Days after the March 4th education Day of Action, activists and concerned citizens around the city are having discussions about the value and impact of the protests, especially the movement onto the 980 Freeway that led to 150 arrests, many of young people. OL published a piece that also ran on Facebook and was circulated privately called Why Did the March onto the 980 Freeway Happen and it's triggered many responses, all worth a read if you are into these issues:

Raider Nation Collective Statement on the M4 Highway Takeover: "On all three occasions individuals have tried to denounce these rebellions as white, middle class outsiders “leading” the youth of color. Reports and analyses from the first two uprisings have already exposed these assumptions as completely false."

Rebuttal to “Why Did the March onto the 980 Freeway Happen”
'By calling a group “mostly white” you are automatically making invisible the people of color on whose behalf you are supposedly writing from. More on that later. You then make the automatic leap that these people (who are leading a march onto the freeway) “don't have any link to Oakland communities."

UC Berkeley students studying beat journalism via writing for Oakland North also went all out on their education coverage, and have pulled together a list of all the stories they wrote for their class.

The Daily Cal makes much of the 18 year old reporter who got arrested covering the freeway protesters and even blurbed his story in the Huffington Post.

Worried about the budget shortfalls? Get involved

Oakland City Auditor Courtney Ruby had a piece in the Chronicle this weekend saying that the city of Oakland must define core services to close the budget gap: "For the upcoming 2010-11 fiscal year, the city of Oakland must close an estimated $32.7 million budget deficit, while the city of Berkeley must trim several million dollars from its general fund."  Her recommendation: As a citizen, get involved. "Your participation will generate the political will to identify core services and cut strategically. Attend your city council's next budget discussion; take the microphone; be heard."

Precious wins 5 Academy Awards (yeah!)

OL was thrilled to see Precious win so many Academy awards last night. Best picture, Best supporting actress for Mo'Nique. Best writing (adapted screenplay), and Independent Spirit award. If you are into Precious, don't miss Jean Melasaine's essay, published on OL some months ago--Precious is about women I know.

Supporting access to healthy food across the Town

Twilight Greenaway (yes, her real name) has a piece on Civil Eats about a panel about food access in the Bay and calls out The Oakland Farms-to-Schools Network, a project of the East Bay Asian Youth Center (EBAYC) and the Oakland Unified School District. Ferment Change announces their May 2010 fundraising drive for City Slicker Farms and invites people to get involved (we want to).

Our latest blog discovery is OakBerkEats, which is all about bargain eating round the way (our way). Author Rosanna lives in Berkeley but seems to spend alot of time in Oakland (and how could you not like a food writer whose profile pic shows her holding THREE scooops of ice cream).

Finally, we've got that ol' calendar loaded up--today we have.