04/20/05

LC050420

Val Zavala>> Tonight on Life and Times --

How do you keep gang violence from seeping onto our schools?
Give youngsters a gang of their own.

>> But we do not have tattoos. We do not have guns, any kind
of weapons. We do not have headbands, anything. But we have
our uniform, our badge and our respect.

Val>> And then, from cellar to attic. The oldest Showcase home
project gives top designers a chance to show off and the results
are spectacular.

It's all straight ahead 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.

And by a generous grant from Jim and Anne Rothenberg.

Val>> Stabbings, brawls and lockdowns. You'd think we were
talking about our prisons. Unfortunately, we're talking about
some public schools. The recent rash of violence begs the
question: how do you keep gang violence off of our school
campuses? Well, there is a way, an aggressive program that
doesn't involve more police and metal detectors. NewsHour
correspondent, John Merrow, went to East Los Angeles to see how
it works.

John Merrow>> Two gang members have been shot in the Boyle
Heights neighborhood of East Los Angeles.

[Film Clip]

John Merrow>> Four blocks away from the crime scene, Breed
Street Elementary School is forced to lock all its doors.
Teachers and students cannot go out until police say it's safe.

>> "The lockout is officially over."

John Merrow>> Street violence is a part of these students'
lives. If you've ever heard a gunshot, would you raise your
hand if you've heard a gun? How about if you've ever seen or
talked to a gang member?

Maria Casillas>> We have a great waste of human lives in this
community. We have about thirty-six organized gangs in the
Boyle Heights area and Boyle Heights is a 2.2 square mile area.

John Merrow>> Maria Casillas is President of Families in
Schools, a civic reform organization that works with Breed
Street School.

Maria Casillas>> If you look at this environment here, you've
got about a sixty-five percent dropout rate by the time these
kids go to high school. It means that more than half of the
kids you see here will probably drop out.

John Merrow>> And those students who remain in school face a
culture where learning is not respected.

>> Kids in middle school just think that it's not cool to be
smart.

John Merrow>> But Breed Street Elementary School in the heart
of Boyle Heights is fighting back. How? With its own gang,
S.O.S. The leader and founder of the S.O.S. Gang is former
teacher, Janis Hiura.

Janis Hiura>> "Say I am the best S.O.S. in the world."

John Merrow>> Officially, S.O.S. stands for Society of
Students.

Janis Hiura>> "And who's going to open that meeting for me?"

John Merrow>> It began as a small group in Hiura's fifth grade
classroom. Her objective was to change her students' attitude
toward learning by instilling confidence, teaching problem-
solving skills and developing social skills.

Janis Hiura>> "First it starts with save our --"

Students>> "Selves."

Janis Hiura>> "Then what?"

Students>> "Save our students."

Janis Hiura>> "Students. Then save our --"

Students>> "School".

Janis Hiura>> "And where are we going for?"

Students>> "Save our society."

John Merrow>> Four years ago, Breed Street Elementary received
a grant from the Annenberg Foundation, which also helps fund
NewsHour education stories. With these funds, the principal
created a new position. She asked Hiura to leave her role as
teacher and make S.O.S. her fulltime job.

Janis Hiura>> Our target is the kid that's struggling, the kid
that's struggling and believes they're dumb, the kid that is so
shy that they don't understand and they won't ask for help.

John Merrow>> Whether they're members or not, all first through
fifth grade students learn the S.O.S. principles starting with
its code of behavior known as Being A.P.

Janis Hiura>> "Okay, I need five people to show me an A.P.
lunch line. Remember we talked about that?"

John Merrow>> A.P. means Advanced Placement, a term generally
used in high schools referring to the most challenging classes.
But to Hiura, A.P. is larger concept, one that includes behavior
as well as academic performance. She believes that, starting in
first grade, students should be encouraged to strive for their
best.

Janis Hiura>> "And you know what I like? Are they pushing each
other?"

Students>> "No."

John Merrow>> Students also learn how to pop up in class
instead of raising their hands. This is called Popcorn.

Student>> Popcorn means like we don't raise our hands up. We
get up and other people get up. We let them go.

John Merrow>> The idea behind Popcorn is to teach students how
to speak with confidence and listen to others.

Janis Hiura>> "She's grabbing me with her what?"

Students>> "Eyes."

John Merrow>> Making eye contact is an important part of what
Hiura calls power greetings in which students learn to present
themselves with self-assurance. Any student who wants to join
S.O.S. can. The only requirements are good effort and behavior
in the classroom. Grades are not a factor. Active S.O.S.
members meet whenever time permits. They talk about upcoming
projects such as developing a mentoring program as well as how
to improve S.O.S. and spread it elsewhere.

Janis Hiura>> "We're going to talk about buddies, how to get
the buddies that aren't S.O.S. in S.O.S."

John Merrow>> Tenth grader, Dennis, gives S.O.S. credit for
making him a more active participant in school. So S.O.S. has
changed you?

Dennis>> I had quiet power. I was a bright student, but I
really wasn't motivated to participate. Now, well, look at me.

John Merrow>> Fourth grader, Stephanie Sanchez, used to be
afraid to speak in class. Today she's comfortable in front of
large audiences.

Stephanie Sanchez>> Joining S.O.S., I've changed a lot. Each
and every day, I get powerful and stronger. It changed my whole
life.

John Merrow>> S.O.S. members sometimes lose their way and may
be asked to turn in their badges. Hiura and S.O.S. members
decide on a case-by-case basis when and how a member can get
back in. She relies on the buddy system to keep behavior in
check.

Janis Hiura>> "What have you two buddies been doing? Bring
each other --"

Student>> "Down".

Janis Hiura>> "Is that what S.O.S. is all about?"

Student>> "No."

Janis Hiura>> "You knew how to bring yourself down. Now I want
to see if you know how to what?"

Student>> "Bring ourselves up."

Janis Hiura>> "Okay, I want you to write me up a plan."

John Merrow>> In just four years, S.O.S. has grown from thirty
Breed Street students to four hundred, more than half the
school. In addition, four other elementary schools in the Boyle
Heights neighborhood have adopted S.O.S. in some capacity, but
S.O.S. faces significant challenges. Researchers are just
starting to track whether S.O.S. helps students academically.
There's no real evidence that S.O.S. improves academic
performance?

Janis Hiura>> No, it's all soft date.

John Merrow>> If, in the end, there's no difference, would you
then get rid of S.O.S.?

Janis Hiura>> No, because I know the difference it has made.
They're doing better in life. I had a student encourage their
parent to go get a restraining order when their dad was
victimizing them. That's worth everything.

John Merrow>> While some students have remained active in
S.O.S. long after Breed Street, there's no official S.O.S.
program past fifth grade. Breed Street students go on to a huge
middle school. After that, comes the nation's fourth largest
high school with about five thousand students and a graduation
rate of only fifty-eight percent. Are any of you nervous about
leaving this wonderful school and all of a sudden you're going
to go off to this huge middle school?

Student>> I actually am not because, no matter what middle
school I go to, I'm going to try to start it over there. I
already joined a gang and it's S.O.S. This is our positive
thing.

John Merrow>> Currently, some S.O.S. members, including a few
older kids who've remained active, are working with local civic
leaders figuring out how S.O.S. can become an effective force in
a new high school due to open in 2006.

Kcet.org is the place to look for the very latest on Life and
Times. You'll find previews of upcoming stories, transcripts
and audio of past episodes and links to some of our most
interesting features. Just go to kcet.org and click on "Life
and Times".

Val>> Fifty years ago in April 1955, Americans breathed a
collective sigh of relief. A polio vaccine had been found. But
now, five decades later, doctors have diagnosed what they call
post-polio syndrome and, as Toni Guinyard tells us, some
patients are fighting a battle they thought was over.

Toni Guinyard>> Richard Daggett had just turned thirteen when
abruptly his whole life changed. It was 1953, the era of polio.

Richard Daggett>> I woke up on a Friday morning with a very
stiff neck. If I tried to bend forward, it was very painful, so
my parents took me to the doctor.

Toni Guinyard>> Within hours, Daggett found himself in the
communicable disease ward at the County Hospital. Doctors
feared he had polio, a virus that attacks the nerves that
control movement. As the hours passed, Daggett lost the ability
to sit up and, by the next day, unable to breath on his own, he
was in a respirator known in those days as an iron lung.
Daggett had been an active boy and, at first, had no idea how
polio would define his life.

Richard Daggett>> I got polio during the summer and my biggest
fear was that I would miss some school. I didn't realize I
would be paralyzed for years. I just thought, well, I'm here in
a hospital and I have to get out and go to school.

Toni Guinyard>> Daggett says he knew about polio, though he
never worried he might get it. But for many growing up in the
1940's and 1950's, polio was a scary word. The disease was most
prevalent during the summer and many parents kept their children
away from swimming pools and other public places.

>> "Give generously, give voluntarily."

Toni Guinyard>> The March of Dimes made regular appeals for
funds to fight the illness and, in a moment of national joy, a
vaccine became available in 1955. Within two years, the
incidents of polio dropped dramatically.

Richard Daggett>> It's a forgotten disease to most people. You
talk to younger people, even younger adults, and you say you
have polio, they won't know what you're talking about.

Toni Guinyard>> Daggett ended up spending three years in
rehabilitation here at Rancho Los Amigos Hospital in Downey.
Rancho was among the leading centers for treating polio. Like
many of his fellow patients, Daggett was eventually able to walk
and breath on his own. He had no idea all that would change.

Richard Daggett>> Well, almost exactly thirty years and I had
no trouble. Then it was like my warranty ran out and my legs
got noticeably weaker, then my breathing failed. I had classic
pulmonary failure.

Toni Guinyard>> Richard Daggett has what is called post-polio
syndrome and he's not alone.

>> "What symptoms in the back are you having?"

>> "Severe pain and I can't walk for more than a half block
without my hip going to one side."

Toni Guinyard>> Thousands of those who had polio decades ago
and thought it was behind them now report weakness, fatigue and
pain. Doctors at Rancho's post-polio clinic believe many
survivors worked so hard to overcome the effects of the disease
that their bodies are now worn out.

Dr. Sophia Chun>> It's a mindset that these post-polio
survivors taught themselves. The society taught them to really
push and be very vigorous with their recovery, but now they're
being told with the post-polio syndrome that that is what might
have gotten them into this trouble and they have to really
change their whole entire approach to life and really learning
to live within the limits of what they can do.

>> "Little by little, you'll be able to kind of stretch a
little farther."

Toni Guinyard>> Cheryl Girnus was nine months old when she came
down with polio in 1953. Though she never fully recovered, she
limped, couldn't run and had trouble going up stairs, she never
imagined her condition might decline. But that's what started
to happen to her in the middle 1980's when she was thirty-five.

Cheryl Girnus>> It's terrifying. You think you're over
something and, all of sudden, I'm going back into using crutches
again. I started with a cane, then I went onto a crutch. Then
I went back into a leg brace, then I went into wrist braces.
Then I went into surgeries again because everything was
deforming again. I felt like I literally did take a step
backwards to the 1950's again and back into the 1960's. I
literally backtracked my life.

[Film Clip]

Toni Guinyard>> Rancho has been at the forefront of efforts to
study and provide care for those with post-polio syndrome. Dr.
Jacquelin Perry is a nationally-recognized orthopedic surgeon
who has spent her career at Rancho. On arriving here in 1955,
she became part of a team working to control deterioration in
polio patients. There was nothing to do for the paralysis, but
surgeries and other treatments could help avoid deformities. In
later years, Dr. Perry's research showed the association between
over-use and post-polio syndrome.

Dr. Jacquelin Perry>> It took a long time to sell it, but I had
the evidence.

Toni Guinyard>> Now at eighty-five and herself coping with
Parkinson's Disease, Dr. Perry remains active at Rancho as an
unpaid consultant.

Dr. Jacquelin Perry>> I got a mind that works. I got time and
I can do things. I like to help people.

Toni Guinyard>> Post-polio survivor, Sue Lau, comes to Rancho
for help with her own symptoms, but she also works through a
support group she founded to increase awareness of the syndrome
among doctors in the community. She says she and fellow
survivors often have a hard time finding physicians who
understand their condition.

Sue Lau>> I may not look like I have a problem, but I have more
of an upper body problem, upper extremity problem, that is also
now affecting my lower extremity. For example, I may be walking
around and doing the normal things, but if I get tired and I
don't stop right away, I could fall and I have fallen.

Dr. Sophia Chun>> "Probably your back starts hurting after that
long drive."

Toni Guinyard>> Dr. Sophia Chun runs Rancho's post-polio
clinic. She wants the medical community to know more about
post-polio and says the lessons learned here will help those
aging with other kinds of disabilities such as stroke. It seems
there is no way to cure post-polio syndrome, but there are ways
to make living with the condition easier.

Kcet.org is the place to look for the very latest on Life and
Times. You'll find previews of upcoming stories, transcripts
and audio of past episodes and links to some of our most
interesting features. Just go to kcet.org and click on "Life
and Times".

Val>> Long before there was the "Fab Five" or "Trading Spaces",
there was the Pasadena Showcase House of Design. For the past
forty years, they've been taking a magnificent home and making
it even more spectacular, redoing it from cellar to attic. This
year, fifty thousand people will come through this home to see
the work of Southern California's top designers and it's all to
benefit the arts.

It was built when Woodrow Wilson was president. Cost? $16,000.
Today this ten thousand square foot mansion is worth well over
ten million. It's perched on a shady hill in Flintridge. At
age eighty-six, this Georgian Colonial classic has never looked
better.

[Film Clip]

Val>> Like the thirty-nine homes before it, it has been
completely redecorated. The home is a project of the Pasadena
Showcase House for the Arts. Charlotte Varner is Benefit
Chairman.

Charlotte Varner>> We usually look for a house that's around
nine thousand square feet or more. This one is about ten
thousand square feet. It has to have at least two staircases
going up and down and it has to have a good flow because we have
to accommodate all the visitors to the house. We've had
approximately fifty thousand people come to Showcase for the
last few years.

Val>> Remodeling delays are notorious and can turn a project
into a nightmare. But if your home is a Showcase home, all the
work is finished in less than three months. Vicki McCluggage is
President of the seventy-member Showcase organization.

Vicki McCluggage>> We also have many homeowners who've not
moved into a home yet and they contact us and say that they
would like to participate with Showcase and then they can move
into a really beautiful renovated home. Sometimes the most
exciting thing for them is that we're able to accomplish so much
in such a short time.

Val>> This 1918 home was designed by the renowned architect,
Myron Hunt. He also designed the Rose Bowl, Caltech, the
Hollywood Bowl, Occidental College and the Ambassador Hotel,
along with many other Southern California landmarks. Every
detail of every room is meticulously planned.

Charlotte Varner>> And the Garden Room. That was an incredible
makeover in there. They had their artists come and do a cloud
ceiling. But the most phenomenal thing in that room, I think,
is the border. Instead of crown molding, they put foil up on
the wall and then used plaster stencils.

[Film Clip]

Val>> And the kitchen? How did that turn out?

Charlotte Varner>> Oh, it's a beautiful kitchen. It's unusual
in the fact that it is a two-tone kitchen. You have a cream and
blue kitchen, which most kitchens are generally one color. They
actually were the only ones that had major construction. They
took out a wall to the adjoining small bedroom so they could
create a family room.

[Film Clip]

Val>> Don't know what to do with that little guest bath under
the stairs? Try this.

[Film Clip]

Val>> Then there is the downstairs. This is called the Pub.
Before and after. But if you explore a little further, you'll
find yourself in the cellar with a vault. It used to look like
this. Now it's called Bacchus's Retreat.

Charlotte Varner>> That's the wine room. That's a sun room
too. There was an existing safe down there, a walk-in vault
with the big doors and everything. Padua/D.K. Designs had it
refrigerated.

Val>> Upstairs is the master suite. Then and now.

[Film Clip]

Val>> Key to the project are the designers who volunteer their
talents.

Vicki McCluggage>> Well, the designers, I think, are
participating because, one, they love to show a multitude of
people their work and the opportunity for their work to be seen
by fifty thousand people obviously is a great opportunity. They
invest a great deal of their own money to present in the
Showcase. We're really very grateful every year because they do
make the show.

[Film Clip]

Val>> One of the most memorable rooms is the Ingénue Room, as
they call it. If Gidget were an heiress, this is what her room
would look like. And careful, those luscious chocolates are
actually doggie truffles.

[Film Clip]

Val>> Thinking about expanding the guest bathroom? Why not add
a rooftop garden?

[Film Clip]

Val>> It's on to the third floor. Only three months ago, these
attic rooms were bare as bones. Today, take a look.

[Film Clip]

Charlotte Varner>> There's an artist loft, or an arts and
crafts loft, at the top. It's a wonderful place to either send
your children up to the top of the house, or go and create.

Val>> The inside of the house is only half the job. Landscape
designers also transformed the grounds of this three and a half
acre estate.

Charlotte Varner>> They've created some fountains. There are a
lot of fountains in the areas, and I think people are really
interested in water features in gardens these days, so we have a
lot of those. We have a faux rock structure that they were
calling Stonehenge originally (laughter).

Val>> Only this one is operated by remote control.

[Film Clip]

Val>> Back in 1964, about seven thousand people came to the
Showcase home. This year, fifty thousand admirers will walk
through, helping to raise about a million dollars.

Vicki McCluggage>> Part of that is going to the Philharmonic
and part of it is going to sixty other schools, charitable
organizations, musical bands, some children's symphonies to
purchase instruments.

Val>> They also sponsor an annual competition for young
performers.

Vicki McCluggage>> Which is open to musicians from the ages of
sixteen to twenty-three and the judges are members of the Los
Angeles Philharmonic. When the winner is selected, it's really
a fierce competition to have been selected the winner.

Val>> When the public viewing is over, the owners who usually
remain anonymous will move back into their new old home. All
the permanent changes like wall treatments, floors and fixtures
will stay. The furnishings and appliances, the owners can
choose to buy if they like.

[Film Clip]

Charlotte Varner>> These are the ideas that people can go home
and say they can't maybe do it all in this style, but there are
ideas that anyone can take from Showcase and apply to their own
homes.

[Film Clip]

Val>> And even before this year's Showcase home closes its
doors, the selection is underway for next year's home.

Vicki McCluggage>> The process starts early and sometimes you
see a lot of homes before you can see one that would be
appropriate for next year. We try not to be in the same
neighborhood two years in a row. That would just be a courtesy
to the neighbors. But also we try to get the variety of styles
of homes. This is a beautiful Georgian colonial. We haven't
had one like this for a while, but we can do another style of
home next year.

Val>> That was last year's house. This year's house is a 1929
Italian style estate designed by Wallace Neff. It's open until
May 15. For information, you can give them a call or go to
their website at pasadenashowcase.org. And that's our program.
I'm Val Zavala. For everyone at Life and Times, thanks for
watching. We'll see you next time.

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.

And by a generous grant from Jim and Anne Rothenberg.

Val>> Next time on Life and Times --

The candidates may be the same as four years ago, but will the
outcome be different?

>> I wouldn't write Hahn off and I think many of the people
inside the game wouldn't. He's won six straight city-wide
elections. He has a very tough campaign team. They have the
strategy.

Val>> That's next time on Life and Times.