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Counselor Erica Martinez has a clearly defined mission: help high school students discover their passions and find a path that will lead them to opportunity, happiness, and success after graduation.
“As a counselor you’re guiding young people on how they’re going to do their education,” remarked Martinez, “but you’re also helping them become adults.”
For Martinez, the call to pursue a career in academic counseling was fueled in part by her own experience with counselors in her hometown of Fresno, California. Martinez recalled seeing her own counselor in high school “maybe one time” and shared that college was not part of the conversation, leaving her to wonder why her post-high school plans and options were never discussed.
By Kathy Chouteau
Students from the West Contra Costa Unified School District (WCCUSD) have organized a “March in Solidarity with the AAPI Community” Sat. April 3 at 2 p.m. The march will start at El Cerrito High School and then proceed to El Cerrito City Hall.
“We stand in solidarity against the recent and historical anti-Asian hate crimes,” the group stated in a flier posted on the WCCUSD’s Facebook page. “Join us to hear from AAPI youth community members and to demand an end to this racist violence.”
The student march comes amid rising number of hate crime incidents targeting the Asian community in the East Bay, San Francisco and nationwide.
WCCUSD, unions reach tentative agreement for spring in-person intervention plan richmondstandard.com - get the latest breaking news, showbiz & celebrity photos, sport news & rumours, viral videos and top stories from richmondstandard.com Daily Mail and Mail on Sunday newspapers.
By Kathy Chouteau
Amid school closures during the pandemic, one bright spot has been the partnership between Conscious Kitchen and the West Contra Costa Unified School District (WCCUSD), which has resulted in the distribution of 100 percent free organic food boxes to the school community on a weekly basis.
According to Conscious Kitchen, the partnership kicked off in November 2020, spurring the shift from conventional food products and produce to all-organic options in the WCCUSD’s food boxes, with increasing quantities each week. They’re distributed each Thursday by volunteers at
“The shift to all organic assists families in a time of need and supports local farms and ranches. And, families have the opportunity to take the organic food and cook healthy meals together,” said WCCUSD Superintendent Matthew Duffy in his March 12 newsletter to the school community, calling it “a silver lining during this pandemic.”
Bay Area must listen to families of color if it wants to reopen schools safely, equitably
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1of2Kim Desai with her homemade sign at the Sunday rally put on by OUSD Parents for Safe Reopening near Lake Merritt, OaklandSam Whiting / The ChronicleShow MoreShow Less
2of2Oakland Mayor Libby Schaaf, a graduate of Skyline High School, flanked by kids from the Oakland Unified School District at Sunday s rally for reopening the schoolsSam Whiting / The ChronicleShow MoreShow Less
Kev Choice said he wondered “where all of the Black and brown people were.”
Choice, a hip-hop artist, activist and music teacher at the Oakland School for the Arts, was referring to the “Schools Not Screens” rally held near Lake Merritt on Feb. 28. The grassroots group OUSD Parents for Safe Reopening organized the event to urge the Oakland Unified School District to quickly reopen schools for in-class instruction. Even Oakland Mayor Libby Schaaf attended, and she told th