Ribbon

Gary Moskowitz SOUTHEAST GLENDALE -- Students, teachers and staff at Cerritos Elementary School will officially move into their new facilities Monday. A ribbon-cutting ceremony will be at 8:20 a.m. and mark the transition from portable classrooms into permanent classroom facilities. The student body will carry American flags and gather on the new playground for the ceremony. School staff, faculty and district officials will attend the event. The total cost of the Cerritos project is $13.7 million.

Karen S. Kim Best Buy to open Friday MEDIA DISTRICT NORTH -- Best Buy -- offering 45,000 square feet of electronics, computers, audio and video equipment, appliances, gadgets and gizmos -- will host its grand opening Friday. The new store, 1501 N. Victory Place, is part of the new Empire Center project, which already boasts a Target Greatlands and Lowe's home improvement store. The store will include more than 17,000 compact discs, 800 videos, 2,000 computer software titles and 2,900 DVD titles.

Enterprise Services opens officially Members from city government and staff, as well as Glendale Police officials, joined community members Wednesday at the Grand Opening of Enterprise Services, a new city facility located inside the former police station. Enterprise Services provides passport applications, does Live Scan fingerprinting and provides notary services. While it has been operating since September, the ribbon was officially cut Wednesday. "This is a great example of adaptive re-use," said City Councilman Ara Najarian.

Throngs of onlookers celebrated the Chinese New Year on Sunday with drum performances, ribbon dances and, of course, red envelopes. Chinese and Korean dance troupes took their turns on the Americana at Brand green Sunday in celebration of the annual turn, also known as the Lunar New Year, which fell on Feb. 7 this year. Brightly dressed Chinese ribbon dancers took their turns among calm, synchronized Korean drummers and the requisite lion dance while hundreds watched. The holiday is hugely popular in mainland China, proliferating into the cultures of neighboring countries, including Korea, Singapore, Thailand, Malaysia and others.

“So many fail because they don’t get started — they don’t go. They don’t overcome inertia. They don’t begin.” W. Clement Stone   Thank goodness the following people got started! We are welcoming two new businesses to the Crescenta Valley this month. We hope you join us at their upcoming ribbon cutting/grand opening celebrations. On Thursday, Feb. 26, Modella Uniforms will be hosting a ribbon-cutting at their new location at 3115 Foothill Blvd.

The Soussana Family Jewish Chabad Center of Burbank was opened Sunday with both a hair- and a ribbon-cutting. Rabbi Shmuly Kornfeld and his wife, Elana, were not only celebrating the opening of the Chabad Center but they were also celebrating their son Mendy's third birthday. In the Jewish tradition, a boy's hair is not cut until he has reached his third year, making his first haircut a significant occasion called an Upshernish. The ribbon-cutting took place about a half hour after the Upshernish ceremony to a large crowd on Magnolia Boulevard.

Gary Moskowitz The arduous task of making his bed every morning gave 13-year-old Ali Rafatnia an idea. The Wilson Middle School eighth-grader went to work immediately to create the "Easy Bed," an invention that uses zippers and Velcro to attach the bed sheet to the blanket. The result: making the bed just got easier and Ali walks away from Saturday's annual Invention Convention with a second-place ribbon for his idea. "Anybody could use it," Ali said.

Karen S. Kim SOUTHWEST GLENDALE -- It's been a little more than a year since a car heading east on Magnolia Boulevard in North Hollywood jumped onto the curb and killed crossing guard William Hooper, 60, of Tujunga. But a little tribute to his memory, and to his service as a major in the U.S. Navy and Air Force, could be seen hanging on the Touched by an Angel Tree in Glendale Memorial Hospital's lobby Wednesday. "He was our friend," said Glendale resident Judy Davis, who bought the angel ornament in Hooper's memory.

Janine Marnien LA CRESCENTA -- Some fifth-grade students at La Crescenta Elementary School hit the wagon trail Friday, as part of Pioneer Day. Students in Ginger Dotson's class made covered wagons, clothespin dolls, beaded jewelry and ate food similar to what pioneers would have eaten on the trail West. They even take their covered wagons around the field to test the stability of them. The activities were meant to teach the students about what it would have been like to be a pioneer.

Students throughout the Glendale Unified School District pledged this week to live a drug-free life as part of Red Ribbon Week, which is celebrated each October at every Glendale public school. The national campaign dates back to the death of Kiki Camarena, an agent with the Drug Enforcement Administration who was kidnapped and murdered in Mexico City in 1985 while he was investigating a major cocaine and marijuana dealer. PHOTOS: Valley View Elementary gets K9 demo for Red Ribbon Week Following his death, parents in the United States started wearing red ribbons to protest the devastation caused by drugs, according to the National Family Partnership.

For Brenna Pratt, a freshman at Crescenta Valley High School, the best parts of a new 2-mile trail are the multiple switchbacks leading up the side of the San Rafael Hills. "I think they're really fun," said the 14-year-old before she and nearly two dozen students on the high school's cycling team climbed once again up the Catalina Verdugo Trail, which officially opened Saturday morning with a ribbon-cutting ceremony. In addition to the Catalina Verdugo Trail, city officials also cut the ribbon for a less-strenuous, .75-mile handicap accessible trail made of decomposed granite.

Mark Keppel Elementary students tried on 20-pound bulletproof vests, got a close look at rifles and climbed in a police car during an assembly to celebrate Red Ribbon Week. On Monday afternoon, eight U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration agents showed Keppel students what agents use on the job, including unmarked cars and metal tools to pry open locked gates and doors. Glendale Police Officer Maribel Feeley pushed a button on her belt that remotely opened her patrol car's back seat.

Clark Magnet High School was named a national Blue Ribbon school for the second time, Glendale Unified officials announced Monday. The award recognizes private and public schools that make significant academic progress on federal benchmarks. Clark Magnet is among just 24 Blue Ribbon schools named in California and 307 in the nation. “I'm just amazed by it,” said Principal Doug Dall. “When you think about how hard it is to do this…it confirms what the district has done with professional development - the fact that our teachers work so hard.” Of 1,100 students at Clark, 52% are low-income and 85% primarily speak a language other than English.

Roosevelt Elementary School in Pasadena is expected to have its federal Blue Ribbon nomination rescinded due to an administrative test-taking error that was reported in October, officials said. Roosevelt Elementary would have been the nearest school to Glendale Unified's Clark Magnet High School to join the prestigious ranks of Blue Ribbon nominated schools had it not been for what one district official called "an honest mistake. " During testing earlier this year, an adult proctor told three Roosevelt students who had turned in incomplete tests to finish filling in answers to questions they had left blank, said Pasadena school district spokesman Adam Wolfson.

Clark Magnet High School was one of 35 California schools nominated Tuesday for the 2012 National Blue Ribbon Schools Program, widely recognized as a gold standard in public education. The school will have to wait until September to learn if it will receive the honor, which is contingent on hitting all of its 2012 standardized testing targets, including its scores for the overall Academic Performance Index. Last year, Clark earned a score of 909 out of a total 1,000, making it the highest-performing high school in Glendale Unified, despite a large population of low-income students.

As two Keppel Elementary School teachers lay side by side on the playground blacktop Wednesday, there were more than a few wide eyes in the crowd. But with a kick of his pedals, pro BMX rider Shawn White - no relation to the red-headed Olympic snowboarder by the same name - cleared the pair with several inches to spare. It was one of scores of tricks White performed during the Red Ribbon Week event, designed to turn students off from drugs and on to healthy alternatives. “This practices individualism,” said the decorated BMX rider and veteran Red Ribbon Week performer.

Red Ribbon Week is Oct. 24 to 28 and schools in our district will be participating in various activities in an effort to educate students to maintain a drug-free environment and make healthy choices. The theme this year is “UR2 Cool4 Drugs” and activities will include assemblies, writing essays, making pledges, wearing bracelets and tying red ribbons around the school. Monte Vista Elementary The community is invited to the PTA evening at 6:30 p.m. Nov. 3 in the cafeteria where a special free seminar will be held on helping frazzled kids in today's society.

Eyes grew wide on Wednesday as Glendale Police Officer Bryan Duncan told high school students the outcome of a recent high-speed traffic accident related to street racing — destroyed cars, criminal charges and long-term disability. And they grew even wider when he showed them on-scene photos. "The No. 1 goal here is for you guys to see the negative impact that — and pardon my language — screwing around behind the wheel does," Duncan said. "That is what these accidents come down to. People not paying attention, people not doing the right thing, texting, talking on the phone, talking to the passenger next to you. " The presentation was one of dozens taking place at Glendale High School as part of Yellow Ribbon Week meant to address violence and safety issues among students.

Yellow Ribbon Week is being recognized this week at many of our schools. There will be meaningful activities provided for students to help them understand the message of nonviolence by Martin Luther King Jr. Classroom teachers will also take some time during the school day to address violence prevention curriculum with students. For the past eight years, Glendale Unified School District has observed Yellow Ribbon Week by providing yellow ribbons as a symbol that the students and staff members work to solve problems without violence.