Kern Sol News
Kern Sol News, a youth-led media outlet that primarily focuses on health disparities in underserved communities across Kern County, is posting new stories online nearly every day. Some recently published reports discuss vaccine equity, redistricting, and water quality in Kern County. Be sure to keep checking back for the latest news!
San Francisco Parent Coalition
In its most recent weekly newsletter, San Francisco Parent Coalition shared good news. After being held up in court since 2018, SFUSD will now receive $123 million from Prop. G. and likely additional funds from the state of California. Along with this infusion of funds, SFUSD is actively working to improve student reading outcomes, starting with a consultant audit of SFUSD’s literacy curriculum and materials.
Attendance Works
Attendance Works is hosting an e-learning professional development series for educators in January and February of 2022. The three-part training is designed to teach educators “proven, evidence-based, tiered strategies to promote attendance and engagement using a team approach.”
North American Primate Sanctuary Alliance (NAPSA)
Mongabay, a non-profit conservation and environmental science news platform, recently featured NAPSA Program Director Erika Fleury in a story about the dangers of GIFs and other imagery of great apes in unnatural situations, such as wearing human clothing, playing instruments, smoking, etc. While many think these images are funny and harmless, Fleury explains that the animals were more than likely abused in order to create those images. Her advice is to ignore any of this type of content, not engage with it at all. Thankfully, Fleury believes “a lot of progress has been made” with popular GIF sites and stock photo agencies changing their policies to better protect apes.
Salinas Community Science Workshop
The grand opening of Salinas Community Science Workshop was held at El Sausal Middle School in Salinas in October. The project offers students several programs, including after-school drop-ins and the STEM Girls group. The grand opening was covered by multiple news outlets, including the Salinas Valley Tribune and the Monterey Herald.
Get to Know Community Initiatives’ Admin Staff!
Braxton Cahill
Braxton joined Community Initiatives in May of 2021 as Project Accountant Supervisor and was recently promoted to the Controller position.
Before entering the world of fiscal sponsorship, Braxton worked at Aquarium of the Bay for many years. His favorite animals at the aquarium were the North American river otters.
The youngest of three children, Braxton grew up in Imperial Beach, CA in San Diego County. Braxton currently lives in San Francisco with his partner, Brian, and their Snowshoe cat named Pandora.
Braxton’s favorite vacation ever was a trip to Maui with Brian. His fondest memory of the the trip was waking up around 3am to make a terrifying cliffside drive through the dark to see the sunrise at Haleakala and, when they finally arrived, they couldn’t see a thing because the dense fog didn’t break.
You can find out more about Braxton on the Meet Us page of our website.
Let us know what’s going on with your project and we’ll do our best to get it into the next Project News and share on social media.
Email Stephanie at communications@communityinitiatives.org.
If you would like to learn more about our projects, please visit our projects page.