Category: Bakersfield

Bakersfield
Stefi Mar

Seven Steps to Help Your Child Build Meaningful Connections

Swinging side by side with a friend on the playground. Sharing chalk over bright, colorful sidewalk drawings. Hiding behind a tree during a spirited game of hide-and-seek. These simple moments between children may seem small, but they matter more than we think: They lay the foundation for some of life’s most important skills.

African Americans
Stefi Mar

Meet Roxanne Brown, The First African American And The First Woman President Of The United Steelworkers

In a significant moment for the labor movement, Roxanne Brown, set to become the first African American woman elected as President of the United Steelworkers (USW), North America’s largest industrial union, joins Make It Plain with Rev. Mark Thompson. With the official transition happening in March, Brown’s ascent is more than just a personal achievement; it represents a shift in the labor movement’s leadership reflecting the demographics of today’s workforce.

Arts & Culture
Stefi Mar

After 43 Years ‘Thriller’ Still Outpaces Modern Music

Forty-three years after “Thriller” hit the world like a lightning bolt, its anniversary still behaves like a global holiday. This weekend the celebration stretched from one continent to the next. In London, a Brixton record stall blasted the bassline of “Billie Jean” as shoppers argued over vintage vinyl. In Paris, a street musician near Châtelet blended Jackson’s melodies into a Metro platform performance. In Tokyo, clusters of teens practiced the zombie routine in Yoyogi Park, laughing when someone forgot a step. In Los Angeles, where the album was born in the studio, the track drifted from convertibles rolling down Sunset.

Bakersfield
Stefi Mar

Fate of Civil Rights Office Unknown as Trump Continues to Dismantle Department of Education 

A busy news week heading into the Thanksgiving holiday has distracted from a continuing effort by the Trump Administration to relocate, and in some cases end, the U.S. Department of Education. It has long been known that Trump and his policy advisors want to dismantle the department — but the acceleration over the last week has taken some by surprise.

Bakersfield
Stefi Mar

Parents Now Pay More for Childcare Than Housing Across the U.S.

Childcare is draining American families with a force that has begun to rival housing costs, and new national analysis shows that in cities across the country, parents are paying more to care for their children than to keep a roof over their heads. Researchers at LendingTree found that infant care exceeds average rent in 11 of the nation’s 100 largest metro areas, while childcare for two children exceeds rent in 85 cities across the country.

Bakersfield
Stefi Mar

Wicked: For Good

“I’ve heard it said. That people come into our lives for a reason…”
That poetic lyric is from the song “For Good,” arguably the second most famous tune from the Broadway musical Wicked. The words hint at the theme of this final half of the Wicked duology, which has been magically created by screenwriters Winnie Holzman and Dana Fox and manifested brilliantly by director extraordinaire Jon M. Chu.

Bakersfield
Stefi Mar

Epstein Files Battle Explodes as Redactions Shield Trump and Other Powerful Figures

The fight over the Epstein files reached a boiling point today as Congress moves to force their release, but the real story has already unfolded behind closed doors. The documents were scrubbed long before lawmakers ever approached the floor. What should have been a moment of transparency has become a demonstration of how political power shields itself while the public is told to wait.

Bakersfield
Stefi Mar

America’s Maternal and Infant Health Crisis Deepens

The March of Dimes has released its 2025 Report Card, and across the United States, the findings tell a story of mothers and infants facing preventable risks that too often lead to tragedy. The national preterm birth rate remains at 10.4 percent. Babies born to Medicaid-insured mothers experienced an 11.7 percent preterm birth rate, while babies born to mothers with private insurance recorded a 9.6 percent rate. For Black mothers, the rate climbed to 14.7 percent, the highest of any group in the country.

Bakersfield
Stefi Mar

What To Know About the CDC’s Baseless New Guidance on Autism

The rewriting of a page on the CDC’s website to assert the false claim that vaccines may cause autism sparked a torrent of anger and anguish from doctors, scientists, and parents who say Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. is wrecking the credibility of an agency they’ve long relied on for unbiased scientific evidence.

Bakersfield
Stefi Mar

Do You Know About California’s Vehicle Safety and Disaster Mortgage Assistance Programs? Get Details

On Nov. 20, the Office of Community Partnerships and Strategic Communications (OCPSC) hosted an online forum with ethnic media outlets across the state to highlight two statewide programs that benefit all Californians: the CalAssist Mortgage Fund, which provides disaster-related mortgage relief, and Check to Protect, a vehicle-safety campaign led by the National Safety Council and supported by the California New Motor Vehicle Board.

Bakersfield
Stefi Mar

A Revolutionary Voice Falls Silent, but Questions About His Conviction Grow Louder

H. Rap Brown did not wait for permission to define himself. Long before federal agents called him a menace and politicians wrote laws in his name, he was a young man from Baton Rouge who believed the country needed an honest confrontation with its own history. Long before he died at 82 in a federal medical facility in North Carolina, he had already become Imam Jamil Abdullah Al-Amin, a name he adopted after turning to Islam inside Attica.