Homework

June Casagrande COSTA MESA -- Sometimes the best presents are the ones you earn for yourself -- a fact self-evident to 11-year-old Cassandra Menendez as she pedaled her shiny new bicycle Saturday morning. "I earned it from doing homework," she said. Cassandra is one of about 160 children who swarmed the Christmas tree at Westside Boys and Girls Club early Saturday morning to cash in on hard work they had done throughout the year. The club's after-school program awards points to students who do their homework there and have it corrected by staff.

Summer's almost over and the kids will soon be back in school. There's nothing worse than having your child tell you about a paper due the next day that he or she hasn't even started, but there is help available from the Newport Beach Public Library. The library has resources that you can access 24/7, so there's no more excuses. Students can get help from home for their reports and research projects by visiting the Library's website at www.newportbeachlibrary.

Each day after school, about 50 students meet in the Fireside Lounge on the Costa Mesa High School campus. The seventh- and eighth-graders are members of the YMCA Youth Achievers After School Learning Center, a free program that includes three hours of scholastics, sports and snacks. With about 30 slots open, organizers are hoping other kids take advantage of the program. The biggest difficulty in enrolling students has been getting parents informed, Program Coordinator Trang Nguyen said.

The social media tool Twitter will be connecting Irvine Unified School District teachers, students and parents in a daylong discussion Wednesday about the dreaded "H" word: Homework. IUSD parents and students will be talking about the role of take-home school work via Twitter during the first of two sessions scheduled for the district's annual Curriculum Council meeting. The Wednesday session marks the first time that the district will use Twitter to solicit input from the community, IUSD officials said.

We asked students at Harbor View School in Corona del Mar about their study habits. Here's what they had to say: "I do my homework before I play with my friends. Because otherwise you might forget about doing it. And you should get your homework done by at least 7:30 p.m. I study vocabulary and spelling every day until I know them very well. I do really good in school. I try really hard." ERIK MUTZKE, 9, third-grader, Newport Beach "I rest first when I get home and then I do my homework.

After many years of bringing up the subject, I have not received any answer to the question of why parents can’t go online to complete the required back-to-school forms and to download the guidelines and other information schools want us to have. This is not rocket science and the ability to do this online would save trees and save kids and parents the trouble of having to make two trips to school: One to pick-up packets, the other to drop them off. There is good study advice in this year’s back-to-school packet.

The subject of time -- where it goes and how we can create more -- keeps coming up. And I am sorry to keep beating this drum, but I am more convinced than ever that the nation is in a time crisis. Until a couple of nights ago, I was convinced that parents bore the brunt of the time assault, but now I'm not so sure. Now, I know for certain that kids are feeling the time strain, too, mostly because parents cannot help but have their stress take its toll on their kids.

Deirdre Newman COSTA MESA -- Before she started attending the Shalimar Teen Center, Maritza Barajas had trouble focusing on her homework and earned low grades. Now the high school senior is getting straight A's and has plans to attend Orange Coast College. On Monday night, Barajas celebrated her Shalimar experience at the center's graduation. Twenty-four eighth-graders and seven high school seniors were honored at the ceremony at St. Joachim's Catholic Church.

The social media tool Twitter will be connecting Irvine Unified School District teachers, students and parents in a daylong discussion Wednesday about the dreaded "H" word: Homework. IUSD parents and students will be talking about the role of take-home school work via Twitter during the first of two sessions scheduled for the district's annual Curriculum Council meeting. The Wednesday session marks the first time that the district will use Twitter to solicit input from the community, IUSD officials said.

The University of Phoenix has donated all sorts of school supplies to the Boys & Girls Club Westside Branch, 661 Hamilton St., Costa Mesa From books to three-ring binders to pencils and pens and crayons, employees with the university in Costa Mesa brought in the supplies over a two-week period and have been making drop-offs at several Boys & Girls Club locations throughout Orange County. Steve Lampron, director of operations for the Westside branch, said he was elated to see all the supplies, adding they would go to good use. He said hundreds of students sign up each year for the "Hour of Power" in which they do their homework after school inside a small classroom at the club.

Did you ever feel as if you were left out of the process? Did you ever think, “Wow, if only I could somehow let them know how I feel?” The Newport-Mesa Unified School District is giving the community that chance. Thousands of parents and residents in the district are being asked to complete a questionnaire that should take about 15 minutes. They have until March 24 to do so. After the survey is completed, district Supt. Jeffrey Hubbard and the Board of Education plan to look at the answers and try to incorporate them into an overall strategic plan.

Twelve-year-old Christopher Camarillo imagined he was a heroic firefighter battling a blaze inside a New York City skyscraper. Eleven-year-old Jacob Lahodny from Newport Beach imagined he was sending a blast of water through a window into a burning building. Others looked at the wide “fog” pattern from the water blasting out of the fire hose as a force field, protecting them from the deadly flames. Whoever they imagined they were Tuesday morning, they were definitely kids having a fun summer morning at the Newport Beach Junior Firefighters Camp at Mariners Park.

Schools on Costa Mesa’s Westside are working aggressively to boost their scores — and their profile — and are seeing results, officials said at a Newport-Mesa School Board study session Tuesday. Principals from the district’s high schools, middle schools and elementary schools are meeting this week with the school board to report their progress, explain their goals for the year to come and talk about how they plan to improve test scores. Schools from the areas around Estancia High School and Newport Harbor High School gave reports Tuesday, while Costa Mesa High School and Corona Del Mar High School are scheduled for today.

Each day after school, about 50 students meet in the Fireside Lounge on the Costa Mesa High School campus. The seventh- and eighth-graders are members of the YMCA Youth Achievers After School Learning Center, a free program that includes three hours of scholastics, sports and snacks. With about 30 slots open, organizers are hoping other kids take advantage of the program. The biggest difficulty in enrolling students has been getting parents informed, Program Coordinator Trang Nguyen said.

Three very different girls with three unique fashion styles have created one catchy sound, and along with it an eye-grabbing clothing line. Runway MMC, a pop group with a rock and urban edge, is preparing for its upcoming album release, which will hit stores at the same time as its new clothing line. And while the girls are busy juggling their time between the studio and the warehouse, they still manage to excel in school. High school, that is. “It’s all about time management,” said 16-year-old Melody Hernandez.

Jordan Vison’s life didn’t mesh well with regular high school. Raised by his single mother, Carla Crawford, Vison moved around a lot. To help his mother, he had to take on more responsibility than most other children his age. He had to walk his brother home from school, make sure he was safe and protected, help him with homework and make him dinner at times. When he was 16, he got a job at Circuit City, and his life became cluttered. There wasn’t much room for sports or homework, and his family priorities came first.

COSTA MESA — Dan Monahan knows that when kids reach a certain age, they prefer not to be referred to as boys and girls. But that isn’t stopping the youth leader from creating a space for teens at the Boys & Girls Club. Monahan, the executive director of the Boys & Girls Club of the Harbor Area, watched proudly Saturday morning as crews from DPR Construction installed new paint, walls and flooring in the aged building on Tustin Avenue. DPR renovates a different venue every year for free.