Education

Congressman Miller visits Richmond schools

Congressman George Miller (D-Martinez) lobbed a lot of questions Thursday afternoon. But he only got one unanimous answer. “How many of you plan to go to college?” Miller asked about 20 Richmond High School students. Every hand shot up. Miller smiled wide. It was part of a more than one-hour after-school conversation between the longtime congressman and teen members of the Bay Area Peacekeepers Inc., a violence prevention and education program that targets youth in Richmond and San Pablo. The…

Charlie Reid Christmas draws huge Richmond crowd

More than 1,000 parents and children came to the Richmond PAL Center Sunday for a the 64th Annual Charles Reid Christmas Party, a community tradition begun in 1947 and carried on today by the Charles Reid Foundation and a handful of sponsors.

Local educator honored at the White House

Eric Peterson, a Richmond resident and the principal at Dover Elementary School in San Pablo, was honored at the White House for achieving National Board Certification last Wednesday. Peterson and about 100 other educators took part in the daylong celebration, attended by Secretary of Education Arne Duncan and White House Domestic Policy Director Melody Barnes. The National Board Certification is an advanced teaching credential that takes between one to three years to obtain. “As the nation focuses on building the…

WCCUSD Union Members protest Benefit cuts

Five negotiators from the Public Employees Union Local One met outside the West Contra Costa County School District building in the parking lot last week to protest what they called unfair increases to the amount employees pay for benefits. The more than 1,600 union members in the WCCUSD have not a had a wage increase in the past three years and, beginning in January, will have to pay more for health insurance as well as dental and vision plans. For…

Richmond family tries homeschooling for a year

We want our kids to know how to buy a bus ticket. We try to hold loosely without being foolish. I think that adds to brainpower. Our learning doesn’t begin at 8:30 and end at 2:30. Those are our school hours but we do so much beyond that.

Play stresses HIV awareness to teens

Ninth and 10th graders from Kennedy High School gathered in their gym Thursday to watch a performance about givin’ it up and hookin’ up—and the risks associated with those behaviors.

Richmond youth share stories of struggle and hope

When Jamaya Walker’s father was murdered last March she cried so fiercely she became physically ill. She still has the bullet that took his life, but now, instead of weeping, she writes. “When you’re a daddy’s girl and your dad gets murdered, you don’t know what to do,” 14-year-old Walker said. “I just wrote all my emotions. I had to.” Walker will join other Richmond youth this Sunday at the East Bay Center for Performing Arts as RAW Talent presents…