Commentary, By VoiceWaves Youth Reporter Suzan Al-Shammari

Do school uniforms help to provide less distractions? Do they improve attendance? Do they increase school pride? Over the past few decades, students, parents and administrators have debated on the issue of school uniforms.

For us students, school can be big part of our lives. It’s where we see our friends, learn, and make memories. In high schools that require uniform, students seem to always be complaining that uniforms don’t let students express themselves. However, for many students in Long Beach like me, it isn’t because they feel that wearing a uniform is boring. It’s because it is taking away from their class time.

Case in point: I was on my way to class one day when one of the school faculties stopped me for a uniform violation. I was wearing a white sheer shirt (with a white shirt underneath) but our guidelines require a solid white shirt. I was sent to on-campus suspension (OCS) to borrow an old used shirt and was sent to class with a one-hour detention. By the time I returned to class, I had missed the first half of my Spanish class.

As the school year began last year, sheer shirts became very popular and many young women were buying the trendy shirts off the racks. But only a few days after the beginning of the school year, all students were prohibited from wearing sheer shirts at Wilson High School. Since then, sheer shirts have been one of the few things students struggle through to match a proper school uniform standard. See sheer shirt example pictured to the right. 

While uniforms can provide less distractions to students and less stress to parents, many students still work hard to add their “own style” to what they wear everyday. Many students enjoy wearing uniforms, but argue that slight dress code violations are often punished too harshly.

“Do students abuse uniforms in inappropriate ways? Yes!,” said Vanessa Rodriguez, a sophomore at Wilson High School. “Girls who wear really tight shorts, a shirt with buttons open in front, a low cut undershirt, or those who wear a sheer shirt with no undershirt under and you can see their skin and bra clearly under their see through shirt, should be defiantly sent to OCS immediately because they’re at school wearing inappropriate uniform.”

To hear students’ stories about uniform violations at Wilson and Millikan High Schools, click on the sound clip at the top of this story.

“For students who dress properly, but might not have the exact school colors or might wear a sheer shirt with appropriate undershirt under, should not be taken out of class,” said Vanessa Rodriguez said. “They should be punished before or after school or during lunch, to be fair to their learning time.”

According to Wilson principal Dr. Sandy Blazer, around 15 students go to on-campus suspension a day, for uniform violations.

“We give students plenty of warnings, we send letters that go out to parents and we have the uniform [guidelines] on our website, so it’s not like it’s a surprise,” Blazer said. “We try to be flexible and if students have issues, we provide free uniforms. It was the rules even before I was a principal here.”

Some students and community leaders agree that taking students out of class for school uniforms, might be counter-productive.

“There needs to be a more positive way for student discipline than pulling the student out of their classes and harming their class time,” said Justine Calma, program coordinator at Khmer Girls in Action, a local non-profit whose mission is to empower Southeast Asian girls and young women.

Calma believes that using restorative justice circles, an approach that focuses on the needs of the victim and the offenders and on talking about the core issues that affect the entire community. The offenders are encourage to repair the harm they did in various ways, such as apologizing or community service. The method has been gaining popularity in schools throughout the nation seeking alternatives to policies like suspension and expulsion.

“Some students wear clothes violating school uniform on purpose just to get out of class,” said Emma Salazar, a junior at Wilson. “Uniforms are important, but there are many ways to deal with students that wouldn’t affect their learning time.”

Everybody has different opinions about school uniforms. But in the end, schools should only be concerned about students’ safety and well-being.  There needs to be a conversation around how a school addresses it’s points of view to students that help them understand why they are doing what they’re doing.

“I personally like uniforms– they’re unique and they usually save money for students,” said Jazmine Gonzalez, a sophomore at Wilson High. “But restricting uniforms and dress codes that affects the student’s learning time, that I’m against.”

For more information about school uniform policy in at LBUSD, click HERE.

New America Media, News Report, Viji Sundaram, Posted: Jun 17, 2013

This article is also available in Spanish. 

OXNARD, Calif. – For years, DREAMer Rodrigo Perea, 18, lived under a threatening cloud of deportation. Now, Perea has legal permission to live and work in the U.S.– but until recently he was still in the dark about the low-income health programs he qualifies for.

He’s not alone. Thousands of immigrants, and even many health care advocates in California who work with young immigrants, are unaware that recipients of the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) program may qualify for state-funded only Medi-Cal, identical in every way to the full scope federal and state funded program that shares the name.

Last August, the Obama administration initiated DACA, giving certain undocumented youth who have grown up in the United States permission to live and work in the country for two-year renewable periods.

Two months later, the administration announced that DACA recipients would not be eligible to receive federal benefits, including health insurance programs — an obvious attempt on the administration’s part to prove to its foes that DACA would not renege on the administration’s promise that undocumented individuals would not benefit from the Affordable Care Act (ACA).

Read more at New America Media

Joshua’s “Road to Happiness” is one of our submissions to Radio Diaries: Teen Diaries Contest. Two teens will be selected to be recorded and aired onNPR.

Read and hear more at The kNOw

Editor’s Note: After reading Helpful Products, Dangerous Toxins by Fatima Ramirez, reader Adriana Garcia wrote in to commend Fatima for her article. She suggested Fatima watch Bag It, a documentary about the impact of plastics on the environment, marine animals and human health.  The following is Fatima’s review of Bag It.

FATIMA RAMIREZ/Coachella Unincorporated

With a perfect blend of humor and eye-opening truth, Jeb Berrier sets out to discover the path a plastic bag takes once it’s disposed. The documentary Bag It goes on to explore the awe-stricken moment Berrier experiences while purchasing a peach yogurt and carrying it home in a single plastic bag which he eventually throws away.

Such revelation proves to have an impact on Berrier, a self-proclaimed “average guy [who is] not what you consider a tree hugger.” He begins to realize that not only plastic bags, but also plastic itself, is the most produced material and is essentially everywhere.

Berrier’s normal-guy appeal serves to flawlessly entertain the audience while explaining hard-hitting facts and the repercussions of a plastic world. The film goes onto exploring the many aspects of plastic, from its manufacturing and distribution to its disposal and the many misconceptions that unknowingly come with it.

Read more at Coachella Unincorporated

By VoiceWaves Youth Reporter Deonna Anderson

Between Artesia Boulevard and Ocean Boulevard, sectioned off by Sante Fe and the San Gabriel River, there are more open mic events than one can count on two hands. Poets have been a part of Long Beach for decades and more recently, the poetry scene has seen a surge.

Poets are performing at every chance they get and outreaching to community members to listen, in hopes that the people they reach will too, be brave enough to share their own stories. This year, the city had its second annual poetry slam competition, which organizers say is really only the beginning for a thriving and growing community of artists. If you don’t tell your story, who will?

VoiceWaves got a chance to chat with folks in the Long Beach poetry community to learn more.

For some residents of Long Beach, poetry is a way to express their creativity, heal themselves and tell their stories. In 2012, five women founded ¡DUENDE! Long Beach, a grassroots arts organization whose mission is to provide creative programming, mentoring, and performance opportunities for youth. They have taught poetry workshops and led a team to Brave New Voices, a national poetry slam competition, in their founding year.

“I started writing for my kids,” said Linda Delmar, writing instructor at the Homeland Cultural Center. “I wanted to write my family’s stories for them.” Delmar’s writing mentor was the late Manazar Gamboa, who wanted a place in Long Beach where youth could express themselves.

This desire is shared among those who call themselves writers, poets, spoken word artists. Over the years, open mics have continued sprouting up around the city. There are even folks who are committed to community outreach and equipping youth with the tools to tell their stories through spoken word.

Here’s a list of spoken word events in Long Beach—where you can listen to stories, and tell your own:

Poet to Poet Open Mic
It’s a Grind Coffeehouse
4245 Atlantic Avenue
Every Monday at 7pm

Open Mic Night
Portfolio Coffeehouse
2300 E. 4^th Street
Every Wednesday at 7:30pm

Open Mic
Viento y Agua Coffeehouse
4000 E. 4^th Street
Every Thursday at 7:30pm

Power Mic
Homeland Cultural Center
(Manazar Gamboa Theater)
1321 E. Anaheim Street
First Thursdays at 7pm

“Pizza Pi” Open Mic
Shillelagh
2742 E. 4^th Street
Every Thursday at 7pm

Bank-Heavy Variety Show
Bank-Heavy Press
5535 E. Spring St.
Last Thursdays

Xpressions Open Mic
The Bungalow Building
727 Pine Avenue
Every Third Friday at 6pm

The Definitive Soapbox
The Mirage Café
539 Bixby Road
Last Fridays at 7pm

The Griot Café
Shades of Afrika
1001 E. 4^th Street
Saturday Night at Sundown
($5 Cover Charge)

The Writers Block
The Bluffs
2300 Ocean Blvd
Saturdays at 7

Twilight Walk Open Mic
Bungalow Art Center
727 Pine Avenue
First Sundays at 6pmGatsby, Re)Verb and Aortic Press Present:

This past Friday, residents in North Long Beach were treated to a concert as part of “BE S.A.F.E. (Summer Activities in a Friendly Environment,” a week-long series of programs for youth and community building in the 8th and 9th districts.

The concert, called Brighter Future Peace Jam, took place at Houghton Park and included classes in Zumba and obesity awareness. The video above interviews community leaders and concert attendees.

AURORA SALDIVAR/Coachella Unincorporated

COACHELLA – As schools let out for the summer, local youth need look no further than Sixth Street.

Community members – but young people in particular — are invited to kick off the summer with Artchella this Friday, June 14. This free community event will take place at Raices Cultura Art Center, 1494 Sixth Street, from 6 to 9:30 p.m.

See more at Coachella Unincorporated

YouthWire was founded to unify and showcase the wealth of youth-created content being generated by New America Media’s community media projects in under-served communities across California, and to broaden their collective reach – beyond the local – to include a statewide audience of policymakers, advocacy groups, activists, educators and youth.

For more than two decades, New America Media has been a pioneer and an innovator in the field of youth media — beginning with San Francisco-based YO! Youth Outlook in the late 80′s and continuing with the founding of The Beat Within in 1997, Silicon Valley De-Bug in 2001 and The kNOw Youth Media in 2006.  Those experiences have informed NAM’s recent expansion of our youth-led media work to five new community media projects in California: Voicewaves in Long Beach, South Kern Sol, Coachella Unincorporated, Richmond Pulse and We’Ced Youth Media in Merced.

Together, these eight media outlets form a necklace of youth-led but community-inclusive journalism projects — the next generation of ethnic media –  spanning the state of California, strategically located in areas of the state that have historically lacked indigenous and accessible media platforms for community voice.

Read more at YouthWire

Domestic workers labor in the shadows without basic labor protections. Please sign to support the Domestic Workers Bill of Rights to recognize and respect those who do the work that makes all other work possible every day.

Read more at DomesticWorkers.org

Take action HERE

I write this in the spirit and honor of my ancestors…

I recently asked a group of school kids in Richmond to tell me what they knew about Juneteenth and the Fourth of July. They all knew the basics of the Fourth of July – that it marks the nation’s independence day (although not all the kids could tell me who the U.S. was fighting for independence from). Not one of them, however, could tell me a thing about Juneteenth (June 19th), the holiday commemorating the announcement of the abolition of slavery in the U.S.

After explaining to the kids what Juneteenth symbolizes, the discussion moved on to less serious things like famous athletes and entertainers. I left the conversation wondering how and why it is that these kids don’t know about the epic history of African Americans that led to the achievements of many of the very same professional athletes and entertainers they’d just been speaking about.

Read more at Richmond Pulse