As school begins here in Indianapolis, we are going to take a look back at a graduation. Not long ago, Deonte Bridges took to the stage as the valedictorian at Booker T. Washington Senior Academy in Atlanta and delivered a speech worth seeing.
In fact, a lot of people have seen it. More than 100,000 on YouTube. It prompted Mark Davis of the Atlanta Journal-Constitution to seek Bridges out for a story, which began:
The trophies are impossible to ignore. At least 37 fill the living room of the south Atlanta apartment Deonte Bridges shares with his mother. Thirty-six extol the teenager’s academic achievements at Booker T. Washington High School.
The 37th trophy? Bridges, 18, smiled. “Basketball,” he said. Turns out he played the sport in ninth grade but gave it up. The game got in the way of more important things.
Now the youngster is preparing to begin his collegiate career at the University of Georgia. After sifting through more than $1 million in offered scholarships, he accepted the opportunity to be a Gates Millennium Scholar, which will completely pay for his studies, both undergraduate and graduate.
One of our partners, the Indianapolis chapter of Architecture for Humanity, is redefining parking this September.
AFH Indy had such a fun time bringing PARK(ing) Day to the Circle City for the first time last fall, that it will be doing it again on Sept. 17. And this time AFH Indy is calling on others to make the celebration bigger… much bigger.
Established by San Francisco art and design studio Rebar in 2005, PARK(ing) Day challenges urban dwellers and visitors to rethink infrastructure by transforming, temporarily, metered parking spaces into public parks.
“In urban centers around the world, inexpensive curbside parking results in increased traffic, wasted fuel and more pollution,” said Rebar’s Matthew Passmore. “The strategies that generated these conditions are not sustainable, nor do they promote a healthy, vibrant urban human habitat. PARK(ing) Day is about re-imagining the possibilities of the metropolitan landscape.”
Last year, AFH Indy took up the challenge by transforming two parking spaces into a 9′ x 40′ park — complete with sod, paving stones, flowers, trees and benches — in front of the Borders Bookstore on Meridian Street near the Washington Street intersection. This year, at the same location, the hope is to transform as many as 10 spaces typically reserved for cars.
“We are actively recruiting organizations to join AFH Indy in its PARK(ing) Day celebration,” said chapter founder ChunSheh Teo. “We are excited about establishing partnerships and collaborations that will have an impact on those who experience PARK(ing) Day in the shadow of Monument Circle in September and beyond. Everyone is invited to join us on September 17.”
In fact, those interested in partnering, sponsoring or volunteering can find out how to do just that by visiting the chapter’s blog. In the coming weeks that will be the best place to learn about the participating organizations as they commit to PARK(ing) Day 2010 in Indianapolis.
Architecture for Humanity is an international nonprofit organization, founded in 1999, which promotes architectural and design solutions to global, social and humanitarian crises. The Indianapolis Chapter was founded in 2008.
Back in June, SBCWorks.org took an unexpected break. As we had readied ourselves for a first-of-its-kind, three-week college readiness program at Vincennes University, we thought that we would deliver content as we always have. We thought we’d have time in the morning or evening to sip some coffee, digest the news of the day and keep this site flowing.
But the entire experience of overseeing 115 at-risk high school juniors (and 13 Fellows ready to advise, mentor and instruct them) was more demanding than we’d thought.
By Day Three, I had blisters on both feet from running around campus. It was all hands on deck, all the time without a manual to prepare us for the issues we’d confront and resolve. I thought that less than a week into the experience, the Fellows had grown to dislike us as the job proved more intense than they’d expected.
But just today, the NCAA published a story about X-Mester. And given time to reflect, it is pretty clear that the Fellowship was impactful. Said Princeton University’s Trey Peacock, “At times you felt like giving up. You were tired, and things weren’t going perfectly. But it forced you to adapt. It was really rewarding. I’d say it’s probably the best thing I’ve done, program or job-wise, in my life so far.”
Wow! And the good news is, as the overseers of X-Mester, we learned so much that will help the next cohort of Fellows. Yeah, we will be doing it again.
In the mean time, SBCWorks is back. So stay tuned.
Today is a particularly proud day for both Vincennes University and its early college partner Ben Davis University High School in the western reaches of Indianapolis.
BDU is holding its first graduation, as 79 students will walk as education pioneers. This is the first class of graduates through Vincennes early college network, which now extends to five schools, and it will be the largest group of graduates ever from an early college high school in the state of Indiana.
More to come as festivities get underway at 2 pm. Continued…
When I moved out of Founders Hall, the college dorm I lived in as a freshman and sophomore at the University of Dayton, for the last time, I was really looking forward to the Olympics returning to Los Angeles. And the top song on the Billboard Hot 100? “Hello,” by Lionel Richie.
But now Patricia and I are heading back to school. Back to the dorms. For the first time in more than a quarter century.
No, it’s not some reality television show, even though it probably could be. Instead, we will be overseeing and providing support for X-Mester, an on-campus early college experience for 117 rising seniors from Indianapolis-area high schools.
It is a unique program where students, mostly first-generation collegians, will be earning college credit and participating in a wide array of extracurricular activities while receiving mentorship from the 13 Fellows we profiled here last week.
We will be writing about the program, the students and the university over at x-mester.com, but here we will be writing about returning to school… and the dorms.
Something we never dreamed of experiencing all over again.
If you have a location in or near Martindale-Brightwood where you think a flyer advertising this survey would be helpful, please print this out and place it on the wall. It would be much appreciated.
Words of Wisdom
Children need models rather than critics. — Joseph Joubert
Noted philosopher Roger Daltrey was known to say, "The world's my home, when I'm mobile. Mobile, mobile, mobile, mobile...."
In respect to Daltrey and his mates, thanks to WordPress, Dipen Shah and a host of unnamed developers, SBCWorks.org is definitely goin' mobile. This means that folks with an iPhone, iPod Touch, Pre, Android, Blackberry and other smart phones can go to our site and get an optimized reading experience. And don't forget to bookmark it!
As school begins here in Indianapolis, we are going to take a look back at a graduation. Not long ago, Deonte Bridges took to the stage as the valedictorian at Booker T. Washington Senior Academy in Atlanta and delivered a speech worth seeing.
One of our partners, the Indianapolis chapter of Architecture for Humanity, is redefining parking this September.
Today is a particularly proud day for both Vincennes University and its early college partner Ben Davis University High School in the western reaches of Indianapolis.
When I moved out of Founders Hall, the college dorm I lived in as a freshman and sophomore at the University of Dayton, for the last time, I was really looking forward to the Olympics returning to Los Angeles. And the top song on the Billboard Hot 100? “Hello,” by Lionel Richie.
Noted philosopher