Fathers And Black Hair: Daughters Beware
It’s an idealized image that’ll get you every time: a dad and a daughter sitting on the stoop of a brownstone — daughter on the lower step, dad on the higher — a tilted, tender head below and big clumsy hands above trying in earnest to master the fine art of tending to a black girl’s hair. Not many fathers take on the task, but for those who do attempt to plait and braid and twist and tame, it very often doesn’t go so well.
Kids’ surprise serenade to NYC 9/11 firefighters in a Spike Lee directed tribute video.
“Never forgotten. Forever grateful.” To help honor the victims and heroes of Sept. 11, director Spike Lee filmed a unique and moving tribute to the New York Fire Department. Lee, working with State Farm, filmed roughly 150 children from New York serenading members of the FDNY to the tune of Jay-Z and Alicia Keys’s smash hit “Empire State of Mind.”
The tribute may remind some of Staten Island’s PS 22 choir’s version of “Somewhere Over the Rainbow” at the most recent Academy Awards.
This version of “Empire State of Mind” was conducted by James Davis Jr. The spot first appeared online several days ago. It then aired during Sunday’s Eagles-Rams NFL game. Now it is quickly going viral. Web searches for “empire state of mind lyrics” and “empire state of mind song” are starting to soar. Watch Now Continue reading
More school: Obama would curtail summer vacation
All you school age kids and teenagers are not going to like this one. In the end, it appears to be a brilliant idea..See this is the kind of change Obama was talking about and it’s time our nation catches us to the rest of the world and stop living in denial.
Too many teachers, and students are just plain STUPID and it’s time we stop acting as if having tons of weapons and clout is all it takes for us to remain as a superpower. We need our youth to grow up and become smart, CRITICAL THINKERS, who can compete in science, math, and economics and against other countries like India and China who are pumping out mini-Einsteins every day. Read the full story below ..
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‘Red Hook High’: The Anti-’Gossip Girl’
Watch a few episodes of “Gossip Girl” or “Laguna Beach: The Real OC,” and you’d think high school was all about sex at your parents’ summer home, going to galas and getting wasted while looking like an Abercrombie and Fitch model, not the “Before” kid in a Clearasil ad.
“Red Hook High” may be the antidote to all that. Instead of stick-thin blondes toting $3,500 Hermes bags, there are black boys toting bags of drugs. Instead of postcard-perfect mansions and cityscapes, there are cramped apartments and construction zones. 
Part drama, part documentary, “Red Hook High,” a new pilot that premiered at the New York Television Festival (NYTVF) this week, shows a high school experience few network and cable series touch on, one that unfolds in a gritty Brooklyn community among teens with the odds stacked against them. Forget prom queens and valedictorians. “Red Hook High’s” stars include a budding drug dealer, an emerging gay crusader and a possibly pregnant teen.
“It’s the opposite of ‘Gossip Girl,’” said director Trac Minh Vu. “It’s not a glossy Hollywood fashion show. There are probably people who actually live lives like what is portrayed on ‘Gossip Girl’ and ‘The OC.’ But they’re fantasy shows. They’re about showcasing high fashion and the small population of people who can live like that.” Continue reading