Back to the dark ages in Bessemer

When I came out (as a gay man) my children were young; 5 and 9. This was in 1995 and it was a scary time for LGBT parenting. I had the best attorney for gay issues in the city of Birmingham.

There was a two year period between when I came out and when my divorce was final. During that time, my children developed relationships with my partner (at the time). They got to know his family, they celebrated together, made or bought gifts for each other, basically, everything that a family member would and should do when families are joined.

When the judge ruled in the divorce case, I has hit with restricted visitation. I could not have my children (by that time aged 7 and 11) in the presence of my partner.

We appealed the decision (with the help of Lambda Legal, a national organization committed to achieving full recognition of the civil rights of lesbians, gay men, bisexuals, transgender people and those with HIV through impact litigation, education and public policy work). The Court of Appeals upheld the lower court's order.

For years we had to live under that draconian order. The injustice was hard to deal with, but the logistics and inconvenience made it almost impossible.

Fifteen years later society has changed. Research shows that children being raised in same-sex households perform as well or better than those raised in opposite-sex household or by single parents. In several states, gays and lesbians are allowed to marry the person they love. In other states, different degrees of domestic partnership are in place. The President of the United States has voiced his support for marriage equality.

But in Bessemer, Judge Eddie Vines has ignored fact and allowed his religious views to create an injustice similar to the one which I experienced in 1995.

A lesbian mother, who is married (in another jurisdiction) to another woman, has just been denied custody, and the child is being returned to an abusive father. On top of that, the child's other mom is not allowed to be present during visitation times.

"Custody and visitation of the minor child shall remain as previously ordered by this
Court, except that the Defendant is restrained from having ****** ****** present
when she is exercising visitation with the child."

The judge said the child would suffer "gender confusion" if allowed to be around ******.

Judge Vines told her point blank that he is a Southern Baptist deacon and that being a lesbian placed her child in an immoral environment.

The father admitted in court to abusing the child. Yet Judge Vines believes that sending a kid to live with his abusive father is better than living in a home where love comes from both parents.

In the past the father has been convicted of domestic abuse against the child's mother. Yet Judge Vines thinks that he provides a moral environment in which to raise a child.

One thing I know from experience. Children who are placed in this situation grow up learning about justice and discrimination and bigotry. They learn that in Alabama, religion trumps justice. 

And they continue to love the person they are separated from.

Again, this is 2012. We know a lot more about same-sex relationships and parenting than we did in 1995. But Judge Vines has let his own prejudices and ignorance (about sexuality and child well being) influence his ruling. 


This ruling should be appealed, but knowing the makeup of the Alabama Court of Appeals and their history on cases of this type, I wouldn't be too confident about the process. 


And let's start looking for someone to run against Judge Vines in 2014. Bessemer can be better than this.

The Affordable Care Act in Alabama

The Affordable Care Act, the new health care law, is making a positive difference in our health care system. I have written about this before, but the following was sent by Jon Carson, Director of the White House Office of Public Engagement.

Just this week, the Obama Administration made three announcements about how the new law is helping people in Alabama. Thanks to the health care law: 3.1 Million More Young Adults Have Health Insurance: Thanks to the health care law, young adults can stay on their parent's health plan until age 26. This week, we announced that 3.1 million people who would have been uninsured - including 49,000 in Alabama - have gained coverage through this new benefit. Learn more here.

Community Health Centers are Stronger: Community health centers work to improve the health of the nation by ensuring access to quality primary health care services. The health care law has helped community health centers serve millions of additional patients. This week, your state health centers received $2,808,333 in new grants that will help them serve 15,669 additional patients. Nationwide, these grants will ensure nearly 1.3 million more patients get high quality health care and will help support approximately 5,640 jobs. Learn more about these grants here.

You are Getting a Better Value for Your Health Care Dollar: The new health care law created the 80/20 rule, which requires that health insurers spend at least 80 percent of your health care premiums on health care or improvements to care or they must refund you the difference. This is also known as the medical loss ratio. In Alabama, 13,600 residents will benefit from a total of $4.2 million in rebates this summer, or an average of $518 for each family covered by a policy. Overall, 12.8 million Americans will be benefiting from $1.1 billion in rebates from insurance companies this summer. Learn more about this announcement here.

Republicans want to do away with all of these benefits and more.

Joe Biden - wow!

Rare day.

Two posts in Bessemer Opinions.

That has not happened in a long time.

But we haven't had a vice-president that told the truth in long time either.

VP Joe Biden went off yesterday talking about the middle class. I am posting this, because Bessemer needs to hear it. Not that the majority of Bessemer residents won't be voting for Barack Obama in November anyway, but because we need to move our city UP to middle class.

With our failing failed schools we are certainly not attracting the people we need to be into this city. More educated people, more creative people, more people with kids that will send them to school are what we need (but we have to have successful schools for this). That would also mean more tax revenue, etc, and a better city for all of us.





Joe! Come to Bessemer and give us a pep talk. OK?

(I'll see what I can do.)

Simple grilling - veggies

The Year of Bessemer Food

I've shared this with several friends this Spring. I discovered (with the help of two friends) Sweet Heat Seasoning at Freshfully in Avondale. I'm sure it is available elsewhere, but Freshfully is worth the drive to get fresh eggs, vegetables and other locally grown products.

Okra

Wash your okra, and skewer 3 or 4 with a short wooden skewer. Brush with olive oil, and sprinkle liberally with Sweet Heat. Place on hot grill for about 10 minutes, turning a couple of time, until browned, like in the picture.

Just serve them on the skewers. Even those who do not like okra will love these. The slime is cooked out of them. These are SO good.

(Hint: soak skewers in water to prevent them from burning.)

Corn

I use Sweet Heat on corn as well. Corn can certainly be grilled in their husks but I prefer to shuck them so I can clean the silks out well. Then I butter my aluminum foil. What?

It's easier than buttering the corn, just use a knife and spread on the flat foil. You'll get used to it.

(Here is where I insert a math lesson, valuable because I am afraid that Bessemer residents don't get this in school, with their 36% graduation rate and all. See my previous posts).

I use a soft butter and spread it in a rectangle starting at one edge (the length of the corn) and extending about 6.25 inches from the edge (corn is about 2 inches in diameter and about 6 inches long, so the area to be buttered is the length of the corn times the circumference of a piece of corn. The circumference (distance around a circle, or a piece of corn) is the diameter times π.

π of course, is 3.1416 (approximately) so 2 x π is (close to) 6.28. Therefore, the area to be buttered is ?

Then I sprinkle Sweet Heat seasoning on the butter, and roll them up (click on the picture to embiggen and see the Sweet Heat bottle)...

...until they are tight little corn on the cob packets. Now the butter and seasoning are in contact with the corn.

Cook these for about 10 minutes over a hot grill, rotating 1/4 turn every 2 or 3 minutes. The corn will come out hot and juicy, but with a little bit of brown on some of the kernels. Yum. Sorry I don't have a picture of the final product. We tore into them and were halfway done eating them when I thought about it.

Sweet Heat can be used on other veggies or poultry or in soups and other ways.

Enjoy the Summer Solstice and grill something today. It 's the longest day of the year.

Thought. We have Winter Solstice parties and music to set the tone on that cold night in December. Does anyone celebrate the Summer Solstice?

More on education and dropouts in Bessemer

Some discussion following my last post about Bessemer graduation rates led me to do a little research on dropouts.

 Photo from All4Ed

I'm sure that hundreds of studies have been done and I'm sure that educators in Bessemer are familiar with these reasons, but the common folk like me may not be.

This particular list comes from Solutions for America, which believes "Contrary to popular beliefs that nothing works to solve tough community problems such as homelessness, crime, and youth unemployment, we know that SOME THINGS WORK."

•  The relationship between students and teachers is the most important factor in student’s school experience, whether positive or negative.
•  The disruptiveness of peers in school causes students to feel distracted and unsafe, leading to increased chance of dropping out. (Remember my experience trying to address bullying in Bessemer? Still haven't heard back.)
•  The pace of instruction is an important reason youth give for leaving school – students who need extra attention and don’t receive it are likely to dropout.
•  Personal problems cause youth to leave school if they do not have a trusted adult from whom they can seek help.
•  Students in small alternative programs appreciate the increased attention and the opportunity to work at their own pace.
•  Weak academic skills can cripple efforts to recover dropouts in “second chance” programs unless they receive even more attention from community volunteers.
•  Economic needs can compete with pursuing education after dropping out.
•  Students who come from single parent families, have a mother who dropped out of high school, have parents who provide low support for learning, or have parents who do not know their friends’ parents well are also all at a higher risk of dropping out than other students. 

Recent (at the time) dropouts were interviewed. Here is some of what they had to say (still getting info from Solutions for America.).

• Improve teaching and curricula to enhance the connection between school and work. 81% of dropouts said there should be more opportunities for “real-world” learning so that students can see the connection between school and getting a job.
  
•  Improve access to support for struggling students. 81% of dropouts surveyed wanted “better” teachers. 75% wanted smaller classes. 70% believed that more tutoring, summer school and extra time with teachers would have improved their chances of graduating. (This is where my volunteer efforts would have com into play).
•  Foster academics. 70% of dropouts said that “increasing supervision in school” and 62% said “more classroom discipline” was necessary to ensure success. 57% said that their schools “did not do enough” to help student’s feel safe from violence. (This is where stricter anti-harassment policies would help.)
•  Promote close relationships with adults. Only 41% of dropouts reported having someone to talk to about personal problems. 62% said they would like to see schools do more to help students with problems outside of class. Only 47% said the schools even bothered to contact them after they dropped out.  

The chances of principals and teachers and school board members seeing and reading this is pretty low. But hopefully, they are aware of the problems and are working on solutions. 

We see educators (usually from states like New Jersey and New York on Morning Joe (on MSNBC) on occasion talking about their successful programs  turning their schools around. So the information is out there. The Bessemer system does not have to re-invent the wheel.


And the community is behind you.  (Most of) the parents, the business owners, the citizens who do not have children in school, and (most of) the kids themselves want the schools to succeed. Let's hope the administrators take the steps, quickly, to make this happen.

Bessemer education - F

I am both disgusted and embarrassed that Bessemer City High School has a graduation rate of 36%, as reported here in the Birmingham News.

Now I know that there is a new way of coming up with the number, and I see that the superintendent has made some excuses, but let’s compare to the other schools in the metro area, which all arrived at their figures using the same formula.

Fairfield – 57%
Midfield – 46%
Hoover – 90%
McAdory – 87%
Wenonah – 59%

I looked at the list for the entire state, and Bessemer is the worst statewide, other than S.R. Butler in Huntsville and a couple of schools that I think are alternative schools.

Let’s take 100 students, represented each by “i” since each student is an individual.

iiiiiiiiii
iiiiiiiiii
iiiiiiiiii
iiiiiiiiii
iiiiiiiiii
iiiiiiiiii
iiiiiiiiii
iiiiiiiiii
iiiiiiiiii
iiiiiiiiii 

Here are the graduates, represented by an exclamation point, because it is the most important achievement most of them have made in their lives.

!!!!!!!!!!
!!!!!!!!!!
!!!!!!!!!!
!!!!!!

Here are those who did not graduate from high school, represented by an “x” because they have a huge strike against them from this moment on.

xxxxxxxxxx
xxxxxxxxxx
xxxxxxxxxx
xxxxxxxxxx
xxxxxxxxxx
xxxxxxxxxx
xxxx.

All lined up the 100 students look like this.

!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

The value of a high school diploma

The thing I don’t want to hear is an anecdotal story of a high school dropout who is now a billionaire. In today’s economy, the chances of becoming successful (or even getting a job) improve with each degree held, beginning with high school, then college, then graduate school.

Of course, there will always be jobs that do not require an education, such as sanitation workers, I guess. And there is nothing wrong with having those jobs…someone must do those things. But is that what anyone aspires to?

According to the U. S. Bureau of Labor Statistics a person with a high school diploma will earn, over their lifetime, $280,000 more than a person without a high school education.

Of course, you need a high school diploma to enter college, and the earnings go up more with a college education

Who is at fault?

Who’s to blame? That is always the question.

Bessemer system superintendent Fred Primm said his biggest concern isn’t dropouts, which is listed at 9%, but instead are “withdrawals, no-shows and missing records.”

If you look at the report and the raw numbers, dropouts were 33, withdrawals are 22, no-shows are 110 and missing records are 16.

Frankly, I can understand his concern about no-shows compared to dropouts, since that is over 3 times the number, but to give more concern to “missing records” (16) and “withdrawals” (22) is misguided, in my opinion.

I see three problems in regards to no-shows and dropouts: the schools and the parents and city officials.

Someone has to instill in kids at a very early age the importance of graduating from high school. Having a “graduation coach” and an “academic improvement specialist” at Bessemer City High School is a waiting a bit too late to do anything.

The graduation coach needs to meet with children each year, beginning with Grade 1.  Seriously. If a goal of graduating is not present from the very beginning, it’s not going to be instilled in the 11^th grade.

I have been told by a former Bessemer educator that some parents actually discourage their kids from performing well. This sounds like an urban legend, but unfortunately, the 1960’s attitude that education is for white folks and black folks don’t need to become what white people aspire to is still around it seems.

The following is from an article I found online, backing this up.

“These kids were just 7 and 8 years old, yet they had already been indoctrinated to think that education is for whites only. Who else other than their parents could they have gotten that from?

"This is exactly why black students are lagging behind white students in school. Black students just don't think that education is important. Black boys also have the highest dropout rate in the country (50% of black boys drop out of high school). Why is this happening? It's because black children are raised in a culture (or a household) that doesn't value education.”

Of course, people will deny this, it will not be addressed, and nothing will be done.

What needs to be done

I don’t have an answer for this, but someone has to step in and let these kids know the value of education. The parents are not doing it. And so far, the schools are not doing it.

Let me throw in that several years ago I was interested in volunteering to assist in teaching science to middle or high schoolers. I started a blog, Bessemer Science and Nature (here is the first post from 2009)  that I wanted to use to interest kids in school in science. I also volunteered to mentor students. I sent emails to teachers and administrators, and mentioned my ideas to the principle of the middle school. No one took me up on it. No emails were returned, and without even considering the reasons they might ignore my offers (he’s gay! He’s white!) I gave up and turned my efforts elsewhere.

The school system is the only entity that can step in. Since they have been unwilling or unable to do this I say it’s time for voters to replace the entire school board. 

Also we need for parents and city officials and business owners to demand of principals of every school that steps be taken to ensure that children know that education is a must to succeed in today’s world, and that education is not a "white" thing.

And the schools need to, as I suggested, talk to every student every year about the importance of goal setting, and of a particular goal: graduating from high school on time.

Fudgy Cake Pops

The Year of Bessemer Food

I've still been cooking (and politicking) and just haven't had much time for blogging.

But these cake pops were a hit, so I thought I would share.

First you need a cake pop pan. This one is made by Nordic Ware and available at Target (in a variety of colors).

Here is the pan, with some fresh-baked cake balls.

Notice the silver colored keys that keep the bottom and top pieces of the pan tightly secured.


Fudgy Cake Pops

3/4 cup semi-sweet chocolate chips
1/2 cup butter
3/4 cup sugar
3 Tbsp cocoa
2 eggs
3/4 cup flour
1/4 tsp salt
24 lollipop sticks
Chocolate and white chocolate coatings (available for dipping fruit and such)
Sprinkles

Heat oven to 325 degrees F. Grease and flour pan (or use a baking spray with flour), set aside.

In medium saucepan, over low heat, melt chocolate chips and butter together, stirring until smooth. Remove from heat and pour into medium bowl (or mixer bowl).

Add egg.s one at a time, mixing well after each addition.

Add flour and salt and stir until blended.

Spoon batter into bottom half of pan (the half without holes) filling each well so it mounds over the top of the pan (the batter is pretty soft, if you let it sit for a few minutes it isn't quite as runny, something I discovered because it takes two batches to use it up. Don't try to mound it up in a ball, though, just a little more than level is OK).

Place top half on top and secure with keys.

Bake 20 to 25 minutes until toothpick inserted into hole comes out almost clean. Cool 5 minutes in pan, remove cake balls from pan and allow to cool completely on wire racks.

Trim cake balls as necessary.



Melt chocolate coatings according to directions on package.

Insert lollipop sticks into cake balls, and dip balls into melted chocolate, and turn to allow excess to drip off. Use spoon to assist in dipping. Decorate with sprinkles as desired. Place on parchment paper to set (can cool in refrigerator).

Makes about 24 cake pops.