Sarah Alvarez

Buena Vista schools approve plan, await state action

Sarah Alvarez — Wed, 15 May 2013 04:51:29 +0000

The Buena Vista School District unceremoniously shut down ten days ago, sending staff and students home for the year after the district ran out of money.

At Tuesday night’s emergency school board meeting there was almost universal confusion about what happens next.

The school board unanimously approved a deficit elimination plan they hope will allow state aid payments to start up again so students can get back in the classroom.

If that doesn't work, the board grudgingly approved a plan for a summer "skills building camp," in lieu of traditional classroom time.

Nobody at the meeting seemed very happy about that option.

Supreme Court case about a little known law could be a big deal for Michigan's kids

Sarah Alvarez — Wed, 17 Apr 2013 20:16:33 +0000

Yesterday, the United States Supreme Court heard oral arguments on a case involving the Indian Child Welfare Act.

The law is designed to make sure Native American children in the child welfare system stay connected with their tribes.

The court's decision will affect Michigan, as the state recently passed a stronger version of Indian Child Welfare Act.

I produced a story on these laws and the people they affect for State of Opportunity.

You can listen to the full version here.

And for those with limited time, here are three important points to know about this story:

Congress passed the Indian Child Welfare Act 35 years ago to put a stop to private and state workers taking Indian children away from their homes and tribes often with little reason other than a desire to assimilate them to white and Christian culture. Many families in Michigan are still dealing with the effects of this, including Judge Alli Greenleaf Maldonado who tells her personal story of her mother and her grandmother being removed from their homes.
A Michigan law that is clearer and stronger than the federal law was passed in January with almost unanimous, bi-partisan support. The abusive practices of the past have stopped, but Indian children are still over-represented in the state's child welfare system.
Some child welfare advocates are looking to Michigan's law, the Michigan Indian Family Preservation Act, as a model for the state because it takes a different approach to child welfare. It tries to keep children out of the state system in the first place. The law requires child welfare workers to work actively with parents to make changes that will benefit their children. The law also allows Indian children to have their cases in a smaller and more personal tribal system. But the success of the law depends on everyone knowing the law and following it. Many people have concerns, like the Burrows family, who personally experienced a devastating loss when the law was applied incorrectly.

Read more about the personal stories behind this law and why people have hope it can change Michigan's child welfare system at State of Opportunity.

A few things to know about ladders, bootstraps and the American Dream

Sarah Alvarez — Tue, 02 Apr 2013 23:23:37 +0000

State of Opportunity hosted a call-in show today and the conversation ranged from privilege to the politics around an increase in the minimum wage. But the conversation always circled back to one central question we asked listeners and our guests, "Do all kids have an equal shot at an American dream?"

Spoiler alert, none of the guests think all kids have an equal shot at what we call the American Dream. Even so, they offer data and insights they think could make a difference in helping all of Michigan's kids get ahead. Guests broke down why they think the state's future depends on more kids having equal opportunity. There was also lots of talk of bootstraps, climbing up ladders, and why the imagery of an American Dream is so powerful.

The State of Opportunity site has all the audio and a more thorough summary of the show.

Are kids in the state's care safe? Court monitor says not safe enough

Sarah Alvarez — Wed, 20 Mar 2013 21:16:50 +0000

Almost 14,000 kids in Michigan have been taken out of their own homes by the state because of an abuse or neglect allegation.

Those kids then rely upon the state's Department of Human Services (DHS) to keep them safe and put them in an environment where they have a chance to thrive. Most of those kids end up in foster care.

Six years ago the state was sued by the advocacy group Children's Rights over treatment of kids in its care.

The state was back in court today to see where things stand. Everyone agrees things have gotten better since the lawsuit started six years ago, but the court appointed monitor said too many kids are still unsafe.

Economy might be getting better, but poverty rate is not

Sarah Alvarez — Thu, 07 Mar 2013 02:19:17 +0000

The slow pace of Michigan's economic recovery is leaving lots of people behind. New research looks into why the poverty rate in Michigan is not going down even though the economy is beginning to pick up.

Kristin Seefeldt is with the University of Michigan and authored the research.

Michigan locking up fewer kids, but is that good enough?

Sarah Alvarez — Wed, 27 Feb 2013 16:19:41 +0000

Fewer teens and kids are incarcerated now in Michigan than fifteen years ago. A new report by the Annie E. Casey Foundation says youth incarceration in the state has dropped 44 percent since 1997.

Stockbridge Series: Economic hardship makes college readiness mean something different

Sarah Alvarez — Fri, 15 Feb 2013 15:54:30 +0000

In the last piece in the Stockbridge series, State of Opportunity explores how the schools in Stockbridge, Michigan have in some ways a sad task in educating their youth.

Because Stockbridge is a rural village with very little economic opportunity, preparing kids to succeed often means preparing them to leave town.

Teachers and administrators at the high school there don't think it's enough to try to prepare their students for college. College is expensive, and though most of the kids will pursue higher education of one kind or another, paying for it can be tough.

So teacher Duane Watson and a few others are heavily invested in technical education. Watson has three rooms he teaches in, to call them classrooms might give the wrong impression. In one of them, the only desks are broken ones people hope his students will fix.

The classroom is actually a garage and I was impressed three full cars could fit inside it before Watson corrected me.

“Four actually, and one compact utility tractor, a snowplow going on a truck, a completely student fabricated tandem-axle trailer, and an alternative fuel vehicle-a battery powered golf cart." He said as he laughed about the golf cart experiment.

This shop is part of a serious effort by Watson and the schools in Stockbridge to keep technical classes from slipping out of the curriculum, like they have at a lot of other places. Plenty of the equipment in the auto shop was donated by schools who shut their programs down.

Finish the story and listen to it and the work of the Stockbridge youth journalists at State of Opportunity.

Stockbridge series: An educational experiment on the cheap

Sarah Alvarez — Wed, 13 Feb 2013 14:40:16 +0000

State of Opportunity's latest story takes you inside the Exploratory Academy at Stockbridge's Heritage Elementary. It's a hands on learning experiment where kids use their hands to build things like underwater robots or a "wax-works museum" full of historical figures.

The Academy has been around since September, and so far results are good. Test scores are on track and Principal Jim Kelly says he's never had so many dads involved in school.

And the best part, it hasn't cost the district any extra money. More on how this innovation got off the ground and if it's likely to be successful at State of Opportunity.

Stockbridge series: High expectations for at-risk kids

Sarah Alvarez — Tue, 12 Feb 2013 16:13:39 +0000

Robin Lowe-Fletcher's son, Brenden, is considered an “at-risk” kid. But he’s also quick, engaging and funny.

He was born with a cognitive impairment, which does make it harder for him to learn. His mom explains that Brenden was born with Down syndrome.

Brenden's special education status gets him the at-risk label. For those kids, economics, statistics, or in Brenden’s case, biology, work against them.

These kids are more likely to disengage from school and then have a really hard time living up to their potential. In Stockbridge what gets a lot of kids an at-risk label is economics. Over 40 percent of the kids qualify for free or reduced lunch. But that doesn’t mean their parents don’t want their kids to do well.

The principal at Brenden's school, Michelle Ruh, has put a system in place she thinks will help all kids do well, even those with the "at-risk" label. It comes along with high expecations. At State of Opportunity we find out if this system is working for Brenden and the other kids at Stockbridge's elementary.

State of Opportunity: A close look at a rural school district

Sarah Alvarez — Mon, 11 Feb 2013 15:39:52 +0000

Stockbridge is a village similar to many places around the state. The economy is tough, industry has gone, and the school system is one of few ways kids from the town can get a leg up.

All this week we're going inside this small town school district. Like a lot places, they're trying to make sure their kids have educational opportunity, even in the face of shrinking state aid and a tough economy.

Today's story is a look at how the district made a push over a decade ago to try to convince parents early childhood education was worth the expense. The district now educates over half of their incoming kindergarten class in their preschool program.

In addition to these daily stories, youth journalists from Stockbridge High School report on what educational opportunity and coming of age in rural Michigan looks like from their perspective.

Find the whole series at State of Opportunity.

The link between marriage and success

Sarah Alvarez — Wed, 30 Jan 2013 11:01:00 +0000

Kids in poverty are much more likely to come from single parent homes. Because of this correlation politicians across the political spectrum (most recently Rick Santorum in his presidential bid) have pushed policies to encourage marriage. The hope is that marriage can alleviate childhood poverty.

Enbridge Energy runs public relations campaign around new pipeline; some neighbors unimpressed

Sarah Alvarez — Tue, 27 Nov 2012 14:00:00 +0000

Enbridge Energy has a bit of a bad reputation in Michigan. In 2010, one of the company’s pipelines burst near Marshall. More than a million gallons of oil have been cleaned up so far from the Kalamazoo River. Last winter there was a small leak near Sterling in the northeast part of the state.

But Enbridge is planning for growth. They’re replacing the pipeline that burst - Line 6B - and they’re building some new sections as well. The company hopes to double the amount of oil they can move from Canada to refineries in Michigan and Ohio (we've previously reported that an Enbridge spokesman said the main product in the new pipeline will be from Alberta's tar sands region. The EPA says the nature of tar sands oil made the Kalamazoo River spill much more difficult to clean up).

Enbridge has been running a public relations campaign to try to improve its image. But some landowners along the pipeline route are not impressed.

Have we been measuring poverty wrong this whole time?

Sarah Alvarez — Wed, 21 Nov 2012 13:35:47 +0000

With the fiscal cliff fight right around the corner, a lot of anti-poverty programs might end up on the chopping block.

The State of Opportunity team has been looking at some of those programs to examine if they are helping move people out of poverty. If you look at the official poverty rate, programs like Medicaid and food stamps seem to be hardly making a dent.

The U.S. poverty rate has hardly budged in half a century. The Census says the same share of our country is living in poverty right now as in the 1960’s.

So there’s lots of traction for accusations that programs like food stamps and Medicaid cost too much and don’t work. That criticism is not new, President Regan famously said in his 1988 State of the Union address, “My friends, some years ago the federal government declared war on poverty, and poverty won.”

But there are some who think the problem isn't in the government programs, it's in how we measure the poverty rate.

James Sullivan and his co-author Bruce Meyer say since we started measuring poverty we’ve been doing it wrong. Sullivan is an economist at the University of Notre Dame. He thinks a simple change in how poverty is measured would have huge implications. Sullivan thinks people should just be asked how they spent their money instead of how much money they earned. It's called a consumption measure. As Sullivan explains,

"The official poverty between 1970 and today has risen by two and a half percentage points. But if you look at consumption based poverty over those same four decades you see that poverty has fallen by 12 percentage points, which is a very different story.”

Find out more about that "different story" and listen to today's feature at State of Opportunity.

Weigh in on your election experience

Sarah Alvarez — Tue, 06 Nov 2012 14:30:51 +0000

Using our Public Insight Network you can add to our news coverage this election day. Just follow the links to weigh in.

We're curious why you voted the way you did on the candidates, and particularly on the statewide ballot initiatives.

We'll fold your insights into our coverage all day and night. You can also tell us about your experience at the polls. Was it smooth sailing, or did you experience something out of the ordinary?

Flint, a city of possiblity and community for young people?

Sarah Alvarez — Wed, 03 Oct 2012 15:56:18 +0000

Flint is a much maligned city. While there is plenty of good happening in the city it does have challenges that go far beyond an image problem.