Cornerstone Theater Company and The California Endowment, in partnership with The Black Parallel School Board, will bring the community, policy makers, and the media together to dramatize personal stories of school discipline and to discuss alternatives to harsh practices on Wednesday, June 26, 2013 at the State Capitol in Sacramento.  This bridge building event, Talk it Out: A Community Conversation to Fix School Discipline, will feature a dramatic reading of a new play, Willful, performed by students, community members and professional actors, with a focus on the current debate over the excessive use of “willful defiance” in school suspensions and expulsions.  The event is sponsored by the office of Roger Dickinson, D-Sacramento and author of AB 420, a new bill that would restrict the ill-defined and overused “willful defiance” rationale for harsh disciplinary measures. Read the rest of this entry »

Award-winning film Bouncing Cats is the inspiring documentary of one man’s attempt to create a better life for the children of Uganda through the unlikely tools of hip hop and breakdance. Narrated by Common and featuring interviews with Will.I.Am, and K’Naan, the story follows the legendary Crazy Legs of the Rock Steady Crew and b-boy Abramz, the founder of Breakdance Project Uganda (BPU), on a journey to unify, empower and inspire youth in the war torn country that has been called one of the worst places on earth to be a child.  Poverty, disease, and a brutal, mindless war in the region have divided families, displaced millions and led to the abduction and mutilation of tens of thousands of children resulting in the deterioration of identity and culture. Read the rest of this entry »