Friday, July 1^st

Solar Panels Save Music

Twenty San Diego campuses to place combined 23,000 panels on rooftops, saving enough to support next year's music programs.

San Diego schools are getting more than just energy from the sun.

The schools' music program has been salvaged by using $1.3 in cost-savings gained from solar panels installed on the rooftops of 20 local schools.

The new plan is part of the district's latest budget proposal, which was presented at Tuesday's meeting. The plan includes savings from eliminating two superintendent positions.

The panels are expected to provide 64 percent of the required electricity for each of the 20 schools with the panels, according to a press release from AMSOLAR Corporation. Read More

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Amount Of Time Teens Spend Online Can Improve Digital Literacy

Don't disconnect your kids: teenagers who spend time on the web are more digitally literate during a time when technological proficiency is increasingly important, a recent report suggests.

Between 2000 and 2009, the number of students who reported having access to Internet at home nearly doubled -- to 89 percent from 45 percent, according to the Digital Technologies and Performance report published by the Programme for International Student Assessment. PISA is an assessment conducted by the Paris-based Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development on 15-year-old students across OECD countries. The group defines reading literacy as:

"Understanding, using, reflecting on and engaging with written texts in order to achieve one's goals, develop one's knowledge and potential, and participate in society. This definition applies to both print and digital reading." Read More

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Sad Summer Ahead for Teen Employment

Seasonal job prospects are so tight that three out of four teens won't have a job this summer, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics.

"It's about as bad as it gets," says Joseph McLaughlin, senior research associate at the Center for Labor Market Studies at Northeastern University in Boston. "Last summer, we reached a postwar employment low for 16 to 19-year-olds."

McLaughlin doesn't expect much improvement this year.

The official teen unemployment rate is about 25%, but that figure doesn't count all the teens who aren't seeking work. When all teens are factored in, only 25% of them will actually have jobs. That level of discouragement or disinterest worries many economists. Read More

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5 Reasons to Consider Hiring an Ex-Prisoner

Following the Rodney King beating in 1993, Shegerian helped start Homeboy Industries, which helps at-risk, recently released and former gang members in Los Angeles become contributing members of their communities through a variety of services, including helping find them jobs.

"I was the king of second chances before there were second chances," Shegerian said. "This has changed my life."

Shegerian provided BusinessNewsDaily with his top five reasons small business owners should consider hiring an ex-offender. Read More

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Gang Prevention Grant Paves Way for Mentor Programs

The Charlotte-Mecklenburg Police Department's Gang of One hosted a re-opening ceremony of the Greenville Neighborhood Center located at 1330 Spring Street, on June 17.

Fran Cook, Gang of One's director and a Charlotte-Mecklenburg Police certified gang specialist, said the program has expanded from a hotline and a staff of one at its 2004 launch to a staff of seven and several gang prevention and re-entry initiatives such as educational, vocational and tattoo removal services. Cook said that being able to use the re-opened Greenville Neighborhood Center will help them to be able to provide programming in addition to case management services. Read More

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Is Apathy Our Greatest Problem?

Maclean's On Campus is proud to announce that Brielle Cram, a grade ten student at Rundle College Senior High School in Calgary, is the winner of the Journalists for Human Rights annual Write the Wrong prize, awarded for the best essay on a human rights theme.

This year, the questions was "What is the single largest problem that we face today and what do Youth need to do to fix it?" Cram made the case that apathy is the biggest problem.

Write the Wrong was created in 2009 to celebrate the twentieth anniversary of the United Nations General Assembly adoption of the Declaration of the Rights of the Child. Notable Canadian journalists, including Cathrin Bradbury of Maclean's, judged this year's essays. Cram will receive a Roger's smart phone as a prize. She says she plans to study medicine and law so that she can advocate for better access to medical care for people around the world. Read More

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Mentoring, Academic Improvements Help Atlantic City Students to Excel

When the top 10 students at Atlantic City High School took the stage at graduation Wednesday, half represented the city rather than the three more suburban sending districts, including four of the top five graduates.

School officials embraced the group in all its diversity as proof that despite its challenges, the district does provide the level of education that helped not just valedictorian Logan Chipkin of Margate get into the University of Pennyslania, but also got Atlantic City resident and salutatorian Rod Aluise into Drexel University, third-ranked Juan Diaz to Yale University, fourth-ranked Anthony Cox to Brown University, and fifth-ranked Thai Thi Tran to Richard Stockton College. Read More

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