[0:00] Same way you can't watch for, I mean it's a movie and somewhere you like to, you know, like it's a statement, it's a body of work.

[0:08] So the sweat equity in it is very, very different, but the muscle to answer your question, muscle of dedication is the same.

[0:15] Blindspotting talks about police brutality and has gun violence and everything inside of it along with

[0:22] Oakland and you know the East Bay having more gun violence and like school shooting, you know in the news and headlines and stuff like that

[0:30] I want to ask what was your experience with police brutality?

[0:34] You know growing up in gun violence growing up and how it's changed or stayed the same over the years. I was raised to dislike, please

[0:43] Um, because my parents were radicals, like, from here, you know.

[0:51] I think, um, waving aside in my personal run is with the police.

[0:56] I think, um, watching the way a lot of my friends were darker, were harassed by police,

[1:02] was enough in itself.

[1:06] I didn't like the police presence in my schools.

[1:10] I didn't like that there was always a cop nearby, and I didn't feel like that cop was

[1:14] ever for us, but for like catching us.

[1:20] And so that created a very contentious relationship on a personal level with those people,

[1:25] Berkeley High is across the street from the police station.

[1:27] If you break a window or you get into a fight, maybe it's security, but it might be the cops.

[1:33] And then we're talking about getting people into a cycle of a prison industrial complex

[1:38] because now you're giving people records as Juno.

[1:44] So off top, I think, the idea of just getting to a point of my life

[1:51] where I could have a nuanced understanding of police

[1:53] took a lot of personal work, meeting police officers,

[1:57] meeting, we tried to do our best in the movie to not just make

[2:01] like a spooky cop.

[2:03] But we hired Ethan Emberry, who's like a legacy actor.

[2:07] who is one line in the whole movie to give that

[2:11] cop his humanity.

[2:14] Don't get them off, don't not off the hook at all.

[2:17] But to have him play a human,

[2:19] because it just makes it more complicated.

[2:22] And life is more complicated,

[2:23] and it's just, it's an oversimplification when you go like,

[2:26] those people over there are bad,

[2:28] and these people over here are good,

[2:29] it just, it isn't, the world isn't like that.

[2:35] I think, I think separate from that,

[2:38] conversation about guns and I feel like what was what looking back what was terrifying

[2:45] for me is how young I was the first time I was around guns and like had one and friends

[2:51] who had and when I was 20 one of my good friends was shot in the heart by a friend of hers

[3:00] was there to help her, and just killed her at a party.

[3:05] And while I had people get hurt or killed before that in,

[3:11] like, this was like, this had nothing to do with nothing.

[3:16] This was like a black woman who was at an Ivy League school,

[3:20] which was back for the summer.

[3:23] And for me, that was the switch.

[3:26] I was like, oh, no, this is like, I don't want to be around.

[3:29] I don't want to participate in this, I don't want to really be around in a street like that anymore.

[3:34] I don't like this is sadistic and not serving us as a community at all.

[3:42] And as much as like you kind of want to be with when you're growing up and like escalate with everybody,

[3:48] you know, fifth funeral's tough, tenth one's, you get cold, you get a real cold and you're not crying anymore.

[3:57] And for me, I think the big problem was like, I was starting to get real numb and that to me was like, oh, no, this is going to, this is going to scar me for life, and so I had to start actively practicing empathy, like really making sure that I was feeling all the feelings I wanted to have and art was a big mechanism for me to do that, because it was so much permission about being able to express who you are fully, especially as men.

[4:22] And so I think for both of those threats of violence in our upper brains, I think what

[4:35] that ends up happening is like, if and when you leave the Bayer you stay here and you become an adult,

[4:40] it becomes a part of you are like, I don't know, for lack of a better word, you're in trauma.

[4:47] Like, we grew up in a violent place, like these high schools are violent, you know?

[4:53] like fighting to, to just fend off people's like assaults, verbal or physical.

[5:00] And at some point in your adulthood, you're going to have to contend with the violence bigger, small that you experience as a young person, whether it's from police, whether it's from people you know, or it's from, you know, the presence of weapons that should have never been there to begin with.

[5:14] But I, I don't know that there's a clean answer for like, how to contend with it, because the reality is that you shouldn't have to.

[5:22] And it's just one of those things that like, I meet people later, I've met people later in my life and he's never had to deal with anything.

[5:29] And I was like, oh cool, you know, but again, like all things that we can construe as negative

[5:39] and they are, it has developed my muscle for empathy for other people who also have dealt

[5:45] with that.

[5:46] And then when it asks to write something or I want to write something about it, I try to do it

[5:51] with a certain level of delicacy because I know that it's not simple.

[5:55] You know, I know, even though some of my closest friends I grew up with are still kind of

[6:00] caught in a toxic masculinity shit, like they can't let it go.

[6:06] But I know they're like hurt little boys that are scared and I've been scared, their whole

[6:12] life so much that they became hardened and tough and like, and now they make that joke you

[6:18] were talking about earlier, because they don't want to get it, so they make that joke.

[6:22] I think as you get older, you recognize the sickness of what violence of any kind does to

[6:27] people in how it affects them in different ways.

[6:29] I think as we get into our like 20s and 30s and 40s, you start to see it in people in

[6:33] the way that it's matured and who they are and it helps you kind of engage with them

[6:36] in a way that is healthier.

[6:38] But to our point where it's not going to earlier when the cameras were off about like, how

[6:42] to not be reactive to people, and a lot of it is that it's like recognizing what the thing

[6:49] is that's happening.

[6:51] You know, now if somebody runs up on me at a gas station

[6:53] when I'm in town, and they don't know who I am,

[6:55] they just mad about some, we not having this.

[6:59] I'm giving them all the excuses to de-escalate.

[7:03] My pride is done.

[7:04] I've already been, I've did my time.

[7:06] I'm not serving that time anymore.

[7:09] I don't have nothing to prove to anybody.

[7:10] I'll be soft.

[7:12] I'm good.

[7:12] I got people to get home to.

[7:13] I got stuff to do.

[7:14] I got a life to live.

[7:15] And I think a lot of those things for me, with gun violence, has been that, and with police, it's about trying to be a part of any, you know, community solutions that de-escalates the aggressors of art and people, you know.

[7:33] The other corruption here.

[7:35] No, me and my mom were having a talk about this the other day when there was a school shooting in the news.

[7:40] And my mom was always asking me like are you afraid to go to school or like what's your opinion on it?

[7:45] It's like and while I do feel for the people who are affected in the in the school shootings like for those who have died and for those who have lost their children

[7:52] It really does hurt me

[7:54] But at the same time I just kind of like put it or like the chalkboard as like another one and I just go about my day, you know

[8:02] So it's that it's that like push and pull of like how much do I want to feel and like what should I be feeling that I feel like is

[8:09] is very difficult sometimes.

[8:11] And then what are you supposed to do with that?

[8:13] Like, you still gotta go to class, which is nuts.

[8:18] But unfortunately, when we're in a circumstance

[8:20] where things are regular, we have to suddenly still

[8:24] try to live life through those things.

[8:26] And you'll be unpacking that forever, bro.

[8:28] I certainly will be.

[8:30] I think it's awful, but it's also shaped to where I am,

[8:33] and I like where I am.

[8:35] And I like that I get to think about it and go, OK,

[8:38] how to disaffect my folk, what do I want to do with that analysis, what do I want to do with who that has made me?

[8:47] And what do I want to put my energy in the future and if you're so called to like do something about making that better?

[8:52] Great, then you have a personal reason to do it.

[8:56] Thank you.

[8:57] Thank you for joining us.

[8:58] We'd like to thank our host, Richie Nunes, La Segunda, KDOL, youth beat, and of course, Rafael Casal, and see you next time.

[9:53] I think we all kind of have this false narrative of a super hard credit super bad

[10:00] It's only bad when you don't understand it. Media and money helps me focus a lot on budgeting, especially for filming, equipment, and for future projects I want to do.

[10:10] It's not very commonly talked about on like what you should do, how to invest in credit, and I appreciate how they're having like a big awareness, especially since we're younger, to teach us when we're ready when we're older.

[10:26] The attention behind the media and money conference was to provide resources to our students

[10:34] and normally aren't accessible to them.

[10:36] At youth beat, educate, empower, and employ, and essentially, during the summer, they're getting

[10:41] educated.

[10:42] This conference is empowered.

[10:44] This is really a day for them to explore, to learn about their pathways that they can take,

[10:47] because high school's the time to try things out.

[10:49] The other piece is just a lot more practical of how they can prepare for any job and how

[10:54] they can be successful.

[10:54] So they need to know how to carry themselves confidently, how to tell a story from themselves in a job interview.

[11:00] We have a lot of talented students here that if given the right resources,

[11:05] given the right tools, they could be the next Ryan Hooler. It was just beautiful to see someone that

[11:10] young being so hungry and determined. This is a great community surrounding youth. The confidence is key.

[11:17] I think we kind of both taught each other that today and one of my students that I had with me

[11:21] to have the confidence in what I've done or what he's done.

[11:25] By trade, I'm a financial planner.

[11:26] It's my role was really to educate them

[11:28] to give them the foundational information

[11:30] that I wish every kid would receive.

[11:34] You know, opportunities like this, this conference, particularly,

[11:37] is it's important to use not just an Oakland, but everywhere.

[11:40] There's all these financial parts of life that we need to explore.

[11:44] And that's a lot of what I explored in my sessions today.

[11:46] In our community, especially, there's not a lot of programs

[11:49] that teach you about finances.

[11:51] A lot of us are still figuring it out now.

[11:53] I think it's extremely important for the youth

[11:55] to get a head start on managing money well

[11:58] and knowing how to operate media

[12:00] because we're moving into the digital world

[12:01] where everything is media.

[12:03] So media and money coverage is definitely with your firm

[12:06] for the future, because my money handle is fields

[12:09] are not that good right now.

[12:10] And there are definitely, excuse me, how do you handle my money

[12:12] and where do you handle my money?

[12:14] Yeah, I think it helps us sort of future

[12:16] of like, you students to like,

[12:19] to go to get to this certain level that they want to be at.

[12:22] And like have a overall good structure of finance

[12:24] for like when they grow up.

[12:25] We got over 100 folks here that are attending today,

[12:28] helping get this event going.

[12:30] We have approximately 71 students that's comprised

[12:33] of our alumni plus some of our students

[12:36] who attend their curriculum program.

[12:37] We have about 22 volunteers, 18 staff members,

[12:42] some more, the better.

[12:44] The more individuals that we have

[12:45] volunteering, the more career exploration opportunities

[12:48] we can offer, the more interviews we can do, the more students we can invite.

[12:53] Ideally, this becomes an Oakland thing that we can have available to the community.

[12:59] And in order to do that, it's going to take a village.

[13:13] Hi, I'm Shalanda Tilman and I'm the principal at Madison Park Academy Prime Minister.

[13:18] I grew up in Oakland, born and raised. I've been an educator for 13 years, nine years at

[13:24] first as a teacher and now as a principal.

[13:28] So I had some amazing, amazing educational experiences throughout Oakland Unified School District

[13:35] and it built my character and it made me resilient and it's a big part of who I am today.

[13:41] We have a safe, fun, welcome and tight knit community environment here at NPA.

[13:47] Families are a big part of our environment, our community, and our decision-making.

[13:54] At NCA, we offer opportunities beyond the classroom.

[13:59] We have academic support and tutoring,

[14:02] support, full pantry, a digital arts prep, a brand new beautiful library,

[14:08] a community, and team building activities, and filters for every classroom.

[14:13] World up at a time where my parents can always provide a strong educational foundation.

[14:19] I grew up with wonderful teachers, throughout Oakland, who showed me love, who showed me

[14:25] structure and of the least in myself. Specifically, I started for free with Ms. Brure at

[14:32] Golden Gate Elementary. She recognized that I was brilliant, that I was different, but I

[14:38] so happy. I see you overall, yes, my world model and still my world model to this

[14:45] thing. This shows up and the work that I do, every single day.

[15:06] Office is life changing, and it's something that they keep as a part of them for not just the days and the weeks after the program, but for years to come.

[15:18] To feel really happy, I get to yell at a lot of new faces and make some meaning friends.

[15:32] I think all fast is important to build confidence.

[15:36] one. Second is to really explore their gifts. Many things that they wouldn't normally try,

[15:44] they would have tried them. And this may be stuff that students were initially not exposed to,

[15:50] but through OFS this gives them the opportunity to have new interest. I can see the growth in the

[15:56] kids so strong and then when they come back to school all the language that they use to express all these

[16:02] different creative modalities. It's just so beautiful.

[16:11] There are a lot of us here at OVAC, a lot of family.

[16:14] One of my jobs is for them to provide a safe environment to use that energy up.

[16:19] So basically a place again to where they can come out, have a lot of fun, make new friends.

[16:24] Such a gift to be able to do drama, dance, singing, modeling, circus, physical education,

[16:33] and choir, so there's a lot going on here at 0-5.

[16:37] You have a lot of opportunities to be yourself

[16:40] and you never get bored

[16:42] because it's always like, it's more stuff to do.

[16:45] One, two, three, five!

[16:47] There are so many things I love about 0-5.

[16:50] I love that it's intergenerational.

[16:53] I love that kids are coming from different schools

[16:55] and getting a chance to meet each other.

[16:56] I love the joy.

[16:58] There's so much joy here.

[17:00] The children that are here, they really want to be here.

[17:02] The teachers are also for me really nice and they always hope you whenever anything is still hard.

[17:14] I like seeing the old fast because it feels like I'm a part of a community.

[17:18] Everybody here, all the teachers and students all friendly.

[17:21] It's rare that a parent can have value, experience, artistic expression, and not have to pay a dime for it.

[17:33] I

[18:25] felt great to be honored up on stage today to see my large community and my friends come all together to celebrate us being scholars

[18:32] It's just so amazing and standing up there with the lights on us and just reflecting on how much work we did this year was incredible

[18:41] And if you are here today to celebrate our African American scholars

[18:45] Make some noise.

[18:52] Welcome to the Oscar right 25th annual African American academic excellence awards.

[18:59] I think it's important that there are cheap and risky recognized so that they continue to achieve.

[19:04] And it lets us know that we're doing something right.

[19:08] With our black young men is very important to reiterate that we have a chance and that there is promise for us.

[19:18] and that somebody else has done it and they can too.

[19:23] I like to experience my culture and like over on my ethnic background.

[19:27] He's my cultural, so it's always good to get recognized for things that you do positively.

[19:33] I'm really proud of making it this far, you know, continuing my B.P.A.

[19:38] B.P.A. B.P.A.

[19:41] So yeah, it feels really good to keep it up, and keep doing good at school.

[19:45] So stay today, it felt great, I feel honored.

[19:48] It's a good feeling, I feel like, you know,

[19:52] I feel like, you know, I worked for it.

[19:54] It's just a really good feeling I do not know how to explain.

[19:57] It makes it good for our community, sorry.

[20:05] We are gathered here to recognize our African-American students who have earned a place on the honor roll.

[20:20] Tonight is a celebration of excellence, perseverance, and promise.

[20:28] Let's listen to each other, it's not about you, it's not about me, it's about our children.

[20:37] I think it honors Oscar's legacy A because he did something, and because he did something, this has happened.

[20:44] We had the benefit of being here when he was still alive, but having this maintained after he's gone showcases that education is primary,

[20:54] and he instilled the message that education for African-American children of Oakland is number one goal.

[21:01] This is beautiful to have and this will keep his memory living on.

[21:07] He's going to live on and all of these children. This is keeping him alive.

[21:37] West Oakland is an integral and valued part of the city with a long and rich history.

[21:42] It includes the city's oldest school, Prescott Elementary,

[21:46] and the historic school of Champions, what climates high and numerous others.

[21:51] We're underneath one of these solar cannabis.

[21:53] It's really fulfilling our promise to the community around creating a sustainable future for our kids.

[21:59] From early childhood investments to elementary to middle and then to high school,

[22:04] this is a coordinated effort to be able to ensure complete investment in the full pathway for our students in West Auckland.

[22:11] My favorite part is like the loose lights.

[22:13] There's three now. It used to be like one or two.

[22:16] It is more colorful.

[22:17] Now they can see like who we are like dover.

[22:19] The windows have been an issue here since I've been here for the last 10 years.

[22:23] You see students appreciate it.

[22:25] It doesn't feel as hot. There's an obvious difference in the heat.

[22:29] Now that we've finally got blinds, that's been helpful too to be able to block out some of the sun.

[22:34] And then visually it's impacting students because it looks nice.

[22:37] The windows look good. It looks new.

[22:39] It feels like it's bringing more like a good energy.

[22:41] What was missing was of just kids motivated to even want to come outside to play.

[22:47] So Martin Luther King Jr. students, the impact of the new YAR shows that everybody cares about them.

[22:54] There's just like kind of more joyful play. Having things to do and nice facilities to do it with is a huge difference.

[23:02] Our investment at McClimans is transformational. I'm still excited to be delivering a project at McClimans that honors the legacy of

[23:11] incredible people who have been students and community members and staff at McClimans.

[23:16] We're launching a nearly $100 million investment in West Oakland and specifically McClimans.

[23:22] It started with the naming of the gym and honoring the legacy of Bill Russell,

[23:27] but now it'll be a full modernization of the school that will be breaking ground this spring.

[23:31] So we're really excited about that project because it's a cornerstone in the West Oakland community.

[23:35] I'm excited because I'm a local kid. I grew up here. I went to Lopiet Elementary. I went to

[23:42] Low Middle School and then came here my 9th and 10th grade year. So coming back to the neighborhood and

[23:48] giving back just coming back home, you know, to where I was raised, no one in the community, no one's people. I was excited.

[23:54] When you get a new house or a new bicycle, it just does something for you and motivates you. And so having

[23:59] a new place to come to, this is new smell is a newness about it. And then people want to take care of it.

[24:05] These projects ultimately create safe, welcoming, and high-quality learning environments that also strengthen schools as neighborhood anchors and serve the community beyond the school day.

[24:43] Different people come in and I get painted different colors. I get cleaned, I get new furniture, but I stay in the same spot in the city.

[24:52] If you use up the moon to make macaroni and cheese, the stars will come together to make a new moon.

[25:00] I felt that it was fun. I usually just read our school, reading is fun. I got a lot of good books in the library.

[25:09] To see our students excited about it is incredible. Oh, this is an exciting moment for me personally. I know reading is everything.

[25:17] And to have the whole city focus on reading, a coalition of people coming together at every level from birth to adult,

[25:26] making the connection to reading with your health, with your body, with joy.

[25:31] I'm here today to really announce that Oakland is a reading town in the spot.

[25:35] Are young people deserve to be able to be literate and to be able to read and write

[25:42] it's their future and we have a duty and responsibility to partner with the school district.

[25:48] So this is a citywide effort.

[25:50] So I like events like this, so we can come and get free books, I think books should be accessible.

[25:56] Being the community and celebrated education, literacy, get some books, and just continue this

[26:03] beautiful vibe of the Oakland Unified School District.

[26:06] I'm a former reading teacher, so that's why I'm excited to be here.

[26:10] I love books.

[26:11] Like the mayor said, I don't think there's a reading town.

[26:13] Starting with the two students who read their poems, it's the energy just built from there.

[26:18] and we're not only getting in talking to the students

[26:19] and looking at them being excited about their writing,

[26:22] looking at here and all our vendors

[26:23] and knowing those kids and adults are gonna

[26:25] go home and read tonight.

[26:26] It's a very exciting look that momentum is great.

[26:29] Our school district and our school partners

[26:30] are gonna be encouraging and incentivizing

[26:33] tracking reading minutes, incentivizing reading

[26:36] for 20 minutes a day in school but also at home.

[26:40] And so they're really gonna be working on ways

[26:42] that we can actually log reading.

[26:45] We built, we designed open as a reading town

[26:47] because we knew that there's a lot of competing stuff

[26:50] for our attention, our phones, our lives.

[26:53] And so we know that one of the things we can do

[26:55] to get reading right is we can read more.

[26:58] So excited to be here today

[27:00] and our third annual lit fast.

[27:01] This is number 20 for families to come

[27:03] and celebrate their students reading and writing.

[27:05] And we have the Oakland Public Library

[27:07] giving away books.

[27:08] We have eat, learn, play, giving away back hacks.

[27:11] And we have food for families to come

[27:13] because we know they're gonna be here from four to six.

[27:15] and we all need to eat at yummy meals.

[27:17] I think every year we have tweaked it

[27:19] to really figure out the perfect combination

[27:22] of showcasing student writing,

[27:25] getting kids up on a stage

[27:26] where they can really be heard.

[27:28] This event is all about our kids.

[27:30] I think that the most important question

[27:32] is whether the kids feel celebrated today

[27:35] and feel the pride of Oakland that is in this space

[27:38] and know that what they read and what they write

[27:41] and how they grow matters to everybody who's here

[27:43] and to this whole city.

[27:53] We are the TCN Panthers, and I am so excited I'm here.

[28:01] Hi, I'm Lacey Lefkowitz, and I am a proud principal at Think College now.

[28:05] Our community was actually formed by families.

[28:08] Families who wanted to see their students and their families in college now.

[28:14] We have both art and science lab.

[28:17] Students can also spend time each week in the library, each month in the garden,

[28:23] And each week with our partner heroes where they have PE spaces, parents at

[28:29] the college now can expect a lot of different opportunities to engage.

[28:33] First, we have our three signature events.

[28:36] We have our literacy night where we celebrate our love of learning and our love of

[28:40] reading.

[28:41] Our second signature event is our unity night where we celebrate all of the wonderful

[28:45] cultures that come together.

[28:48] And number three is our Black Excellence Night where we further celebrate our

[28:52] community. We hope that you will all join us in our

[28:56] think college now community. You will be joining a legacy of

[29:00] families who have come together both to found this school and to continue

[29:05] to work to make sure that all of our students can be successful in

[29:09] college careers and beyond.

[29:33] I learned about the problems of the

[29:42] and reconstruction, and I learned how the community solved it.

[29:46] The engineer was John August then there was about a lot of laborers working on this.

[29:53] I felt the Golden Gate Bridge. I learned all of the different parts of the bridge.

[30:00] Incaples, cables, the roadway, and the towers, the wallets, edinburg, wildlife crossing on the 101 freeway in LA.

[30:13] It's only for wildlife and no humans can go on it. It has plants on the top so the animals can find stuff for their family.

[30:22] With larger projects, sometimes it can be hard for students to see that end goal because it can feel so far away and there's all of these tedious steps that they feel like they're doing to get to this like long term thing.

[30:34] So this was like our cumulative project our ELA module and the focus was informational text so students were learning research skills and how to look at different sources and kind of synthesize information and put it together.

[30:47] That said, I still was one of the best materials to build with because it's a used-to-home.

[30:52] But Burpland Bridge was the first steel suspension bridge in the world,

[30:56] and one of the longest steel suspension bridges at the time,

[30:59] standing at 6,016 feet.

[31:01] It was kind of scary, but since I did it with my team, it was like, wasn't that scary?

[31:07] They're nervous, it feels hard, but it's something special about doing a hard thing.

[31:13] It connects to their competence and realizing that they could do it.

[31:17] I learned that British take a long time to do, they help the community a lot and they help people cross over to their destinations.

[31:27] I never knew that inside, inside of the Brooklyn Bridge there's like, I think so a room, a museum, I'm pretty sure.

[31:33] It was like the most shop shop thing to me, because I never heard of it.

[31:38] But I think what is the most special time is it was this week, because it was really like the grind time,

[31:44] when they started to realize okay we're super close to our finish line and now we're gonna

[31:49] really like lock in as the kids would say how I built the bridge it was like at first my

[31:54] dad was like kind of building the sticks wrong kind of but we fixed it up I used a little

[32:02] cockable sticks and cardboard for the streets I think it when you accomplish anything big in life

[32:07] it makes it like when you come across other challenges those challenges don't seem as hard at

[32:13] I can take one step to accomplish in that.

[32:27] This is a lot to me because back then,

[32:30] that you felt like I was going to start it,

[32:32] like it could be on this slavery and what the hard times.

[32:36] And if you're here today,

[32:36] it's kind of writing and telling me that 100 year anniversary

[32:41] of not just human, everything's been happening.

[32:45] This event is important to me because our dancing,

[32:49] Few of the big audiences is just like for fun, but they have an inspired man for it.

[32:56] We need more programs like this, not just in February. The young people really get excited about being able to showcase their hard work,

[33:06] and I think it gives them a bigger sense of purpose.

[33:10] I get to express how I feel through dancing, and I get to tell them what my culture is.

[33:16] It was important to find out what makes young people even want to move.

[33:21] Words are really powerful because those words turn in the movement.

[33:25] You know, movement turns into bigger movement and then movement turns in the chain.

[33:30] The expanded learning arts programs and initiative that comes out of central office.

[33:35] And our goal is to provide our students with high quality arts instruction from Oakland

[33:43] based professional teaching artists. West Oak and Middle School has an a very good job. I

[33:48] feel that I feel like making sure we have that connection, especially through music and

[33:52] through dance. This collaboration is important and it reminds me a lot of hip hop. Hip

[33:57] hop is a collaboration. It's a collaboration of music, DJs, dancers, B boys, taggers, you know,

[34:04] spray painters. Dame, creating that track and then kind of like bringing Mari at one to the

[34:09] and like you know what can we do and the kids kind of like feel right into it.

[34:14] majority of the kids here do music and dance as well so it's not a hard

[34:16] transition for them to do that. But I think that that showed a positive

[34:19] collaboration which also passed down to them.

[34:21] Always learn something working with young people in general because they have a lot

[34:25] of creative ideas. They may not always have the technical abilities but the

[34:30] lens that they use to see the world is always something in the future and

[34:34] hopeful. Before I started the program I don't have much confidence because I

[34:39] to get bullied. But now I have my confidence. It's actually fun to run a new thing.

[34:45] I hope you learn that I'm good at making the beach.

[34:48] It's so cool. How good I can be at something wonderful in my mind.

[34:52] Students have an opportunity to learn how to conceptualize their ideas.

[34:57] They learn the tools of the train, whatever it is.

[35:17] I love that I can express myself in movement. I can laugh with my friends. And I love that I can, like, do an active activity, like, almost every day. It makes me excited to come to the school.

[35:38] This is my first time dancing like I never dance football. It's really wonderful. It's to be here. I learned a many dances.

[35:48] The elementary dance teachers and the elementary music teachers and the elementary arts teachers. Each of those groups gets to meet every single week.

[35:56] We call it PD but it's really more of a professional learning community. The whole focus of it is that teachers are learning from each other.

[36:02] I remember when I first got this position, one of the things I was really worried about was being on an island and being by Masa.

[36:08] If then I met Emily, and it was a gang-changer, I think the mentorship has been great, not just from Emily, but also from the other teachers and then getting to see their work and how it can influence what I do with my students is really helpful.

[36:23] being of first time teacher was very intense and overwhelming. I don't know what this would be,

[36:31] but it's sort of like corraling energy rather than trying to like pull like they already have

[36:39] so much and I'm just giving it structure. I felt like my eyes didn't know how to see all of the things

[36:47] that were going on in the room and to process it to be able to make a decision and I probably

[36:52] would have cried if it wasn't for the group. I was kind of nervous, but I

[36:57] don't do with it. I was still nervous, but I just love all the choreography

[37:06] and all of them move me.

[37:08] Any arts is a challenge to make it fit into a school culture. We created a dance

[37:14] framework, we created a vision for dance education, and then as we started to

[37:18] have positions that opened up, we were able to convince the powers of

[37:22] to turn, initially, one of them into a dance physician,

[37:26] very went from one teacher to two teachers to what do we have now

[37:30] to offer something that are doing elementary dance across our schools.

[37:34] My favorite part about being in this position class is performing and saying like

[37:40] poems and I love when she teaches us and she makes us laugh a lot.

[37:44] Sometimes she has a special guest or we're doing something special, like when I was

[37:52] our performance. I love dancing because it makes me feel happy and it brings me a motion.

[38:02] My philosophy for dance is really about building the students and building their character

[38:07] outside of dance. Among the discipline of dance and how that discipline can translate into

[38:12] other areas in Hawaii. So it's about how we can build the most people through dance.

[38:26] But for this program my attendance was okay. I really just like doing internships this

[38:32] stuff so I just want to post it and I just want to sign up for it for fun.

[38:36] Well I'm just really proud I happen to be at Calsomon, the home of the nights. Education opens

[38:41] the door to everything. Schools bring those opportunities to students, students bring

[38:47] opportunity to the community. Since 2015 we've been doing one iteration or another of the

[38:53] day counts at 10 this town. I just started with maybe 20 winners per year and then we've

[38:57] increased it up year over year because we believe in the power of spreading awareness in this

[39:02] way. The celebration today is to honor a student, Wendell and who won $500 for having near

[39:07] perfect attendance. Monica's students is not too late. School goes out away through May. We do this

[39:14] every month. Coming to school that's the only way that you can be considered.

[39:22] You've been

[39:25] We just believe in awarding people for going and showing up when there's a position

[39:30] I'm up and doing what they're supposed to do.

[39:32] School can help me get through and pass my accomplishments.

[39:37] If they get me to a further point in life, I'm getting closer to my dreams every day.

[39:42] I just feel like Yoshiko to school did that in good y'all learning.

[39:46] And yeah, it's going to take y'all somewhere like...

[40:02] My advice is to use back for others and listen to a door.

[40:08] Don't crash out. Try your best not to procrastinate.

[40:11] Do as much as you can. Listen to your peers and be nice to everyone.

[40:15] Focus and learn and if you feel you mind it, you can do anything you want.

[40:18] Keep trying and never give up. Believe in yourself and be chill.

[40:22] Never give up and keep working. Be yourself and make decisions.

[40:26] Believe in yourself that you could do anything you want.

[40:29] Never give up and keep on trying.

[40:31] Be mindful to a lot of people always communicate with your teachers because I wouldn't have gone here

[40:37] If I didn't communicate to my teachers that I needed help always listen to your teacher

[40:42] Be kind to others and be nice to people find a good group of friends people that are positive be good and listen to the teachers

[40:50] Just enjoy the year make friends get along with everyone. You all year homework

[40:54] This school you're I'm looking forward to keep taking college classes making new friends and learning stuff

[41:00] for myself to be smarter, making new friends

[41:04] and maintaining good grades.

[41:06] I show up to 60, I show up to learn.

[41:09] I show up to roll, I show up to be my desk.

[41:12] I show up for my future.

[41:14] We got work

[41:21] to take, we got

[41:26] work to take.

[41:26] We got work to take, we got work to take.

[41:32] I think we all kind of have these false narratives of,

[41:35] like, it's super hard, it's super bad.

[41:38] But it's only bad when you don't understand it.

[41:40] Media and money helps me focus a lot on budgeting.

[41:44] especially for filming and equipment and for future projects I want to do.

[41:48] It's not very commonly talked about on what you should do, how to invest in credit,

[41:54] and I appreciate how they are having a big awareness especially since we're younger,

[42:01] to teach us when we're ready when we're older.

[42:04] The attention behind the media and money conference was to provide resources to our students

[42:12] that normally aren't accessible to them.

[42:14] At youth be educate and power and employ.

[42:16] Essentially during the summer,

[42:18] they're getting educated.

[42:20] This conference is empowered.

[42:22] This is really a day for them to explore,

[42:24] to learn about the prepared ways that they could take,

[42:25] because high schools of time to try things out.

[42:27] The other piece is just a lot more practical

[42:29] of how they can prepare for any job

[42:31] and how they can be successful.

[42:33] So they need to know how to carry themselves confidently,

[42:35] how to tell a story from themselves

[42:37] in a job interview.

[42:38] We have a lot of talented students here

[42:40] that if given the right resources of given the right tools, they could be the next Ryan

[42:45] Kooler.

[42:46] It was just beautiful to see someone that young being so hungry and determined.

[42:51] This is a great community surrounding you.

[42:54] The confidence is key.

[42:55] I think we kind of both taught each other that today and one of my students that I had with

[42:59] me just having the confidence in what I've done or what he's done.

[43:02] By trade, I'm a financial planner.

[43:04] My role was really to educate them to give them the foundational information that I wish

[43:09] every kid would receive.

[43:12] You know, opportunities like this, this conference, particularly is,

[43:15] it's important to use not just an Oakland, but everywhere.

[43:18] There's all these financial parts of life that we need to explore.

[43:22] And that's a lot of what I explore to my sessions today.

[43:24] In our community, especially, there's not a lot of programs that teach you about finances.

[43:29] A lot of us are still figuring it out now.

[43:31] I think it's extremely important for the youth to get a head start on managing money well

[43:36] and knowing how to operate media because we're moving into the digital world.

[43:39] or everything is medias.

[43:41] The media and many conferences is definitely with your parents,

[43:44] both future, because my money hit the Westfield

[43:46] are not that good right now.

[43:48] And there are definitely tissue in the head of my money

[43:50] and like, where to head of my money?

[43:52] Yeah, I think I have this sort of future of like,

[43:54] you students to like sort of my what path

[43:57] we need to go to get to this certain level

[43:59] that they want to be at.

[44:00] And like, have a overall good,

[44:01] like, structure of finance for like, when they grow up.

[44:03] We got over 100 folks here that are attending today,

[44:06] helping get this event, go in.

[44:08] We have approximately 71 students that's comprised of our alumni plus some of our students

[44:14] who attend their curriculum program.

[44:16] We have about 22 volunteers, 18 staff members, the more the better, the more individuals

[44:23] that we have volunteering, the more career exploration opportunities we can offer, the more

[44:28] interviews we can do, the more students we can invite.

[44:31] Ideally, this becomes an Oakland thing that we can have available to the community.

[44:37] And in order to do that, it's going to take a village.

[45:00] 15 years, nine years at MPA primary. First, as a teacher, and now as a principal.

[45:06] I had some amazing, amazing educational experiences throughout Oakland, Unified School District,

[45:14] and it built my character and it made me resilient, and it's a big part of who I am today.

[45:19] We have a safe, fun, welcome and tight knit community environment here at MPA.

[45:25] families are a big part of our environment, our community, and our decision-making, and in

[45:33] today we offer opportunities beyond the classroom.

[45:37] We have academic support and tutoring, support, full-pantry, a digital arts prep, a brand

[45:44] new beautiful library, a community, and team building activities, and still trips for

[45:51] We're all up at a time where my parents can always provide a strong educational foundation.

[45:57] I grew up with wonderful teachers throughout Oakland who showed me love, who showed me structure, and of the least in myself.

[46:06] Specifically, I started fourth grade with Ms. Brure at Golden Gate of America.

[46:11] She recognized that I was brilliant, that I was different, but I also had Lee.

[46:18] She was overall just my role model and still my role model could have said, and he shows up in the work that I do every single day.

[46:34] He's great.

[46:36] I'm going to teach him.

[46:43] We are the TCN Panthers, and I am so excited I'm here.

[46:47] Hi, I'm Lacey Loughwoods, and I am a proud principal at Think College now.

[46:52] Our community was actually formed by families, families who wanted to see their students and their families in college now.

[47:01] We have both art and a science lab. Students can also spend time each week in the library, each month in the garden,

[47:10] and each week with our partner heroes where they have PE spaces. Parents at the college now can expect a lot of different opportunities to engage.

[47:20] First, we have our three signature events, we have our literacy night, where we celebrate our love of learning and our love of reading.

[47:28] Our second signature event is our unity night, where we celebrate all of the wonderful cultures that come together.

[47:35] And number three is our Black Excellence Night, where we further celebrate our community.

[47:39] We hope that you all join us in our thank college now community.

[47:44] you will be joining a legacy of families who have come together, both to

[47:50] found this school and to continue to work to make sure that all of our

[47:54] students can be successful in college careers and beyond.

[48:18] I'm Dr. Lucinda Taylor, Principal of West Lake Middle School.

[48:21] I feel like my work is still important, changing the lives of black and brown kids in

[48:27] Oakland.

[48:28] We're here to make another impact in Oakland in a way that creates leaders

[48:32] at politicians, doctors, lawyers, the focus here at West Lake this year and in the years

[48:38] come will be to increase the literacy scores of our students and so we have a beautiful

[48:44] full service library with a librarian, a writer's room. West Lake also hosts a merit of athletic

[48:52] programs. We have sports like volleyball, track and field basketball, tennis, soccer for our students

[49:00] participate in during our sports program. All right, here at West Lake, West Lake also hosts

[49:08] a number of Vapa classes, which includes digital media. It includes banned. It includes art.

[49:15] It includes choir and a host of other opportunities for our students to engage in the arts

[49:21] in the way that makes them young and free and fresh. Some of the interest that our students have

[49:28] where they're very passionate are our clubs.

[49:30] And one of them is Robotics this year.

[49:33] Our students competed in the district wide challenge,

[49:36] but we have a variety of clubs,

[49:39] including cooking, barbershop.

[49:41] We actually have math and reading clubs

[49:44] and a host of LGBTQ and personalized clubs right here at West Lake.

[49:50] So with about 30 years in Oakland,

[49:52] I am here at West Lake to create conditions

[49:54] for our students to be excellent readers

[49:57] and writers, and be able to compete global.

[50:00] So our focus is creating conditions in the classrooms, hiring qualified teachers to match the energy of our students and make sure that they are prepared.

[50:09] Our attendance is up, our discipline is down, and that's all because we know that restorative justice works.

[50:17] And it's about surrounding them with people who care and actually love them.

[50:28] He's great in the whole city of Michigan.

[50:36] A

[51:27] Stokeland is an integral and valued part of the city with a long and rich history.

[51:32] It includes the city's oldest school, Prescott Elementary,

[51:36] and the historic school of Champions, Le Climins High, and numerous others.

[51:41] We're underneath one of his solar cannabis.

[51:43] It's really fulfilling our promise to the community around creating a sustainable future for our kids.

[51:49] from early childhood investments to elementary, to middle and then to high school.

[51:54] This is a coordinated effort to be able to ensure complete investment in the full pathway for our students in West Auckland.

[52:01] My favorite part is like the loose lights. There's three now. It used to be like only two.

[52:06] It is more colorful. Now they can see like who we are like, do we?

[52:09] The winners have been an issue here since I've been here for the last 10 years.

[52:13] You see students appreciate it. It doesn't feel as hot. There's an obvious difference in the heat.

[52:19] Now that we finally got blinds, that's been helpful too to be able to block out some of the

[52:23] sun. And then visually, it's impacting students because it looks nice. The windows look good,

[52:28] it looks new. It feels like it's bringing more like a good energy. What was missing was a of just

[52:34] kids motivated to even want to come outside to play. So Martin Luther King Jr. students,

[52:39] the impact of the new yarr shows that everybody cares about them. There's just like kind of

[52:48] facilities to do it with is a huge difference.

[52:52] Our investment at McClimans is transformational.

[52:55] I'm so excited to be delivering a project at McClimans that honors the legacy of incredible people

[53:02] who have been students and community members and staff at McClimans.

[53:06] We're launching a nearly $100 million investment in West Oakland and specifically McClimans.

[53:12] It started with the naming of the gym and honoring the legacy of Bill Russell,

[53:16] But now it'll be a full modernization of the school that will be breaking around the spring

[53:21] So we're really excited about that project because it's a cornerstone in the West Oakland community

[53:25] I'm excited because I'm a local kid. I grew up here. I went to

[53:30] Lafayette elementary. I went to low middle school and then came here about my ninth and 10th grade year

[53:35] So coming back to the neighborhood and given back just just coming back home

[53:40] You know to where I was raised no one the community knowing people was I was excited when you get a new house

[53:44] on new bicycle, which has just done something for you and motivates you and so

[53:49] having a new place to come to, it says new smell is a newness about it and

[53:54] people want to take care of it. These projects ultimately create safe,

[53:58] welcoming and high quality learning environments that also strengthen schools

[54:03] as neighborhood anchors and serve the community beyond the school day.

[54:33] Different people come in and I get painted different colors. I get

[54:37] I get cleaned, I get new furniture, but I stay in the same spot in the city.

[54:43] If you use up the moon to make macaroni and cheese, the stars will come together to make a new moon.

[54:50] I felt that it was fun.

[54:52] I usually just read at school, reading is fun.

[54:54] I got a lot of good books in the library.

[54:59] To see our students exist.

[55:00] Excited about it is incredible. Oh, this is an exciting moment for me personally. I know reading is everything and to have the whole city focused on reading, a coalition of people coming together at every level from birth to adults, making the connection to reading with your health, with your body, with joy.

[55:21] I'm here today to really announce that Oakland is a reading town and the spot are young people.

[55:26] Our young people deserve to be able to be able to be literate and to be able to read and write.

[55:33] It's their future and we have a duty and responsibility to partner with the still district.

[55:38] So this is a citywide effort.

[55:39] It looks like Spencer.

[55:41] I like events like this so we can come and get free books.

[55:44] I think books should be accessible.

[55:45] being the community and celebrating education, literacy, get some bugs and just

[55:52] continue this beautiful vibe of the Oakland Unified School District.

[55:56] I'm a former reading teacher. So that's why I'm excited to be here. I love books,

[56:01] like the Mayor Staddleton is a reading town. Starting with the two students who read

[56:05] their poems, it's the energy just felt from there. Going in and talking to the students and

[56:09] looking at them being excited about their writing, looking at here are our vendors and knowing

[56:14] kids and adults are going to go home and read tonight. It's a very exciting look that momentum is great.

[56:19] Our school district and our school partners are going to be encouraging and incentivizing

[56:23] tracking reading minutes and incentivizing reading for 20 minutes a day in school but also at home.

[56:30] And so they're really going to be working on ways that we can actually log reading. We built. We

[56:36] designed open as a reading town because we knew that there's a lot of competing stuff for our

[56:40] our phones, our lives, and so we know that one of the things we can do to get reading

[56:46] right is we can read more. So excited to be here today in our third annual live fast.

[56:51] This is number 20 for families to come and celebrate their students reading and writing.

[56:55] And we have the Oakland Public Library giving away books. We have eat, learn, play,

[56:59] giving away backpack. And we have food for families to come because we know they're

[57:04] going to be here from four to six. And we all need to eat at yummy meal. I think every year

[57:08] we have tweaked it to really figure out the perfect combination of showcasing student writing,

[57:15] getting kids up on a stage where they can really be heard.

[57:18] This event is all about our kids, but I think that the most important question is whether

[57:22] the kids feel celebrated today and feel the pride of Oakland that is in this space and know

[57:29] that what they read and what they write and how they grow matters to everybody who's here

[57:34] into this whole city.

[57:48] This is a lot to me, because back then,

[57:50] that you felt black as we must start it,

[57:52] black security and slavery, and what the hard times.

[57:55] And if you're here today,

[57:57] you've got a great mentality that 100 year anniversary.

[58:01] I'm not used to it.

[58:03] Every year's been happening.

[58:05] This event is important to me, because our dancing,

[58:09] a few of this thing our dance is just like for fun.

[58:12] But they have like, it's fireman for it.

[58:16] We need more programs like this, not just in February.

[58:20] The young people really get excited about being able to showcase their hard work.

[58:26] And I think it gives them a bigger sense of purpose.

[58:30] I get to express how I feel through dancing.

[58:33] And I get to tell them what my culture is.

[58:36] It was important to find out what makes young people even want to move.

[58:41] words are really powerful because those words turn in the movement, you know,

[58:46] move it, turns into bigger movement, and then movement turns in the chain.

[58:50] The expanded learning arts programs and initiatives that comes out of central office.

[58:55] And our goal is to provide our students with high quality arts instruction

[59:01] from Oakland-based professional teaching artists.

[59:05] West Oakland Middle School has an a very good job. I feel like, make sure we have

[59:10] connections, especially through music and through dance.

[59:12] This collaboration is important and it reminds me a lot of hip-hop.

[59:16] Hip-hop is a collaboration, it's a collaboration of music, DJs, dancers,

[59:22] B-boys, taggers, spray painters.

[59:25] Dame creating that track and then bringing Marty on to the phone and being like,

[59:31] what can we do when the kids kind of feel right into it.

[59:33] Majority of the kids here do music and dance as well, so it's not a hard

[59:37] but I think that that showed a positive collaboration

[59:40] which also passed down today.

[59:41] Always learn something, working with young people in general

[59:44] because they have a lot of creative ideas.

[59:47] They may not always have the technical abilities,

[59:49] but the lens that they use to see the world

[59:52] is always something in the future and hopeful.

[59:55] Before I started the program,

[59:57] I don't have much confidence because I like to get bullied.

[1:00:00] But now, I have my confidence, it's actually fun to learn anything.

[1:00:05] I hope you learned that I'm good at making beats, and show, how good I can be at something I'm going to learn from my mind.

[1:00:12] Students have an opportunity to learn how to conceptualize their ideas. They learn the tools of the train.

[1:00:19] Whatever it is, if it's fancy, if it's visual arts, everybody may not be a dancer, if they may not be with the music, you know what I mean?

[1:00:26] So it's important to bring them both together.

[1:00:40] Hello, my name is Emerald Smith, and I'm a senior at Casimal High School.

[1:00:45] After graduation, I'm currently committed to University of Michigan for cheer, and I'm

[1:00:51] majoring in psychology.

[1:00:53] I'm always excited to just be on my own really and being a whole different new environment.

[1:00:57] It's going to be something different.

[1:00:58] It's going to be challenging.

[1:00:59] And I've up for the challenge.

[1:01:01] I was out of private school before this.

[1:01:03] When I came to Casimal, they pushed for black excellence and pushed for people of my color

[1:01:07] and Brown people to be great,

[1:01:09] and that's like something that really inspired me.

[1:01:12] One of the most memorable experience

[1:01:14] I've just been at Casemar is being on the shoot team

[1:01:17] and going to all the games.

[1:01:19] Homecoming specifically were all the lungs come out

[1:01:21] and they do cheer with us.

[1:01:23] That's like something that was so life changing.

[1:01:25] All the little different types of clubs

[1:01:27] that I join, feels or all like small things

[1:01:29] that really were a fun, but also everything was community-based

[1:01:33] and I was like really cool to do.

[1:01:35] Just remember who you are, don't be like scared to change and don't be afraid to stand out because I know sometimes that can be challenging

[1:01:44] Série to get out of your comfort zone. Enjoy the moment, use your resources and don't be afraid to change

[1:01:51] environment that's going to better suit you like I'd had to change from five

[1:01:55] it's called a public school which is very drastic but honestly I would say it was the

[1:01:59] best thing I can ever make.

[1:02:12] I feel very happy when I'm out there dancing it makes me happy

[1:02:16] and makes me smile. I made more friends I got to connect with people because of dance

[1:02:21] who got to do dances together I got to do a solo. It's kind of scary and nerve-wracking but

[1:02:29] you can use to it the more you do it. So what Bell made to the program first is because

[1:02:34] my best friend, she was asking me if I wanted to join dad. My English wasn't good at that

[1:02:39] moment, so I was like, I don't understand what you're saying. But I said yes, and then I joined and it

[1:02:45] was pretty good and one makes me want to stay all the time. My desk is really nice. To be teaching

[1:02:52] here in West Oakland is like a really, really, really big deal for me, if the students need it,

[1:02:56] outlet. You can't teach everything. One thing we do not teach is

[1:02:59] test. We want to make sure that when they join dance they understood

[1:03:02] that we are family. I do a couple of dances. Some dances I just

[1:03:05] come in for parts. I performed a lot in like a band. I performed a lot

[1:03:10] already. But dance is like my first year in dance. So it was kind of

[1:03:15] it was like a first time but I felt a little bit more confident. I say

[1:03:19] it's a good way to try something new. It's something to it's good to keep

[1:03:24] to remind off the other things.

[1:03:25] We collaborate, we try to collaborate,

[1:03:27] and also this fossil, even if we're not dancing

[1:03:29] and doing bad at the same time.

[1:03:31] Mr. Stern is a big, big, huge part of how

[1:03:36] and why we keep coming back.

[1:03:38] This is our winter concert.

[1:03:40] You would have to ask them what it's like

[1:03:41] to perform in front of everybody, but I think that for me,

[1:03:45] it's just, I feel really humbled

[1:03:46] that I get to work with these people.

[1:03:48] Some of these young people are, we have some real musicians

[1:03:51] in this group.

[1:03:51] The philosophy with our program is like show up and participate and do your best.

[1:03:56] That's how you get an A in the class.

[1:03:58] You just show up in class and you're kind of other people and you're participating in doing

[1:04:01] your best.

[1:04:02] Again, it's not about talent.

[1:04:03] It's just about the effort you're putting in and how you show up.

[1:04:06] It's a band so we're a team.

[1:04:07] We have students who put in a lot of effort and try and practice and learn about reading

[1:04:12] music and all that.

[1:04:13] The vibe in our classroom is really good.

[1:04:15] Our first update jump it, but I didn't really enjoy playing so I switched to saxophone.

[1:04:21] And it's really nice. I love it.

[1:04:24] I was really proud of myself because I learned to play a song with saxophone in three days.

[1:04:29] Like I just, like, I learned it at the beginning of the stressful, and I was scary all the time.

[1:04:34] But then now, I feel like I feel really confident.

[1:04:38] It's still a little bit stressful, but once you're on stage, you just enjoy yourself.

[1:04:42] I perform saxophone, and my favorite song was Tom's Diet.

[1:04:47] Because I get to start this song and also I get to just kind of play around with the notes and like

[1:04:56] Customize it to my own like I

[1:05:20] The students here are the way it feels to perform with them is I feel super blessed and I feel honored and I feel humbled to perform with them.

[1:05:28] Like I said, some of these students are really talented, really musical, and they're surpassing

[1:05:33] what I can do in this case, which is great.

[1:05:36] I tell students all the time, when I need to substitute, I'm going to talk to you.

[1:05:39] I definitely would suggest coming to West Oklahoma Middle School, so that you can have fun,

[1:05:43] make more fun, and just get to build your community.

[1:06:02] Like things like this are so important, because when you ask questions of the kid,

[1:06:06] do you feel seen now? Like, that's not only any of the flyers.

[1:06:11] Open California is one of the richest diversity pockets in the entire state.

[1:06:16] And there are a lot of resources, but none of those resources specifically look at honoring

[1:06:21] the diversity of the community. Our equity initiative is really geared around creating

[1:06:28] affinity spaces for use in after school and creating skill building spaces. Again, that

[1:06:35] been either cost prohibitive or just not available to people who are heavily impacted by societal

[1:06:41] injustice. It's not just adults teaching young people. It's adults and young people coming together

[1:06:46] in community and learning in community. Home is the best word to describe it. It's like I said

[1:06:51] it's a safe place. And it's an open program. It is really a matter of which you are. It gets a

[1:06:57] learning of our culture. We bring them in and tell them hey it's okay. So we do activities around

[1:07:04] Pacific Islander history, having programs such as ours helps students to navigate those two worlds.

[1:07:14] One of the activities I do in my class means that therapy is music jeopardy.

[1:07:17] They get to dance, they get to be free, they get to be loose.

[1:07:19] My favorite memory is our check-ins.

[1:07:24] Antisaries, youth developments, asset and building,

[1:07:27] program that is non-judgemental,

[1:07:30] of self-assassation, women and girls.

[1:07:32] This program tells me being more myself by really listening to what I say and do without judgment.

[1:07:41] Programs are a bunch of rare and important for young women and girls in Oakland because it's what we call a sad space.

[1:07:48] It's not school. It's not home. It's a non-judgmental space. It's safe.

[1:07:54] Expanding these programs in Oakland is important because it gives students a safe space and they feel welcomed.

[1:08:01] Many of our students this year were first-time photocletic audancers had never danced anything a year ago April.

[1:08:08] And I have seen them grow as a dancer, but also their confidence has really been growing.

[1:08:14] It's like a really nice way for us to showcase our culture, our history, like do costumes through music and do dancing styles.

[1:08:22] It gives me the reason to attend school.

[1:08:25] want to be here more and more often in another quality way other than academics.

[1:08:31] The positive representation this group makes me very proud to be a Latina and to be around

[1:08:36] the Latina's. Yeah, just very proud to be Hawaiian. I teach the AMA class at Loro Elementary,

[1:08:43] but self-value is actually where we had to start. We kind of had to take a couple steps back to

[1:08:49] finding who they are and that who they are matters.

[1:08:55] Vinny, good evening.

[1:08:56] It's a good evening. It's a good evening.

[1:08:57] I recommend this to lots of schools.

[1:09:01] We did a crowd budget.

[1:09:02] Something that we did inside the country was writing

[1:09:05] info on letters to them.

[1:09:07] I did one to my mom and I was writing

[1:09:10] how deep I am for she does.

[1:09:13] We work with a variety of community-based partners here in Oaklet

[1:09:17] to really bring in these enrichment opportunities to students again at no cost.

[1:09:24] There's power when these affinity spaces are used effectively.

[1:09:30] So many young people are faced with this monolith of dominant culture.

[1:09:36] And a lot of that means for them to shed everything that connects them to home.

[1:09:40] Like there's some great things about being from Oakland.

[1:09:42] There's some great things about my culture.

[1:09:44] But I don't have to have this like this tug of war between the two our program allows and gives opportunities for students to explore both sides.

[1:10:08] I

[1:10:14] think we all kind of have this false narrative of like, it's super hard, credit, super bad, but it's only bad when you don't understand it. Media and money helps me focus a lot on budgeting, especially for filming, equipment and for future projects I want to do.

[1:10:30] It's not very commonly talked about on what you should do, how to invest in credit,

[1:10:36] and I appreciate how they're having a big awareness, especially since we're younger,

[1:10:43] to teach us when we're ready when we're older.

[1:10:46] The attention behind the media and money conference was to provide resources to our students

[1:10:54] that normally aren't accessible to them.

[1:10:56] at youth beat, educate, empower, and employ.

[1:10:59] Essentially during the summer, they're getting educated.

[1:11:02] This conference is empowered.

[1:11:04] This is really a day for them to explore, to learn about

[1:11:06] the prepared pathways that they could take,

[1:11:08] because high schools at times have tried things out.

[1:11:09] The other piece is just a lot more practical

[1:11:11] of how they can prepare for any job,

[1:11:13] and how they can be successful.

[1:11:15] So they need to know how to carry themselves confidently,

[1:11:17] how to tell a story from themselves in a job interview.

[1:11:20] We have a lot of talented students here that

[1:11:23] if given the right resources of given the right tools,

[1:11:27] they could be the next Ryan Kooler.

[1:11:28] It was just beautiful to see someone that young,

[1:11:31] being so hungry and determined.

[1:11:33] This is a great community surrounding you.

[1:11:36] The confidence is key.

[1:11:37] I think we kind of both taught each other that today

[1:11:39] and one of my students that I had with me.

[1:11:41] This is having the confidence in what I've done

[1:11:43] or what he's done.

[1:11:44] By trade, I'm a financial planner.

[1:11:46] It's my role was really to educate them

[1:11:48] to give them the foundational information

[1:11:50] that I wish every kid would receive.

[1:11:54] You know, opportunities like this,

[1:11:55] this conference particularly is it's important to use,

[1:11:58] not just in Oakland, but everywhere.

[1:12:00] There's all these financial parts of life

[1:12:02] that we need to explore and that's a lot of what I explore

[1:12:05] to my sessions today.

[1:12:07] In our community, especially, there's not a lot of programs

[1:12:09] that teach you about finances.

[1:12:11] A lot of us are still figuring it out now.

[1:12:13] I think it's extremely important for the youth to get a head start

[1:12:16] on managing money well and knowing how to operate media,

[1:12:20] because we're moving into the digital world where everything is

[1:12:22] media.

[1:12:23] The media and many conference is definitely with your parents,

[1:12:26] but the future, because my money hit the Westfield

[1:12:28] are not that good right now.

[1:12:30] And there are definitely T-Shutney, how do you handle my money

[1:12:32] and like, where do you handle my money?

[1:12:34] Yeah, I think I hope that's for the future of like,

[1:12:36] you students to like, start on my what path I need to go

[1:12:40] to get to this certain level that they want to be at.

[1:12:42] And like, have a overall good, like,

[1:12:44] structure of finance for like, when they grow up.

[1:12:45] We got overall hoods with folks here that are attending today,

[1:12:48] helping get this event going, we have approximately 71 students that's comprised of our alumni

[1:12:54] plus some of our students would tend to have a record program. We have about one

[1:12:59] or two volunteers, 18 staff members, the more the better, the more individuals that we have

[1:13:05] volunteering, the more career exploration opportunities we can offer, the more interviews

[1:13:10] we can do, the more students we can invite. Ideally, this becomes an Oakland thing

[1:13:16] that we can have available to the community.

[1:13:19] And in order to do that, it's going to take a village.

[1:13:33] Hi, I'm Shalanda Tilme and I'm the principal

[1:13:36] of Madison Park Academy primaire.

[1:13:38] I grew up in Oakland, born and raised.

[1:13:40] I've been an educator for 13 years, nine years at NPA primaire,

[1:13:45] for us as a teacher and now as a principal.

[1:13:48] So I had some amazing, amazing educational experiences throughout

[1:13:53] Oakland, Unified School District and it built my character and it made me

[1:13:58] resilient and it's a big part of who I am today.

[1:14:01] We have a safe, fun, welcome and tight knit community environment here at NPA.

[1:14:08] Families are a big part of our environment, our community and our decision-making at NPA.

[1:14:15] We offer opportunities beyond the classroom.

[1:14:19] We have academic support and tutoring for full pantry, a digital arts prep, a brand new

[1:14:26] beautiful library, a community, and team building activities, and filters for every classroom.

[1:14:33] We're all up at a time where my parents can always provide us with educational donations.

[1:14:39] I grew up with wonderful teachers throughout Oakland, told me love, who showed me structure

[1:14:46] and a belief in myself, specifically it started for Spray with Ms. Bruer at Golden Gate Elementary.

[1:14:53] She recognized that I was brilliant, that I was different, but I also had leaves.

[1:15:25] I'm Dr. Lucinda Taylor, principal of West Lake Middle School.

[1:15:30] I feel like my work is still important, changing the lives of black and brown kids in Oakland.

[1:15:36] We're here to make another impact in Oakland, in a way that creates leaders at politicians,

[1:15:42] Drs. Lawyers, the focus here at West Lake this year, and in the years, the comm will be to increase the literacy scores of our students.

[1:15:50] And so we have a beautiful full service library with a librarian, a writer's room. West Lake also hosts a

[1:15:59] of athletic programs. We have sports like volleyball, track and field, basketball, tennis, a

[1:16:07] soccer for our students to participate in during our sports program. All right here at West Lake,

[1:16:14] West Lake also host a number of Vapa classes, which includes digital media. It includes band,

[1:16:21] it includes art, it includes choir and a host of other opportunities for our students to engage in the arts.

[1:16:29] in the way that makes them young and free and fresh.

[1:16:34] Some of the interest that our students have

[1:16:36] where they're very passionate are clubs.

[1:16:38] And one of them is Robotics this year.

[1:16:41] Our students competed in the district wide challenge.

[1:16:44] But we have a variety of clubs,

[1:16:47] including cooking, barbershop.

[1:16:49] We actually have math and reading clubs,

[1:16:53] and a host of LGBTQ and personalized clubs.

[1:16:57] Right here at West Lake.

[1:16:58] So with about 30 years in Oakland, I am here at West Lake to create conditions for our students to be

[1:17:04] excellent readers and writers and be able to compete globally. So our focus is creating

[1:17:09] conditions in the classrooms, hiring qualified teachers to match the energy of our students,

[1:17:15] and make sure that they are prepared. Our attendance is up, our discipline is down,

[1:17:20] and that's all because we know that restorative justice works. And it's about surrounding them with

[1:17:27] people who care, and actually love them.

[1:17:52] Different people come in, and I get painted different colors.

[1:17:56] I get cleaned, I get new furniture, but I stay in the same spot in the city.

[1:18:02] If you use up the moon to make macaroni and cheese, the stars will come together to make a new moon.

[1:18:09] I felt that it was fun. I usually just read at school,

[1:18:12] Reading is fun. I got a lot of good books in the library.

[1:18:18] To see our students excited about it is incredible.

[1:18:21] Oh, this is an exciting moment for me personally.

[1:18:24] I know reading is everything.

[1:18:26] And to have the whole city focused on reading,

[1:18:29] a coalition of people coming together at every level

[1:18:33] from birth to adults,

[1:18:35] making the connection to reading with your health,

[1:18:38] with your body, with joy.

[1:18:40] come here today to really announce that Oakland is a reading town and the spot are young people.

[1:18:45] Our young people deserve to be able to be literate and to be able to read and write.

[1:18:52] It's their future and we have a duty and responsibility to partner with the school district.

[1:18:57] So this is a city wide effort.

[1:18:58] It looks like Fencem.

[1:19:00] I like events like this so we can come and get free books.

[1:19:03] I think books should be accessible.

[1:19:04] being the community and celebrated education, literacy, get some bugs and just

[1:19:11] continue this musical vibe of the Oakland Unified School District. I'm a former

[1:19:16] reading teacher. So that's why I'm excited to be here. I love books like

[1:19:20] Bob and the Mayor Staddleton is a reading town. Starting with the two students who

[1:19:24] read their poems at the energy just felt from there. Going in and talking to the

[1:19:28] students and looking at them being excited about their writing. Looking at here

[1:19:32] our vendors and knowing those kids and adults are going to go home and read tonight, it's a very

[1:19:36] exciting look that momentum is great. Our school district and our school partners are going to be

[1:19:41] encouraging and incentivizing tracking reading minutes, incentivizing reading for 20 minutes a day

[1:19:46] in school but also at home and so they're really going to be working on ways that we can actually

[1:19:52] log reading. We built, we designed open as a reading town because we knew that there's a lot of

[1:19:58] of heating stuff for arts.

[1:20:00] Our phones are live and so we know that one of the things we can do to get reading right is we can read more.

[1:20:07] So excited to be here today and our third annual lit fast. There's a number 20 for families to come and celebrate their students reading and writing.

[1:20:14] We have the Oakland Public Library giving away books. We have Eat-Lerm plague giving away backpack.

[1:20:20] And we have food for families to come because we know they're going to be here from four to six.

[1:20:24] and we all need to eat a yummy meal.

[1:20:26] I think every year we have tweaked it to really figure out

[1:20:30] the perfect combination of showcasing student writing,

[1:20:34] getting kids up on a stage where they can really be heard.

[1:20:37] This event is all about our kids.

[1:20:39] I think that the most important question

[1:20:41] is whether the kids feel celebrated today

[1:20:44] and feel the pride of Oakland that is in this space

[1:20:47] and know that what they read and what they write

[1:20:50] and how they grow matters to everybody who's here

[1:20:53] and to this whole city.

[1:20:54] My

[1:21:12] advice is to use back for others unless it's your door.

[1:21:17] Don't crash, child.

[1:21:18] Try your best not to procrastinate.

[1:21:20] Do as much as you can.

[1:21:21] Listen to your peers as you nice to everyone.

[1:21:24] Focus and learn and if you take your mind, you can do anything with your mind.

[1:21:27] Keep trying and never give up.

[1:21:29] Believe in yourself and be chill.

[1:21:31] Never give up and keep working.

[1:21:33] Be yourself and make great decisions.

[1:21:35] Believe in yourself that you could do anything you want.

[1:21:38] Never give up and keep on trying.

[1:21:40] Be mindful to let our people always communicate with your teachers because I wouldn't have gone here

[1:21:46] If I didn't communicate to my teachers that I needed help always listen to your teacher

[1:21:51] Be kind to others and think that's the people find it good people friends people that are positive be good and listen to the teachers

[1:21:59] Just enjoy the year make friends get along with everyone. You all year home

[1:22:03] This school you're I'm looking forward to keep taking college classes and making new friends and learning stuff

[1:22:09] for myself to be smarter, making new friends,

[1:22:13] and maintaining good grades.

[1:22:15] I show up to 60, I show up to learn.

[1:22:18] I show up to roll, I show up to be my desk.

[1:22:21] I show up from my future.

[1:22:23] Please, I want

[1:22:27] to be great.

[1:22:29] I want to be a good school student.

[1:22:41] I think we all kind of have this false narrative of it.

[1:22:44] It's super hard, it's pretty super bad.

[1:22:47] But it's only bad when you don't understand it.

[1:22:49] media and money helped me focus a lot on budgeting, especially for filming, and

[1:22:55] equipment, and for future projects I want to do.

[1:22:57] It's not very commonly talked about on like what you should do, how to invest in

[1:23:03] credit, and I appreciate how they're having like a big awareness, especially since

[1:23:08] for younger to teach us when we're ready when we're older.

[1:23:13] The attention behind the media money conference was to provide resources to our students that normally aren't accessible to them.

[1:23:23] At youth beat, educate, empower, and employ. Essentially during the summer they're getting educated.

[1:23:29] This conference is empowered.

[1:23:31] This is really a day for them to explore, to learn about the prepared ways that they could take.

[1:23:34] Because high school's the time to try things out.

[1:23:36] The other piece is just a lot more practical of how they can prepare for any job and how they can be successful.

[1:23:41] So, they need to know how to carry themselves confidently, how to tell a story from themselves in a job interview.

[1:23:47] We have a lot of talented students here that if given the right resources,

[1:23:52] given the right tools, they could be the next Ryan Hougler.

[1:23:55] It was just beautiful to see someone that young being so hungry and determined.

[1:24:00] This is a great community surrounding youth. The confidence is key.

[1:24:04] I think we kind of both taught each other that today and one of my students that I had with me.

[1:24:08] just having the confidence in what I've done or what he's done.

[1:24:12] By trade, I'm a financial planner.

[1:24:13] My role was really to educate them to give them the foundational information

[1:24:17] that I wish every kid would receive.

[1:24:21] You know, opportunities like this, this conference particularly is

[1:24:24] it's important to use not just an Oakland but everywhere.

[1:24:27] There's all these financial parts of life that we need to explore.

[1:24:31] And that's a lot of what I explore to my sessions today.

[1:24:33] In our community especially, there's not a lot of programs that teach you about finances,

[1:24:38] a lot of us are still figuring it out now.

[1:24:40] I think it's extremely important for the youth to get a head start on

[1:24:43] men's and money well and knowing how to operate media because we're moving into the digital world where everything is

[1:24:49] media.

[1:24:50] The media and money conference is definitely preparing for the future because my money

[1:24:55] hit the list fields are not that good right now.

[1:24:57] And there are definitely tissue in the head of my money and my

[1:25:01] Yeah, I think I hope that's for the future of, like, youth students to, like, sort of my what path I need to go to get to this certain level that they want to be at. And, like, have a overall good, like, structure of finance for, like, when they grow up.

[1:25:12] We got overall hoods with folks here that are attending today helping get this event. Go in. We have approximately seventy-one students that's comprised of our alumni plus, some of our students who attend their erected program.

[1:25:24] We have about 22 volunteers, 18 staff members,

[1:25:29] the more the better, the more individuals that we have,

[1:25:32] volunteering, the more career exploration opportunities

[1:25:35] we can offer, the more interviews we can do,

[1:25:38] the more students we can invite.

[1:25:40] Ideally, this becomes an Oakland thing that we can have

[1:25:45] available to the community.

[1:25:46] And in order to do that, it's going to take a village.

[1:26:00] Hi, I'm Shalanda Tilman and I'm the principal at Madison Park Academy primaries.

[1:26:05] I grew up in Oakland, born and raised.

[1:26:07] I've been an educator for 13 years, nine years at MPA primaries.

[1:26:12] First, as a teacher, and now as a principal.

[1:26:15] I had some amazing, amazing educational experiences throughout Oakland, Unified School District,

[1:26:22] and it built my character and it made me resilient and it's a big part of who I am today.

[1:26:28] We have a safe, fun, welcome and tight knit community environment here at NPA.

[1:26:35] Families are a big part of our environment, our community and our decision making.

[1:26:41] At NPA we offer opportunities beyond the classroom. We have academic support and tutoring,

[1:26:49] For full pantry, a digital arts prep, a brand new beautiful library, a community, and two building activities, and still trips for every classroom.

[1:27:00] We're all up at a time where my parents can always provide us for an educational foundation.

[1:27:07] I grew up with wonderful teachers throughout Oakland, who showed me love, who showed me structure and a belief in myself.

[1:27:15] Specifically, I started working with Ms. Brure at Golden Gate Elementary.

[1:27:20] She recognized that I was brilliant, that I was different,

[1:27:25] but I also had leaves, and she was overall just my role model

[1:27:30] and still my role model to this day. She shows up in the work that I do,

[1:27:34] every single day.

[1:27:43] We are

[1:27:53] the TCN Panthers, and I am so excited I'm here.

[1:27:56] Hi, I'm Lacey Lefkowitz and I am the proud principal at Think College now. Our community was

[1:28:02] actually formed by families. Families who wanted to see their students and their families in college now.

[1:28:10] We have both art and a science lab. Students can also spend time each week in the library,

[1:28:17] each month in the garden, and each week with our partner heroes where they have PE spaces.

[1:28:24] Parents at Thing College now can expect a lot of different opportunities to engage.

[1:28:29] First, we have our three signature events. We have our literacy night where we celebrate

[1:28:34] our love of learning and our love of greeting. Our second signature event is our unity

[1:28:39] night where we celebrate all of the wonderful cultures that come together. And number three is

[1:28:45] our Black Excellence Night where we further celebrate our community. We hope that you all join us.

[1:28:51] in our thing college now community you will be joining a legacy of families who have come together

[1:28:58] both to found this school and to continue to work to make sure that all of our students can be

[1:29:04] successful in college careers and beyond.

[1:29:26] I'm Dr. Lucinda Taylor, principal of Wesley Middle School.

[1:29:31] I feel like my work is still important changing the lives of black and brown kids in Oakland.

[1:29:36] We are here to make another impact in Oakland in a way that creates leaders at politicians, doctors, lawyers.

[1:29:44] The focus here at West Lake this year and in the years come will be to increase the literacy scores of our students.

[1:29:51] So we have a beautiful full-service library with a librarian, a writer's room.

[1:29:58] West Lake also hosts...

[1:30:00] Mayor of athletic programs. We have sports like volleyball, track and field basketball, tennis,

[1:30:07] a soccer for our students to participate in during our sports program. All right, here at

[1:30:14] West Lake, West Lake also host a number of vapa classes, which includes digital media, it includes

[1:30:22] band, it includes art, it includes choir, and a host of other opportunities for our students

[1:30:28] to engage in the arts in the way that makes them young and free and fresh.

[1:30:35] Some of the interests that our students have, whether they're very passionate, are our clubs.

[1:30:39] And one of them is Robotics this year.

[1:30:42] Our students competed in the district wide challenge, but we have a variety of clubs, including

[1:30:48] cooking, barber shop, we actually have math and reading clubs, and a host of LGBTQ and

[1:30:56] personalized clubs. Right here at West Lake. So with about 30 years in Oakland, I am here at

[1:31:02] West Lake to create conditions for our students to be excellent readers and writers and

[1:31:07] be able to compete globally. So our focus is creating conditions in the classrooms, hiring

[1:31:12] qualified teachers, to match the energy of our students, and make sure that they are prepared.

[1:31:18] Our attendance is up, our discipline is down, and that's all because we know that we're

[1:31:24] board of justice works, and it's about surrounding them with people who care and actually

[1:31:30] love them.

[1:31:45] West

[1:32:37] Oakland is an integral and value part of the city with a long and rich history.

[1:32:41] It includes the city's oldest school, Prescott Elementary, and the historic school

[1:32:47] of Champions, Le Climans High, and numerous others.

[1:32:50] We're underneath one of his solar cannabis.

[1:32:53] It's really fulfilling our promise to the community around creating a sustainable future for our kids.

[1:32:58] From early childhood investments to elementary to middle and into high school, this is a coordinated effort

[1:33:04] to be able to ensure complete investment in the full pathway for our students in West Auckland.

[1:33:10] My favorite part is like the loose lights.

[1:33:12] My first three now is just to be like only two.

[1:33:15] I guess more colorful.

[1:33:16] Now they can see who we are like, do we?

[1:33:18] The Windows have been an issue here since I've been here for the last 10 years.

[1:33:22] You see students appreciate it.

[1:33:24] It doesn't feel as hot. There's an obvious difference in the heat.

[1:33:28] Now that we've finally got blinds, that's been helpful too to be able to block out some of the sun.

[1:33:33] And then visually, it's impacting students because it looks nice.

[1:33:36] The Windows look good. It looks new.

[1:33:38] It feels like it's bringing more like a good energy.

[1:33:41] What was missing was just kids motivated to even want to come outside to play.

[1:33:45] So Martin Luther King Jr. students, the impact of the new yarr shows that everybody cares about them.

[1:33:53] There's just like kind of more joyful play. Having things to do and nice facilities to do it with is a huge difference.

[1:34:01] Our investment at McClimans is transformational.

[1:34:04] I'm so excited to be delivering a project at McClimans that honors the legacy of incredible people who have been students and community members and staff at McClimans.

[1:34:15] We're launching a nearly $100 million investment in West Oakland and specifically McClimits.

[1:34:21] It started with the naming of the gym and honoring the legacy of Bill Russell, but now it'll be a full modernization of the school that will be breaking around the spring.

[1:34:30] So we're really excited about that project because it's a cornerstone in the West Oakland community.

[1:34:35] I'm excited because I'm a local kid. I grew up here. I went to Lafayette Elementary.

[1:34:40] went to low middle school and then came here my 9th and 10th grade year. So coming back to the neighborhood

[1:34:46] and giving back, just coming back home, you know, to where I was raised, I went to the community,

[1:34:51] knowing that people was, I was excited. When you get a new house, a new bicycle, just dust up and

[1:34:56] in motivation, and so having a new place to come.

[1:35:00] 2. As a new smell is a newness about it and people want to take care of it.

[1:35:04] These projects ultimately create safe, welcoming, and high quality learning environments that

[1:35:10] also strengthen schools, as neighborhood anchors, and serve the community beyond the school day.

[1:35:42] Different people come in and I get painted different colors. I get cleaned, I get new furniture,

[1:35:48] But I stay in the same spot in the city if you use up the moon to make macaroni and cheese

[1:35:55] The stars will come together to make a new moon. I felt that it was fun. I usually just read at school reading is fun

[1:36:03] I got a lot of good books

[1:36:05] I'm in the library to see our students excited about it. It's incredible. Oh

[1:36:11] This is an exciting moment for me personally. I know reading is everything and to have the whole city

[1:36:18] focus on reading, a coalition of people coming together at every level from birth to adult,

[1:36:25] making that connection to reading with your health, with your body, with joy.

[1:36:30] I'm here today to really announce that Oakland is a reading town, and the spot are young people.

[1:36:35] I young people deserve to be able to be literate and to be able to read and write.

[1:36:42] It's their future, and we have a duty and responsibility to partner with the school district.

[1:36:46] So this is a city wide effort.

[1:36:48] It looks like Spencer.

[1:36:50] So I like events like this so we can come and get free books.

[1:36:53] I think books should be accessible.

[1:36:55] Being the community and celebrated education, literacy, get some books,

[1:37:01] and just continue this beautiful vibe of the Oakland Unified School District.

[1:37:05] I'm a former reading teacher.

[1:37:07] So that's why I'm excited to be here.

[1:37:08] I love books.

[1:37:10] Like Bob and the Mayor Staddleton is a reading town.

[1:37:12] Starting with the two students who read their poems

[1:37:15] It's the energy just felt from there.

[1:37:17] Going in and talking to the students and looking at them

[1:37:19] and being excited about their writing, looking at here

[1:37:22] and all our vendors and knowing those kids and adults

[1:37:24] are going to go home and read tonight.

[1:37:25] It's a very exciting look that momentum is great.

[1:37:28] Our school district and our school partners

[1:37:29] are going to be encouraging and incentivizing

[1:37:32] tracking reading minutes, incentivizing reading

[1:37:35] for 20 minutes a day in school, but also at home.

[1:37:39] And so they're really going to be working on ways

[1:37:41] that we can actually log reading.

[1:37:44] We built. We designed open as a reading town because we knew that there's a lot of competing stuff for our attention our phones our lives

[1:37:51] And so we know that one of the things we can do to get reading right is we can read more

[1:37:57] So excited to be here today in our third animal look fast. There's a number of turning for families to come and celebrate their students reading and writing

[1:38:04] And we have the Oakland Public Library giving away books. We have eat learn play giving away backhacks

[1:38:09] We have food for families to come because we know they're going to be here from four to six and we all need to eat a yummy meal

[1:38:16] I think every year we have tweaked it to really figure out the perfect combination of showcasing student writing

[1:38:23] Getting kids up on a stage where they can really be heard. This event is all about our kids

[1:38:28] I think that the most important question is whether the kids feel celebrated today and

[1:38:34] feel the pride of Oakland that is in this space and know that what they read and what they write and how they grow

[1:38:41] Matters to everybody who's here and to this whole city

[1:38:56] As soon as he's eloxomy because back then that he felt like his remos started blackicunty slavery and what the Varktons

[1:39:04] And if you're here today, it's kind of ready to tell me that 100-year anniversary of not

[1:39:11] kissed him. Every day's the last day.

[1:39:14] This event is important because our guessing, few of the big audiences is just like

[1:39:20] for fun, but they have like, it's fire meant for it.

[1:39:25] We need more programs like this, not just in February. The young people really get excited about

[1:39:32] being able to showcase their hard work and I think it gives them a bigger sense of purpose.

[1:39:39] I get to express how I feel through dancing and I get to tell them what my culture is.

[1:39:45] It was important to find out what makes young people even want to move.

[1:39:50] Whereas are really powerful because those words turn in a movement, you know, move it, turns

[1:39:56] into bigger movement and then movement turns in the chain.

[1:39:58] the expel learning

[1:40:00] Our program is an initiative that comes out of central office and our goal is to provide our students

[1:40:07] with high quality arts instruction from Oakland-based professional teaching artists.

[1:40:14] West Oakland Middle School has an a very good job. I feel like, make sure we have that connections,

[1:40:20] especially through music and through dance. This collaboration is important. It reminds me a lot of hip hop.

[1:40:25] The pop is a collaboration, it's a collaboration of music, DJs, dancers,

[1:40:31] B boys, taggers, spray painters.

[1:40:35] Dame, creating that track, and then kind of like bringing Mari up on to the

[1:40:38] phone and like being like, you know, what can we do?

[1:40:41] And the kids kind of like feel right into it.

[1:40:42] But during the kids here do music and dance as well, so it's not a

[1:40:45] hard transition for them to do that.

[1:40:47] But I think that that showed a positive collaboration, which also

[1:40:49] passed down to them.

[1:40:50] Always learn something, working with young people in general, because

[1:40:54] have a lot of creative ideas.

[1:40:56] They may not always have the technical abilities,

[1:40:58] but the lens that they use to see the world

[1:41:01] is always something in the future at Hoku.

[1:41:04] Before I started the program,

[1:41:06] I don't have much confidence because I think it's really,

[1:41:09] but now I have my confidence,

[1:41:11] it's actually fun to learn anything.

[1:41:14] I hope you learned that I'm good and I can be so,

[1:41:18] how good I can be as simple as I'm going to.

[1:41:21] Students have an opportunity to learn

[1:41:23] how to conceptualize their ideas and learn the tools of the trade, whatever it is

[1:41:28] if it's fancy, if it's visual arts, everybody may not be a dancer if I may not be a

[1:41:34] music, you know what I mean? So support your bring them both together.

[1:41:49] Hello, my name is Emerald Smith and I'm a senior at Casimal High School.

[1:41:54] After graduation, I'm currently committed to the University of Michigan for

[1:41:58] here, and I'm majoring in psychology.

[1:42:02] I'm always excited to just be on my own, really,

[1:42:05] and be in a whole different new environment.

[1:42:06] It's going to be something different.

[1:42:07] It's going to be challenging.

[1:42:08] And I love for the challenge.

[1:42:10] I was out of private school before this.

[1:42:12] When I came to Katama, they pushed for black excellence

[1:42:14] and pushed for people of my color and brown people to be great.

[1:42:18] And that's something that really inspired me.

[1:42:21] One of the most memorable experience as a student at Katama

[1:42:24] is being on the shoot team and going to all the games,

[1:42:27] Homecoming specifically were all the lumps come out,

[1:42:30] and they do cheer with us.

[1:42:32] That's like something that was so life-changing.

[1:42:34] All the little different type of clubs

[1:42:36] that I joined, fills, or all like small things

[1:42:38] that believe were a fine, but also everything

[1:42:41] was community based, and I was like really cool to do.

[1:42:44] Just remember who you are, don't be scared to change,

[1:42:48] and don't be afraid to stand out,

[1:42:51] because I know sometimes that can be challenging,

[1:42:53] and scary to get out of your comfort zone.

[1:42:55] Enjoy the moment, use your resources, and don't be afraid to change environments that's gonna

[1:43:01] better suit you.

[1:43:02] I'd had to change from private school to public school, which is very drastic, but honestly

[1:43:07] I would say it was the best decision I can ever make.

[1:43:21] I feel it's very happy when I'm out there dancing, it makes me happy and makes me smile.

[1:43:26] I made more friends, I got to connect with people because of dance, who got to do dances together,

[1:43:32] I got to do ads, solos, it's kind of scary and nerve-wracking, but you get used to it the more you do it.

[1:43:41] So what about me to the program first is because my best friend, she was asking me if I wanted to join dad.

[1:43:47] My English wasn't good at that moment, so I was like, I don't understand what you're saying.

[1:43:51] But I said yes, and then I joined and it was pretty good and one makes me want to stay all the time.

[1:43:58] my desk, it sure because she's really nice. To be teaching here in West Oakland is like a really, really, really big deal for me.

[1:44:04] The suit is needed. It's the outlet. You can't teach everything. All of these, all of the things we do that I teach is

[1:44:09] Pat. We want to make sure that when they join dance they understood that we are family.

[1:44:12] I do a couple dances. Some dances I just comment for parts. I performed a lot in like band. I performed a lot already.

[1:44:20] But dance, this is like my first year in dance. So it was kind of, it was like my first time, but I felt a little bit more confident.

[1:44:27] I say it's a good way to try something new.

[1:44:31] It's something to, it's good to keep your mind off the other things.

[1:44:34] We collaborate, we try to collaborate as often as possible.

[1:44:37] Even if we're not dancing and doing bad at the same time,

[1:44:40] Mr. Stern is a big, big, huge part of how and why we keep coming back.

[1:44:47] This is our winter concert.

[1:44:49] Even after, as then, what it's like to perform in front of everybody.

[1:44:52] But I think that for me, it's just, I'm, I feel really humbled

[1:44:55] but I get to work with these people.

[1:44:57] Some of these young people are, we have some real me-

[1:45:00] The philosophy with our program is like show up and participate in do your best. That's how you get an A in the class. If you're showing up in class and you're kind to other people and you're participating in doing your best, it's again, it's not about talent. It's just about the effort you're putting in and how you show up. It's a band so we're a team. We have students who put in a lot of effort and try and practice and learn about reading music and all that. The vibe in our classroom is really good.

[1:45:24] I first applied trumpet, but I didn't really enjoy playing, so I switched to saxophone

[1:45:30] and it's really nice, I love it

[1:45:32] I was really proud of myself because I learned to play a song with saxophone in three days

[1:45:38] like that just like I learned it

[1:45:40] at the beginning it was stressful and I was scary all the time

[1:45:43] but then now I feel like I feel really confident

[1:45:47] it's still a little bit stressful, but once you're on stage you just enjoy yourself

[1:45:51] I performed saxophone and my favorite song was Tom's Dieter because I get to start this

[1:45:59] song and also I get to just kind of play around with the notes and like customize it to

[1:46:06] my own life. I have a job solo on it. So that we did for the day because it was two drummers

[1:46:12] and me and all the kids out there and so we did to turn on the beat. Coming here and being able to

[1:46:18] have a community that is still big large,

[1:46:21] but it's still tight knit.

[1:46:22] Really does take my heart really, really happy.

[1:46:24] I love coming to West Open.

[1:46:25] I love going to West Open.

[1:46:26] They're good in the in West Open.

[1:46:28] And I think being here in West Open middle school

[1:46:30] needs to be that.

[1:46:31] With the students here, the way it feels to perform with them

[1:46:33] is I feel super blessed and I feel honored

[1:46:35] and I feel humbled to perform with them.

[1:46:37] So like I said, some of these students are really talented,

[1:46:40] really musical and they're surpassing what I can do

[1:46:43] in these cases, which is great.

[1:46:45] I tell students all the time.

[1:46:46] When I need to substitute, I'm going to talk to you.

[1:46:47] I definitely was suggest coming to SLF the middle school, so that you can have fun, make

[1:46:52] more fun, and just get the build your community.

[1:47:11] Things like this are so important because when you ask questions of the kid, do you feel

[1:47:15] seen now?

[1:47:17] Like that's not only any of the flyers.

[1:47:20] Open California is one of the richest diversity pockets in the entire state.

[1:47:25] And there are a lot of resources, but none of those resources specifically look at honoring

[1:47:30] diversity of the community. Our equity initiative is really geared around creating

[1:47:37] affinity spaces for youth and after school and creating skill building spaces. Again that

[1:47:44] have been either cost prohibitive or just not available to people who are heavily impacted by societal

[1:47:49] injustice. It's not just adults teaching young people. It's adults and young people coming together

[1:47:55] community and learning in community. Home is the best word to describe it. Like I said, it's a safe place.

[1:48:02] I am an open program. It is really matter what you are. It gets a learn of our culture.

[1:48:08] We bring them in and tell them, hey, it's okay. So we do activities around Pacific Islander history.

[1:48:15] Having programs such as ours helps students to navigate those two worlds.

[1:48:22] One of the activities I do in my class, I mean the therapy is musical jeopardy.

[1:48:26] They get to dance, they get to be free, they get to be loose.

[1:48:29] My favorite memory is our check-ins.

[1:48:33] Antisaries, youth developments, asset building,

[1:48:36] program that is non-judgemental, of Southeast Asian women and girls.

[1:48:42] This program tells me being more myself by really listening to what I say and do without judging.

[1:48:49] programs up on this area are important for young women and girls and Oakland because it's

[1:48:55] what we call a sad space. It's not school. It's not home. It's a non-judgmental space. It's safe.

[1:49:03] Expand in these programs in Oakland is important because it gives students a safe space and they

[1:49:09] feel welcomed. Maybe our students this year were first time for political dancers had never

[1:49:14] anything a year ago April. And I have seen them grow grow as a dancer, but also their

[1:49:21] confidence has really been growing. It's like a really nice way for us to showcase our culture,

[1:49:27] our history, like do costumes through music and do dancing styles. It gives me the reason to attend

[1:49:33] school. Want to be here more and more often in another quality way, other than academics.

[1:49:40] The positive representation in this group makes me very proud to be a Latina and to be around the Latina's.

[1:49:46] Yeah, just very proud to be Hawaiian.

[1:49:48] I teach the AMA class at Laurel Elementary.

[1:49:52] But self-value is actually where we had to start.

[1:49:55] We kind of had to take a couple steps back to finding...

[1:50:17] We work with a variety of community-based partners here in Oakland to really bring in these enrichment opportunities to

[1:50:29] to students again at no cost.

[1:50:33] There's power when these affinity spaces

[1:50:36] are used effectively.

[1:50:39] So many young people are faced with this monolith

[1:50:43] of dominant culture.

[1:50:45] And a lot of that means for them to shed everything

[1:50:48] that connects them to home.

[1:50:49] Like, there's some great things about being from Oakland.

[1:50:52] There's some great things about my culture.

[1:50:54] But I don't have to have this like this tug of war

[1:50:58] between the two our program allows and gives opportunities for students to explore

[1:51:04] both sides.

[1:51:23] I think we all kind of have this like false narratives of like

[1:51:26] it's super hard, credit super bad, but it's only bad when you don't understand it. Media and money

[1:51:33] helps me focus a lot on budgeting, especially for filming, equipment and for future projects I want to do.

[1:51:39] It's not very commonly talked about on what you should do, how to invest in credit, and I appreciate how they're having a big awareness, especially since for younger, to teach us when we're ready when we're older.

[1:51:55] The attention behind the media and money conference was to provide resources to our students that normally aren't accessible to them.

[1:52:05] at youth beat, educate, empower, and employ.

[1:52:07] Essentially, during the summer, they're getting educated.

[1:52:11] This conference is empowered.

[1:52:13] This is really a day for them to explore,

[1:52:15] to learn about to prepare pathways that they could take,

[1:52:16] because high schools at times have tried things out.

[1:52:18] The other piece is just a lot more practical

[1:52:20] of how they can prepare for any job and how they can be successful.

[1:52:24] So, they need to know how to carry themselves confidently,

[1:52:26] how to tell a story from themselves in a job interview.

[1:52:29] We have a lot of talented students here that,

[1:52:32] If given the right resources of given the right tools, they could be the next Ryan Kooler.

[1:52:37] It was just beautiful to see someone that young being so hungry and determined.

[1:52:42] This is a great community surrounding youth. The confidence is key.

[1:52:46] I think we kind of both taught each other that today and one of my students that I had with me.

[1:52:50] This is having the confidence in what I've done or what he's done.

[1:52:53] By trade, I'm a financial planner. My role was really to educate them to give them the

[1:53:02] You know, opportunities like this, this conference particularly is it's important to use not just an Oakland, but everywhere there's all these financial parts of life that we need to explore and that's a lot of what I explored in my sessions today.

[1:53:16] In our community especially, there's not a lot of programs that teach you about finances, a lot of us are still figuring it out now.

[1:53:22] I think it's extremely important for the youth to get ahead and start on managing money well and knowing how to operate media because we're moving into the digital world where everything is media.

[1:53:32] The media and money conference is definitely with your firm, both future, because my money

[1:53:37] hit the list fields are not that good right now.

[1:53:39] And there are definitely T-Sony, how do you handle my money and, like, where do you handle my

[1:53:42] money?

[1:53:43] Yeah, I think it helps us for the future of, like, youth students to, like, start on my

[1:53:48] what path I need to go to get to this certain level that they want to be at, and, like, have

[1:53:51] a overall good, like, structure of finance for, like, when they grow up.

[1:53:54] We got overall hoods with folks here that are attending today, helping get this event, go in,

[1:53:59] We have approximately 71 students that's comprised of our alumni plus some of our students who attend their

[1:54:05] curriculum program. We have about 22 volunteers, 18 staff members, the more the better, the more

[1:54:13] individuals that we have volunteering, the more career exploration opportunities we can offer, the more

[1:54:19] interviews we can do, the more students we can invite. Ideally, this becomes an Oakland thing

[1:54:25] we can have available to the community and in order to do that it's going to take a

[1:54:30] village.

[1:54:42] Hi, I'm Shalanda Tilme and I'm the Principal at Madison Park Academy

[1:54:46] Prime Minister.

[1:54:47] I grew up in Oakland, Born & Race.

[1:54:49] I've been an educator for 13 years, nine years at MPA Prime

[1:54:53] First of the teacher, and now as a principal,

[1:54:57] I had some amazing amazing...

[1:55:00] Education or experiences throughout Oakland, Unified School District, and it built my character and it made me

[1:55:07] resilient and it's a big part of who I am today. We have a safe, fun, welcoming, tight knit community

[1:55:14] environment here at NPA. Families are a big part of our environment, our community and our decision-making.

[1:55:23] At NCA, we offer opportunities beyond the classroom.

[1:55:28] We have academic support and tutoring,

[1:55:31] support, full pantry,

[1:55:33] a digital arts prep, a brand new beautiful library,

[1:55:37] a community and team building activities,

[1:55:40] and filters for every classroom.

[1:55:42] We're all up at a time where

[1:55:44] my parents can always provide us

[1:55:46] from educational foundation.

[1:55:49] I grew up with wonderful teachers

[1:55:51] Throughout Oakland, we showed me love,

[1:55:54] who showed me structure and a belief in myself.

[1:55:57] Specifically, it started for free with Ms. Brure at Golden Gate Elementary.

[1:56:02] She recognized that I was brilliant, that I was different,

[1:56:07] but I also had a leaf, and she was overall just my world model,

[1:56:12] and still my world model to the extent

[1:56:14] that she shows up in the work that I do every single day.

[1:56:34] I'm Dr. Lucinda Taylor, principal of Wesley Middle School.

[1:56:39] I feel like my work is still important,

[1:56:41] changing the lives of black and brown kids in Oakland.

[1:56:45] We're here to make another impact in Oakland

[1:56:47] in a way that creates leaders at politicians,

[1:56:51] doctors, lawyers, the focus here at Wesley Lake this year

[1:56:54] and in the years the comm will be to increase

[1:56:57] the literacy scores of our students.

[1:56:59] And so we have a beautiful full service library

[1:57:02] with a librarian, a writer's room.

[1:57:06] West Lake also hosts a merit of athletic programs.

[1:57:10] We have sports like volleyball, tracking field, basketball, tennis, a soccer for our students to participate in during our sports program.

[1:57:20] All right, here at West Lake, West Lake also hosts a number of Vapa classes, which includes digital media.

[1:57:29] It includes band, it includes art, it includes choir, and a host of other opportunities for

[1:57:36] our students to engage in the arts in the way that makes them young and free and fresh.

[1:57:43] Some of the interests that our students have when they're very passionate are our clubs.

[1:57:47] And one of them is Robotics this year.

[1:57:50] Our students competed in the district wide challenge, but we have a variety of clubs, including

[1:57:56] cooking, barbershop, we actually have math and reading clubs and a host of LGBTQ and personalized

[1:58:05] clubs right here at West Lake. So with about 30 years in Oakland, I am here at West Lake

[1:58:10] to create conditions for our students to be excellent readers and writers and be able to

[1:58:16] compete globally. So our focus is creating conditions in the classrooms, hiring qualified teachers,

[1:58:22] to match the energy of our students and make sure that they are prepared.

[1:58:26] Our attendance is up, our discipline is down, and that's all because we know that restorative

[1:58:32] justice works.

[1:58:34] And it's about surrounding them with people who care and actually love them.

[1:59:01] Different people come in and I get painted different colors.

[1:59:05] I get cleaned, I get new furniture, but I stay in the same spot in the city.

[1:59:11] If you use up the moon to make macaroni and cheese, the stars will come together to make a new moon.

[1:59:18] I felt that it was fun.

[1:59:19] I usually just read at school, reading is fun.

[1:59:23] I got a lot of good books in the library.

[1:59:27] To see our students excited about it, is incredible.

[1:59:30] Oh, this is an exciting moment for me personally.

[1:59:33] I know reading is everything.

[1:59:35] And to have the whole city focus on reading,

[1:59:38] a coalition of people coming together at every level from birth

[1:59:43] to adults, making the connection to reading

[1:59:46] with your health, with your body, with joy.

[1:59:49] I'm here today to really announce that Oakland is a reading town, and this is about a young people.

[1:59:55] A young people deserve to be able to be able to be literate and to be able to read.

[2:00:00] And right, it's their future and we have a duty and responsibility to partner with the school district. So this is a citywide effort.

[2:00:07] Books like Fencem, so I like events like this, so we can come in and get free books. I think books should be accessible.

[2:00:14] Being the community and celebrated education, literacy, get some books, and just continue this musical vibe of the Oakland Unified School District.

[2:00:24] I'm a former reading teacher, so that's why I'm excited to be here. I love books,

[2:00:29] like Bob Vermeer Staddleton is a reading town. Starting with the two students who read their

[2:00:33] poems, if the energy just felt from there. Going in and talking to the students and looking at

[2:00:38] them the excited about their writing. Looking at here are our vendors and knowing those kids and

[2:00:42] adults are going to go home and read tonight. It's a very exciting look that momentum is great.

[2:00:47] Our school district and our school partners are going to be encouraging and incentivizing

[2:00:51] tracking reading minutes, incentivizing reading for 20 minutes a day in school, but also at home.

[2:00:58] And so they're really going to be working on ways that we can actually log reading.

[2:01:03] We built, we designed open as a reading town because we knew that there's a lot of competing

[2:01:08] stuff for our attention, our phones, our lives.

[2:01:11] And so we know that one of the things we can do to get reading right is we can read more.

[2:01:16] So excited to be here today and our third annual lit fast.

[2:01:19] This is an opportunity for families to come and celebrate their students reading and writing.

[2:01:23] And we have the Oakland Public Library giving away books.

[2:01:26] We have eat, learn, play, giving away back hacks.

[2:01:29] And we have food for families to come because we know they're going to be here from four to six.

[2:01:33] And we all need to eat at Yomi and Mia.

[2:01:35] I think every year we have tweaked it to really figure out the perfect combination of showcasing student writing,

[2:01:43] getting kids up on a stage where they can really be heard.

[2:01:46] This event is all about our kids.

[2:01:47] I think that the most important question is whether the kids feel celebrated today and feel the pride

[2:01:54] of Oakland that is in this space and know that what they read and what they write and how they grow matters

[2:02:00] to everybody who's here and to this whole city.

[2:02:17] I learned about the problems of the prepping bridge and how there was about a problem.

[2:02:25] they're in construction and reconstruction, and I learned how the community solved it.

[2:02:30] The engineer was John August then there was a boat, a lot of laborers working on this.

[2:02:37] I felt the golden gate bridge, I learned all of the different parts of the bridge.

[2:02:43] The main cables, cables, the roadway and the towers, the walls, the Edinburgh,

[2:02:52] while they're crossing on the 101 freeway in LA.

[2:02:57] It's only for wildlife and no humans can go on it.

[2:03:00] It has plants on the top so the animals can find stuff for their family.

[2:03:06] With larger projects, sometimes it can be hard for students to see that end goal

[2:03:10] because it can feel so far away.

[2:03:12] And there's all of these tedious steps that they feel like they're doing

[2:03:15] to get to this long-term thing.

[2:03:17] So this was like our cumulative project, our ELA module, and the focus was information on tech,

[2:03:23] so students were learning research skills and how to look at different sources and kind of synthesize information and put it together.

[2:03:32] They say that still is one of the best materials to build with because it's used to work strong.

[2:03:36] The Burpren Bridge was the first steel suspension bridge in the world, and one of the longest steel suspension bridges at the time,

[2:03:42] Standing at 6,16 feet.

[2:03:45] It was kind of scary, but since I did, it was like my team, it was like, wasn't that scary.

[2:03:51] Their nervous, it feels hard, but it's something special about doing a hard thing.

[2:03:57] It connects into their confidence and realizing that they could do it.

[2:04:01] I learned that for years, like, take a long time to do.

[2:04:04] They helped the community a lot, and they helped people cross over to their best in these years.

[2:04:11] I never knew that inside inside of the Brooklyn Bridge there's like I think it's all a room a museum

[2:04:17] I'm pretty sure it was like the most shocked shocked things in me because I never heard of it

[2:04:21] But I think what is the most special time is it was this week

[2:04:25] Because it was really like the grind time and when they started to realize okay, we're super close to our our finish line

[2:04:32] And now we're gonna really like lock in as the kids would say how I do so bridge it was like at first

[2:04:38] my dad was like kind of building the sticks wrong kind of but we fixed it up I use a little

[2:04:46] costable sticks and cardboard for the streets I think it when you accomplish anything big and

[2:04:51] light it makes it like when you come across other challenges those challenges don't seem as hard

[2:04:57] at least I can take one step

[2:05:17] My advice is to use back for others and listen to adults. Don't crash, child. Try your best, not to procrastinate. Do as much as you can.

[2:05:26] Listen to your peers and be nice to everyone. Focus and learn and if you think you mind you, you can do anything you want. Keep trying and never give up.

[2:05:34] Believe in yourself and be chill.

[2:05:36] Love is good love and keep working.

[2:05:38] Be yourself and make good decisions.

[2:05:40] Believe in yourself that you could do anything you want.

[2:05:43] Never give up and keep on trying.

[2:05:46] Be mindful to let our people always communicate with your teachers.

[2:05:49] Because I wouldn't have gone here if I didn't communicate to my teachers.

[2:05:53] That I needed help.

[2:05:54] Always listen to your teacher.

[2:05:56] Be kind to others and be nice to people.

[2:05:59] Find a good group of friends.

[2:06:01] People that are positive.

[2:06:02] Be good and listen to the teachers.

[2:06:04] Just enjoy the year, make friends, get along with everyone.

[2:06:07] You all year homework.

[2:06:08] This school year I'm looking forward to.

[2:06:10] Keep taking college classes.

[2:06:12] Make new friends and learning stuff for myself to be smarter.

[2:06:16] Make a new friends and maintain a good grades.

[2:06:20] I show up to 16.

[2:06:21] I show up to learn.

[2:06:23] I show up to grow.

[2:06:25] I show up to be my best.

[2:06:26] I show up from my future.

[2:06:28] Please, yeah, we're

[2:06:35] good to see you.

[2:06:45] I think we all kind of have this false narrative of like, it's super hard, it's

[2:06:50] pretty super bad, but it's only bad when you don't understand it, media and money

[2:06:56] helped me focus a lot on budgeting, especially for filming and equipment and for future projects

[2:07:01] I want to do.

[2:07:02] It's not very commonly talked about on what you should do, how to invest in credit, and I appreciate

[2:07:09] how they're having like a big awareness, especially since for younger, to teach us when we're ready

[2:07:17] when we're older. The attention behind the media and money conference was to provide resources

[2:07:24] to our students that normally aren't accessible to them. At youth be educated and power and

[2:07:30] employ essentially during the summer they're getting educated. This conference is empowered.

[2:07:35] This is really a day for them to explore

[2:07:37] to learn about their pathways that they could take

[2:07:39] because high schools at times try things out.

[2:07:41] The other piece is just a lot more practical

[2:07:43] of how they can prepare for any job

[2:07:45] and how they can be successful.

[2:07:47] So they need to know how to carry themselves confidently,

[2:07:49] how to tell a story from themselves

[2:07:51] and a job interview.

[2:07:52] We have a lot of talented students here

[2:07:55] that if given the right resources

[2:07:57] of given the right tools,

[2:07:59] they could be the next Ryan Hooler.

[2:08:00] It was just beautiful to see someone

[2:08:01] that young being so hungry

[2:08:04] and determined.

[2:08:05] This is a great community surrounding us.

[2:08:08] The confidence is key.

[2:08:09] I think we kind of both taught each other that today and one of my students that I had

[2:08:13] with me.

[2:08:13] Just having the confidence in what I've done or what he's done.

[2:08:16] By trade, I'm a financial planner.

[2:08:18] My role was really to educate them to give them the foundational information that I wish

[2:08:23] every kid would receive.

[2:08:26] Opportunities like this, this conference particularly is, it's important to use not just

[2:08:30] an Oakland but everywhere.

[2:08:31] There's all these financial parts of life that we need to explore, and that's a lot of what I explored in my sessions today.

[2:08:39] In our community, especially, there's not a lot of programs that teach you about finances.

[2:08:43] A lot of us are still figuring it out now.

[2:08:45] I think it's extremely important for the youth to get ahead and start on,

[2:08:48] manage and money well, and knowing how to operate media,

[2:08:52] because we're moving into the digital world where everything is media.

[2:08:55] The media in many conferences is definitely with your friends,

[2:08:58] for the future because my money in the Westfield are not that good right now.

[2:09:02] And there are definitely some need how to handle my money and like where to handle my money.

[2:09:06] Yeah, I think I hope that's for the future of like youth students to like sort of like what

[2:09:11] path would need to go to get to this certain level that they want to be at and like have a overall

[2:09:15] good like structure of finance for like when they grow up.

[2:09:17] We got over 100 folks here that are attending today helping get this event go in.

[2:09:22] We have approximately 71 students that's comprised of our alumni plus some of our students

[2:09:27] to attend their erected program.

[2:09:29] We have about 22 volunteers, 18 staff members,

[2:09:34] some more, the better.

[2:09:36] The more individuals that we have volunteering,

[2:09:38] the more career exploration opportunities

[2:09:40] we can offer, the more interviews we can do,

[2:09:43] the more students we can invite.

[2:09:45] Ideally, this becomes an Oakland thing

[2:09:48] that we can have available to the community.

[2:09:51] And in order to do that, it's going to take a bit.

[2:10:05] Hi, I'm Shalanda Tillman and I'm the principal of Madison Park Academy Prime Minister. I grew up in Oakland, born and raised. I've been an educator for 13 years, nine years at NPA, primary. First, as a teacher, and now as a principal.

[2:10:20] I had some amazing, amazing educational experiences throughout Oakland, Unified School District, and it built my character and it made me resilient and it's a big part of who I am today.

[2:10:33] We have a safe, fun, welcome and tight knit community environment here at NPA.

[2:10:39] Families are a big part of our environment, our community, and our decision-making.

[2:10:46] At NPA, we offer opportunities beyond the classroom.

[2:10:51] We have academic support and tutoring, fort full pantry,

[2:10:56] a digital arts prep, a brand new beautiful library, a community, and team building activities,

[2:11:03] and skills skills for every classroom.

[2:11:05] We're all up at a time where my parents can always provide us with educational donations.

[2:11:12] I grew up with wonderful teachers throughout Oakland,

[2:11:16] told me love, who showed me structure and of the least in myself.

[2:11:20] Specifically, I started fourth grade with Ms. Brure at Golden Gate Elementary.

[2:11:25] She recognized that I was brilliant at I was different, but I also had Lee, and she was overall just my role model is still my role model to this day.

[2:11:37] She shows up in the work that I do every single day.

[2:11:48] We are

[2:11:58] the TCN Panthers, and I am so excited I'm here.

[2:12:01] Hi, I'm Lacey Lefkowitz, and I am the proud principal at the college now.

[2:12:06] Our community was actually formed by families. Families who wanted to see their students

[2:12:12] and their families in college now. We have folks art and a science lab. Students can also

[2:12:19] spend time each week in the library, each month in the garden, and each week with our partner

[2:12:26] heroes where they have PE spaces. Parents at Thing College now can expect a lot of different

[2:12:33] opportunities to engage. First we have our three signature events. We have our

[2:12:37] literacy night where we celebrate our love of learning and our love of

[2:12:41] reading. Our second signature event is our unity night where we celebrate all of

[2:12:46] the wonderful cultures that come together. And number three is our Black Excellence

[2:12:51] Night where we further celebrate our community. We hope that you all join us.

[2:12:56] in our thing college now community, you will be joining a legacy of families who have come together,

[2:13:03] both to found this school and to continue to work to make sure that all of our students can be

[2:13:09] successful in college careers and beyond.

[2:13:32] I'm Dr. Lucinda Taylor, principal of Wesley Middle School.

[2:13:35] I feel like my work is still important, changing the lives of Black and Brown kids in Oakland.

[2:13:41] We're here to make another impact in Oakland in a way that creates leaders, at politicians, doctors, lawyers.

[2:13:49] The focus here at West Lake this year and in the years come will be to increase the literacy scores of our students.

[2:13:56] So we have a beautiful full-service library with a librarian, a writer's room.

[2:14:02] West Lake also hosts a merit of athletic programs.

[2:14:07] We have sports like volleyball,

[2:14:09] track and field basketball, tennis, a soccer for our students

[2:14:14] to participate in during our sports program.

[2:14:17] All right, here at West Lake, West Lake also hosts

[2:14:22] a number of Vapa classes, which includes digital media.

[2:14:26] It includes band, it includes art, it includes choir,

[2:14:30] and a host of other opportunities for our students to engage in the arts in the way that makes them young and free and fresh.

[2:14:40] Some of the interest that our students have when they're very passionate are clubs.

[2:14:44] And one of them is Robotics this year. Our students competed in the district wide challenge.

[2:14:50] But we have a variety of clubs, including cooking, barbershop.

[2:14:55] We actually have math and reading clubs and a host of...

[2:15:00] LGBTQ, and personalized clubs. Right here at West Lake. So, with about 30 years in Oakland, I am here at

[2:15:07] West Lake to create conditions for our students to be excellent readers and writers and be able to

[2:15:13] compete globally. So, our focus is creating conditions in the classrooms, hiring qualified teachers,

[2:15:19] to match the energy of our students, and make sure that they are prepared. Our attendance is up,

[2:15:25] are disappointed down, and that's all because we know

[2:15:29] that restorative justice works.

[2:15:31] And it's about surrounding them with people who care

[2:15:34] and actually love them.

[2:15:43] He's great.

[2:15:45] He's great to be here.

[2:15:46] He's great to be

[2:15:49] here.

[2:16:31] Hunter Deaf on stage today to see my large community

[2:16:34] and my friends come all together to celebrate us being scholars.

[2:16:38] It's just so amazing.

[2:16:40] And standing up there with the lights on us

[2:16:42] and just reflecting on how much work we did this year was incredible.

[2:16:46] And if you are here today to celebrate our African American scholar,

[2:16:57] welcome to the Oscar Wright's 25th Annual African American Academic Excellence Award.

[2:17:04] I think it's important that there are achievements be recognized so that they continue to achieve.

[2:17:09] And it lets us know that we're doing something right.

[2:17:13] with our black young men, it's very important to reiterate that we have a chance and that there is promise for us and that somebody else has done it and they can too.

[2:17:28] I like to experience my culture and like over on my ethnic background.

[2:17:32] He's my cultural, so it's always good to get recognized for things that you do positively.

[2:17:37] I'm really proud of making it this far, you know, continuing my, uh, 3. GPA, 3.67 GPA. So yeah, it feels really good to keep it up and keep doing good at school.

[2:17:50] The stay today, it felt great. I feel honored. It's a good feeling. I feel like, you know, I feel like, you know, I work for it. It's just a really good feeling. I do not know how to explain.

[2:18:01] It makes it good for our community so our kids can witness some good things that we do have going on.

[2:18:09] I think that it makes them want to stay in school longer and get what they need done.

[2:18:15] We are gathered here to recognize our African American students who've earned a place on the honor roll.

[2:18:25] Tonight is the celebration of excellence, perseverance, and promise.

[2:18:33] Let's repeat together.

[2:18:35] It's not about you.

[2:18:38] It's not about me.

[2:18:41] It's about our children.

[2:18:43] I think it honors our courage, legacy, a because he did something,

[2:18:47] and because he did something, this has happened.

[2:18:49] We had the benefit of being here when he was still alive,

[2:18:53] But having this maintain after he's gone showcases that education is primary, and he instills the message that education for African-American children of Oakland is number one goal.

[2:19:06] This is beautiful to have, and this will keep his memory living on.

[2:19:12] He's going to live on and all of these children. This is keeping him alive.

[2:19:42] West Oakland is an integral and value part of the city with a long and rich history.

[2:19:47] It includes the city's oldest school, Prescott Elementary, and the Historic School of Champions,

[2:19:54] McLemain's High, and numerous others.

[2:19:56] We're underneath one of these solar cannabis. It's really fulfilling.

[2:20:00] During our promise to the community around creating a sustainable future for our kids.

[2:20:04] From early childhood investments to elementary to middle and into high school, this is a coordinated effort

[2:20:10] to be able to ensure complete investment in the full pathway for our students in West Auckland.

[2:20:16] My favorite part is like the loose lights. There's three now. It needs to be like only two.

[2:20:21] It is more colorful. Now they can see who we are like, do we?

[2:20:24] The winners of Indonesia here since I've been here for the last 10 years.

[2:20:28] You see students appreciate it. It doesn't feel as hot. There's an obvious difference in the heat.

[2:20:34] Now that we finally got blinds, that's been helpful too to be able to block out some of the sun.

[2:20:39] And then visually, it's impacting students because it looks nice. The windows look good. It looks new.

[2:20:44] It feels like it's bringing more like a good energy. What was missing was of just kids motivated to even

[2:20:50] want to come outside to play. So Martin Luther King Jr. students, the impact of the new

[2:20:56] are, shows that everybody cares about them.

[2:20:59] There's just like kind of more joyful play.

[2:21:01] Having things to do and nice facilities to do it with is a huge difference.

[2:21:07] Our investment at McClimans is transformational.

[2:21:10] I'm so excited to be delivering a project at McClimans that honors the legacy of incredible

[2:21:16] people who have been students and community members and staff at McClimans.

[2:21:21] and we're launching a nearly $100 million investment in West Oakland and specifically McClimus.

[2:21:27] It started with the naming of the gym and honoring the legacy of Bill Russell,

[2:21:32] but now it'll be a full modernization of the school that will be breaking around the spring.

[2:21:36] So we're really excited about that project because it's a cornerstone in the West Oakland community.

[2:21:41] I'm excited because I'm a local kid. I grew up here. I went to Lafayette Elementary.

[2:21:46] you went to low middle school and then came here my 9th and 10th grade year so coming back

[2:21:52] to the neighborhood and giving back just coming back home you know to where I was raised

[2:21:56] and when the community knowing people was I was excited. When you get a new house on a new

[2:22:01] bicycle it just does something for you. It motivates you and so having a new place to come to

[2:22:06] it says new smell is a newness about it and people want to take care of it. These projects ultimately

[2:22:12] create safe, welcoming, and high quality learning environments that also strengthen schools

[2:22:18] as neighborhood anchors and serve the community beyond the school day.

[2:22:48] Different people come in and I get painted different colors. I get cleaned, I get new

[2:22:54] furniture, but I stay in the same spot in the city. If you use up the moon to make macaroni and cheese,

[2:23:00] The stars will come together to make in you.

[2:23:05] I felt that it was fun.

[2:23:07] I usually just read our school.

[2:23:09] Reading is fun.

[2:23:09] I got a lot of good books in the library.

[2:23:14] To see our students excited about it is incredible.

[2:23:17] Oh, this is an exciting moment for me personally.

[2:23:20] I know reading is everything.

[2:23:22] And to have the whole city focus on reading,

[2:23:25] a coalition of people coming together at every level

[2:23:29] from birth to adults, making the connection to reading with your health, with your body, with joy.

[2:23:36] I'm here today to really announce that Oakland is a reading town and the spot are young people,

[2:23:41] are young people deserve to be able to be literate and to be able to read and write.

[2:23:48] It's their future and we have a duty and responsibility to partner with the school district,

[2:23:53] so this is a city wide effort. It looks like fence ends. I like events like this,

[2:23:57] So we can come and get free books.

[2:23:59] I think books should be accessible.

[2:24:01] Being the community and celebrated occasion, literacy,

[2:24:05] get some books, and just continue

[2:24:08] this beautiful vibe of the Oaklandian-Ephysical District.

[2:24:11] I'm a former reading teacher.

[2:24:13] So that's why I'm excited to be here.

[2:24:14] I love books like Bob and the Mayor Saddleson

[2:24:17] is a reading town.

[2:24:18] Starting with the two students who read their poems,

[2:24:21] it's the energy just built from there.

[2:24:23] Going in and talking to students and looking

[2:24:24] at me, excited about their writing,

[2:24:26] looking to hear all our vendors and knowing those kids and adults are going to go home and

[2:24:30] read tonight. It's a very exciting look that momentum is great.

[2:24:34] Our school district and our school partners are going to be encouraging and incentivizing

[2:24:38] tracking reading minutes and incentivizing reading for 20 minutes a day in school but also

[2:24:44] at home and so they're really going to be working on ways that we can actually log reading.

[2:24:50] We built, we designed open as a reading town because we knew that there's a lot of competing

[2:24:55] stuff for our attention, our phones, our lives, and so we know that one of the things

[2:25:00] We can do to get reading right, is we can read more.

[2:25:03] So excited to be here today in our third annual lit fast. This is number 20 for families to come and celebrate

[2:25:08] their students reading and writing. And we have the Oakland Public Library giving away books. We have

[2:25:13] eat, learn, play, giving away back hacks. And we have food for families to come, because we know

[2:25:19] they're going to be here from four districts. And we all need to eat at yummy meals. I think every year we have

[2:25:24] We did it to really figure out the perfect combination of showcasing student writing,

[2:25:30] getting kids up on a stage where they can really be heard.

[2:25:33] This event is all about our kids.

[2:25:34] But I think that the most important question is whether the kids feel celebrated today

[2:25:40] and feel the pride of Oakland that is in this space and know that what they read and what they write

[2:25:46] and how they grow matters to everybody who's here and to this whole city.

[2:26:02] This is a lot to me, because back then, they give up like a three-month started black

[2:26:07] security on this slavery and what the hard times.

[2:26:11] And if you're here today, it's kind of raining this hell of a million hundred year anniversary

[2:26:16] of black history, but everything's the last day.

[2:26:20] This event is important to me, because our dancing, few of this thing our dance is just

[2:26:26] for fun, but they have like, it's fireman for it.

[2:26:31] We need more programs like this, not just in February, the young people really get excited

[2:26:37] about being able to showcase their hard work and I think it gives them a bigger sense of

[2:26:44] purpose. I get to express how I feel through dancing and I get to tell them what my

[2:26:50] culture is. It was important to find out what makes young people even want to move.

[2:26:56] words are really powerful because those words turn in a movement, you know,

[2:27:01] movements, turns into bigger movement in a movement, turns into change.

[2:27:05] The expanded learning arts programs and initiative that comes out of central office.

[2:27:10] And our goal is to provide our students with high quality arts instruction

[2:27:15] from Oakland-based, professional teaching artists.

[2:27:20] West Oakland Middle School has an a very good job.

[2:27:23] I feel like, make sure we have that connection,

[2:27:26] especially through music and through dance.

[2:27:27] This collaboration is important.

[2:27:29] And it reminds me a lot of hip hop.

[2:27:31] Hip hop is a collaboration.

[2:27:33] It's a collaboration of music, DJs, dancers,

[2:27:37] big boys, taggers, spray painters.

[2:27:41] Dame, creating that track, and then bringing

[2:27:43] Mari up on one to the phone and being like,

[2:27:46] what can we do when the kids feel right into it.

[2:27:48] But during the kids here do music and dance as well.

[2:27:50] was not a hard transition for them to do that, but I think that that showed a positive

[2:27:54] collaboration which also passed down to you.

[2:27:56] Always learn something, working with young people in general, because they have a lot

[2:28:00] of creative ideas, they may not always have the technical abilities, but the lens that

[2:28:05] they use to see the world is always something in the future and hopeful.

[2:28:10] Before I started the program, I don't have much confidence because I like to get bullied.

[2:28:14] But now I have my confidence, it's actually fun to learn a new thing.

[2:28:20] I hope you learned that I'm good at making beats, and it's so cool how good I can be as

[2:28:25] something wonderful in my mind to students have an opportunity to learn how to conceptualize

[2:28:30] their ideas, and learn the tools of the trade, whatever it is if it's fancy, if it's visual

[2:28:37] arts.

[2:28:38] Everybody may not be a dancer if I may not be like a music, you know what I mean, so support

[2:28:42] and bring them both together.

[2:28:43] I

[2:28:55] love that I can express myself in movement, I can laugh with my friends, and I love that I can do an

[2:29:03] active activity like the most every day. It makes me excited to come to the school.

[2:29:13] This

[2:29:15] is my first time dancing. I never dance football. It's really wonderful.

[2:29:21] It's to be here. I learned many dances.

[2:29:23] the elementary dance teachers and the elementary music teachers and the elementary arts teachers,

[2:29:28] each of those groups gets to meet every single week. We call it PD but it's really more of a

[2:29:33] professional learning community. The whole focus of it is that teachers are learning from each other.

[2:29:37] I remember when I first got this position, one of the things I was really worried about was being on an

[2:29:41] island and being by Mesa. And then I met Emily and it was a gang changer. I think the mentorship

[2:29:48] has been great not just from Emily but also from the other teachers and then getting to see their work and how it can

[2:29:55] influence what I do with my students is really helpful. Being the first time.

[2:30:00] Peter was very intense and overwhelming. I don't know what this would be, but it's sort of like

[2:30:08] corraling energy rather than trying to like pull, like they already have so much and I'm just

[2:30:16] giving it structure. I felt like my eyes didn't know how to see all of the things that were going

[2:30:23] on in the room and to process it to be able to make a decision and I probably would have

[2:30:28] If it wasn't for this group, I was kind of nervous, but I want to do with it, it felt good.

[2:30:35] Well, I was still nervous, but I just love all the choreography and all of them move me.

[2:30:43] Well, any arts is a challenge to make your fit into a school culture.

[2:30:47] We created a dance framework and created a vision for dance education,

[2:30:52] and then as we started to have positions that opened up,

[2:30:55] We were able to convince the powers of being determined.

[2:30:58] Initially, one of them into a dance position.

[2:31:01] They went from one teacher to two teachers to what do we have now,

[2:31:05] to Oliver, something that are doing elementary dance across our schools.

[2:31:09] My favorite part about being in this position is performing and saying like,

[2:31:15] poems and I love when she teaches us and she makes us laugh a lot.

[2:31:19] Sometimes she has a special guest or we're doing some big special like when I was a second

[2:31:25] day we went to Castle Ward for our foot performance. I love dancing because it makes me feel happy

[2:31:34] and it brings me a motion. My philosophy for dance is really about building the students and

[2:31:41] building their character outside of dance and one of the discipline of dance and how that discipline

[2:31:46] and translate into edit areas and family.

[2:31:48] So it's about how we can build the mess people through dance.

[2:32:00] For high school, I played professionally

[2:32:02] for several years, played overseas

[2:32:06] for another handful years, came back to California,

[2:32:09] maybe six years ago.

[2:32:10] I'm really glad I'm to education,

[2:32:12] and so now here I am trying to change the world.

[2:32:15] My name is Dr. Alexis Gray-Lossin,

[2:32:17] and I attend an open-set high school.

[2:32:19] To me, what a community management, a school's manager, is it really is a way of life.

[2:32:24] It's a connector. It's a connector of people,

[2:32:26] connected community partnerships, students, and so it really kind of encompasses all these different

[2:32:32] things. And so to me, it's really important because it really helps create the culture and

[2:32:37] caramel in your campus. I think the community school's vision encompasses so much that

[2:32:42] it's hard sometimes to just dial in on one thing that your school needs and like with a bigger

[2:32:47] like tech, you know, sometimes you get a little bit overwhelmed with that piece, but I would say that,

[2:32:53] you know, it's going and where we're still figuring it out. And, you know, each year, I think

[2:32:57] the community schools role is changing and continues to be in demand. Favorite memory? Definitely

[2:33:04] as long as you say shit and shit's here, open tech. We had some incredible athletes at that particular

[2:33:09] time, you know, Leon Poe, Marchon, Josh, socially incredible one of different basketball games and

[2:33:14] other sports and seeing other sports.

[2:33:17] I was a little bit over nerd.

[2:33:18] So I love to be challenged in the classroom

[2:33:21] and be able to read different types of books

[2:33:23] and learn from all my different classmates.

[2:33:26] So my current advice is always strive to be who you want

[2:33:30] and don't let anyone deteriorate from that.

[2:33:33] I'm fine, but I think as a young person,

[2:33:34] we get overwhelmed by life

[2:33:36] and things, you know, some positives and different directions.

[2:33:38] They'll continue to develop and be young people

[2:33:42] to the world and hopefully they'll come back

[2:33:44] one of poor back in Oakland Tech in different ways, whether that be teaching or being a

[2:33:48] community school's manager or maybe even coaching. For the reason why I got my doctorate

[2:33:53] is I was teaching offing. I have to make a female excellence. I fell in love with it and I really

[2:33:58] wanted to create a curriculum for it. And so that's literally why I went and got the doctorate.

[2:34:05] It was really important for me and for other black girls to see that what it is to be a doctor,

[2:34:11] You know, it's not the normal that we're walking a door and I think it's really important for

[2:34:17] representation to be seen and heard kids see me and they're like, oh, if you know this likes us can do it

[2:34:24] You know like I could do that. I think there's a stigma and Oakland that you can't do things and I think I'm a living example of whatever

[2:34:31] You want to do you can definitely do. I mean you got to put your mind to it

[2:35:02] Breema was a place where I was able to be myself creatively and just kind of find my people.

[2:35:07] It also was a place that challenged me emotionally, academicity, and it made me really seek to see who I am.

[2:35:15] Jeliza, Malika, Marie, Collins, and I attended Wudir Elementary, Haven Sport, Media Academy, after one high school.

[2:35:23] We in a part of the Media Academy opened up my eyes to a world that never knew existed, and allow me to be exposed to things I otherwise would be exposed to.

[2:35:31] favorite memories is just being able to be a kid.

[2:35:35] Beauty, nature, half-on, learn new things, and be able to express myself

[2:35:39] great to be. I was our editor-in-chief at the school in the

[2:35:42] safer. My senior year, after a high school, I went to fashion

[2:35:45] safe.

Budget and Finance Committee on 2026-09-03 6:00 PM

Agenda

Transcript