on the East Side of San Antonio, Texas, where I grew up, the black community was unraveling. Crack cocaine had kidnapped black mothers and fathers, including my father. When my grandma saw me in the principal’s office, it was reminiscent of the countless times she had seen my father strung out on crack cocaine as he was being hauled off to the county jail. To my grandma, my schooling experience had become my father’s prison experience.
As I got older, rather than focusing on becoming better in school, I focused on getting out. The older I got, the less I attended school. I was chronically absent and despite a B+ average in high school, my mother was forced to pay a fine, to the courts, for my absenteeism. I was assigned to a probation officer and sentenced to Saturday school and after-school detention for most of my 11th-grade year of high school to make up for all of the days I had missed. Despite skipping school and being suspended at nearly every grade level of K-12, I graduated from high school and tried college for a bit before dropping out. I eventually went back to college after a four-year hiatus, and in 2012, eight years after graduating from high school, I became the first woman — and just the second person — in my family to earn a bachelor’s degree. On the surface, it appeared as though the adult-me had outrun the school-suspended child-me. On the surface, the trauma of being cast out by schooling, and the trauma experienced in my family had been conquered.
And then in 2014, the phone rang.
“We need you to come pick up Jason,” the director of my oldest son’s preschool said.
“Is he being suspended?” I asked.
“We don’t like to use the word ‘suspended,’” the director said. “We just call it going home for the day.”
That same year, my oldest two sons, Jason and Joah, who were 3 and 4 years old at the time, went “home for the day” nearly a dozen times combined. By 2014, my life was completely different than that of the 1990s. Having escaped poverty and married now, my husband, who was in the Air Force, and I were living in suburban Omaha. I was a published author, motivational speaker and founder of a nonprofit. But no matter the years and miles removed, that phone call took me back to my childhood; that of not only being told that I was a problem but actually believing it. While on the first of multiple calls that year with my children’s preschool, I was reminded that I could not outrun trauma, out-accomplish trauma, nor could I buy my way out of trauma. The trauma of my childhood experiences with suspension and those of my children permeated my core being. Similar to a solider, safe and away from the battlefields, having a reflexive duck-for-cover response after hearing a loud sound, suspension had “impaired my hearing.” Every time the phone rang, the sound brought tears to my eyes as I was always expecting it to be a suspension phone call. The trauma impaired my sight. As I looked in the mirror, I no longer saw the accomplished woman, only a problem who had given birth to two problems.
For black families throughout the United States, this has become the norm as black children have become the most suspended students in the country, according to a report released in 2018 by the U.S. Government Accountability Office. According to that report and others like it, black boys are the most suspended of any group of students; and Black girls — the most suspended of all girls — have the highest-growing suspension rate of all students. Black K-12 students are nearly four times as likely to receive one or more out-of-school suspensions as white students. Among children in preschool, black children, who make up only 19 percent of preschool enrollment, represent 47 percent of out-of-school suspensions. Furthermore, according to a report released by UCLA’s Civil Rights Project, even among students with disabilities, who carry federal documents that are supposed to protect their civil rights (e.g. IEP and 504 plans), black students are unprotected as they are suspended more often than any other group of students with disabilities. Based on these statistics, it is easy to assume black children – as young as 3 and 4 years old – are the problem, that their behavior and emotional responses are particularly maladaptive to schooling. However, black and white children do not behave very differently; it is the adult response that is different. Previous studies have shown that adults typically view black children as older, less innocent and more blameworthy compared with non-black children, including Latino children.
In my case, I was a curious child who asked a lot of questions and enjoyed talking. At home, my family, especially my father, called me smart and gifted. However, at school, preschool teachers interpreted that behavior as me “acting too grown.” These school discipline disparities are rooted in a history of the dehumanization and adultification of black children. Black children are treated like they should know better, adultified and are consequently robbed of the chance to be children. For example, in 2016, a group out of Yale University found that the early childhood educators tended to observe black students more closely, especially black boys. According to their study, early childhood educators expected black preschoolers to exhibit more challenging behaviors compared with their non-black peers. This has resulted in the increased likelihood of dropping out of high school, academic failure, grade retention and future incarceration – all things that are harmful and traumatic to black children and their families.
As the Trump administration is repealing federal protections that guard students from these discriminatory practices, the fight to disrupt and dismantle what is happening in schools must be fought at the local level – and must begin and end with black families. All across the nation, in cities such as Los Angeles; Portland, Oregon; and Dayton, Ohio, black families are fighting against school suspension and supporting behavior intervention. In Omaha, where black families are met with the same fate as black families nationally, the time to be vocal is now. The single-most-important first step of disrupting and dismantling school suspension disparities is for black parents and students to share their experiences. Additionally, because parents in other states have launched grassroots efforts to combat school suspension, it is important to study those successes. For example, Dignity in Schools – a national coalition of parents, youth and community organizers to end school pushout – offers a toolkit for parents, youth and organizers who want to combat school pushout. This toolkit includes organizing and campaign strategies as well as fact sheets and sample reports.
Right after desegregation, black parents tried to alert us of school suspension disparities. More than 50 years later, the cries of black parents have gone unheard, resulting in black children being the most pushed-out children in the country. However, at this time in history, black parents are lifting their voices in ways that are forcing school districts to hear us and see us. Omaha needs this kind of rallying.
Diana Rogel: A life of service
Diana Rogel: A life of service
©by Leo Adam Biga
Originally published in El Perico (el-perico.com)
Diana Rogel
In the calling she feels to serve others, Diana Rogel of Omaha often addresses community needs.
“I feel like that is my reason for being here,” she said.
Rogel’s done tobacco prevention education in minority communities through UNMC’s Center for Reducing Health Disparities, She’s trained facilitators to dialogue with Latinos on sexual identity issues for a National Human Rights Campaign project, As ßLead Navigator-Program Specialist with the Eastern Nebraska Community Action Partnership, she informed underserved groups about affordable healthcare options.
Now, as Student Advocate with the Latino Center of the Midlands, she’s working with Ralston Public Schools in the Pathways to Success Program.
“I am part of an organization and a program that wants to be that bridge for students to use to get to the next level,” she said of her LCM position. “I am a mentor to students at Ralston High School. For me the absolute most important thing is that youth feel like there are people that care about them and will advocate for them.”
Growing up, Rogel didn’t seriously consider college since she didn’t see other Latinas following that path. That changed when an adult in her life encouraged her to try. It’s what she now does for youths.
“I get to work with students that may not (otherwise) see people that look like me at school. I think representation is very important for students – to see that people like them can be successful. I don’t necessarily just serve Latino students. I serve all types of students who may feel disconnected. As an adult mentor looking out for them, I create that sense of belonging and as a woman of color, I say, ‘Look, I’m successful, you can be, too.'”
Making a difference motivates her.
“Leaving things better than how I found them really satisfies me. I know I did a good job when I’m able to connect people and those relationships build and people utilizd services because of some part that I played.”
Many community projects she initially spearheaded continue going strong today, including outreach efforts at OneWorld Community Health Centers and the Nebraska Urban Indian Health Coalition.
“It’s really comforting to have projects be taken up by organizations. Then I can go onto my next thing knowing it’s in good hands.
“I’m always working on the next thing, the next project.”
The University of Nebraska at Omaha graduate recently enhanced her professional development as a New Leaders Council Leadership Institute fellow.
“The Institute looks for people in the community making an impact. We learned how to be better directors and supports of nonprofits and even to create more opportunities for others to lead, to follow and to mentor through entrepreneurship. We learned all these aspects that create progressive values and communities.
“We each took on a capstone project to implement in the community and see it through. My capstone is to create a youth conference that helps youth of color identify what their next steps are after high school, whether a four-year university or a two-year certification program or a vocational school. The conference will also get youth connected with resources in the community.”
She also wants to connect young Spanish-speakers to jobs-careers where dual language fluency is in demand.
Rogel’s working with LCM and partners to make the conference a reality in 2019.
“If I see a gap where things aren’t in place for youth to be successful, then I want to be a part of creating that for them. I take that to heart,” said the mother of two, “because if I pave the road for them, then when I’m old and gray they’re going to look out for me.”
A decade ago she noted Omaha lacked a young professionals network for Latinos, so she co-founded the Metro Young Latino Professionals Association.
“I took great pride in being able to form that group because we didn’t have anything like it and we had to create it from scratch. It has a huge membership today.”
This daughter of immigrant parents (her mother’s from Mexico and her father’s from El Salvador) grew up in Los Angeles. At 19 she moved to Omaha to be near her godmother and to pursue higher education.
“I really had a passion to learn more about my own culture and history. I helped reactivate the Latino student association on campus (UNO). My involvement got me noticed by the Office of Latino and Latin American Studies – OLLAS. I pretty much got recruited to be a part of that program.”
While a UNO student she worked as an OLLAS intern, went on a service learning trip to Peru and did field studies among Latinos in rural Nebraska communities.
“It made me realize the only way to help my community is to learn about it and to be a resource. That’s what I sought to do once I graduated – to build bridges and to get connected.”
Her role models include fellow Latinas Lourdes Gouveia, the former director of OLLAS, and community activist Marta Nieves.
Through Gouveia, Rogel said, “i’ve learned how to have tough conversations with people who feel disenfranchised and discriminated against.” Rogel said she’s inspired by the leadership Nieves shows and her ability “to bring people together.”
Rogel serves on the Nebraska Democratic Party’s Latinix Caucus board.
“Once I’m a little bit guided. I just take it and run.”
Looking ahead, she said, “I do see myself continuing to serve where I see gaps. I also see myself running a nonprofit that develops skills for youth, particularly in language.”
Read more of Leo Adam Biga’s work at leoadambiga.com.
Onward and upward is theme of Yarina Garcia’s life and her work with young people
Onward and upward is theme of Yarina Garcia’s life and her work with young people
©by Leo Adam Biga
Originally published in El Perico (el-perico.com)
As the first in her immigrant family to graduate high school and college, Yarina Garcia, 29, felt her parents’ pride as she advanced in her studies.
“My dad always emphasized, ‘Your job is to go to school and do the best you can.’ I remember him repeating to me every day, ‘You gotta learn English. That’s the only way you’re going to be able to do things for yourself in this country.’ I took that message to heart,” said Garcia, who with her two younger sisters was born in Mexico..
“Once we all learned English, my dad said. ‘You guys have to graduate from high school.’ He never really mentioned college, but I just took it as I have to go as I high as i can. As a senior I heard all my friends talking about going to college, so I took it upon myself to pursue that.”
The Omaha South High and University of Nebraska at Omaha graduate has become the family’s trailblazer. She’s currently working on her master’s degree. After a foray in media and communications, she’s found her niche as Assistant Director of Undergraduate Admissions at UNO. The bilingual Garcia helps many first-generation students and their parents navigate the higher ed maze.
“I love helping students who are still learning English and struggling, who are lost in the system because they just got here or they don’t understand what’s next or how to move forward in their academic goals.”
Information is power, so she gives prospective students and families what they need to make informed decisions about options and opportunities.
“I find myself playing the role of an educator more than anything else. Even for our U.S.-born students or students who’ve been here many tears, the college application process can be tricky and tedious.”
It becomes even more daunting when applying to multiple colleges or universities.
“It’s complicated. A lot of our Latino parents don’t understand how it works. My job is to help parents and students understand what UNO offers and to hold their hand and walk them through the process. It’s important they see me as a person they can trust and open up to. The conversations definitely get very personal. If I know exactly what their situation is, it makes it easier for me to find resources.
“Some parents are undocumented and they need to know if their son or daughter can still qualify for financial aid or scholarships. My goal is to make sure there are no barriers for students looking into applying at UNO. I want to help be that bridge between them and the school so that they can fulfill their dreams.”
Even though not in her job description, she said she feels duty-bound “helping students not just get here but to actually finish and walk away with a diploma.”
“It’s very important for me personally to know that what I do matters to somebody, somehow. Seeing those results brings a lot of fulfillment.”
She works closely with her alma mater, Omaha South, as well as Bryan High School.
“A big part of my heart is students from Omaha South.”
She’s pleased her two younger brothers are following her lead. The oldest is a UNO sophomore. The youngest is thinking college, too.
Leaving a legacy is important to Garcia, who’s worked hard to realize the family’s aspirational goals in America.
“Just last year I was able to become a legal permanent resident through marrying my husband (Roger Garcia).
The middle sister is in the same process. The little sister is still a DACA recipient.”
Her brothers were born in Nebraska and are U.S. citizens. Ironically. they’re able to travel freely to Mexico and back while Garcia, her sisters and parents have been unable to return to their homeland.
Now that Garcia’s new permanent legal status means she can travel without restrictions, she said, “I’m dying to go back to Mexico. I was really excited to make it this year because it’s 20 years since I left.” But since she’s expecting her second child in January she must wait.
Her own immigrant journey has made her an advocate for Dreamers and DACA recipients. She said she’s spoken to elected officials to help them “understand our story and to hear our voices.”
“Once a Dreamer, always a Dreamer,” she said. “More than anything, it’s an experience
A 2014 internship with NBCUniversal Telemundo in Washington D.C. meant working on immigration issues.
“It was journalism on steroids every day.”
She returned to be part of the inaugural radio news team at Omaha Noticias (Lobo 97.7 FM). She enjoyed it, but burned-out working long days for little pay.
She tried freelancing but found it too unstable. Then she found her professional home at UNO, whose communications department she started in. Her work brought her in contact with the undergraduate admissions team and when a position opened there she was encouraged to apply. She got hired and was recently promoted.
“I love communications and a lot of my job is creating bilingual outreach pieces. I’m definitely passionate about it. I’m doing an integrated media master’s from the University of Nebraska-Lincoln.”
She and husband Roger Garcia, executive director of Centro Latino in Council Bluffs, have their own side business, Garcia Consulting Group. The couple apply her communication and his administrative expertise, along with a shared passion for community advocacy, to Latino-based nonprofits and entrepreneurs.
“We saw a need for a bilingual or Spanish communications group with a specific niche reaching out to Latinos. We both want to use our talents and knowledge to benefit the community.”
Read more of Leo Adam Biga’s work at leoadambiga.com.
Cheryl Logan settles into role as new Omaha Public Schools superintendent
|
Logan settles into role as new OPS superintendent
©by Leo Adam Biga
Originally appeared in El Perico (el-perico.com)
New Omaha Public Schools Superintendent Cheryl Logan, 55, is the first woman to hold the position full-time and the first African-American filling it, period. That’s not what this East Coast native, mother of one and daughter of a career educator mother and law enforcement father wants the community focusing on.
“I hope when people in the district see me or visit with me they see themselves as being able to sit in this seat. I’m as ordinary as you can be. I did take advantage of some opportunities that allowed me to be in this chair,”
she said. “I think if you’re a person of color or a person raised by two middle-class parents or a woman or a parent, you can identify with me.
“I think any of those things are points of common ground. I always find when I meet people there’s a touch point. While my social identity can be very exciting to some folks, it is something probably less remarkable when we relate and just share our common humanity.”
More important to her then being the district’s first double-minority top leader is that her parents met at historically black Philander Smith College and made aspirational lives for themselves and their five children. Logan and her siblings have all achieved highly in their respective careers.
She’s part of a three-generational lineage of educators. Her daughter Cassie is a teacher just as Logan and her mother were before her.
“It is something that brings me great joy. It is very meaningful to me,” Logan said of this legacy.
Her 30-year journey from high school Spanish teacher to principal to assistant superintendent to chief academic officer – earning Washington Post Distinguished Educational Leader Award recognition – expresses her deep commitment to the education field.
“I just fundamentally believe in public education. It changes lives every day. There are children who come through our doors who will change the whole trajectory of their family based on the fact they became well educated. That’s what happened to me.”
In a recent tweet she referred to education as “the profession that makes all others possible.”
“Growing up in the Jim Crow South, my parents could have had a very different outcome,” she said.
Instead, education was a pathway to career success. They raised a family in a Maryland suburb outside Washington D.C., where they set high expectations for their children to do well in school.
“I know that that happened for me and it happens to children every day. Hopefully it happened to children I taught along the way. I know it’s happening every day in Omaha and in schools around the country.”
Logan vied for superintendencies across the country. Once this job came into view, she felt Omaha offered a desired slower pace and OPS mirrored the diverse urban district she came from in Philadelphia.
Being a superintendent appeals to her, she said, because “you have the opportunity to make impact across an entire community and be a role model.”
On visits here prior to starting her OPS post in July, she found a district and community brimming with humility, generosity, forward-thinking and caring.
“The district has very smart people working here,” she said. “All up and down the line I feel the staff’s committed. Arts are thriving, sports are thriving, academics are thriving, career-technical education is thriving. All of those things you think about wanting to lead are in place here.”
Budget and finance are priorities moving forward in a district that made cuts before her arrival.
“The fiscal challenges are part of the landscape of education no matter which district you go to,” she said.
A recently passed second bond issue secured OPS bricks and mortar needs for the next 15 years.
She likes Omahans’ buy-in with in the district.
“The community is deeply committed to OPS. Philanthropic, faith, community groups really believe OPS needs to thrive if Omaha’s going to thrive. I hear this from every person that I meet – OPS must do well.”
She’s grateful for the support she’s received.
“I think part of the support I’ve been given is that people want me to do well because they want OPS to do well. Part of it is having a well-educated community that understands schools are really an important barometer of the health of a city – and they support accordingly.”
A measure of people’s buy-in is the record 10,000-plus respondents to a district survey.
“It’s incredible that many people wanted to give me their feedback to a survey specifically designed to baseline where we are as a district. It was sent to students,
parents, staff, community stakeholders. They were overwhelmingly very positive about the district.”
Once the honeymoon of her hire ends, she’ll have a better gauge for how her “business-like, firm-and-fair, hard-on-the-problem-and-not-on-the-person, hands-on and distributive” leadership style’s going over.
“I think one of the things you have to do is delegate but not abdicate your responsibility. You have to have some sort of continuous or regular feedback group so that as people understand the vision or what needs to happen, you are mostly co-creating that and folks can see that their ideas are a part of it.
“I may go into a meeting with my head going in one way and be very convinced by a compelling argument or case that it should go in another direction. I think there’s a certain degree of openness that’s needed.”
Her job is keeping a big picture view while ensuring kids get the education they need.
“I do think having a bird’s eye view is helpful. You can be more objective, less defensive about things, and give critical feedback that will help us move forward. I’m always going to be super interested in anything curriculum or academics related. That’s the old chief academic officer in me.
“Because I was a principal for so long time I’m always real interested in all things about the principalship and building leadership. I know principals have a lot of influence and ability to make schools really special for kids. You see and feel when you walk in their schools their impact.”
An OPS value-add for her its many immigrant families.
“With deep appreciation I’ve enjoyed serving those communities knowing I was making a difference.”
She believes her Spanish fluency “removes a barrier and allows me to experience the world through eyes different from my own.”
“Resource deployment” can make delivering education “difficult” amid state budget constraints and teacher shortages, she said. “I really want to position the district well in all aspects of talent pool in ensuring we are going to have enough teachers and those teachers can meet the needs of our students. I hope that’s something I will have a long-term impact on. I’m deeply interested in it.”
“This job is really a lot about policy and what we’re going to do, but when it comes to implementation the devil is in the details. Implementation is typically going to be done by folks who don’t have regular contact with you. I stay connected in a lot of ways. First, by making myself accessible, open, listening to feedback and understanding from the perspective of others how they might be experiencing something.”
She likes the community’s-district’s sensible approach.
“There are places where people want to make policy and there are places where people want to make sense, and I think Omaha is a place where people want to make sense.””
Representing an entire district is new.
“This job is very different,” she said. “There’s a lot of public facing.”
She wants her constituencies to see her “urgency around the work” as well as her “commitment, compassion, strategic-thinking and longterm vision.”
“Those are the things I hope I convey.”
Perhaps the most vital relationship she get right is with the school board. Informed by the experience of recent district leaders coming under fire for opaque leadership and contentious relations, her 90-day entry plan emphasized transparency and communication.
“Our vision and mission have to be clear to everyone. Dealing with a board elected by the voting public is a careful balance, especially for a new superintendent. I think the board has been open. They want to understand my leadership style. I’m trying to get into that groove but it’s something that will take time. It is a work in progress.”
Making connections extends to students and parents. She held a town hall meeting with them in September.
She views public education as a compact with people who expect a return on investment.
“Just like any investment you’ve made, when people send their children to the school district, they’re making an investment. It’s property taxes, it’s time, it’s devotion and support for the school. At the end of the child’s K-12 experience they ought to be able to point to exactly the things they got as a result of that experience. If every one of them can fully articulate something that really prepared them for the next chapter or phase of their life, then we will have done a really good job.”
In another tweet, she revealed a philosophy for getting the most out of kids: “Positive relationships with students will yield amazing outcomes that intellect, technical skill and positional authority cannot.”
In addition to mentoring educators on the job, she’s taught graduate level courses to aspiring ed leaders.
The end of September marked the end of her first 90 days on the job.
“It’s actually been a smooth first 90 days. There’s been some bumps and hiccups and I’ve gotten a couple of surprises – and I do not like surprises.”
As she learns the nuances of leading a district in a new community and culture, she knows there will be missteps, and that’s hard for this perfectionist.
“I can be really hard on myself, I can internalize things. One of my friends used to say, ‘Okay, Cheryl, you’re in analysis paralysis.’ I also know I’m fallible. There are mistakes I’m going to make. I’m the first person who will admit if I’ve made a mistake and move on from there.”
As the face of the district, she said, “I am also somewhat hyper-aware I’m modeling behavior for others. Sometimes at board meetings I watch people looking at me because they see how I’m going to react in a stressful situation and it’s an opportunity for me to teach because I think a lot of this job is temperament.
“I do not like to go up and down. If I can be a steadying force, it helps my team. I’m like, we’re going to stay right here in the middle.”
For Logan, “the best days are when I know I made a difference.”
“My final school-based assignment was at Parkdale High School. It’s where I began and ended my career. I was a student teacher there and 23 years later I became its principal. It was so meaningful to start and end my career in that building in a community I grew up in. That was the most difficult job I have had, bar none, because the school needed to be turned around. But it was awesome serving those kids.”
At the end of the day, it’s all about the kids.
“Kids are delightful and delicious wherever you go, and they are here.”
Read more of Leo Adam Biga’s work at leoadambiga.com.
Screen Gems Made in Nebraska – Film discussions and screenings
The next round of noncredit Continuing Education film classes I am teaching for Metropolitan Community College is called
Screen Gems Made in Nebraska
This fall series runs Wednesday evenings, from October 10 through November 14, at MCC’s North Express in the Highlander Accelerator.
We’ll screen and discuss diverse films made in Nebraska from the 1930s through the 2000s.
Please join us.
|
Screen Gems Made in Nebraska
Nebraska is not high on most filmmakers’ list of places to shoot pictures for its lack of arresting locations, paucity of film production facilities and no meaningful tax incentives. Yet dozens of Hollywood and indie feature projects have been filmed here in part or in their entirely since the 1930s. Some even ended up award-winners and classics.
Big budget studio or network projects are a rarity here. Most in-state pictures have modest or micro budgets. Still, there’s a history big screen names working here, sometimes before they were stars.
Native son Alexander Payne is responsible for a preponderance of the major films lensed in Nebraska. Five of his seven features have shot in total or in part in his home state. Each time he’s had to fight to shoot here. His in-state projects have brought A-list talent.
Some made-in-Nebraska films have enjoyed national premieres in Omaha, complete with red carpet, search lights and queues of fans.
From the Golden Age of the studio system to today’s dispersed production apparatus, Nebraska has hosted a wide range of film productions. This fall’s series of film classes will sample seven very different pictures from the relatively small but surprisingly rich filmed in Nebraska heritage.
Fall Class sessions are held Wednesday evenings from 5:45 to 8:45 at the Highlander Accelerator, 2112 North 30th Street.
$$ Bundle & Save $$ Screen Gems Made in Nebraska
Dates:
October 10 through November 14, 2018
Meets:
Wednesdays
5:45 PM to 8:45 PM
Location:
MCC North Express 311 in the Highlander Accelerator
2112 North 30th Street.
Registration Fee:
$145.00
For a limited time only, bring a friend for free.
Register at:
https://coned.mccneb.edu/wconnect/ace/
This fall, Metropolitan Community College’s series of film classes will sample seven different pictures from the relatively small, but surprisingly rich filmed-in-Nebraska inventory.
The instructor is yours truly, Leo Adam Biga, film journalist and author of the book “Alexander Payne: His Journey in Film.”
This bundle includes “Boys Town,” “The Rain People,” “We’re Not the Jet Set,” “Terms of Endearment,” “My Antonia,” “A Time for Burning” and “Wigger.” (five sessions)
NOTES:
Must be 18 or older.
Series skips Wednesday, October 31.
The fall 2018 Screen Gems Made in Nebraska series:
Boys Town
October 10, 2018
5:45 PM to 8:45 PM
MCC North Express 311, Highlander Accelerator
$29.00
MGM came to Omaha to make the 1938 Oscar-winning chestnut “Boys Town” about an institution and its beloved priest founder, Edward Flanagan. The presence of stars Spencer Tracy and Mickey Rooney set the town to talking during the film’s shoot at the village of Boys Town and in Omaha. (one session)
The Rain People & We’re Not the Jet Set
October 17, 2018
5:45 PM to 8:45 PM
MCC North Express 311, Highlander Accelerator
$29.00
In 1968 Francis Ford Coppola and George Lucas came to Ogallala, Nebraska for the last few weeks shooting on “The Rain People,” an arty road picture Coppola wrote and directed that starred Shirley Knight, James Caan and Robert Duvall. While working in Nebraska, actor Robert Duvall met a Nebraska farm-ranch family who became the subjects of his evocative, rarely seen 1977 documentary, “We’re Not the Jet Set.” This was Duvall’s first directorial effort and it’s a must-see for anyone wanting a full appreciation of his screen career. (one session)
Terms of Endearment
October 24, 2018
5:45 PM to 8:45 PM
MCC North Express 311, Highlander Accelerator
$29.00
James L. Brooks found great success creating “The Mary Tyler Moore Show,” “Taxi” and “The Simpsons” and he proved equally adept with big screen comedy when he produced-wrote-directed 1983’s “Terms of Endearment,” whose A-list cast worked on several scenes in Lincoln. Brooks won Oscars as producer, writer and director. (one session)
My Antonia
November 7, 2018
5:45 PM to 8:45 PM
MCC North Express 311, Highlander Accelerator
$29.00
The classic book “My Antonia” by iconic Nebraska author Willa Cather was adapted into this 1995 cable television movie featuring Neal Patrick Harris, Ellna Lowensohn, Jason Robards and Eva Marie Saint. The movie, helmed by acclaimed TV director Joseph Sargent, shot in and around the Stuhr Museum in Grand Island. (one session)
A Time for Burning & Wigger
November 14, 2018
5:45 PM to 8:45 PM
MCC North Express 311, Highlander Accelerator
$29.00
In the mid-1960s, Lutheran Film Associates commissioned Bill Jersey and Barbara Connell to make a cinema verite documentary about race relations in mainstream America. They focused their camera on Omaha, where a young, liberal pastor met resistance attempting interracial fellowship at his North Omaha church. A young barber-philosopher-activist by the name of Ernie Chambers stole the show in the Oscar-nominated “A Time for Burning” about the rupture that resulted among the Augustana Lutheran Church congregation.
University of Nebraska at Omaha Black Studies professor Omowale Akintunde took on the tricky subject of racial identity in his 2010 urban drama “Wigger,” which the writer-director shot entirely in North Omaha. Join this in depth discussion which will also be facilitated by the director himself. (one session)
Register at:
https://coned.mccneb.edu/wconnect/ace/ShowSchedule.awp?&Criteria
A Talent for Teaching and Connecting
A Talent for Teaching and Connecting
©by Leo Adam Biga
Originally appeared in El Perico (el-perico-com)
Liberty Elementary School kindergarten instructor Luisa Maldonado Palomo has reached the top of her field as a 2010 Alice Buffet Outstanding Teacher Award-winner.
The Gering, Neb. native is the grade leader at her Omaha school. She heads outreach efforts to parents, many of them undocumented, through the Liberty Community Council. She’s a liaison with partners assisting Liberty kids and families. The school engages community through parenting and computer classes, food and clothes pantries, and, starting in the fall, a health clinic.
Colleagues admire her dedication working with the school’s many constituents.
“She truly reaches the whole child — behaviorally, academically, socially, emotionally — and then steps beyond that and reaches the family too,” said Liberty Principal Carri Hutcherson. “We can count on her to do a lot of the family components we have at Liberty because she gets it, she has a heart for it, the passion, the drive, the focus, all those great things it takes. She’s an expert practitioner on so many levels.”
But there was a time when Palomo questioned whether she wanted to be a classroom teacher. While a Creighton University education major she participated in Encuentro Dominicano, a semester-long study abroad in the impoverished Dominican Republic. She described this immersion as a “huge, life-changing experience” for reawakening a call to service inherited from her father, Matt Palomo.
“My dad has spent his whole life doling for others,” she said. “He comes from a migrant worker family. He gave up a college scholarship to work so he could help support his nine brothers and sisters. From the age of 15 he’s been involved with the Boy Scouts as a scout leader. He just celebrated his 45th year with the Boy Scouts of America.
“He’s always worked with underprivileged youth, Hispanic or Caucasian, in our small town. He’s such a role model for so many young boys who’ve gone through that program. He has such a sense of what’s right and wrong and he’s instilled that in my brother and sister and I.”
Luisa Palomo (standing) talks to Primarily Math Cohort 3 LPS on June 6.
In the Dominican Republic Luisa felt connected to people, their lives and their needs.
“You work, take classes and live with families,” she said. “You learn the philosophy and the why of what’s going on. You really learn to form relationships with people, which isn’t something that always comes naturally to Americans. Here, it’s always more individualistic and what do I need to do for myself, whereas in a lot of other countries people think about what do I need to do for my community and my family.”
The communal culture was akin to what she knew back in Gering. When she returned to the States she sought to replicate the bonds she’d forged. “I came back wanting that,” she said. Unable to find it in her first teaching practicums, she became disillusioned.
“I was ready to quit education and my advisor was like, ‘Nope, there’s this new school in a warehouse and Nancy Oberst is the principal and you’ll meet her and love her — give it a shot before you quit.’ So I went there and loved it and stayed there. Nancy and I just clicked and she hired me to teach kindergarten.”
Liberty opened in 2002 in a former bus warehouse at 20th and Leavenworth. In 2004 it moved into a newly constructed building at 2021 St. Mary’s Avenue. Oberst was someone Palomo aspired to be like.
“She’s so dynamic and such a good model,” said Palomo. “She has such a vision for how a school should be — it shouldn’t be an 8:30 to 4 o’clock building. Instead it should be a community space where it’s open all the time and families come for all kinds of different services, and that really is the center of the community.”
Oberst and many of Liberty’s original teachers have moved on. Palomo’s stayed. “We have a core group of parents who have been with us from the old building and they know I’m one of the few teachers who have been here all eight years,” she said. “They’ve seen what I do. They know Miss Palomo is the one who spent the night in the ER when Jose broke his arm and started a fund raiser when Emiliano’s house burned down. They know me and they trust me and they let me into their homes.
“They know I’m coming from a good place.”
She said one Liberty family’s “adopted” her and her fiance. The family’s four children will be in the couple’s fall wedding.
Hutcherson said Liberty is “the hub” for its downtown neighborhood and educators like Palomo empower parents “to feel they’re not just visitors but participants.” Whether helping a family get their home’s utilities turned back on or translating for them, she said Palomo and other staff “step out of the walls of this building to get it done.” For two-plus years Palomo mentored a girl separated from her parents.
“It’s that whole reaching out and meeting our families where they’re at,” said Palomo.
Liberty’s holistic, family-centered, “do what’s best for the child” approach is just what she was looking for and now she can’t imagine being anywhere else.
“I really love it here. We’re not just a teacher in the classroom. We do so much to really bring our community into our school so our families can come to us for all these different activities and for help with different needs. It’s one of those things where we let them into our lives and they let us into theirs, and we’re both better for it.”
She’s proud to be “a strong Hispanic” for kids who may not know another college graduate that looks like them.
Palomo recently earned her master’s in educational administration from UNO. Sooner or later, she’ll be a principal. Hutcherson said when that day comes “it’ll be a great loss to Liberty but a great gain for the district.”
Screen Gems Made in Nebraska
The next round of noncredit Continuing Education film classes I am teaching for Metropolitan Community College is called
Screen Gems Made in Nebraska
This fall series runs Wednesday evenings, from October 10 through November 14, at MCC’s North Express in the Highlander Accelerator.
We’ll screen and discuss diverse films made in Nebraska from the 1930s through the 2000s.
Please join us.
|
Screen Gems Made in Nebraska
Nebraska is not high on most filmmakers’ list of places to shoot pictures for its lack of arresting locations, paucity of film production facilities and no meaningful tax incentives. Yet dozens of Hollywood and indie feature projects have been filmed here in part or in their entirely since the 1930s. Some even ended up award-winners and classics.
Big budget studio or network projects are a rarity here. Most in-state pictures have modest or micro budgets. Still, there’s a history big screen names working here, sometimes before they were stars.
Native son Alexander Payne is responsible for a preponderance of the major films lensed in Nebraska. Five of his seven features have shot in total or in part in his home state. Each time he’s had to fight to shoot here. His in-state projects have brought A-list talent.
Some made-in-Nebraska films have enjoyed national premieres in Omaha, complete with red carpet, search lights and queues of fans.
From the Golden Age of the studio system to today’s dispersed production apparatus, Nebraska has hosted a wide range of film productions. This fall’s series of film classes will sample seven very different pictures from the relatively small but surprisingly rich filmed in Nebraska heritage.
Fall Class sessions are held Wednesday evenings from 5:45 to 8:45 at the Highlander Accelerator, 2112 North 30th Street.
$$ Bundle & Save $$ Screen Gems Made in Nebraska
Dates:
October 10 through November 14, 2018
Meets:
Wednesdays
5:45 PM to 8:45 PM
Location:
MCC North Express 311 in the Highlander Accelerator
2112 North 30th Street.
Registration Fee:
$145.00
For a limited time only, bring a friend for free.
Register at:
https://coned.mccneb.edu/wconnect/ace/
This fall, Metropolitan Community College’s series of film classes will sample seven different pictures from the relatively small, but surprisingly rich filmed-in-Nebraska inventory.
The instructor is yours truly, Leo Adam Biga, film journalist and author of the book “Alexander Payne: His Journey in Film.”
This bundle includes “Boys Town,” “The Rain People,” “We’re Not the Jet Set,” “Terms of Endearment,” “My Antonia,” “A Time for Burning” and “Wigger.” (five sessions)
NOTES:
Must be 18 or older.
Series skips Wednesday, October 31.
The fall 2018 Screen Gems Made in Nebraska series:
Boys Town
October 10, 2018
5:45 PM to 8:45 PM
MCC North Express 311, Highlander Accelerator
$29.00
MGM came to Omaha to make the 1938 Oscar-winning chestnut “Boys Town” about an institution and its beloved priest founder, Edward Flanagan. The presence of stars Spencer Tracy and Mickey Rooney set the town to talking during the film’s shoot at the village of Boys Town and in Omaha. (one session)
The Rain People & We’re Not the Jet Set
October 17, 2018
5:45 PM to 8:45 PM
MCC North Express 311, Highlander Accelerator
$29.00
In 1968 Francis Ford Coppola and George Lucas came to Ogallala, Nebraska for the last few weeks shooting on “The Rain People,” an arty road picture Coppola wrote and directed that starred Shirley Knight, James Caan and Robert Duvall. While working in Nebraska, actor Robert Duvall met a Nebraska farm-ranch family who became the subjects of his evocative, rarely seen 1977 documentary, “We’re Not the Jet Set.” This was Duvall’s first directorial effort and it’s a must-see for anyone wanting a full appreciation of his screen career. (one session)
Terms of Endearment
October 24, 2018
5:45 PM to 8:45 PM
MCC North Express 311, Highlander Accelerator
$29.00
James L. Brooks found great success creating “The Mary Tyler Moore Show,” “Taxi” and “The Simpsons” and he proved equally adept with big screen comedy when he produced-wrote-directed 1983’s “Terms of Endearment,” whose A-list cast worked on several scenes in Lincoln. Brooks won Oscars as producer, writer and director. (one session)
My Antonia
November 7, 2018
5:45 PM to 8:45 PM
MCC North Express 311, Highlander Accelerator
$29.00
The classic book “My Antonia” by iconic Nebraska author Willa Cather was adapted into this 1995 cable television movie featuring Neal Patrick Harris, Ellna Lowensohn, Jason Robards and Eva Marie Saint. The movie, helmed by acclaimed TV director Joseph Sargent, shot in and around the Stuhr Museum in Grand Island. (one session)
A Time for Burning & Wigger
November 14, 2018
5:45 PM to 8:45 PM
MCC North Express 311, Highlander Accelerator
$29.00
In the mid-1960s, Lutheran Film Associates commissioned Bill Jersey and Barbara Connell to make a cinema verite documentary about race relations in mainstream America. They focused their camera on Omaha, where a young, liberal pastor met resistance attempting interracial fellowship at his North Omaha church. A young barber-philosopher-activist by the name of Ernie Chambers stole the show in the Oscar-nominated “A Time for Burning” about the rupture that resulted among the Augustana Lutheran Church congregation.
University of Nebraska at Omaha Black Studies professor Omowale Akintunde took on the tricky subject of racial identity in his 2010 urban drama “Wigger,” which the writer-director shot entirely in North Omaha. Join this in depth discussion which will also be facilitated by the director himself. (one session)
Register at:
https://coned.mccneb.edu/wconnect/ace/ShowSchedule.awp?&Criteria
Paul Serrato finds balance as musician and educator
Paul Serrato finds balance as musician and educator
©by Leo Adam Biga
Originally appeared in El Perico (el-perico.com)
Intrepid photojournalist Don Doll reinvents himself by adding video to repertoire of making images that matter
Intrepid photojournalist Don Doll reinvents himself by adding video to repertoire of making images that matter
©by Lei Adam Biga
Originally published in The Reader (www.thereader.com)
Giving Voice to the Voiceless
Since first picking up a camera in the 1960s while ministering to residents of Sioux reservations in South Dakota, the Rev. Don Doll of Omaha has become a well-traveled, award-winning photojournalist. The Jesuit priest is perhaps best known for chronicling the Lakota, Dakota and Nakota people’s attempts to integrate traditional ways in nontraditional times. Two acclaimed books, Crying for a Vision (1976, Morgan and Morgan) and Vision Quest (1994, Crown), depict the suffering and resurgence of these Indian cultures through his haunting pictures and his subjects’ stirring words.
For a pair of National Geographic spreads he lived with Yupik Eskimos and Athapaskan Indians to record the daily rituals of native societies far outside the mainstream. For the Jesuit Refugee Service he captured the human toll exacted by land mines in Angola and Bosnia and the wrecked lives left behind by civil strife in Sri Lanka. For yet more assignments he went to Cambodia, Belize, the Dominican Republic and other remote locales to document the disenfranchised.
“I’ve thought of myself as giving voice to people who normally don’t have a voice,” said Doll, a fine arts professor at Creighton University, where he holds the Charles and Mary Heider endowed Jesuit Chair. “My work has generally been about other cultures — about how other people live and work. It’s been about telling people’s stories and breaking some stereotypes. As a priest, I’m formed by the faith I’ve grown into and one of the foundations of that faith is to have special appreciation for other people. And I think when you point a camera at someone it should be a loving look at that person.”
A master still photographer, Doll’s images are notable for their clarity, power and depth. Portraits, like the enigmatic ones for Vision Quest, are among his favorites. “I love making insightful pictures of people that reveal something of their character, but leave a question mark. I think any good portrait has a bit of mystery and ambiguity in it. Without raising that question, it becomes boring.”
A New Path
Major publications have long sought Doll’s talent, but he has remained selective about the projects he takes. Until recently, he used a 35-millimeter Leica to tell his stories. Now, at 63, an age when most artists slip comfortably into a safe niche, he is reinventing himself as a videographer.
While far from abandoning still work, he now mainly works in digital video and, along with writer Elizabeth O’Keefe, a former student of his who is publications coordinator for the U.S. Jesuit Conference, he is beginning to make waves in this new field. A story he shot and that he and O’Keefe edited and produced appeared on ABC’s “Nightline” last year. The story, “Finding Ernesto,” grew out of a report the pair prepared in El Salvador on the efforts of Jesuit priests to reunite loved ones separated during the civil war there. A second story by the team — this one chronicling a Jesuit priest who is a kind of Martin Luther King figure in India — is being considered for future “Nightline” airing.
The El Salvador and India pieces are installments in a larger, multi-media documentary project by Doll and O’Keefe called The Jesuits: Two Thousand Years After Christ, which illustrates the Jesuit order’s mandate of working toward social justice and respecting other cultures. Additional stories for that project include a biography on Society of Jesus founder St. Ignatius, which sent the filmmakers to Spain and Italy last spring, and a look at the Jesuit presence on the reservations, which brought Doll back to his old stomping grounds.
How he came to photograph old friends in video after portraying them in stills is emblematic of his need to find new means of expressing himself and his faith. The ever-inquisitive Doll attended intensive professional workshops on Web publishing and DVD production. Part of his motivation to learn new forms was to introduce his students to Wed design, a class he has taught at Creighton, and to gain more personal expertise making CD-ROMs.
“I began to learn that just having pictures and type on a page is not enough. You also need sound and video. I saw people multi-purposing their material — interviews, photographs or whatever — and publishing them in different media.” Attracted by that idea, Doll incorporated his Vision Quest work, both the images he made and the sound recordings of interviews he conducted, into a CD-ROM but found many interviews unusable due to excessive ambient noise. “I resolved the next time I did any project the sound was going to be outstanding.” Under the instruction of veteran videographers Doll not only learned state-of-the-art audio but, much to his surprise, developed an affinity for making moving pictures.
Transitioning from the still to video format has meant learning a whole new set of techniques, realities and assumptions.
“Video is a storytelling medium. It’s more about the words than it is about the pictures. Before, I was making good pictures that almost supplanted the words,” he said. “Now, I’ve had to learn how to shoot a sequence — with a wide shot, a medium shot and a close up — and how to cover sequences and how to do interviews and how to put it all together. The guys who have been doing this for 20 years know a lot of tricks I certainly don’t. But I think the advantage I have is the compositional, lighting, and story skills I bring. I’m aware of every visual detail in the frame. I know how to layer a picture with meaning in every corner.”
Overall, he described as “exciting” his adventure in video. Gone, however, are the days when he could quietly insinuate himself into a scene and be an inconspicuous observer with only his small hand-held camera in-tow. Now, he lugs around a big, clattering batch of audio-visual devices that require more set-up, more cooperation, more planning.
For his first video project Doll chose a familiar subject — the reservations. Today, after completing several pieces, he feels he is hitting his stride. “I think I know how to shoot good video now. I’m getting some nice stuff. And I’m finally feeling comfortable editing, which is a whole other skill dealing with time and sound and pacing. The audio cut goes down first and then the pictures are dropped in, which is just the complete opposite of how I worked before. Have I found my voice totally in this new medium? I’m not sure. But the beauty of digital video is that you hear people talk — in their own voice — with real fervor and passion. That’s a powerful tool for people who have something to say.”
Just Doing It
The new technology also allows anyone with the ability to bypass traditional media paths and produce Hollywood-Madison Avenue quality video on their own home studio set-up. Doll shoots with a Canon XL-1 digital video camera-sound system and edits on a dual processor Macintosh G4 (“my souped-up personal computer”) with Apple Final Cut Pro software. “We produced a program for ‘Nightline’ on it, and they were blown away,” Doll said. “Now, you can conceive a project or story or idea and, with a few thousand bucks, actually go out and do it. You can produce professional videos or movies or broadcast television programs. DVD technology is going to be really big. We’ll see a whole new generation of filmmakers.”
Currently on a leave of absence from teaching, Doll plans wrapping-up the Jesuit project (to be released as a DVD) by July and returning to the classroom next fall brimming with new ideas. “That’s how I’ve always done things. I teach for three or four years, then I take off to go do something and then I reflect on that and bring it back to the teaching experience. It’s a mutually enriching process.” As for new photo shoots, he said, “With this endowed chair I have the resources to go photograph anywhere in the world I want if I find a story I want to cover. I have the luxury of going where my heart is. It’s kind of sweet.”