Teach For America Program

LaShawnda Henderson graduated from college last spring, and this winter she's right back where she started -- sleeping in her childhood home in Compton, eating her mother's cooking every night and returning every day to her elementary school, three blocks away. Henderson is a new teacher at her old school, Dickison Elementary, one of 13 Teach For America members in Compton, the first new contingent in the city since the district stopped hiring them five years ago.

LaShawnda Henderson graduated from college last spring, and this winter she's right back where she started -- sleeping in her childhood home in Compton, eating her mother's cooking every night and returning every day to her elementary school, three blocks away. Henderson is a new teacher at her old school, Dickison Elementary, one of 13 Teach For America members in Compton, the first new contingent in the city since the district stopped hiring them five years ago.

Donna Foote spent a year at troubled Locke High School in Watts observing and documenting the workaday struggles of four new teachers. In her recently published book, "Relentless Pursuit: A Year in the Trenches With Teach For America," Foote delves into the lives of the teachers she met and reveals much about the high school.

Donna Foote spent a year at troubled Locke High School in Watts observing and documenting the workaday struggles of four new teachers. In her recently published book, "Relentless Pursuit: A Year in the Trenches With Teach For America," Foote delves into the lives of the teachers she met and reveals much about the high school.

With the nation needing 2 million new teachers over the next decade, President Clinton last week proposed a $350-million scholarship program to fully train 35,000 teachers and assign them to the country's poorest schools. Another approach is Teach for America, the New York-based corps that places top college graduates in inner-city classrooms after only five weeks of training.

By the numbers, they are just a fraction of the new teachers needed in California classrooms. But give credit to these young idealists fresh out of college. They go straight into the schools where teachers are needed most. Now in its ninth year, Teach for America is still attracting some of the country's top college graduates for service in urban and rural schools.

In Kathryn Holcomb's second-grade class at Dickison Elementary School in Compton, Dan Jansen talked Friday about his Olympic experience. Jansen had tried to compete in the 1988 Calgary Olympics the same day his sister died of leukemia. A favorite in the race, he fell. It would be six years later--in the 1994 Games in Lillehammer, Norway--before he won a gold medal. "Just because you work real hard and try doesn't mean it always works out," he said.

The Compton High softball players huddle at the front of graffiti-scarred bleachers, jeering fans over their shoulders, two hours of dusty humiliation in their face. They can't win; in 10 games they have been outscored, 175-2. They can't bat; their one official hit this season was a three-foot bunt. They can't catch; during home games, players chase fly balls amid cars that occasionally barrel through the outfield weeds.

The Times' profile of the Teach for America program (Oct. 21) fails to mention the program's fatal flaw: Teach for America's entire premise is that college graduates can go into the classroom, do two years of "duty" and then move on to their "real" careers. This is nonsense. It takes two years for new teachers simply to feel comfortable in the classroom. And then, each and every succeeding year is spent trying out new ideas and ways of reaching the students and implementing revised state standards.

Aquarium of the Pacific in Long Beach needs volunteers for a variety of jobs, including bird handling, public speaking and face painting. Information: (562) 951-1659. * Women Helping Children, a service of the National Council of Jewish Women, needs literacy and enrichment volunteers for elementary school library programs. Information: (323) 852-8508.

By the numbers, they are just a fraction of the new teachers needed in California classrooms. But give credit to these young idealists fresh out of college. They go straight into the schools where teachers are needed most. Now in its ninth year, Teach for America is still attracting some of the country's top college graduates for service in urban and rural schools.

In Kathryn Holcomb's second-grade class at Dickison Elementary School in Compton, Dan Jansen talked Friday about his Olympic experience. Jansen had tried to compete in the 1988 Calgary Olympics the same day his sister died of leukemia. A favorite in the race, he fell. It would be six years later--in the 1994 Games in Lillehammer, Norway--before he won a gold medal. "Just because you work real hard and try doesn't mean it always works out," he said.

With the nation needing 2 million new teachers over the next decade, President Clinton last week proposed a $350-million scholarship program to fully train 35,000 teachers and assign them to the country's poorest schools. Another approach is Teach for America, the New York-based corps that places top college graduates in inner-city classrooms after only five weeks of training.

When Christina Kondos receives her bachelor's degree at Caltech's commencement Friday, she will represent a tiny and little-known minority at the prestigious science and engineering campus in Pasadena. Kondos is the only one in her graduating class of 247 to have majored in humanities or social sciences - economics and history in her case - without double-majoring in science, math or engineering. Since 2008, only a dozen Caltech students have done the same, and they received bachelor of science degrees because Caltech doesn't offer a bachelor of arts, campus officials said.

Take Kirsten Dunst's 2000 cheerleader romp "Bring It On," give it a hip-hop Hispanic make-over to attract the growing legions of young urban Latino viewers and, voila, you have tonight's Disney Channel movie, "Gotta Kick It Up" (8 p.m.). But as formulaic as it may sound, the idea for the film didn't come from the Mouse's marketing department but from the true-life experiences of Meghan Cole, who with this effort makes her co-producing debut. Prior to joining the Walt Disney Co.