Self Esteem

For more than 17 years, Yvonne Nance knew just who she was -- the helpful voice at the other end of the line when people called AT&T for directory assistance. That ended in December, when AT&T Inc. informed the 47-year-old mother of four that she was among 12,000 workers being cut from the telecom giant's payroll. Two months later, Nance is confused. "I'm going to my 30th class reunion in July," the Los Angeles resident said. "What do I put on my bio? Unemployed? Homemaker?

John Paul Lopez, 18, drilled plywood boards to add to a maze of ceiling frames. Isabelle Izquierdo, 17, pounded nails to the roof. Gevon Hubbard, 18, sawed floorboards and lined them with insulation. From the ground up, the teenagers started building two single-family houses at 53rd Steet and Vermont Avenue in South-Central Los Angeles two months ago. But construction of the homes is not their only goal. They also are rebuilding their lives under a national program called YouthBuild.

One moment, the girls were singing the theme song to "Sesame Street." The next, they were talking about friends they knew who had been raped. Little was taboo for the 13 girls, all between the ages of 13 and 15, and their five collegiate mentors who met Sunday and Monday for a retreat at a sycamore-lined campsite in picturesque Point Mugu State Park in Ventura County.

Six students from Sepulveda Middle School in North Hills who planned a school dance and donated half the proceeds to charity were honored in a pregame ceremony on the field at Dodger Stadium this week. The Sepulveda students were among six groups selected as grand winners in the Dodgers' "Team Esteem Program," a public service project also sponsored by the Times In Education program and the Foundation for Self-Esteem.

When Cleveland High School's college counselor gives the cue for the valedictorian during the Reseda school's graduation Thursday, Galit Sarfaty--a reserved girl with a 4.46 GPA--proudly will rise to her feet. So will TramAnh Nettie LeDuc, Bree Blumstein, Eva Friedberg, Joshua Dimon, Michelle Looren, Davinder Mann and Bruce Pao, to name a few. In fact, 27 Cleveland High seniors are being honored this year as valedictorians.

It once was the stuff of snickers, the butt of those "only-in-California" jokes, like hot tubs and vanity plates and goat cheese pizza. But they're not laughing any more. The gospel of self-esteem has gone mainstream, and that makes John Vasconcellos feel good. Nine years ago Assemblyman Vasconcellos hatched a state task force to improve Californians' self-esteem. His theory: People with a strong self-image are more likely to live productive, moral, law-abiding lives.

Emperor Elementary School is different from most others. Teachers at the Temple City campus rarely raise their voices in frustration. Children queue up silently after recess, with hardly a word from their instructors. Administrators settle squabbles between children by admonishing them to remember the school's code of conduct: Treat everyone with respect. On the playground, many older students volunteer to play with the youngest ones.

Nancy Morales went to a conference at Cal State Fullerton on Tuesday because she wanted to learn more about her heritage. The 17-year-old student body president at Fullerton Union High School, persuaded her principal to let her and 16 schoolmates attend the fifth annual PRIDE conference.

This is the time of year when tempers run a little testy. After all, this is peak dieting season, when even the mathematically challenged are known to perform great feats of caloric carry-over right there in the grocery aisles, hoping desperately to slip into something a little more comfortable--or rather, something more comfortably little. Let's see, for one slice of apple pie you could chew--click, click, click--78 pieces of sugarless gum.

As a child walking home from school, Alan would take the alleys to avoid classmates or neighbors. As a diversion to his shyness and the omnipresent angst of viewing himself as an outsider, he would solve math problems in his head. By 13, he was a computer programmer. His father was an astronomer, and when Alan was 14, he was allowed to drive his father's Jeep out to the middle of the dark, silent west Texas desert.