SoCal education choices: a look at home schools, a WGA study explores how women and minority scribes have been faring, how Batman has impacted nerd culture.
SoCal Pakistanis plan vigil after deadly park bombing in Lahore
Families in Pakistan are in mourning today, after the death toll from a Sunday bombing has risen.
The suicide attack at a popular park in Lahore killed at least 70 people and injured hundreds more, according to government officials. An offshoot of the Pakistani Taliban claimed responsibility for the attack.
People here in Southern California with ties to the area have been sharing information and planning a vigil.
For more, we're joined by Amjad Mahmood Khan, he's an adjunct law professor at UCLA and public affairs director with the Ahmadiyya Muslim Community USA.
Sanders sweeps weekend caucuses: So what's next?
It was a busy weekend for presidential politics.
Democrat Bernie Sanders racked up high-margin victories in three states Saturday. Alaska, Hawaii and Washington State have helped Sanders cut Hillary Clinton's pledged-delegate lead by 20%.
Sanders has clinched the last six out of seven contests, and his campaign hopes the momentum will continue into Wisconsin — the birthplace of the progressive movement.
For more on the state of the Sanders campaign, Take Two spoke to Thad Kousser, professor of political science at UC San Diego.
Press the blue play button above to hear the interview.
Writers' rooms are more diverse than ever, but have a long way to go, study says
A new report from the Writer's Guild of America explores how women and minority screenwriters have been faring recently, and the results are mixed, to say the least.
Take Two explored the report with study author Darnell Hunt and professional writer Janis Hirsch.
Press the blue play button above to hear the interview.
7 things to know about homeschooling in California
There are lots of different types of schools parents can choose from in Southern California, but for some families, none of the options really fit. That's why some turn to homeschooling.
Pam Sorooshian, a member of the Board of Directors of the HomeSchool Association of California, joined Take Two to answer some frequently asked questions about homeschooling:
1. When did the homeschooling movement start to take off and why?
Probably it can be traced back to the early 1980s with John Holt, who was a school reformer and then sort of gave up on reforming schools and turned to writing about parents taking their children out of school altogether. His concern was that we've basically overdone it when it comes to instruction. That it's one thing to put a bunch of kids together and sort of help them learn for a few hours a day, but it's another thing to keep them in school all day. The idea is that there's no reason to do that, that kids are natural learners and that they're better off in home environments rather than being in a classroom and forced to all march along to the same curriculum timing.
2. How many different homeschool options are there in California?
We have five different legal ways to homeschool in California, none of which are actually called homeschooling, so it can be kind of confusing. You can establish your own private school, you can join a charter homeschool program, school districts have homeschool programs where they support homeschooling, there are hybrid programs, there are private schools that support homeschool programs or have hybrid programs.
The learning set-up really varies too. There are co-ops where parents take turns offering lessons to each other's kids and there's a lot of collaboration among homeschoolers.
3. What's the curriculum like? Do some mirror the public school curriculum?
Every family and every child combination is going to homeschool in their own way. There are probably a lot of people, mostly those just starting out homeschooling, who mirror the public school program. But "natural learning" is something that most homeschoolers turn to after they've been home with their kids for a while. That means, for example, going out into nature or to a science museum to learn about science rather than the really conventional read the text book, answer the questions, take a test type of approach to learning.
4. How many kids are homeschooled in California?
It's hard to say, but it's probably about 1.5 to 2 percent of the school-age population.
5. What sort of regulations are there? Is there a guarantee that a child who is homeschooled will be as well educated as a child who goes through the traditional schooling system?
There's just about as much guarantee as there is in public schools. There's no more or less guarantee. When it comes to regulations, many homeschoolers go through home-based charter schools and they have all the exact same requirements as a regular public school. They have standardized testing, they have a teacher that's overseeing them. If they're enrolled in a private school, they have the same regulations as any other California private school, which is essentially none. Once you've established your own private school, you don't really have to report to anybody. There are requirements, you're supposed to cover the general branches of study that are required to be offered in regular public schools (English, Math, Science, History, P.E., Fine Arts), but there's nobody looking over your shoulder and there are no testing requirements of any kind.
6. What should parents consider if they're considering homeschooling but are concerned about going it alone?
One of the things they can do is join a Private School Satellite Program (or PSP), these are private schools that support homeschooling, and so you have private school administration who help you find curriculum, help you find the support you might need when you're just getting started. They can also join a charter school homeschool program. They're going to provide you with the curriculum and you can meet with the teachers as often as you need to and get the guidance that you need. But the independent homeschoolers are also going to find a lot of support from organizations like the HomeSchool Association of California, other groups and online support groups.
7. What makes homeschooling a good option for families?
What makes a good homeschooling parent is a sense of curiosity, enjoying learning, and really enjoying being with your kids. If you're wishing that you could be a bigger part of your child's learning, then homeschooling might be a really good option.
Series: Good Schools
As part of its Good Schools series, Take Two looks at the education landscape in the Los Angeles area. That includes its public schools, magnets, charters, private institutions and dual-language programs. You’ll hear from parents, academics, teachers, kids and even a couple of TV show producers.
Read more in this series and let us know your thoughts on Facebook, or tweet us
and
with the hashtag #goodschools.
CA NAACP Chair: Marijuana is a civil rights issue
There's another big push to legalize recreational pot during California's November ballot.
If it passes, the state could join the likes of Colorado enjoying the GREEN rush - the economic boom around the sale of weed.
But not everyone is reaping the benefits. A recent Buzzfeed investigation found just one percent of black marijuana entrepreneurs in the U.S. are black.
This is in stark contrast to the high number of African Americans imprisoned for pot-related offenses.
Alice Huffman, Chair of the California NAACP tells Take Two's A. Martinez that this means people of color are being locked out of the financial riches weed can bring.
Thanks to recent storms, CA's largest reservoir is filling up
California's largest reservoir is filling up so fast, water managers actually had to allow some of it to run downstream.
For more on this, Take Two's Alex Cohen talks to Maury Roose, Chief hydrologist at the California Department of Water Resources.
What's next for CA to lift minimum wage to $15 an hour
California lawmakers may have a deal to gradually raise the minimum wage to $15 an hour in the coming years.
If it goes through, California would have the highest statewide minimum wage in the nation. And other states are considering similar moves.
For more, we're joined by David Siders of the Sacramento Bee.
Batman's nerdy crusade: From the Batusi to Kevlar suits
Over the weekend, Batman made his first big screen appearance since 2012's The Dark Knight Rises. Christopher Nolan's Dark Knight trilogy reinvented the caped crusader as a dark and gritty shadow of the night. This portrayal of the beloved comic book character gained approval from both comic book aficionados and casual fans equally.
In Batman v. Superman: Dawn of Justice, Ben Affleck continues to carry the gritty torch lit by Nolan and Christian Bale's Batman, but is it possible the dark knight is getting too dark?
Host A Martinez spoke to Glen Weldon, who explores Batman's impact on nerd culture, the 70-year history of Batman and more ' in his latest book, The Caped Crusade: Batman and the Rise of Nerd Culture, which he released just in time for the Batman v. Superman hype.
Interview Highlights
On Batman being the master of reinvention:
"He is malleable, he is an ink blot that we project onto. You can look at Christian Bale in his Kevlar suit going 'swear to me' and you can look at Adam West dancing the Batusi on the dance floor and you can see that they're the same character, not because of the costume but because of what drives them. The motivation is what's important here and that is the key to understanding the character."
On the myth of relatability:
"I talked to a lot of nerds for this book and to a person they all told me it's because he's relatable, it's because he's like me, he doesn't have powers. I would point out to them that he has a super power, and that super power is wealth. Unimaginable wealth, that makes everything possible. That functions in any given batman story like magic, to make it all happen."
On what's next for Batman:
"I think we're going to see him lightening up a bit. There's only one direction he can go. The fact that the Lego Batman is making fun of him for being so self-serious all the time...the fact that now, for the first time in 30 years we can actually get merch that has something to do with the Batman 66 television series. You can see this other version of the character existing in the cultural consciousness...you can only go so dark and we're about to see the breaking of some light."
To hear the full interview, click the blue play button above.
Remembering Jim Harrison, a literary 'force of nature'
Jim Harrison was a great titan of literature, having made a name for himself in many genres as a novelist, a poet and an essayist.
Last Saturday, he passed away at 78 from undisclosed causes.
Harrison was best known to many as the author of, "Legends of the Fall," a novel that was adapted into a Hollywood movie which launched the career of Brad Pitt.
But Harrison preferred to live a life far from L.A., choosing to stay in the rural expanses of his home state of Michigan and, later, Arizona.
Fellow writer Tom Bissell, author of, "Apostle," grew up in Michigan where Harrison sometimes hunted with his dad or took a seat at the dinner table.
"He seemed more like a force of nature than a man," he says.
Bissell also credits Harrison with giving him the inspiration to become a writer, and the hope that he didn't need to grow up in New York City or Los Angeles to be successful.
"It was very liberating for me to realize that this hugely celebrated writer could actually make literature out of the texture of my own experience," he says. "He did that no only for me but also for young writers growing up in the dream coasts all over the country."
Hear more of Bissell's memories of Harrison by clicking the blue audio player above
Bissell is the author of "Apostle: Travels among the tombs of the Twelve." He will appear at the L.A. Times Festival of Books on Sunday, April 10th.