Date: 2/26/2009
By SHAYA TAYEFE MOHAJER
Associated Press Writer
LOS ANGELES (AP) — Nadya Suleman has voiced concern that the hospital where her octuplets are being cared for may prevent her from taking them home when they’re healthy enough in coming weeks.
But in reality, hospitals don’t prevent healthy children from going home — child protective services do.
And that’s only if a complaint has been filed. Hospital employees are mandated to report to county authorities any concerns they have about unsuitable home environments, a mother’s emotional or psychological instability, or any other situation that could result in harm to a child.
According to talk show host Dr. Phil McGraw, the 33-year-old unemployed mother called him Tuesday and said hospital officials were worried that her current living arrangement wouldn’t be suitable.
Stu Riskin, a spokesman for Los Angeles County Department of Children and Family Services, said the agency cannot comment specifically on Suleman’s situation and could not confirm whether a case had been opened on her family.
But in the event a child welfare complaint is made for a baby ready to leave the neo-natal intensive care unit, it’s followed by interviews with family and doctors and in-home visits in an effort “to leave no stone unturned so that we can make the best possible assessment,” Riskin said.
If a home is determined to be unsuitable, the county first looks to relatives willing to care for the children. If none is found, a foster home is sought, Riskin said.
Suleman gave birth to the octuplets at Kaiser Permanente Bellflower Medical Center on Jan. 26, when they were nine weeks premature. She has six other children, lives in her mother’s three-bedroom home in Whittier and has relied on food stamps and disability income to provide for her family.
She expects the children to come home within the next two weeks, she told McGraw in a show that aired Wednesday. Part two of the interview is scheduled to air Thursday.
Kaiser Permanente spokesman Jim Anderson refused to provide details of Suleman’s case, citing privacy concerns, and further refused to elaborate on the health provider’s normal procedure for discharging neo-natal infants.
But according to experts and information published on the health provider’s Web site, typical protocol for babies discharged from NICU is that the hospital’s hired social workers and discharge planners work with parents to coordinate the child’s return to the home.
“This discharge plan has to account for the fact that these children, because they’re small, they might require special consideration,” said Lizelda Lopez, spokeswoman for the state’s Department of Social Services, which oversees the county-run child welfare programs. “The hospital has to plan for that and has to work with Ms. Suleman.”
It is normal for hospitals to provide parents of premature babies with a host of services to prepare them to care for the babies at home, according to Vicki Bermudez, a neo-natal intensive care unit nurse at the Kaiser hospital in Roseville and a California Nurses Association regulatory policy specialist.
That includes environmental assessments and parenting instruction. Home consultations or home visits from nurses are not unusual, Bermudez said.
“This whole issue has been very emotional, and there have been many judgments made by the public. But nurses and doctors aren’t there to make judgments,” she said. “They just want to make sure the children and family are getting the services they’re entitled to and what’s in the best interest of those babies.”
The babies must be medically stable before they can be released, which means they should be feeding well and able to breathe on their own, though they are sometimes sent home with oxygen or monitoring equipment, said California Nurses Association co-president Geri Jenkins, also a registered nurse.
“The bottom line is they won’t be sent home until the medical team is sure — and they’re evaluated to make sure — they’re strong enough to eat and grow and thrive,” Jenkins said.
In a video posted on the celebrity news Web site RadarOnline.com on Wednesday, cameras went from room to room at Suleman’s home, showing cramped quarters and clutter.
In the video, Suleman says the home is “obviously too small” but has a large backyard where the children can play. She also says she’s looking for a larger home to rent.
“I want the house to be ready, so my whole head is swimming with ideas,” Suleman said in the video.
She has not responded to repeated interview requests from The Associated Press. Her phone has been disconnected and though she said on “Dr. Phil” that she has a publicist, the show only identifies him as “Victor” at his request. Efforts to reach him were unsuccessful.
Copyright 2009 The Associated Press.
Coroner criticizes doctors over girl who starved
Date: 2/16/2009
LONDON (AP) — An 8-year-old girl starved herself to death because of an extreme dental phobia that doctors failed to diagnose properly, a British coroner said Monday.
Coroner Emma Carlyon said staff did not realize the severity of the condition afflicting Sophie Waller, who died in December 2005. Carlyon said this prevented the girl “from receiving the medical support that could have prevented her death.”
Witnesses at the inquest testified that Sophie had an extreme phobia of dentists and refused to eat, sleep or drink after her baby teeth became loose. Medical staff ultimately decided to pull out all her baby teeth under general anesthetic in November 2005.
She was sent home a few days later but would not eat and died three weeks after the operation.
Her parents said they contacted doctors and a psychologist but no one saw Sophie in person before she died.
The Royal Cornwall Hospital in Truro, 250 miles (400 kilometers) southwest of London, acknowledged there had been failures in Sophie’s care, and said it had made changes.
A coroner’s inquest is required in Britain to establish the facts when someone dies unexpectedly, violently or of unknown causes, but has no power to punish anyone.
Carlyon gave a narrative verdict, in which a coroner simply outlines the circumstances that led to the death or deaths.
She said the immediate cause of Sophie’s death was kidney failure due to dehydration and starvation.
Copyright 2009 The Associated Press.
LONDON (AP) — An 8-year-old girl starved herself to death because of an extreme dental phobia that doctors failed to diagnose properly, a British coroner said Monday.
Coroner Emma Carlyon said staff did not realize the severity of the condition afflicting Sophie Waller, who died in December 2005. Carlyon said this prevented the girl “from receiving the medical support that could have prevented her death.”
Witnesses at the inquest testified that Sophie had an extreme phobia of dentists and refused to eat, sleep or drink after her baby teeth became loose. Medical staff ultimately decided to pull out all her baby teeth under general anesthetic in November 2005.
She was sent home a few days later but would not eat and died three weeks after the operation.
Her parents said they contacted doctors and a psychologist but no one saw Sophie in person before she died.
The Royal Cornwall Hospital in Truro, 250 miles (400 kilometers) southwest of London, acknowledged there had been failures in Sophie’s care, and said it had made changes.
A coroner’s inquest is required in Britain to establish the facts when someone dies unexpectedly, violently or of unknown causes, but has no power to punish anyone.
Carlyon gave a narrative verdict, in which a coroner simply outlines the circumstances that led to the death or deaths.
She said the immediate cause of Sophie’s death was kidney failure due to dehydration and starvation.
Copyright 2009 The Associated Press.
Don’t just talk to your toddler — gesture, too.
Date: 2/13/2009
By LAURAN NEERGAARD
AP Medical Writer
WASHINGTON (AP) — Don’t just talk to your toddler — gesture, too. Pointing, waving bye-bye and other natural gestures seem to boost a budding vocabulary.
Scientists found those tots who could convey more meaning with gestures at age 14 months went on to have a richer vocabulary as they prepared to start kindergarten. And intriguingly, whether a family is poor or middle class plays a role, the researchers report Friday.
Anyone who’s ever watched a tot perform the arms-raised “pick me up now” demand knows that youngsters figure out how to communicate well before they can talk. Gesturing also seems to be an important precursor to forming sentences, as children start combining one word plus a gesture for a second word.
University of Chicago researchers wondered if gesturing also played a role in a serious problem: Children from low-income families start school with smaller vocabularies than their better-off classmates. It’s a gap that tends to persist as the students age. In fact, kindergarten vocabulary is a predictor of how well youngsters ultimately fare in school.
One big key to a child’s vocabulary is how their parents talked to them from babyhood on. Previous research has shown that higher-income, better-educated parents tend to talk and read more to small children, and to use more varied vocabulary and complex syntax.
Do those parents also gesture more as they talk with and teach their children?
To see, university psychology researchers Susan Goldin-Meadow and Meredith Rowe visited the homes of 50 Chicago-area families of varying socioeconomic status who had 14-month-olds. They videotaped for 90 minutes to count both parents’ and children’s words and gestures. Quantity aside, they also counted whether children made gestures with specific meanings.
This is not baby sign-language; parents weren’t formally training their tots. Instead, they used everyday gestures to point something out or illustrate a concept. A child points to a dog and mom says, “Yes, that’s a dog.” Or dad flaps his arms to mimic flying. Or pointing illustrates less concrete concepts like “up” or “down” or “big.”
The researchers found an income gap with gesturing even in toddlerhood, when children speak few words.
Higher-income parents did gesture more and, more importantly, their children on average produced 25 meanings in gesture during that 90-minute session, compared with an average of 13 among poorer children, they reported in the journal Science.
Then the researchers returned to test vocabulary comprehension at age 4½. The poorer children scored worse, by about 24 points. Researchers blamed mostly socioeconomic status and parents’ speech, but said gesturing contributed, too.
It’s not just that richer parents gesture more, stressed Peggy McCardle of the National Institute of Child Health and Human Development, which funded the work.
“It’s that there’s a greater variety of types of gesture that would signal different types of meaning,” McCardle said. “It sure looks like the kids are learning that and it’s given them kind of a leg-up.”
The study doesn’t prove gesturing leads to better word-learning, but it’s a strong hint. Now scientists wonder if encouraging low-income parents to gesture more could translate to toddlers who do, too, and in turn improve school readiness.
“It wouldn’t hurt to encourage parents to talk more and gesture more,” Rowe said.
Copyright 2009 The Associated Press.
By LAURAN NEERGAARD
AP Medical Writer
WASHINGTON (AP) — Don’t just talk to your toddler — gesture, too. Pointing, waving bye-bye and other natural gestures seem to boost a budding vocabulary.
Scientists found those tots who could convey more meaning with gestures at age 14 months went on to have a richer vocabulary as they prepared to start kindergarten. And intriguingly, whether a family is poor or middle class plays a role, the researchers report Friday.
Anyone who’s ever watched a tot perform the arms-raised “pick me up now” demand knows that youngsters figure out how to communicate well before they can talk. Gesturing also seems to be an important precursor to forming sentences, as children start combining one word plus a gesture for a second word.
University of Chicago researchers wondered if gesturing also played a role in a serious problem: Children from low-income families start school with smaller vocabularies than their better-off classmates. It’s a gap that tends to persist as the students age. In fact, kindergarten vocabulary is a predictor of how well youngsters ultimately fare in school.
One big key to a child’s vocabulary is how their parents talked to them from babyhood on. Previous research has shown that higher-income, better-educated parents tend to talk and read more to small children, and to use more varied vocabulary and complex syntax.
Do those parents also gesture more as they talk with and teach their children?
To see, university psychology researchers Susan Goldin-Meadow and Meredith Rowe visited the homes of 50 Chicago-area families of varying socioeconomic status who had 14-month-olds. They videotaped for 90 minutes to count both parents’ and children’s words and gestures. Quantity aside, they also counted whether children made gestures with specific meanings.
This is not baby sign-language; parents weren’t formally training their tots. Instead, they used everyday gestures to point something out or illustrate a concept. A child points to a dog and mom says, “Yes, that’s a dog.” Or dad flaps his arms to mimic flying. Or pointing illustrates less concrete concepts like “up” or “down” or “big.”
The researchers found an income gap with gesturing even in toddlerhood, when children speak few words.
Higher-income parents did gesture more and, more importantly, their children on average produced 25 meanings in gesture during that 90-minute session, compared with an average of 13 among poorer children, they reported in the journal Science.
Then the researchers returned to test vocabulary comprehension at age 4½. The poorer children scored worse, by about 24 points. Researchers blamed mostly socioeconomic status and parents’ speech, but said gesturing contributed, too.
It’s not just that richer parents gesture more, stressed Peggy McCardle of the National Institute of Child Health and Human Development, which funded the work.
“It’s that there’s a greater variety of types of gesture that would signal different types of meaning,” McCardle said. “It sure looks like the kids are learning that and it’s given them kind of a leg-up.”
The study doesn’t prove gesturing leads to better word-learning, but it’s a strong hint. Now scientists wonder if encouraging low-income parents to gesture more could translate to toddlers who do, too, and in turn improve school readiness.
“It wouldn’t hurt to encourage parents to talk more and gesture more,” Rowe said.
Copyright 2009 The Associated Press.
Medical society looking into octuplets’ conception
Date: 2/10/2009
LOS ANGELES (AP) — The American Society for Reproductive Medicine says it’s investigating whether fertility treatment guidelines were broken in the case of a Southern California woman who gave birth to octuplets last month.
The society said in a statement issued Monday that it asked Nadya Suleman and the doctor for more details about her latest pregnancy. Suleman’s six other children were conceived through in vitro procedures.
The voluntary, nonprofit organization has guidelines for the number of embryos that should be implanted to prevent multiple births. But the group can’t stop doctors from practicing.
“It seems that the guidelines may not have been followed in Ms. Suleman’s case,” Dr. R. Dale McClure, president of the American Society for Reproductive Medicine, said in a statement.
In an interview broadcast Monday on NBC’s “Today,” Suleman said she underwent in vitro fertilization at a Beverly Hills fertility clinic run by Dr. Michael Kamrava.
The birth of the octuplets has raised questions over the ethics of implanting numerous embryos in a woman who already had six children.
Without identifying the doctor, the Medical Board of California said last week it was looking into the Suleman case to see if there was a “violation of the standard of care.” The board said it has not taken any disciplinary action against Kamrava in the past.
Kamrava, 57, would not comment on the issue.
In the NBC interview, Suleman did not identify her doctor by name, but said that she went to the West Coast IVF Clinic in Beverly Hills — of which Kamrava is director — and that all 14 of her children were conceived with help from the same doctor. In 2006, Los Angeles TV station KTLA ran a story on infertility that showed Kamrava treating Suleman and discussing embryo implantation.
Suleman said she had six embryos implanted for each of her pregnancies. The octuplets were a surprise result of her last set of six embryos, she said, explaining she had expected twins at most. Two of the embryos evidently divided in the womb.
Medical ethicists have criticized the implanting of so many embryos. National guidelines put the norm at two to three embryos for a woman of Suleman’s age, except in extraordinary circumstances.
Kamrava’s clinic performed 52 in vitro procedures in 2006, according to the most recent national report compiled by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Of those, five resulted in pregnancies and two in births. One of the births were Suleman’s twins.
Kamrava’s pregnancy rate that year was one of the lowest in the country. Experts say many factors affect a clinic’s success rate including a patient’s health and types of procedures done.
The average number of embryos Kamrava transferred per procedure for women under 35 was 3.5, compared with 2.3 nationally the report said. Fertility doctors often implant more than one embryo to increase the chances that one will take hold.
Suleman’s octuplets were delivered nine weeks premature but doctors have said they appear relatively healthy.
Copyright 2009 The Associated Press.
LOS ANGELES (AP) — The American Society for Reproductive Medicine says it’s investigating whether fertility treatment guidelines were broken in the case of a Southern California woman who gave birth to octuplets last month.
The society said in a statement issued Monday that it asked Nadya Suleman and the doctor for more details about her latest pregnancy. Suleman’s six other children were conceived through in vitro procedures.
The voluntary, nonprofit organization has guidelines for the number of embryos that should be implanted to prevent multiple births. But the group can’t stop doctors from practicing.
“It seems that the guidelines may not have been followed in Ms. Suleman’s case,” Dr. R. Dale McClure, president of the American Society for Reproductive Medicine, said in a statement.
In an interview broadcast Monday on NBC’s “Today,” Suleman said she underwent in vitro fertilization at a Beverly Hills fertility clinic run by Dr. Michael Kamrava.
The birth of the octuplets has raised questions over the ethics of implanting numerous embryos in a woman who already had six children.
Without identifying the doctor, the Medical Board of California said last week it was looking into the Suleman case to see if there was a “violation of the standard of care.” The board said it has not taken any disciplinary action against Kamrava in the past.
Kamrava, 57, would not comment on the issue.
In the NBC interview, Suleman did not identify her doctor by name, but said that she went to the West Coast IVF Clinic in Beverly Hills — of which Kamrava is director — and that all 14 of her children were conceived with help from the same doctor. In 2006, Los Angeles TV station KTLA ran a story on infertility that showed Kamrava treating Suleman and discussing embryo implantation.
Suleman said she had six embryos implanted for each of her pregnancies. The octuplets were a surprise result of her last set of six embryos, she said, explaining she had expected twins at most. Two of the embryos evidently divided in the womb.
Medical ethicists have criticized the implanting of so many embryos. National guidelines put the norm at two to three embryos for a woman of Suleman’s age, except in extraordinary circumstances.
Kamrava’s clinic performed 52 in vitro procedures in 2006, according to the most recent national report compiled by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Of those, five resulted in pregnancies and two in births. One of the births were Suleman’s twins.
Kamrava’s pregnancy rate that year was one of the lowest in the country. Experts say many factors affect a clinic’s success rate including a patient’s health and types of procedures done.
The average number of embryos Kamrava transferred per procedure for women under 35 was 3.5, compared with 2.3 nationally the report said. Fertility doctors often implant more than one embryo to increase the chances that one will take hold.
Suleman’s octuplets were delivered nine weeks premature but doctors have said they appear relatively healthy.
Copyright 2009 The Associated Press.
Fla. lawsuit claims 3 kids died from hospital mold
Date: 2/4/2009
By CHRISTINE ARMARIO
Associated Press Writer
TAMPA, Fla. (AP) — The families of three pediatric cancer patients sued a Florida hospital this week, claiming their children died after contracting fungal infections from renovations being performed at the facility.
The lawsuit filed by parents against St. Joseph’s Hospital Inc. in Tampa on Tuesday claims the children were exposed to pathogenic fungi because the hospital failed to properly seal off an area under renovation.
Each of the children — ages 2, 5, and 9 — had been previously diagnosed with acute lymphoblastic leukemia, a cancer of white blood cells. Two had recently gone into remission, and a third was still battling the disease.
Attorney Steven Yerrid, who is representing the families, said they believe dust containing the fungus became airborne and invaded the patients’ rooms, “where all these children then were forced to engage in yet another battle.”
“And this one was unnecessary, and could and should have been prevented,” he said.
In a statement, the hospital said patient safety is its top priority, and that they take necessary measures to reduce infections. Those include using barriers around construction areas, filtering the air and monitoring ventilation systems.
All those measures were in place when the infections occurred, spokeswoman Lisa Patterson said. The hospital is part of the BayCare Health System, a network of not-for-profit hospitals in the Tampa Bay region.
“Cancer kills more children than any other disease,” the hospital statement read. “Sometimes, despite all the measures we have in place, all the medical expertise we provide, and all the personal care we deliver, patients do not survive.”
The lawsuit offers the following patient accounts:
Matthew J. Gliddon was first diagnosed with leukemia in 2005. After being treated with chemotherapy, he went into remission. But two and a half years later, his cancer returned. From November of 2007 through February 2008, he spent most of his time as a patient at St. Joseph’s Hospital receiving treatment.
The 5-year-old’s white blood cell count dropped very low, and he was at risk for bacterial and fungal infections.
According to the lawsuit, physicians discovered a spot on his nose, which grew and began destroying tissue. A nose biopsy later determined that he was suffering from a nasal mold infection.
As a result of the infection, Gliddon underwent surgery that removed most of his septum. Still suffering from cancer, and now in the presence of a mold infection, he was not a candidate for a bone marrow transplant. Gliddon died in April.
Around that same time, 2-year-old Kaylie Gunn-Rimes was also taken to St. Joseph’s.
She had been diagnosed with leukemia when she was less than a year old. Last January, the toddler had an allergic reaction to one of her medications and was admitted to the hospital. Though she was cancer-free at the time, she was staying in the pediatric cancer floor and developed a fungal infection in her lungs. She spent 76 days on a ventilator before dying.
The third patient was a 9-year-old girl named Sierra Kesler.
Her leukemia had been in remission, but in March 2008 she went to the hospital and physicians discovered it had returned. She was given chemotherapy and went into remission again. The lawsuit says Sierra returned to the hospital a week later with a fever and coughing. She eventually had to be intubated and died in May.
In each case, tests confirmed the presence of a pathogenic fungi.
The lawsuit says patient rooms were located right above the construction activity, where renovation work would have created a moderate to high level of dust. The air condition systems would have brought air from the outside into patient rooms, it claims.
Sometimes, the patients had to be transported right through the construction area. The parents claim the hospital failed to take common precautions, including sealing the area under construction from non-work areas.
At least one of the parents had raised concerns about the air ventilation in their child’s room, Yerrid said.
The hospital said that aside from using barriers around construction areas, it also conducts regular preventative maintenance rounds throughout the hospital; infection control, nursing, and other departments work together to provide a clean environment; and they educate families about the importance of infection control measures.
Yerrid said the parents are filing the lawsuit in hopes of helping other cancer patients. The parents themselves did not wish to speak publicly, he said. “Every precaution that needs to be taken, should be taken, from the welfare of our most vulnerable, these young weakened children,” he said.
___
BayCare Health System: http://www.baycare.org/
Copyright 2009 The Associated Press.
Summary
By CHRISTINE ARMARIO
Associated Press Writer
TAMPA, Fla. (AP) — The families of three pediatric cancer patients sued a Florida hospital this week, claiming their children died after contracting fungal infections from renovations being performed at the facility.
The lawsuit filed by parents against St. Joseph’s Hospital Inc. in Tampa on Tuesday claims the children were exposed to pathogenic fungi because the hospital failed to properly seal off an area under renovation.
Each of the children — ages 2, 5, and 9 — had been previously diagnosed with acute lymphoblastic leukemia, a cancer of white blood cells. Two had recently gone into remission, and a third was still battling the disease.
Attorney Steven Yerrid, who is representing the families, said they believe dust containing the fungus became airborne and invaded the patients’ rooms, “where all these children then were forced to engage in yet another battle.”
“And this one was unnecessary, and could and should have been prevented,” he said.
In a statement, the hospital said patient safety is its top priority, and that they take necessary measures to reduce infections. Those include using barriers around construction areas, filtering the air and monitoring ventilation systems.
All those measures were in place when the infections occurred, spokeswoman Lisa Patterson said. The hospital is part of the BayCare Health System, a network of not-for-profit hospitals in the Tampa Bay region.
“Cancer kills more children than any other disease,” the hospital statement read. “Sometimes, despite all the measures we have in place, all the medical expertise we provide, and all the personal care we deliver, patients do not survive.”
The lawsuit offers the following patient accounts:
Matthew J. Gliddon was first diagnosed with leukemia in 2005. After being treated with chemotherapy, he went into remission. But two and a half years later, his cancer returned. From November of 2007 through February 2008, he spent most of his time as a patient at St. Joseph’s Hospital receiving treatment.
The 5-year-old’s white blood cell count dropped very low, and he was at risk for bacterial and fungal infections.
According to the lawsuit, physicians discovered a spot on his nose, which grew and began destroying tissue. A nose biopsy later determined that he was suffering from a nasal mold infection.
As a result of the infection, Gliddon underwent surgery that removed most of his septum. Still suffering from cancer, and now in the presence of a mold infection, he was not a candidate for a bone marrow transplant. Gliddon died in April.
Around that same time, 2-year-old Kaylie Gunn-Rimes was also taken to St. Joseph’s.
She had been diagnosed with leukemia when she was less than a year old. Last January, the toddler had an allergic reaction to one of her medications and was admitted to the hospital. Though she was cancer-free at the time, she was staying in the pediatric cancer floor and developed a fungal infection in her lungs. She spent 76 days on a ventilator before dying.
The third patient was a 9-year-old girl named Sierra Kesler.
Her leukemia had been in remission, but in March 2008 she went to the hospital and physicians discovered it had returned. She was given chemotherapy and went into remission again. The lawsuit says Sierra returned to the hospital a week later with a fever and coughing. She eventually had to be intubated and died in May.
In each case, tests confirmed the presence of a pathogenic fungi.
The lawsuit says patient rooms were located right above the construction activity, where renovation work would have created a moderate to high level of dust. The air condition systems would have brought air from the outside into patient rooms, it claims.
Sometimes, the patients had to be transported right through the construction area. The parents claim the hospital failed to take common precautions, including sealing the area under construction from non-work areas.
At least one of the parents had raised concerns about the air ventilation in their child’s room, Yerrid said.
The hospital said that aside from using barriers around construction areas, it also conducts regular preventative maintenance rounds throughout the hospital; infection control, nursing, and other departments work together to provide a clean environment; and they educate families about the importance of infection control measures.
Yerrid said the parents are filing the lawsuit in hopes of helping other cancer patients. The parents themselves did not wish to speak publicly, he said. “Every precaution that needs to be taken, should be taken, from the welfare of our most vulnerable, these young weakened children,” he said.
___
BayCare Health System: http://www.baycare.org/
Copyright 2009 The Associated Press.
Summary
Obama hails passage of children’s health insurance
Date: 1/30/2009
WASHINGTON (AP) — The White House says President Barack Obama could sign a bill providing government-sponsored health care to roughly 4 million uninsured children as soon as next week.
Obama released a statement Friday, the day after the Senate approved the bill 66-32, calling the vote, in his words, “a down payment on my commitment to ensure that every American has access to quality, affordable health care.”
The House plans to take up the bill next week.
The measure authorizes an additional $32.8 billion over the next 4 1/2 years for the State Children’s Health Insurance Program.
White House press secretary Robert Gibbs said Friday that Obama looks forward to inviting lawmakers to a bill signing as early next week.
Copyright 2009 The Associated Press.
WASHINGTON (AP) — The White House says President Barack Obama could sign a bill providing government-sponsored health care to roughly 4 million uninsured children as soon as next week.
Obama released a statement Friday, the day after the Senate approved the bill 66-32, calling the vote, in his words, “a down payment on my commitment to ensure that every American has access to quality, affordable health care.”
The House plans to take up the bill next week.
The measure authorizes an additional $32.8 billion over the next 4 1/2 years for the State Children’s Health Insurance Program.
White House press secretary Robert Gibbs said Friday that Obama looks forward to inviting lawmakers to a bill signing as early next week.
Copyright 2009 The Associated Press.
Minn. illnesses worry CDC officials
Date: 1/23/2009
ATLANTA (AP) — Five Minnesota children have grown sick — and one of them died — from a germ that can cause meningitis, causing U.S. health officials to warn of the importance of a common childhood vaccine.
The Hib vaccine, which is given to babies, has succeeded in reducing U.S. cases of the bacterial illness to about only 20 a year in children younger than 5. But a cluster of five cases occurred in central Minnesota last year in young children. One child, who was 7 months old, died of meningitis in November.
No other states have reported such an increase. But Minnesota’s disease surveillance is unusually good, so problems in other states could be developing, said Dr. Anne Schuchat of the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
Three of the five children — including the dead child — had not received any vaccine, due to a decision by their parents. But a shortage of Hib vaccine may also have contributed, CDC officials said.
Haemophilus influenzae Serotype b (Hib) can cause meningitis, pneumonia and other dangers. Because of a Hib vaccine shortage that started in 2007, CDC officials say doctors should defer for most children a booster dose given at 12 to 15 months. But they say there’s enough for children to get necessary doses at ages 2, 4 and 6 months.
___
On the Net:
CDC information on Hib: http://www.cdc.gov/ncidod/dbmd/diseaseinfo/haeminfluserob_t.htm
Copyright 2009 The Associated Press.
ATLANTA (AP) — Five Minnesota children have grown sick — and one of them died — from a germ that can cause meningitis, causing U.S. health officials to warn of the importance of a common childhood vaccine.
The Hib vaccine, which is given to babies, has succeeded in reducing U.S. cases of the bacterial illness to about only 20 a year in children younger than 5. But a cluster of five cases occurred in central Minnesota last year in young children. One child, who was 7 months old, died of meningitis in November.
No other states have reported such an increase. But Minnesota’s disease surveillance is unusually good, so problems in other states could be developing, said Dr. Anne Schuchat of the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
Three of the five children — including the dead child — had not received any vaccine, due to a decision by their parents. But a shortage of Hib vaccine may also have contributed, CDC officials said.
Haemophilus influenzae Serotype b (Hib) can cause meningitis, pneumonia and other dangers. Because of a Hib vaccine shortage that started in 2007, CDC officials say doctors should defer for most children a booster dose given at 12 to 15 months. But they say there’s enough for children to get necessary doses at ages 2, 4 and 6 months.
___
On the Net:
CDC information on Hib: http://www.cdc.gov/ncidod/dbmd/diseaseinfo/haeminfluserob_t.htm
Copyright 2009 The Associated Press.
Texas girl gets new heart; sis awaiting transplant
Date: 1/20/2009
By JAMIE STENGLE
Associated Press Writer
DALLAS (AP) — A 7-year-old girl received a new heart Monday, more than eight months after she and her older sister were put on the transplant list because of the same rare ailment.
Their mother said Shayde Smith is relieved now that her sister Emily has received a transplant. “She’s still nervous about it, but she said that now that Emily’s made it through, she knows she will,” Natalie Van Noy said.
The girls have restrictive cardiomyopathy, which means the heart doesn’t relax between pumps and doesn’t fill properly with blood. The condition can cause blood clots or death.
Emily was a higher priority for transplant than 9-year-old Shayde because she had more symptoms, including wheezing spells and her lips, toes and fingertips turning blue when she got cold.
Van Noy said Emily’s hands and feet are now warm. “She looks awesome,” her mother said.
The girls’ condition is rare, with less than one-in-a-million children diagnosed, said Dr. Kristine Guleserian, the pediatric cardiothoracic surgeon who led the team operating on Emily at Children’s Medical Center Dallas. Without a transplant, the chance of survival is 40 to 50 percent one to two years after diagnosis.
Restrictive cardiomyopathy doesn’t have a known cause. It seems to run in families, but the condition hasn’t yet been proven to be genetic.
While it isn’t rare for siblings to need transplants, it is rare that they would need them at the same time, said Pam Silvestri, a spokeswoman for Southwest Transplant Alliance, one of the organ donation agencies across the country that provides organs to transplant hospitals.
The girls are from the Boyd area, about 30 miles northwest of Fort Worth.
___
Children’s Medical Center Dallas: www.childrens.com
Donate Life America: www.donatelife.net
Copyright 2009 The Associated Press.
By JAMIE STENGLE
Associated Press Writer
DALLAS (AP) — A 7-year-old girl received a new heart Monday, more than eight months after she and her older sister were put on the transplant list because of the same rare ailment.
Their mother said Shayde Smith is relieved now that her sister Emily has received a transplant. “She’s still nervous about it, but she said that now that Emily’s made it through, she knows she will,” Natalie Van Noy said.
The girls have restrictive cardiomyopathy, which means the heart doesn’t relax between pumps and doesn’t fill properly with blood. The condition can cause blood clots or death.
Emily was a higher priority for transplant than 9-year-old Shayde because she had more symptoms, including wheezing spells and her lips, toes and fingertips turning blue when she got cold.
Van Noy said Emily’s hands and feet are now warm. “She looks awesome,” her mother said.
The girls’ condition is rare, with less than one-in-a-million children diagnosed, said Dr. Kristine Guleserian, the pediatric cardiothoracic surgeon who led the team operating on Emily at Children’s Medical Center Dallas. Without a transplant, the chance of survival is 40 to 50 percent one to two years after diagnosis.
Restrictive cardiomyopathy doesn’t have a known cause. It seems to run in families, but the condition hasn’t yet been proven to be genetic.
While it isn’t rare for siblings to need transplants, it is rare that they would need them at the same time, said Pam Silvestri, a spokeswoman for Southwest Transplant Alliance, one of the organ donation agencies across the country that provides organs to transplant hospitals.
The girls are from the Boyd area, about 30 miles northwest of Fort Worth.
___
Children’s Medical Center Dallas: www.childrens.com
Donate Life America: www.donatelife.net
Copyright 2009 The Associated Press.
MRSA rising in kids’ ear, nose, throat infections
Date: 1/19/2009
By LINDSEY TANNER
AP Medical Writer
CHICAGO (AP) — Researchers say they found an “alarming” increase in children’s ear, nose and throat infections nationwide caused by dangerous drug-resistant staph germs.
Other studies have shown rising numbers of skin infections in adults and children caused by these germs, nicknamed MRSA, but this is the first nationwide report on how common they are in deeper tissue infections in the head and neck, the study authors said. These include certain ear and sinus infections, and abcesses that can form in the tonsils and throat.
The study found a total of 21,009 pediatric head and neck infections caused by staph germs from 2001 through 2006. The percentage caused by hard-to-treat MRSA bacteria more than doubled during that time from almost 12 percent to 28 percent.
“In most parts of the United States, there’s been an alarming rise,” said study author Dr. Steven Sobol, a children’s head and neck specialist at Emory University.
The study appears in January’s Archives of Otolaryngology, released Monday.
It is based on nationally representative information from an electronic database that collects lab results from more than 300 hospitals nationwide.
MRSA, or methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus, can cause dangerous, life-threatening invasive infections and doctors believe inappropriate use of antibiotics has contributed to its rise.
The study didn’t look at the severity of MRSA illness in affected children.
Almost 60 percent of the MRSA infections found in the study were thought to have been contracted outside a hospital setting.
Dr. Robert Daum, a University of Chicago expert in community-acquired MRSA, said the study should serve as an alert to agencies that fund U.S. research “that this is a major public health problem.”
MRSA involvement in adult head and neck infections has been reported although data on prevalence is scarce.
MRSA infections were once limited mostly to hospitals, nursing homes and other health-care settings but other studies have shown they are increasingly picked up in the community, in otherwise healthy people. This can happen through direct skin-to-skin contact or contact with surfaces contaminated with germs from cuts and other open wounds.
But staph germs also normally live or “colonize” on the skin and in other tissues including inside the nose and throat, without causing symptoms. And other studies have shown that for poorly understood reasons, the number of people who carry MRSA germs is also on the rise.
Sobol said MRSA head and neck infections most likely develop in MRSA carriers, who become susceptible because of ear, nose or throat infections caused by some other bug. Symptoms that it could be MRSA include ear infections that drain pus, or swollen neck lymph nodes caused by pus draining from a throat or nose abcess.
Unlike cold and flu bugs, MRSA germs aren’t airborne and don’t spread through sneezing.
MRSA does not respond to penicillin-based antibiotics and doctors are concerned that it is becoming resistant to others.
The study authors said a worrisome 46 percent of MRSA infections studied were resistant to the antibiotic clindamycin, one of the non-penicillin drugs doctors often rely on to treat community-acquired MRSA. However, other doctors said it’s more likely that at least some of infections thought to be community-acquired had actually originated in a hospital or other health-care setting, where MRSA resistance to clindamycin is common.
Dr. Buddy Creech, an infectious disease specialist at Vanderbilt University Medical Center, said the research “fits nicely” with smaller studies reporting local increases in MRSA head and neck infections.
“Every time someone looks, the rates of MRSA are going up and that’s certainly concerning because it’s a bug that can cause dramatic disease,” Creech said.
___
On the Net:
Archives: http://www.archoto.com
CDC: http://www.cdc.gov/ncidod/dhqp/ar_mrsa.html
Copyright 2009 The Associated Press.
By LINDSEY TANNER
AP Medical Writer
CHICAGO (AP) — Researchers say they found an “alarming” increase in children’s ear, nose and throat infections nationwide caused by dangerous drug-resistant staph germs.
Other studies have shown rising numbers of skin infections in adults and children caused by these germs, nicknamed MRSA, but this is the first nationwide report on how common they are in deeper tissue infections in the head and neck, the study authors said. These include certain ear and sinus infections, and abcesses that can form in the tonsils and throat.
The study found a total of 21,009 pediatric head and neck infections caused by staph germs from 2001 through 2006. The percentage caused by hard-to-treat MRSA bacteria more than doubled during that time from almost 12 percent to 28 percent.
“In most parts of the United States, there’s been an alarming rise,” said study author Dr. Steven Sobol, a children’s head and neck specialist at Emory University.
The study appears in January’s Archives of Otolaryngology, released Monday.
It is based on nationally representative information from an electronic database that collects lab results from more than 300 hospitals nationwide.
MRSA, or methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus, can cause dangerous, life-threatening invasive infections and doctors believe inappropriate use of antibiotics has contributed to its rise.
The study didn’t look at the severity of MRSA illness in affected children.
Almost 60 percent of the MRSA infections found in the study were thought to have been contracted outside a hospital setting.
Dr. Robert Daum, a University of Chicago expert in community-acquired MRSA, said the study should serve as an alert to agencies that fund U.S. research “that this is a major public health problem.”
MRSA involvement in adult head and neck infections has been reported although data on prevalence is scarce.
MRSA infections were once limited mostly to hospitals, nursing homes and other health-care settings but other studies have shown they are increasingly picked up in the community, in otherwise healthy people. This can happen through direct skin-to-skin contact or contact with surfaces contaminated with germs from cuts and other open wounds.
But staph germs also normally live or “colonize” on the skin and in other tissues including inside the nose and throat, without causing symptoms. And other studies have shown that for poorly understood reasons, the number of people who carry MRSA germs is also on the rise.
Sobol said MRSA head and neck infections most likely develop in MRSA carriers, who become susceptible because of ear, nose or throat infections caused by some other bug. Symptoms that it could be MRSA include ear infections that drain pus, or swollen neck lymph nodes caused by pus draining from a throat or nose abcess.
Unlike cold and flu bugs, MRSA germs aren’t airborne and don’t spread through sneezing.
MRSA does not respond to penicillin-based antibiotics and doctors are concerned that it is becoming resistant to others.
The study authors said a worrisome 46 percent of MRSA infections studied were resistant to the antibiotic clindamycin, one of the non-penicillin drugs doctors often rely on to treat community-acquired MRSA. However, other doctors said it’s more likely that at least some of infections thought to be community-acquired had actually originated in a hospital or other health-care setting, where MRSA resistance to clindamycin is common.
Dr. Buddy Creech, an infectious disease specialist at Vanderbilt University Medical Center, said the research “fits nicely” with smaller studies reporting local increases in MRSA head and neck infections.
“Every time someone looks, the rates of MRSA are going up and that’s certainly concerning because it’s a bug that can cause dramatic disease,” Creech said.
___
On the Net:
Archives: http://www.archoto.com
CDC: http://www.cdc.gov/ncidod/dhqp/ar_mrsa.html
Copyright 2009 The Associated Press.
Caution: Students soaring ahead
Date: 1/18/2009
By DORIE TURNER
Associated Press Writer
ATLANTA (AP) — The seventh-grade students are playing a round-robin trivia game, excitedly naming the countries on a blank map showing on their classroom’s overhead projector. Burkina Faso. Cote d’Ivoire.
Justyn McGowan does a dance each time he gets an answer right and remains standing as one-by-one his classmates sit down, disappointed.
Ghana. Togo. Benin.
Faster and faster, the teacher goes around the room until it’s just Justyn and another boy.
The tallest mountain in Africa? Mount Kilimanjaro. The tallest mountain range in South America? The Andes.
And then it’s over. Justyn doesn’t win the game but he’s still smiling, showing off the deep dimples in his cheeks. His 25 classmates erupt into cheers, applauding both students.
This is how it works at the extraordinary Ron Clark Academy, a private middle school tucked among boarded-up houses and graffiti-peppered walls in Lakewood, one of Atlanta’s poorest neighborhoods.
Ron Clark isn’t just the name behind the school — he teaches mathematics and global politics, plays basketball and spends many evenings on the phone with boys and girls who need help with homework.
Going over a test, the lanky 37-year-old quickly covers members of the U.S. Supreme Court and the presidential line of succession. Amid the questions, Clark utters the magic words that send his students into musical overdrive.
“It’s easy,” he says.
“It’s so easy, easy,” the students sing in unison, swaying their hands back and forth, ending with a “Bom, bom.”
These children know a collection of songs written by Clark, ditties that help them remember everything from algebra to political platforms. He wrote many of them while teaching in New York City schools, a unique strategy that helped him win the Disney American Teacher of the Year title in 2000 and inspired a TNT movie, “The Ron Clark Story.”
Seventh-grader Ajee Jenkins says music helps her connect with what she’s learning in a way she’s never experienced.
Indeed, music has made the children overnight stars. Last fall they scored millions of views of their YouTube video featuring an infectious election rap called “Vote However U Like,” which led to Justyn and his classmates performing on “Good Morning America,” CNN and BET.
Each appearance, the children discussed political platforms for Republicans and Democrats, talking about capital gains taxes and the war in Iraq with the composure and maturity of grown-ups.
They’ve written a follow-up song called “Dear Obama” that some students will perform at the inaugural celebration for the new president.
On the way to class each morning, Justyn passes a sign in the lobby at the foot of a blue plastic slide that curls from the second floor down to the first.
“Caution: People flying!” it warns.
It’s not merely a warning that students might come shooting out the mouth of the slide. The sign is the unspoken mantra in the halls of this unique school, where students say “yes, ma’am” and “no, sir” and look you in the eye while giving a firm handshake.
They wear their uniforms with pride: khaki pants, light blue shirts and navy blue blazers — girls have the option of wearing skirts. Their navy blue ties are trimmed with the colors and crests reflecting which of the four houses they belong to: Isibindi (Zulu for “courage”), Reveur (French for “dreamer”), Amistad (Spanish for “friendship”) or Altruismo (Portuguese for “altruism”).
From fundamental discipline to essential courtesy, these children are learning what it takes to succeed, and they’re soaring.
“I don’t care if you have a problem with your parents, your brother, your cousin. I don’t care if things are tough at home,” says Clark, a white man looking at a sea of black faces in his global politics class. “You have no excuse. You have got to find a way to rise above that and be successful.”
Debate is a key to what the students learn here, and it spills over into their personal conversations.
At lunch, Justyn and his friend Willie Thornton are deep in a discussion over which kind of pilot is more important to his country. Justyn dreams of flying for a commercial airline, Willie wants to be an Air Force fighter pilot. The 12-year-olds volley back and forth like seasoned politicians on the stump.
“People are depending on us to take them from one country to another country. They need us,” Justyn says.
“We have missiles, we have guns, but all Boeings have are peanuts and crackers,” Willie retorts.
Just one day at Ron Clark Academy reveals how these boys and girls from mostly working-class families in Atlanta are changing perceptions — and beating the odds. They come from some of the city’s toughest neighborhoods. They could be joining gangs, failing out of school. They could easily become tragic statistics.
Instead, the 80 students who attend this academy in a renovated 100-year-old warehouse have gotten a chance at something most urban students can only dream about. They are attending a private school carrying a price tag of $14,000 a year per student, a bill paid almost entirely by donors.
Oprah Winfrey’s foundation sent the school a $365,000 check for Christmas, a gift that can pay for 26 students to attend the academy for a year. She calls Clark a role model and applauds the “profound difference you’re making with your passion for teaching.”
The children each have their own donated Dell laptop and sit in classrooms decorated with colorful mosaics painted by Atlanta graffiti artist Totem. Instead of chalkboards, teachers use interactive projection screens that respond to touch like an iPhone.
The bathrooms feature flat screen TVs broadcasting CNN, a strategy Clark says keeps students preoccupied in the place where most school fights break out. They take trips abroad thanks to Delta Air Lines, traveling to countries most of their parents couldn’t afford to take them — the Netherlands, England, France and Australia. It’s part of the school’s curriculum to escort students to six of the seven continents by the time they finish the eighth grade.
“We’re not just teaching math and reading for a test. We’re teaching life,” says Clark. “We want kids to have appreciation of other countries and religions.”
Many days, teachers from school districts across the globe visit the academy, observing classes and learning techniques to take back to their schools. About 3,000 teachers visit each year, a way for Clark to reach beyond the students he teaches.
The school was founded on one basic principle — any child can learn. Clark was tired of the excuses he was hearing for children he taught in his home state of North Carolina and in a Harlem public school.
They’re too unruly. They have a hard home life. They’re a lost cause.
He created a set of rules called “The Essential 55,” which became the title of his best-selling book, aimed at creating a structure that promotes a mix of creativity and discipline. He teaches classes with animation, doing impressions of presidents Richard Nixon and John F. Kennedy.
He marches around on the desktops, crouching down to make eye contact with each child as he lectures on Supreme Court cases and sings about algebraic equations. Students must sit up straight, pay close attention and answer “yes, sir” or they could face detention.
“If there’s no structure, you end up with chaos. That’s how creativity gets a bad name,” said Kim Bearden, an English teacher who co-founded the school with Clark in 2007. “We teach them how to have organized creativity.”
For students like Justyn, who lives with his mother, her boyfriend and his 6-year-old half-sister, Taylor, in a Habitat for Humanity house not far from a federal prison, the school is a lifeli ne. He likes school now, has fewer discipline problems and is more respectful, his mother, Shaewana Johnson, said.
He likes to wear his glasses in class, something that might have gotten him picked on at his old school. He doesn’t talk back to adults. He stopped mentioning wanting to be a basketball player when he grows up, shifting his focus to becoming an airline pilot so he can see more of the world.
“He would have fallen into that peer pressure trap. I can’t afford to supply him with the shoes these students have,” said Johnson, 32, who works full-time at a daycare center and takes college classes in hopes of becoming a school counselor. “He would try to fit in and he would be an angry child.”
Justyn has a daily checklist he must complete, with tasks for the morning and evening.
Wash face. Brush hair. Iron clothes. Put book bag by door. Make up bed. Organize desk.
School is his magnet now, a place where students aren’t allowed to tease each other.
“I want to get up in the morning and go,” he said as he stood in his bedroom, which was recently redecorated courtesy of Delta after he won a school essay contest. “It’s just something in me. I want to go to school.”
In each classroom, around every corner, along the corridors countless surprises emerge.
Life-sized cardboard cutouts of the students hang from windows, hover over door frames and smile down from the upper balcony. Walls are decorated with brightly colored graffiti murals of city skylines, football games and the Seven Wonders of the World.
In the student garden, they’re helping to grow carrots, potatoes and spinach for the school cafeteria. The stairwell is lined with coins from every country in the world — among them the Japanese yen and Italian lira (now defunct).
One classroom is dedicated to The Gauntlet, an academic obstacle course where children are tested on what they learn during the year. Students run from station to station, only moving on once they’ve answered the math problem or geography trivia question correctly.
Classrooms burst with song, drumming and dancing. Cheers of students applauding each other’s correct answers echo in the hallways.
“We teach them how to represent themselves in society, how to be articulate,” Clark said. “We still are struggling with prejudices in our country. I never want to give anyone an opportunity to deny my students a chance because they don’t know how to present themselves or act in a certain situation. We’re taking away excuses from people.”
The 2-year-old school serves fifth- through eighth-graders, though the first class of eighth-graders won’t start until next year. Once the children graduate, Clark and Bearden hope to get them into some of Atlanta’s private high schools.
In math class, Justyn’s worst subject, he is using Life Savers, mints and licorice to graph out the concepts of greater than, less than and equal to. He gets the first few wrong but doesn’t give up.
“I’m gonna get this one,” he says under his breath, determination in his eyes.
He does, and the dimples sink even deeper into his cheeks as a grin lights up his face. The next problem proves even tougher than the last, and just when hope seems lost, his buddy Jalen Tyler pipes up.
“You got it, Justyn!”
Even the crowd at the football game painted on the classroom walls seems to cheer him on.
Copyright 2009 The Associated Press.
By DORIE TURNER
Associated Press Writer
ATLANTA (AP) — The seventh-grade students are playing a round-robin trivia game, excitedly naming the countries on a blank map showing on their classroom’s overhead projector. Burkina Faso. Cote d’Ivoire.
Justyn McGowan does a dance each time he gets an answer right and remains standing as one-by-one his classmates sit down, disappointed.
Ghana. Togo. Benin.
Faster and faster, the teacher goes around the room until it’s just Justyn and another boy.
The tallest mountain in Africa? Mount Kilimanjaro. The tallest mountain range in South America? The Andes.
And then it’s over. Justyn doesn’t win the game but he’s still smiling, showing off the deep dimples in his cheeks. His 25 classmates erupt into cheers, applauding both students.
This is how it works at the extraordinary Ron Clark Academy, a private middle school tucked among boarded-up houses and graffiti-peppered walls in Lakewood, one of Atlanta’s poorest neighborhoods.
Ron Clark isn’t just the name behind the school — he teaches mathematics and global politics, plays basketball and spends many evenings on the phone with boys and girls who need help with homework.
Going over a test, the lanky 37-year-old quickly covers members of the U.S. Supreme Court and the presidential line of succession. Amid the questions, Clark utters the magic words that send his students into musical overdrive.
“It’s easy,” he says.
“It’s so easy, easy,” the students sing in unison, swaying their hands back and forth, ending with a “Bom, bom.”
These children know a collection of songs written by Clark, ditties that help them remember everything from algebra to political platforms. He wrote many of them while teaching in New York City schools, a unique strategy that helped him win the Disney American Teacher of the Year title in 2000 and inspired a TNT movie, “The Ron Clark Story.”
Seventh-grader Ajee Jenkins says music helps her connect with what she’s learning in a way she’s never experienced.
Indeed, music has made the children overnight stars. Last fall they scored millions of views of their YouTube video featuring an infectious election rap called “Vote However U Like,” which led to Justyn and his classmates performing on “Good Morning America,” CNN and BET.
Each appearance, the children discussed political platforms for Republicans and Democrats, talking about capital gains taxes and the war in Iraq with the composure and maturity of grown-ups.
They’ve written a follow-up song called “Dear Obama” that some students will perform at the inaugural celebration for the new president.
On the way to class each morning, Justyn passes a sign in the lobby at the foot of a blue plastic slide that curls from the second floor down to the first.
“Caution: People flying!” it warns.
It’s not merely a warning that students might come shooting out the mouth of the slide. The sign is the unspoken mantra in the halls of this unique school, where students say “yes, ma’am” and “no, sir” and look you in the eye while giving a firm handshake.
They wear their uniforms with pride: khaki pants, light blue shirts and navy blue blazers — girls have the option of wearing skirts. Their navy blue ties are trimmed with the colors and crests reflecting which of the four houses they belong to: Isibindi (Zulu for “courage”), Reveur (French for “dreamer”), Amistad (Spanish for “friendship”) or Altruismo (Portuguese for “altruism”).
From fundamental discipline to essential courtesy, these children are learning what it takes to succeed, and they’re soaring.
“I don’t care if you have a problem with your parents, your brother, your cousin. I don’t care if things are tough at home,” says Clark, a white man looking at a sea of black faces in his global politics class. “You have no excuse. You have got to find a way to rise above that and be successful.”
Debate is a key to what the students learn here, and it spills over into their personal conversations.
At lunch, Justyn and his friend Willie Thornton are deep in a discussion over which kind of pilot is more important to his country. Justyn dreams of flying for a commercial airline, Willie wants to be an Air Force fighter pilot. The 12-year-olds volley back and forth like seasoned politicians on the stump.
“People are depending on us to take them from one country to another country. They need us,” Justyn says.
“We have missiles, we have guns, but all Boeings have are peanuts and crackers,” Willie retorts.
Just one day at Ron Clark Academy reveals how these boys and girls from mostly working-class families in Atlanta are changing perceptions — and beating the odds. They come from some of the city’s toughest neighborhoods. They could be joining gangs, failing out of school. They could easily become tragic statistics.
Instead, the 80 students who attend this academy in a renovated 100-year-old warehouse have gotten a chance at something most urban students can only dream about. They are attending a private school carrying a price tag of $14,000 a year per student, a bill paid almost entirely by donors.
Oprah Winfrey’s foundation sent the school a $365,000 check for Christmas, a gift that can pay for 26 students to attend the academy for a year. She calls Clark a role model and applauds the “profound difference you’re making with your passion for teaching.”
The children each have their own donated Dell laptop and sit in classrooms decorated with colorful mosaics painted by Atlanta graffiti artist Totem. Instead of chalkboards, teachers use interactive projection screens that respond to touch like an iPhone.
The bathrooms feature flat screen TVs broadcasting CNN, a strategy Clark says keeps students preoccupied in the place where most school fights break out. They take trips abroad thanks to Delta Air Lines, traveling to countries most of their parents couldn’t afford to take them — the Netherlands, England, France and Australia. It’s part of the school’s curriculum to escort students to six of the seven continents by the time they finish the eighth grade.
“We’re not just teaching math and reading for a test. We’re teaching life,” says Clark. “We want kids to have appreciation of other countries and religions.”
Many days, teachers from school districts across the globe visit the academy, observing classes and learning techniques to take back to their schools. About 3,000 teachers visit each year, a way for Clark to reach beyond the students he teaches.
The school was founded on one basic principle — any child can learn. Clark was tired of the excuses he was hearing for children he taught in his home state of North Carolina and in a Harlem public school.
They’re too unruly. They have a hard home life. They’re a lost cause.
He created a set of rules called “The Essential 55,” which became the title of his best-selling book, aimed at creating a structure that promotes a mix of creativity and discipline. He teaches classes with animation, doing impressions of presidents Richard Nixon and John F. Kennedy.
He marches around on the desktops, crouching down to make eye contact with each child as he lectures on Supreme Court cases and sings about algebraic equations. Students must sit up straight, pay close attention and answer “yes, sir” or they could face detention.
“If there’s no structure, you end up with chaos. That’s how creativity gets a bad name,” said Kim Bearden, an English teacher who co-founded the school with Clark in 2007. “We teach them how to have organized creativity.”
For students like Justyn, who lives with his mother, her boyfriend and his 6-year-old half-sister, Taylor, in a Habitat for Humanity house not far from a federal prison, the school is a lifeli ne. He likes school now, has fewer discipline problems and is more respectful, his mother, Shaewana Johnson, said.
He likes to wear his glasses in class, something that might have gotten him picked on at his old school. He doesn’t talk back to adults. He stopped mentioning wanting to be a basketball player when he grows up, shifting his focus to becoming an airline pilot so he can see more of the world.
“He would have fallen into that peer pressure trap. I can’t afford to supply him with the shoes these students have,” said Johnson, 32, who works full-time at a daycare center and takes college classes in hopes of becoming a school counselor. “He would try to fit in and he would be an angry child.”
Justyn has a daily checklist he must complete, with tasks for the morning and evening.
Wash face. Brush hair. Iron clothes. Put book bag by door. Make up bed. Organize desk.
School is his magnet now, a place where students aren’t allowed to tease each other.
“I want to get up in the morning and go,” he said as he stood in his bedroom, which was recently redecorated courtesy of Delta after he won a school essay contest. “It’s just something in me. I want to go to school.”
In each classroom, around every corner, along the corridors countless surprises emerge.
Life-sized cardboard cutouts of the students hang from windows, hover over door frames and smile down from the upper balcony. Walls are decorated with brightly colored graffiti murals of city skylines, football games and the Seven Wonders of the World.
In the student garden, they’re helping to grow carrots, potatoes and spinach for the school cafeteria. The stairwell is lined with coins from every country in the world — among them the Japanese yen and Italian lira (now defunct).
One classroom is dedicated to The Gauntlet, an academic obstacle course where children are tested on what they learn during the year. Students run from station to station, only moving on once they’ve answered the math problem or geography trivia question correctly.
Classrooms burst with song, drumming and dancing. Cheers of students applauding each other’s correct answers echo in the hallways.
“We teach them how to represent themselves in society, how to be articulate,” Clark said. “We still are struggling with prejudices in our country. I never want to give anyone an opportunity to deny my students a chance because they don’t know how to present themselves or act in a certain situation. We’re taking away excuses from people.”
The 2-year-old school serves fifth- through eighth-graders, though the first class of eighth-graders won’t start until next year. Once the children graduate, Clark and Bearden hope to get them into some of Atlanta’s private high schools.
In math class, Justyn’s worst subject, he is using Life Savers, mints and licorice to graph out the concepts of greater than, less than and equal to. He gets the first few wrong but doesn’t give up.
“I’m gonna get this one,” he says under his breath, determination in his eyes.
He does, and the dimples sink even deeper into his cheeks as a grin lights up his face. The next problem proves even tougher than the last, and just when hope seems lost, his buddy Jalen Tyler pipes up.
“You got it, Justyn!”
Even the crowd at the football game painted on the classroom walls seems to cheer him on.
Copyright 2009 The Associated Press.
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