Connecticut Youth Leadership Forum....

is held every summer at the University of Connecticut for more than 30 of the state's students with disabilities to teach them leadership skills for use in the community.



The site of the Connecticut Youth Leadership Project can be found here.

The kids from PS22 sing Let There be Peace on Earth

A day after Christmas message from this ever changing group of fifth graders in Staten Island led by a teacher who, since 2000, has shared his gift of music, changing these children's lives. These kids are not from a music school - just a "regular " school.

Film Review : Touching Wild Horses

I rented this film from Netflix. It's a 2002 movie starring Jane Seymour, who plays a prickly woman (Fiona) living alone on an island off Nova Scotia studying wild horses. When her brother in law and niece are killed in a car accident and her sister left in a coma, she reluctantly takes in her nephew Mark who is suffering from post traumatic stress disorder -both from the accident and also from abuse. It becomes clear as the movie progresses that Fiona is hiding her own secret from a hidden past.

The movie sensitively portrays the characters' influence on each other and the emotional healing of the young boy as Fiona helps him regain not only his self esteem but provides him with safety and structure. It contains beautiful footage of the wild horses, the acting is superb and, although the screenplay wasn't as good as the acting, it did justice to the characters, providing a realistic portrayal.

For more information about this movie, click above.

[visual description: Young Mark is shown standing next to one of the wild horses, a black foal.]

Gospel workshop for kids

Due to the drop in music training in many public schools ( California alone lost 27% of its music teachers between 1999 and 2004) -

"... the Washington Performing Arts Society, which brings internationally acclaimed artists to the city's top stages, stepped in, says president Neale Perl. It devotes $200,000 of its $1.2 million annual education budget to offer, free, the training that great singing requires.

For two weeks every July, the workshop offers vocal technique, musicality, gospel music history, songwriting and more. Many campers are members of the 110-voice Children of the Gospel choir, which is sponsored by the performing arts society. Others are newcomers who may audition for the choir this fall.
...
"We teach them that gospel music is theology and Scripture and an outcry of the soul. It connects the singer and the listener to what God can do, has done, will do, might do, in their lives," says gospel history teacher Emory Andrews.

Via USA Today

Click above to read the rest.

[visual description: Choir director Philip Carter leads the rehearsal of a group of young singers.]

Parents: Prescription and OTC drug abuse on the rise among teens

In this interview, a mother who works in the substance abuse field talks about how this generation's parents, including herself, do not always consider it "on the radar" that their children are abusing prescription and/or OTC drugs and miss the signs. Part of the explanation might be that drug abuse looked a lot different a generation ago.

She spoke out to help other parents spot the signs after her own son died of an overdose.

In today's news, Al Gore's son was arrested for possession of various drugs in his vehicle, including prescription drugs. The younger Gore has a history of drug-related problems.

Click above to read.

Children with disabilities get social outlet in group

Via SignOnSanDiego.com

An article about the Friendship Circle, established to provide a social group for children with disabilities.


Thanks to William Gaventa , NJCIM list serve

Ugly Betty just won a Globe....

....and she thanked her mother. I'm sure she's a very nice person. This isn't aimed at her at all.

She looked elegant in a gown among the glitz and glamour of Hollywood's finest as she stood before them, speaking of how she gets emails from girls who feel as if they are worthy and loveable after watching her show.

The cameras scanned the crowd. There were tears in the eyes of all of the beautiful actors and actresses, their wives, partners, lovers, cameramen, directors, producers, etc.

When her speech was done, she walked to the side of the stage. Someone obviously told her she would be interviewed by an announcer standing there. Betty stood there, next to the announcer, shifting a bit from foot to foot, just not quite sure in her endearing way that she should be standing there.

Clearly it was either a mis-cue....or she just stood in the wrong place. She's a natural.

For a moment I found all of this heartwarming. Then my trouble-making Irish self thought ....

So what?

There's this beautiful actress hired to be dressed up as "ugly". But she's not ugly. It could only happen in Hollywood - that make-up is used to make her ugly. And the sad thing is that there are real girls out there writing to her about their feelings because they feel ugly. Maybe they're not ugly either.

Maybe none of us are ugly. Radical thinking, I know. If any of us received a Hollywood makeover so we could get an award at the Golden Globes and wore an expensive gown or tux, had people work on our make-up, and pamper us - we could all look much better.

Yet maybe the lesson of Ugly Betty needs to be not that we should all have a "feel good" moment that she's a role model, but that Hollywood has created such a false definition of beauty that real kids worry that they aren't good enough, worthy or loveable.

Go hug your kids. Tell them they're beautiful.