11/20/03

LC031120

This program is made possible in part by a grant from the City
of Los Angeles Cultural Affairs Department.

Val Zavala>> Tonight on Life and Times --

A teacher who really knows how to connect with her students and
it may have something to do with her address.

Susan Antebi>> If I have authority, it's just in the classroom
in terms of giving a grade. You know, that's like any
professor. But in the Residents Halls, I'm think I'm seen more
as a resource.

Val>> And then, can classical music find an audience in the
heart of Los Angeles's inner city? It all depends on who's
playing it. We'll follow the Debussy Trio as it gives rappers
and MTV a run for their money.

All that and more next on tonight's Life and Times.

Life and Times is made possible through the generous support of
the L.K. Whittier Foundation dedicated to improving the quality
of life by supporting innovative endeavors in the fields of
medicine, health, science and education.

Val>> Hello, I'm Val Zavala. Somewhere in your past, you
probably had a teacher who helped change your life for the
better. Maybe it's because they recognized your hidden talents
or spent time after class helping you figure out algebra. Well,
in Riverside County, we found a college professor who's gone
even further and, as Toni Guinyard reports, she never has to
worry about getting stuck in traffic on her way to work.

Toni Guinyard>> The University of California Riverside has the
reputation of being a commuter campus. Many students stay
onsite just long enough to go to class and then quickly go home.
The challenge now? Maintaining a one on one relationship with
students at a time when enrollment is growing. It's prompting
the university to respond to changing attitudes and changing
student needs.

Kathryn Jones>> I think gone are the days that we can only
reach students in the classroom environment. We have to look at
other ways of helping them to learn, helping them to grow and
develop.

Toni Guinyard>> Kathryn Jones is Director of Student Affairs
for the UC Riverside Honors Program. Its members are a
friendly, yet highly competitive, group of academic achievers.
Administrators decided to reach out to these students by getting
closer to them outside of the classroom setting.

Kathryn Jones>> We want students to feel like they're having an
integrated experience, that they just don't come to Honors to
take courses, but they're here to learn about themselves and
some of that doesn't go on in the classroom environment.

Toni Guinyard>> Susan Antebi is an Associate Professor of
Hispanic Studies. She is also a living breathing experiment in
cultivating professor-student relationships.

Susan Antebi>> It is a situation where I'm kind of the guinea
pig.

Toni Guinyard>> Students are used to seeing her in the
classroom, but now they're seeing her in a much different
setting: at home. Professor Antebi agreed to live in an
apartment on campus at the Pittman Hills Student Residence Hall,
a position to which she applied and was chosen for, making her
the one and only professor in residence on the UC Riverside
campus.

Susan Antebi>> I'm new to the west coast. I'm from Cambridge,
Massachusetts, which is a long way away, and this is my first
real job. You could say it's my first time in California and I
had the sense that it would be a very different experience from
universities on the east coast that I'm used to and I wanted to
get more of a sense of how the university works, how campus
works, what student life is like and it seemed like a positive
way to do that. You know, to have more interaction.

Kathryn Jones>> The norm has been that students don't interact
with faculty unless they go to their office hours or they happen
to have an interaction with them after a course lecture. What
we're trying to do is, say, on a more social level and other
aspects of your life, faculty can be important people for you to
know.

Toni Guinyard>> But they're still faculty.

Kathryn Jones>> That's true (laughter). That's not going to
change.

Toni Guinyard>> As part of the effort to strengthen the ties of
this on-campus community, informal breakfasts are held every
Friday at the Honors program office. Students are required to
attend. So is Professor Antebi. It is here that we witness the
awkwardness of students and teacher interacting on neutral turf.
First, polite acknowledgement of one another, then silence.
Antebi sits, the students sit too. After several minutes,
finally conversation.

[Film Clip]

Kristina Avila>> Everyone was really quiet and no one would
really look at her. Everyone was looking down at the ground or
at their feet while she was talking, but I didn't. I liked her.
I thought she had, I don't know, good things to say, but then
she was kind of awkward too. You could tell she was nervous.

Susan Antebi>> Yeah, I think it is awkward sometimes,
especially to the extent that I go on different Fridays,
sometimes at different times, and there are so many students
coming in and out that on any given day I may not know the
students who are there, so I'm meeting different ones each time.

Kristina Avila>> It's a professor. I mean, these people aren't
supposed to know what goes on in your Residence Halls.

Susan Antebi>> If I have authority, it's just in the classroom
in terms of giving a grade. You know, that's like any
professor. But in the Residence Halls, I think I'm seen more as
a resource.

Kristina Avila>> They're supposed to have this idea of what the
perfect student is and, if they see you doing something bad --

Toni Guinyard>> -- as a student, you'd never --

Kristina Avila>> -- I would never do anything bad, no.

Kathryn Jones>> There is an awkwardness. It's new. It's new
for the campus and very new for the students to have someone
that they might view as an authority figure, a parental figure,
living in their space.

Toni Guinyard>> Although the Faculty in Residence Program is
new to UC Riverside, it's not a unique program. It's been done
on other campuses before. But administrators here say theirs is
different because of the types of students living side by side
with the professor. Honors students are being used to test the
Faculty in Residence pilot program.

France Cordova>> It's a good place to start. I think
eventually what we'd like to do is all the students who are on
campus, who live on campus, to have this experience, whether
they're in the Honors program or not.

Toni Guinyard>> Before the program was launched, the students
were surveyed.

France Cordova>> And what we got back was, well, they could
just be there, someone for us to talk to. Also, they can
demystify the whole mystique of faculty-student relationships,
especially for first-year students. Also, just someone who
shows that they care.

William Wescott>> If she'd just go around to the different like
suites and talk to us, like maybe she would make the first move,
I guess, we'd talk to her.

Toni Guinyard>> But you aren't going to make the first move?

William Wescott>> Well, probably not.

Ian Seward>> As a Physics major, she's like a Spanish or
language -- I have like very little connection to what she's
teaching, so I don't really have any questions for her.

Toni Guinyard>> University officials believe the questions will
come and the connections will be made in time.

Susan Antebi>> If nothing else, it initiates the idea that
there can be more of a sense of community in the university and
it goes away from the idea that professors all live far away and
leave as soon as they can and many of the students do so as
well.

Val>> Being the professor in residence does have a few fringe
benefits starting with free room and board, but as Toni tells
us, the teacher also puts in some very long hours. In addition
to her work in the classroom, she coordinates many of her
students' extracurricular activities.

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Philip Bruce>> Los Angeles's public schools have been dealing
with the allegations for years, that many of their cafeterias
and bathrooms are dirty and aren't fit for the kids. Now Los
Angeles's City Attorney is planning his own personal crackdown.
He wants to launch surprise inspections on more than 1,500
schools across Los Angeles. Ultimately, those schools will get
their own personal letter grade not unlike the one the Health
Department now gives to restaurants. But Rocky Delgadillo knows
he may be in for a fight. We talked with him about his new
plan. So Rocky, you're talking about surprise inspections not
only in bathrooms, but cafeterias. Is there really a need for
that kind of thing?

Rocky Delgadillo>> Well, you know, I'm fighting for our kids
and our kids deserve to be in safe and clean environments. It's
not just bathrooms, by the way. It's the entire buildings. Our
schools should be the safest buildings in the city. Our kids
spend most of their waking hours at our schools, so they should
be the safest buildings in the city. In addition, studies show
that when schools are well maintained, test scores go up, and
the opposite is true as well. When they're poorly maintained,
test scores go down. I want our kids to have every opportunity
to lead amazing lives.

Philip Bruce>> What sparked your concern about this? I know
there have been reports about dirty bathrooms. There's been a
campaign issue, in fact, at school board races.

Rocky Delgadillo>> That's right.

Philip Bruce>> But have you personally seen things that got
your attention on this track?

Rocky Delgadillo>> Well, both myself and my neighborhood
prosecutors -- my prosecutors, as you know, go out into the
neighborhoods and quite often, in fact, I asked them to do this,
they meet at the schools because that's where parents go, that's
where the neighborhood shows up, that's where kids are at. It
seems to be a collecting place for neighborhoods in Los Angeles.
Well, they go there, they notice no fire extinguishers, trash
cans chained to the cafeteria where the food is delivered,
bathrooms are locked or they're unclean and unsanitary, ceiling
tiles falling down, reports of vermin in the cafeterias. It
just doesn't seem right. We need to take care of our kids.

Philip Bruce>> And this is not an isolated problem in your
experience, right? It's widespread?

Rocky Delgadillo>> Well, we don't know yet. I hear the school
district. They say they've done a lot. They've cleaned up
their act. If they have, great. Let us come in and verify
that. Let us go into the schools and say this is a great
situation, they've done a great job and let's send them on their
way with all good health.

Philip Bruce>> Well, in fact, L.A. Unified says they've spent
millions of dollars to address this very question and that
they're putting bathroom attendants in more than two hundred of
these bathrooms around the district. Is that enough? Isn't
that accomplishing what you're talking about?

Rocky Delgadillo>> Well, who knows? We don't know yet until we
go in and inspect. You know, the same is true with any
commercial building or apartment owners or anybody else in the
city of Los Angeles. We're going to go in and inspect and make
sure that those places are clean and safe. The same should be
true for our schools. In fact, they should be held to the
highest standards.

Philip Bruce>> Now is this -- you talk about surprise
inspections. Is this a deterrent factor for the schools,
knowing that these inspectors could come in at any time or is
there a certain "gotcha" factor of going in and actually finding
something and penalizing somebody?

Rocky Delgadillo>> Well, hopefully, it's an inspiration to the
people who work with our children that they should make sure
that those environments are the cleanest and safest around. I'm
hopeful that the school district is inspired to do better at
what they should do for our kids.

Philip Bruce>> What do you say, though, about L.A. Unified's
response? They say, hey, we're facing a $500 million dollar
deficit. We are barely getting by as it is. We've got huge
problems. These among them are the physical conditions of the
school, and you're layering on another thing we have to worry
about.

Rocky Delgadillo>> Well, I'm not layering it on. The fact is
that the schools are in poor condition. I didn't cause those to
be in poor condition. All we're doing is exposing it and I
believe that the public deserves to know if our schools are in
poor condition and only then will we be able to find a solution.
Only then will hopefully the public will rally around our
children and around our schools and say, hey, let's fix this
problem. If it means adding more money to the bond they're
going to issue, then we should add more money to the bond and
see if we can fix our schools because our children deserve the
best.

Philip Bruce>> The dirty conditions have been pretty well
publicized in the bathrooms. You talk about in the cafeterias
as well? Vermin?

Rocky Delgadillo>> Well, it's the cafeterias, it's the
buildings, it's the bathrooms, it's everywhere in the schools
that we have gotten reports of bad conditions. I'm hopeful,
again, that our kids are excited about coming to school every
day. I have to tell you that I've heard too many stories of
kids cutting class because they have to go home to use the
restroom facilities.

Philip Bruce>> And you're also talking about safety. Where
does that come in to play?

Rocky Delgadillo>> Well, safety in terms of -- for example,
back in 1994, we had the worst national disaster in the
country's history. We sent inspectors back then in 1994 to the
schools to check them out and make sure they were safe, as a
courtesy really to our school district. We were turned away.
We couldn't go in and inspect the buildings.

Philip Bruce>> Following the earthquake.

Rocky Delgadillo>> Following the earthquake. I don't know, I'm
hopeful that all of the buildings have been fixed up since then,
but if they're in dire conditions, we want to make sure that our
kids are safe.

Philip Bruce>> So what kind of response are you getting from
L.A. Unified now when you raise this issue and say, listen, I'm
going to send my people in?

Rocky Delgadillo>> Well, I mean, LAUSD at the moment and Roy
Romer in particular have said that they don't want us to come
in, but the fact is that their own review of their own schools
with standards they made up themselves -- there are no state
standards and that's part of the reason why we have the ability
to go in -- there are no state standards and their own review
says that forty-two percent of the schools are in poor
condition. That's their own review. So if, on their own
review, they say that forty-two percent of the schools are in
poor condition, then something is wrong. We need to go in and
fix this problem.

Philip Bruce>> Well, if they're saying they don't want you, are
you going to go in anyway and do you have the authority to go
in?

Rocky Delgadillo>> I say I do have the authority to go in, the
law says I have the authority to go in and we are going to go
in. I think that Roy Romer believes as I do that the kids
should have great conditions in their schools and he does
welcome inspections. We're happy to go in and provide him with
validations for the work he's done so far. And if there is more
work to do, let's identify that and let's rally the public,
rally the parents, rally the kids and the leaders in the city
and help solve the problem.

Philip Bruce>> So what happens if you go in and you find a lot
of problems or you find any problems, for that matter? Do you
slap them with a fine? Do you prosecute somebody? Or do you
just say, hey, look what you've got going on?

Rocky Delgadillo>> Well, what I hope is true is that Roy Romer
and myself and the rest of the city leaders will identify the
problems and say, hey, let's figure out a way to make sure that
our kids have a clean and safe environment.

Philip Bruce>> And who does the inspections?

Rocky Delgadillo>> It would be a series of inspectors. We have
county health inspectors and we also have building and safety
inspectors that will go in principally. Fire inspectors might
go in as well. We'll check out the entire building like we
would any other building in the city of Los Angeles.

Philip Bruce>> Do you have a timetable for when you hope to
make this happen?

Rocky Delgadillo>> Well, tomorrow would be a great timetable,
but what I hope is that -- the County Board of Supervisors
already approved it in concept. The City Council needs to
approve it as well to dedicate the inspectors to go there. I'm
hopeful that that will happen in the next few weeks.

Philip Bruce>> Could you anticipate this becoming a major legal
fight between your office and L.A. Unified resulting in the
school district trying to set up some kind of legal barrier to
you doing this?

Rocky Delgadillo>> I certainly hope not. I hope that everyone
in the city of Los Angeles, including the school district, will
say our kids are the most important thing we have and we need to
make sure we protect our children. So let us come in and, if
they've done a great job, let us validate that they've done a
great job. You know, I'm a firm believer in transparency in
government, open government. The only time that democracy works
is when you can see everything and I'm hopeful that the school
district will allow us to come in and see what the problems are
and, if there are no problems, stand up and cheer and say this
is great what you're doing.

Philip Bruce>> Well, Rocky Delgadillo, an interesting plan.
We'll keep an eye on it and hope it works out. Thanks for
talking to us at Life and Times.

Rocky Delgadillo>> Great. I'm happy to. Thank you so much.
Great to see you.

To send a comment or a question to our program, you can reach us
by mail at this address:

Life and Times
4401 Sunset Blvd.
Los Angeles, California 90027

You can also call our viewer comment line (323) 953-5555) or
contact us the fast way by e-mail at kcet.org.

Val>> Can a harp compete with MTV? Can a flute really hold its
own against rap? For nearly fifteen years, three Los Angeles-
based musicians have performed for audiences around the world,
but their most important audiences are youngsters who seldom get
a chance to hear, much less touch, a harp. How do you keep an
auditorium of restless school kids interested in chamber music?
I went to LaSalle Elementary School in South Central Los Angeles
to find out.

It's an early morning for Marcia Dickstein. She's the harp
player, artistic director and founder of the Debussy Trio
inspired by the music of the nineteenth century French composer.

Marcia Dickstein>> Since I was a little girl, I used to be
involved with an organization called the Young Musicians
Foundation. When I was twelve, I started doing children's
concerts for them. I would go out. I would, you know, drag my
harp. The idea for them was kids playing for kids. I would
take my harp everywhere.

[Film Clip]

Val>> Angela Wiegand is the flutist and co-founder of the Trio.
She and Marcia met when they were music students at USC.

[Film Clip]

Val>> David Walther is the violist. He joined the Trio about
five years ago. All three are top-notch musicians who play for
the Los Angeles Opera and other symphonies and for film scores.
But today they're taking their music to one of their toughest
audiences, an auditorium full of third graders.

Marcia Dickstein>> Classical music is, you know, arguably a
very difficult art form to propagate right now. You look around
and all the kids listen to rap and they listen to what's being
sold to them. I feel so strongly about my music and my art form
that I want to tell them about it. I'm proselytizing a bit
(laughter), I suppose. But I love doing it and I love kids.

Marcia Dickstein>> "This harp is a very modern instrument.
It's probably the most modern...."

Val>> The first step is introducing the kids to the
instruments.

Marcia Dickstein>> "Just listen really quiet. I'm only pulling
the red strings, but I can change the sound by using by using my
feet."

[Film Clip]

Val>> Most of these children haven't listened to much classical
music, but they've certainly heard this before.

Marcia Dickstein>> "And what other kinds of music might you go
home and listen to? Way in the back? Rock and roll, yeah."

Val>> The Debussy Trio takes the children back to a different
time before cars and computers when kings and royalty would hire
popular composers to write the music for parties and court
events.

[Film Clip]

Marcia Dickstein>> One of my criticisms of education in general
and in my own education is that, you know, you go to math class
and they teach you math, you go to science class and they teach
you about science. It wasn't until later in my life that I
started researching and doing more things. I found that, you
know, first of all, during the first World War, Debussy was
writing this piece of music and Van Gogh was creating this
painting and you think, God, it was there. Art was being
created at the same time that, you know, that people are being
killed. So I like to tie it all together so people start to
realize that different things go on at the same time. We don't
live in a little, you know, this is your subject today.

Marcia Dickstein>> "And these instruments are what you call
acoustic instruments. Can you all say acoustic?"

Val>> Marcia also uses music to teach a basic lesson about the
nature of sound.

Marcia Dickstein>> "You all take your right hand and put it on
your chest and hum. Great. What do you feel? Vibration,
exactly. Guess what? I have big news for you all. You are all
acoustic instruments. Congratulations."

Val>> Some of the music the Trio plays is contemporary. This
piece was written in 1969 on the occasion of man's walk on the
moon.

[Film Clip]

Val>> It's another chance for a little history.

Marcia Dickstein>> "Does anybody know what was happening? Were
you guys born in 1969? No, well, guess what, I was (laughter).
In 1969, your parents were so excited. This was the first time
that it ever happened. Shout it out, Neal Armstrong, yes. What
did he do? Exactly. You've all heard of Neal Armstrong? Neal
Armstrong walked on the moon."

Marcia Dickstein>> I think you touch everybody in a certain
way. I try to cover a lot of ground. I try to cover a lot of
different topics that might light up somebody in some way,
whether it's a scientific thing or an historical reference.

[Film Clip]

Val>> The music sparks another provocative question. What does
music sound like on the moon?

Marcia Dickstein>> "Yes, silence. Very good. We got one.
Exactly. You have the right idea. It doesn't sound like
anything on the moon. It's completely quiet up there. The
reason there's no sound on the moon is because there is no air
on the moon."

Val>> But if you really want kids to remember music, give them
a chance to make a little of their own.

Marcia Dickstein>> "This is Roderick. Everybody know him?
Well, he's pretty nervous up here, so you've got to chill out.
You nervous? Pretty scary, huh? No, I'm kidding."

Val>> The Debussy Trio has traveled and performed across the
world from Washington, D.C. to Honolulu, in various European
cities and festivals. Wherever they go, they try to play at
schools. Marcia estimates they've reached more than 250,000
children and families at Outreach concerts like this one.

Marcia Dickstein>> "Now we're going to take it and drag it up
the harp. We're going to make beautiful angel sounds. Don't
press too hard. Don't bend your fingers. Beautiful, just like
that. Now can you do the same thing with your left hand? Okay,
now do it with your left hand."

Val>> Now, Nia, what did you think of today's program?

Nia Johnson>> I thought the music was very interesting because
I don't listen to classic music that much.

Val>> So it was something different.

Nia Johnson>> Yes.

Val>> What do you usually listen to?

Nia Johnson>> I usually listen to rap or R&B.

Robert Uribe>> It's different from rap because it's much
quieter and there's nobody talking.

Val>> What do you remember from today's playing? Was there
something in particularly interesting that you learned?

Crystal Anderson>> Yes, the moon has no sound. I thought it
had like a sound that goes like a very light wind sound.

Marcia Dickstein>> I really honestly believed when I started
this group that I was going to change the world. I was
convinced that I was going to make every person in the room come
to my way of thinking and that everybody was going to walk out
and want to either play the harp or, you know, do something.
I'm more realistic now.

[Film Clip]

Marcia Dickstein>> Sort of my attitude now is that I want to
show them as much as anything that I'm passionate about what I
believe in, so I'm teaching them that, if anything, go out there
and put energy into what you love.

Val>> If the real lesson for children is to put energy into
what you love, the Debussy Trio strikes a chord.

[Film Clip]

Marcia Dickstein>> "When you go home, do yourself a favor and
don't always listen to the same kind of music. Remember you've
got all those choices. Try listening sometimes to something
that you wouldn't normally listen to. Maybe you'll like it.
Thanks for coming, everybody."

Val>> And that's our program. I'm Val Zavala. For everyone at
Life and Times, thanks for watching.

Life and Times was made possible through the generous support of
the L.K. Whittier Foundation dedicated to improving the quality
of life by supporting innovative endeavors in the fields of
medicine, health, science and education.

This program is made possible in part by a grant from the City
of Los Angeles Cultural Affairs Department.

Val>> Tomorrow on Life and Times, counting on the kindness of
strangers. Is it possible to be compassionate to illegal
immigrants and still defend America's borders?

>> If a person is being (inaudible), they have an absolute
right to healthcare. They have a right to have their children
get an education. Again, you cannot punish the stranger or the
children of a stranger because we don't like (inaudible).

Val>> That's tomorrow on Life and Times.