The Weekly Newspaper of Torrance Herald Publications - Torrance, El Segundo, Manhattan Beach, Hawthorne, Lawndale, & Inglewood Community Newspapers Since 1911 - (310) 322-1830 - Vol. 6, No. 3 - January 14, 2016 Inside This Issue Certified & Licensed Professionals.....................10 Classifieds............................4 Crossword/Sudoku.............4 Film Review..........................4 Legals....................................9 Police Reports.....................2 Real Estate................... 11,12 Sports....................................5 TerriAnn in Torrance..........6 Weekend Forecast Annie Get Your Gun Coming to the James Armstrong Theatre Members of The Aerospace Player, actors Angela Asch, Jason Stout, Julie Hinton, Stephen Cathers and Kevin Wheaton in costume and ready for their upcoming performance. See more about all the preproduction work in our feature “TerriAnn in Torrance” page 6. Photo by TerriAnn Ferren. • AAUW Torrance Kicks Off Year Focusing On Women In Government By Cristian Vasquez See AAUW, page 2 See School Board, page 2 Councilwoman Speaks at General Meeting Councilwoman Heidi Ann Ashcraft kicked off the American Association of University Women of Torrance’s 2016 programs with an address where she shared her experience as an active community member and an elected official. The AAUW’s general meeting took place Saturday, Jan. 9 in a meeting room at Zamperini Field and highlighted the AAUW Campus Leadership Program and “Elect Her,” which is described as the only program across the country that encourages and trains college women to run for student government and future political office. With AAUW members and League of Women Voters representatives in the audience, Ashcraft shared a few historical facts about former first lady Eleanor Roosevelt before diving into what it entails to be a leader. “I think that each organization is a very important organization because they are very active in the City of Torrance. One of the ideas was to give information to them in order to support young women in the universities, their leadership skills and teach them what they can do to formulate their lives to be leaders in their communities,” Councilwoman Ashcraft said. “Whether it be elected officials, heading a corporation, or whatever it might be, I feel that this is very important and this group of ladies is involved with that pursuit.” Ashcraft, who was first appointed to city council in December of 2013, stepped in to fill a vacancy left by former Councilman Cliff Numark and by June of 2014 she was elected to her council seat. However, her experience with as an elected official dates back to her days as an active parent at West High School, which led to the first elected position she would hold: Torrance Unified School District Board Member. “One thing that you will find about Torrance is that the PTA group here is very strong so you have a groundswell of women who might not want to go into an elected position but that are being leaders in other ways,” Councilwoman Ashcraft said. “Whether it be through the PTA, or whether it be on city commissions, we have a lot of women involved.” The AAUW’s Elect Her Program is a collaboration between AAUW and Running Start that addresses the “need to expand the pipeline of women candidates and to diminish the longstanding political leadership gender gap” states the AAUW website. Elect Her is a 4.5 hour, one-day training program that involves Torrance Unified Shares CAASPP Results By Cristian Vasquez In August of 2010 the California State Board of Education adopted its new K-12 California Common Core Standards for school districts across the state. For the Torrance Unified School District, like all other districts across the state, those new testing standards have taken effect. “It is a little bit different than it has been in the past years because of the change in the testing system,” TUSD Chief Academic Officer Dr. Tim Stowe said. “We no longer give the CST (California Standards Test) because we now give the Smarter Balance Assessment Test, better known as CAASPP (California Assessment of Student Performance and Progress.” Designed to provide a more detailed and accurate description of student achievement, the new testing assessments are aligned with the states new content standards for English Language Arts/Literacy (ELA) and math which are tailored to measure critical thinking and problem solving skills rather than recording memorization abilities. Another difference in state’s new testing is that achievements on the CAASPP are reported along different standards, including: Standard Exceeded, Standard Met, Standard Nearly Met or Standard Not Met. Second, achievement on more specific topics [referred to as claims] within the subject area test is reported as being either Above Standard, At or Near Standard, or Below Standard. “We were pleased and we have always been Friday Partly Cloudy 61˚/51˚ Saturday Partly Cloudy 62˚/52˚ Sunday Partly Cloudy 64˚/53˚
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