By Luis J. Rodriguez, Los Angeles Times, September 3, 2009

Forty years ago, I was a gang member and a tagger, an aerosol graffiti artist. No doubt this was vandalism -- my canvases were the walls of businesses, homes, schools, any public place.

I was just the sort of kid City Atty. Carmen Trutanich is targeting with his proposed civil injunction against taggers, a court order that would allow taggers to be arrested for merely hanging out together, an act that for most of us would be legal.

Meeting the Challenge of Low Graduation-Rate High Schools

Everyone Graduates Center and Jobs for the Future, July, 2009

In his first major address to Congress, President Barack Obama envisioned a country where dropping out “is no longer an option.” He linked improving high school graduation rates to restoring the nation’s economic and political standing in the world.

Since then, federal officials and educators have focused on transforming or replacing the 2,000 high schools that produce more than half of U.S. dropouts. No longer can these failing schools, which routinely graduate fewer than two-thirds of their students, “go it alone.” Substantially increasing the number of young people who earn a high school diploma and are ready for college will require effective partnerships among the federal government, states, communities, and school districts.

September 19, 2009 • 9 a.m. - 7 p.m. • Ivy Tech College • Bloomington, IN

A writer’s conference for authors in their teens and twenties? That’s right! Join authors, editors, publishers and literary agents, including best-selling authors Dana Carpender and Bob Hammel, for this day-long conference dedicated to young authors. The 16 workshops will include novel building, getting published, magazine journalism, playwriting, universalizing personal experience, online writing, memoir and more. An after-conference party will include an open mic, book signings and live music. The conference is open to all participants.

http://www.tntconference.com/