Washington Informer

The 39th Annual Capital Classic pitted the U.S. All-Stars against the Capital All-Stars at T.C. Williams High School in Alexandria, Va., on Saturday, April 21. The U.S. All-Stars defeated the Capital All-Stars105-93. Prior to the 39th Annual Capital Classic, a girls' basketball double-header featured the best public and private high school seniors.

These are the winninng essay submissions by students at Richard Wright Public Charter School. The students also participated in The Washington Informer's April 19, "A Conversation with John Lewis," which was held at THEARC in Southeast D.C. For the contest, students were asked to write about someone who inspisres them.

Inspired by a Movement...

At age 17, John Lewis was so inspired by Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. that he wrote a letter to Rev. King asking to meet him. Dr. King responded and sent Lewis a round-trip Greyhound bus ticket to meet with him in Atlanta, Ga. The Washington Informer asked Richard Wright Public Charter School students to write a letter to someone who inspires them and tell them why they would want to meet them and join their cause. Below are excerpts of three compelling letters selected by The Washington Informer staff.

David McFarland

The Trevor Project

Dear McFarland:

I am writing this letter to you because I am very passionate about ending the cycle of bullying. I selected your organization to write to because you focus on supporting gay, lesbian, transgender, or questioning youth and ending the cycle of suicide among these youth by providing "life-saving" and "life-affirming' resources. I think it is wonderful that your organization exists and that it has a 24/7 lifeline intervention that the youth can call if they feel like they need someone to talk to.

I understand that the Trevor Project's vision is to create a future where all youth can have the same dreams and possibilities as everyone else, no matter what sexual orientation, or gender identity that they choose to be. That is a future I want to experience. I want to be affiliated with your organization because in the past, I have been bullied. I have been pushed around, and tortured, and it got to that point where I felt like nothing. Your organization would have been great to know about back then.

Another reason I'd like to be a part of your group is because one of my closet friends that I knew since 5th grade recently committed suicide. You see she was being bullied because she came out as a lesbian.

When I first heard about the Trevor Project, I thought to myself, if only I had known about this earlier then I could've helped my friend, I could've done something.

One way I think this can be stopped is to get parents more involved. It's not right to bully, and

I am writing this letter because this bullying thing has been happening a lot and it's time for this to stop. I am very pleased to learn about the work that your organization does. I would love to become a volunteer, or an advocate at any time. Please contact me to advise me of ways that I can get involved and make a difference. Thank you for all you hard work and effort.

I look forward to hearing from you soon.

Arianna Marsh

9th Grade Student

Honorable Julian Bond

The American University

Dear Mr. Bond:

I am writing this letter to let you know that I support the marriage between same sex couples. I believe this is a civil rights issue. Since you have always been a supporter for civil rights I hope you believe this way, too.

Discrimination against same sex couples is wrong. Same sex relationships are just as beautiful as opposite sex relationships. As a homosexual male myself, and not only that, but I'm being raised by a same sex couple I want to honor myself and my family.

My mother and her fiancé' are doing a fantastic job raising me and my siblings. What can opposite sex couples teach kids that same sex couples can't?

This topic is really sensitive for me because I've recently come out. I've been teased and discriminated against on more than one occasion. I think that treating someone differently just because they like something different from you is borderline mean. It bothers me that it's a huge million man march when a "homie" from the hood gets killed. It's all over the news and everywhere. But when a transgender is slain with a slit throat at a bus stop, people say absolutely nothing. Maybe you get a "this is a sad world we're coming to" and then someone flips the channel on the television, or the page in the newspaper is turned.

Legalizing gay marriage would be a giant move to help people accept homosexuals as equals. People need to wake up and realize that there are people in the world who are born differently.

What would legalizing gay marriage mean for me? This movement means the world to me. I know of your history with civil rights. I believe that you can offer me sound advice on how I can make same-sex marriage a reality in my lifetime. I hope that you will contact me with information.

De'Quan Barclift

9th Grade

Anthony Lake

UNICEF House

Dear Mr. Lake:

I am passionate about ending world hunger and helping needy children. I really appreciate the work that has been done by your organization. I feel that UNICEF is one of the greatest organizations supporting children today and I would love to be a part of it.

UNICEF is over 50 years old but it is still needed today because every year, 15 million children throughout the world die from hunger. Current data suggests that even in America, 1 in 4 children are at risk of starvation.

UNICEF is an organization that not many teenagers around me know about. But now that I know more about it, I feel as though I should inform others. World hunger is something that really affects young people in over 150 countries around the world. From my research I learned what UNICEF really stands for.

I learned that UNICEF is a global humanitarian relief organization providing children with so much to keep them alive like; healthcare, immunizations, clean water, nutrition, food security, education, emergency relief and so much more. That really inspired me to want to help children whose parents can't afford to feed them, or take them to regular doctor visits. I've always wanted to help people that didn't have much in life and to find out that this organization helps children in over 150 countries really makes me want to be a part of something so significant.

If you think about it this organization is saving lives of young people every day. Even though there are still 21,000 children that still die each day from preventable causes, with organizations like UNICEF, this situation will get better.

I would love to participate in the fight to feed and protect young people all over the world because it is something that needs to be done. During the past four years, our economy has more families in poverty and more children suffering. Every day I think about what I can do to help others. Please write to me and let me know what I can do to get involved.

Sincerely,

Akiya Kent

9th Grade Student

R&B legend Gladys Knight might have gotten the boot Tuesday from "Dancing with the Stars," but the 67-year-old diva walked away 60 pounds lighter.

She says she owes the dramatic weight loss to a health regimen she began shortly before teaming up with her DWTS partner, Tristan McManus.

"[Tristan] helped [by] wearing me out," Knight said in an interview. "You've got to eat healthy and you've got to put a little movement into it."

"The Midnight Train to Georgia" singer added that her diet for the show included an energy bar, protein drink and fruit for breakfast.

Mayor Vincent Gray and District of Columbia Public Schools (DCPS) Chancellor Kaya Henderson recently released a five-year strategic plan, "A Capital Commitment," designed to improve the traditional public schools.

The plan outlines five goals: improve struggling schools, increase student achievement, graduation rates, enrollment, and student satisfaction. The Chancellor believes the strategic plan will guide DCPS spending and programmatic decisions through 2017.

"Mayor Gray and Chancellor Henderson's intentions are proper and there is merit to support the overall goals of the five-year strategic plan," said WTU President Nathan Saunders. "However, it only amounts to half of what needs to be done. To improve the quality of education for all students, it is imperative for schools to spend more time on tasks and less time on testing.

"Schools must also provide more services for our returning special education students and every student must have the benefit of robust art, music, physical education and library/media services.

Saunders added: "We must all acknowledge that education not only happens in classrooms, but also in our homes and communities--making it essential to secure and maintain the support of teachers, parents and students as the plan is implemented over the next five years.

"I encourage Mayor Gray and Chancellor Henderson to work with us to achieve these goals and I look forward to developing the substance and sustainability of this plan to achieve long-term success. Mayor Gray and Chancellor Henderson, our appointment books are open and we're ready for the hard work ahead."

Ward 8 Councilman Marion Barry, who ended up apologizing earlier this month to the Asian community over comments he made about the upkeep of their shops, made a subtle comparison to the establishments with charter schools during hearing Tuesday morning.

Barry stated that because admission to charter schools is gained by citywide lotteries, students who live in close proximity can't always attend them. As a result, parents are hard-pressed to pull their children out of low-performing public schools in the District, he reportedly said.

"I'm running into the same situation with these restaurants in Ward 8," Barry was quoted as saying to charter school officials. "Somebody said to me the other day, 'Well, if they don't treat you well there, why should I shop there?' The problem is, in some of our neighborhoods — in my neighborhood — there's no other place at 9 o'clock at night or 4 o'clock in the afternoon, except those carry outs."

The veteran council member, who easily retained his post in the April 3 Democratic primary, added that: "So, we're going to make sure that they're clean, they're decent places to come in to, they're conducive to eat [at], but also that the owners are contributing to this community. They're not going to come into the Ward 8 community and just take all our money."

Jennifer Hudson fought back tears April 23 during opening testimony in the case William Balfour, who is accused with murder in the deaths of her mother, brother and 7-year-old nephew four years ago in Chicago.

When handed a photo of her mother, the Grammy and Oscar winner broke down in tears. She said the family never like Balfour, who was married to her sister Julia Hudson --mother of the slain child. Julia and Balfour are divorced.

"Where he was, I tried not to be. So if I saw him, I separated myself," Hudson was quoted as saying of Balfour.

While both sisters have suggested that Balfour had been violent toward Julia, a clear motive for the murders has not been revealed. However, Julia who also testified Monday, indicated that jealousy had always been an issue.

According to Julia, her former husband became jealous when she got gifts from other people, including her son, who was told not to kiss his mother. Balfour's nickname for the middle school student was "the little monster," Julia said.

Reports state that Balfour had threatened several times to kill members of Hudson's family, and that had Hudson not joined David Otunga, (who has since become her fiancé) on a trip to Florida, she might have been at the family's home when her mother and brother were killed. Police believe Hudson's nephew was abducted from the home and murdered.

According to the Chicago Tribune News:

Dressed all in black and wearing little make-up, the Academy Award-winning actress struggled at times to maintain her composure during a half an hour on the witness stand.

Her voice cracked as she described how no one in the family wanted her sister, Julia, to marry Balfour.

A year after hitting No. 1 on Billboard's Hot Gospel Songs chart with "I Believe," a collaboration with James Fortune & FIYA and Shawn McLemore, Zacardi Cortez is bracing himself for another number one with the song, "One More Time." The down home plea for God's salvation features Cortez' musical godfather, John P. Kee, and has just risen to the Top 5 on the Nielsen BDS gospel chart this week. "We are pulling out all the stops," says Blacksmoke music CEO, Kerry Douglas, who discovered Cortez years ago and brought him into the Blacksmoke family of artists.

"We are partnering with radio stations and bloggers to help get this inspirational message out to people that no matter what they are going through, God can help them through it just one more time."

With the explosion of praise and worship music that is often sung as a vocal ensemble as opposed to as a soloist, gospel music has drifted away from real singers but Cortez is bringing the art of technique back with his raw vocal skills. Nowhere is this better exemplified than on "One More Time," a rousing ballad written by James Fortune and Terence Vaughn, who wrote Fortune's Top 10 hits "Encore," "I Wouldn't Know You," and the smash, "I Trust You," which spent 29 weeks at No. 1 on Billboard's Gospel chart. In the simple song, Cortez' second verse reads as a confession to God: "There's one thing that I know is true, When everything else fails I can count on you. With tears in my eyes, down on my knees. Can you do what you did before, Lord? I'm asking you please."

The legendary John P Kee, who Cortez has been singing with Kee since the age of 10, adds another level of passion and authenticity to this inspiring church melody. They play off of each other, finishing each other's vocal lines. "Oh Lord, I need you to heal my sister", Kee sings before Cortez jumps in to proclaim, "I'm depending on you to repair my broken heart too."

During the vamp, Cortez and Kee go head to head, testifying back and forth of the many times God has pulled them through the storms of life. It's the type of solid gospel song that artists don't record anymore, a pure church melody that blends the best of the past with the best of the future to create a classic that appeals to young and old alike.

"That's the message I'm getting out there," says Douglas. "Zacardi appeals to people across the board and I'm open to all ideas on how to make take Zacardi to the top and make him America's favorite gospel artist because he can do it alls. He's got the swag to hang with your R. Kellys, he's got the Sunday morning church style to hold his own with the Marvin Sapps and at the same time, he can be as smooth as Luther Vandross."

He displays all of these sides to his extraordinary talent on his forthcoming debut solo CD, "Zacardi Cortez: The Introduction"(Blacksmoke Media) that hits online and retail stores everywhere on May 22 with cameos by Lalah Hathaway, Kierra Sheard, Fred Hammond, John P. Kee, The Williams Singers, James Fortune and Isaac Carree.

WASHINGTON, D.C. -- Stoddert Elementary School in Ward 3 has been named a Green Ribbon School by the U.S. Department of Education, making it the first-ever public school in the District to earn the distinction.

Schools nationwide receiving the award were recognized for creating green environments, promoting healthy schools and working to provide environmental and outdoor education.

"I am so proud of the entire Stoddert Elementary School community for this prestigious recognition," said District of Columbia Public Schools (DCPS) Chancellor Kaya Henderson. "Being green and teaching green makes our schools healthier and safer places for our students, while also saving money. Teaching our children early about the importance of the environment around them will make them smart, strong stewards of their communities."

Stoddert, which was modernized by the Department of General Services in 2010, received LEED Gold Certification from the U.S. Green Building Council, and boasts a range of sustainability features. The school's green elements include: an extensive geothermal system under the athletics field that provides the building's heating and cooling; two green roofs; light shelves that improve day lighting, reduce solar heat gain in the summer, and allow winter sun to penetrate and heat the school as well as a comprehensive recycling program; glazing for improved insulation; individual lighting; and HVAC controls in every classroom.

"I'm delighted to see Stoddert Elementary recognized by the White House for being a green leader," said Mayor Vincent C. Gray. "My administration is committed to making the District the most green and livable city in the world, and our schools are already leading the way to that goal."

George Zimmerman, who has been charged with 2nd-degree murder in the death of Trayvon Martin, has been released on bail.

Zimmerman, 28, admitted shooting 17-year-old Trayvon on Feb. 26 as the unarmed youth walked along a gated community in Sanford, Fla.

Zimmerman was seen leaving the John E. Polk Correctional Facility in Sanford over the weekend, headed for an undisclosed location. The neighborhood watch guard will remain in seclusion and out of touch with his family. He will also have to wear an ankle monitoring device.

Following a bond hearing on April 20, Zimmerman's family came up with the required $15,000 of his $150,000 bond, and will be free from jail until his trial.

Zimmerman offered his apologies to Trayvon's family, saying:

"I wanted to say I am sorry for the loss of your son. I thought he was a little bit younger than I was, and I did not know if he was armed or not."