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FRIDAY, NOVEMBER 20, 2009

GOOGLE PIONEERSEric Schmidt (Cal M.S. ’79; Ph.D.

’82) leads the company, but LarryPage and Sergey Brin (Stanford M.S.’98 and ’95 , respectively) founded it.Mr. Schmidt’s dual degrees keep itclose: Field goal, Stanford.

Stanford leads, 3-0.

COMPUTER PIONEERSSteve Wozniak (Cal ’86) co-founded

Apple but left before it reached globaldominance. William Hewlett and Da-vid Packard (both Stanford ’34) werethe symbolic founders of Silicon Val-ley. Touchdown, Stanford.

Stanford leads, 10-0.

LSD PIONEERSKen Kesey (Stanford creative writing

program) first tripped as part of a C.I.A.study at Stanford in 1959, then spentmuch of the ’60s leading the MerryPranksters. Timothy Leary (Cal Ph.D.’50) did his own academic research on thesubject and coined the phrase, “Tune in,turn on, drop out.” Touchdown, Cal.

Stanford leads, 10-7.

CHILD ACTORSFred Savage (Stanford ’99) charmed

the country in “The Wonder Years” from1988 to 1993. Jerry Mathers (Cal ’74)charmed the country in “Leave It to Bea-ver” from 1957 to 1963 and in syndicatedperpetuity. Touchdown, Cal.

Cal leads, 14-10.

TV SUPERHEROESBill Bixby (Cal) gave it his best shot

with “The Incredible Hulk,” but Batmanas played by Adam West (Stanford) isiconic. (Neither actor graduated.)Touchdown, Stanford.

Stanford leads, 17-14.

GOVERNORSJerry Brown (Cal ’61) ran California

from 1975 to 1983. Gray Davis (Stanford’64) was in charge from 1999 to 2003. Mr.Davis was unseated in a recall election.Field goal, Cal.

Tied, 17-17.

ARTISTSThe creator of Dilbert, Scott Adams

(Cal M.B.A. ’86), and Pearls BeforeSwine’s Stephan Pastis (Cal ’89) woulddominate a cartoonists category. In-stead, they go up against Richard Die-benkorn (Stanford ’49). Touchdown,Stanford.

Stanford leads, 24-17.

DIRECTORSAlexander Payne (Stanford ’84 ) di-

rected “Sideways.” John McCone (Cal’22) directed the C.I.A. Touchdown, Cal.

Tied, 24-24.

CROWN PRINCESHaakon Magnus of Norway (Cal

’99) squares off with Philippe of theNetherlands (Stanford ’85). Bothsides punt.

ROCKERSWilliam Andress (Stanford ’84),

known as Tuck, was half of the gui-tar-vocal duo Tuck & Patti and amember of the Gap Band. The Ban-gles singer Susannah Hoffs (Cal ’80)walked like an Egyptian. Field goal,Cal.

Cal’s late drive through 1980s bandsbrings a 27-24 victory as space expires.

BIG GAME

A Cal-Stanford Score, Off the FieldFor 111 years, Stanford and Cal, which play on Saturday, have battled for su-

premacy on the football field. Still, there is more than one way to compete. JASON TURBOW

Eric Schmidtand Larry

Page.

Ken Keseyand Timothy

Leary.

Fred Savageand JerryMathers.

Jerry Brownand Gray

Davis.

Drive through Vallejo andyou will see a once-proud Navytown clearly down on its luck. Amotel room goes for $30.99 anight, including HBO. Closed

businesses prolifer-ate; those that re-main often havetemporary vinylsigns held up bystring, indicating atentative invest-

ment in the future.The problems plaguing this

community are among the mostdaunting to face any municipali-ty: the city has declared bank-ruptcy, its schools are in statereceivership and a court battlethreatens to strip firefighters ofexpensive salaries and benefits.

But there is concern that, asthe city tries to find the way outof this financial abyss, it is fall-ing into another that is perhapsmore pernicious — its politicalsystem increasingly reflects theinfluence of evangelicalchurches. This influence, manysay, has been gained by condon-ing intolerance of the city’sgrowing gay community.

“There’s definitely a discon-nect between the faith commu-

nity and the gay community,”said Marc Garman, editor ofThe Vallejo Independent Bulle-tin, an online town crier.

There has been a gay migra-tion to Vallejo from San Francis-co in the past decade, lured byinexpensive home ownershipand opulent Victorians ripe forrenovation. The newcomersfound tolerance here, but nowthere are signs of a push back.

Earlier this year, the Vallejoschool district settled a lawsuitafter an openly gay high schoolstudent said she was harassedby staff and told she was going“to hell.” She was awarded$25,000, and schools wereforced to adopt antidiscrimina-tion policies.

Gay candidates for public of-fice say they have been singledout for defeat by a coalition oflocal churches calling itself the“faith community.” In 2007 and2009 the group hosted “faith for-ums” that included gay candi-dates, but not in other contests.

An openly gay priest who wasa school board candidate, theRev. Lou Bordisso, said heheard murmurs and laughter at

a forum this fall. A moderatorasked if he wanted to put a gayand lesbian curriculum inschools. Father Bordisso is anauxiliary bishop of the Dioceseof California in the AmericanCatholic Church (a sect not un-der Vatican control). “Theyhave a hidden agenda to imposetheir particular version of Chris-tianity on the citizens of Vallejo,”he said.

Comments posted on Mr. Gar-man’s Web site described theforum as “homophobic” and“horrid.” An openly gay mayoralcandidate, Gary Cloutier, at-tended such a forum in 2007. Mr.Cloutier said introductions re-ferred to him as “a gay.” Then,he said, “I was asked if I wouldbring the Folsom Street Fair toVallejo.” The question referredto San Francisco’s notoriouspublic display of sexuality.

Mr. Cloutier said the politicalclimate changed six years agowhen he was serving as a mem-ber of the City Council. Evan-gelicals began forming prayercircles outside the Councilchambers. “ I was disturbed be-cause they called America aChristian nation,” he said.

Both men eventually lost theirraces. Mr. Cloutier was defeated— by only two votes — by OsbyDavis, a devout Assemblies ofGod follower. “I don’t knowwhat the fear is about consider-ing Vallejo as a city of God,”Mayor Davis said. If believed,he said, “that God created heav-en and earth and everythingthat’s in it, and that God is sov-ereign, then you believe that heis already a part of this commu-nity and this is already his city;and so what’s the big deal?”

Mr. Davis thought the ques-tion asked about the FolsomStreet Fair was “really, reallyunfair.” But his faith does informthe way he sees gay people.“They’re committing sin andthat sin will keep them out ofheaven,” he said. “But you don’thate the person. You hate thesin that they commit.”

Told his outspoken religiouspassion might rattle some, hesaid: “That means that theyhave a problem, and not me. I’mjust as passionate about myfaith as someone is about theOakland Raiders football team.No one says a word when some-one rides down the street withtheir body all painted up yelling,‘Go Raiders!’ If I start yelling,‘Go Jesus! Praise God!’ some-one gets upset.”

Stephanie Gomes, a CityCouncil member, has “a verystrong feeling about the separa-tion of church and state.” Her re-cent, successful campaign fo-cused on economic problems.Ms. Gomes is concerned aboutthe political tone. “We becameso diverse,” she said, “and Iwonder if some people feltthreatened by that.”

Faith and Tolerance

Collide in Vallejo

Scott James is an Emmy-win-ning television journalist andnovelist who lives in San Fran-cisco.

A city’s struggles are not bringingpeople together.

SCOTTJAMES

BARBARYCOAST

By PHIL YOST

Kathleen Martin stood in frontof a white board covered withmath problems, her class clus-tered at her feet. As they talkedthrough the solutions together,the students repeated the head-ings over each problem on theboard: “Algebra and Function,”“Probability,” “Data Analysis.”

“So I see three addends here,”said Mrs. Martin, in her thirdyear of teaching, “and I know Iam going to find the sum.” Thechildren then call out the ad-dends — make that the numbers— in unison. They are adding six,four and zero.

Mrs. Martin teaches first gradeat Leroy Anderson ElementarySchool in San Jose, a regular pub-lic school. Of its 430 students, 90percent receive subsidizedlunches. For 70 percent, Englishis a second language and 70 per-cent are Hispanic.

Those can be the demographicingredients for a watered-downcurriculum and the excuses foracademic failure. Indeed, fouryears ago Anderson was, aca-demically, the worst elementaryschool in Santa Clara County,with the lowest score on Califor-nia’s Academic Performance In-dex. But when scores were re-leased this fall, Anderson hadjumped 136 points in a year, to 810out of a possible 1,000.

Only a handful of Bay Areaschools notched triple digit in-creases. In the past three years,Anderson’s scores rose 206points.

What is turbo-charging aca-demics at this school? It is nevereasy to prove a cause-and-effectrelationship in education, butthree ingredients associated withsuccess in other schools are atwork: high expectations for ev-eryone, constant assessment andfamily involvement.

Now, other schools are lookingto Anderson for guidance in elim-inating the so-called achievement

gap between Hispanic and Afri-can-American students on onehand and whites and Asians onthe other.

Anderson is bucking a disturb-ing trend in Santa Clara County:on California’s 2009 Accountabil-ity Progress Report, which meas-ures student performance, scoresfor Hispanic students in the coun-ty — 715 — fell further behindthose of Hispanic students state-

wide. The gap this year was 19points; last year it was 14.

Not surprisingly, given the af-fluence and high education levelsin Silicon Valley, its overallscores exceed the statewide av-erage. But many Hispanic stu-dents — 37 percent of the schoolpopulation — are in danger of be-ing left out of the “knowledgeeconomy.”

Closing the gap is this genera-tion’s civil rights issue, saidCharles Weis, superintendent ofschools in Santa Clara County.“We know what needs to bedone; we know how to do it,” Dr.Weis said at a rally for education-al improvement. Yet, he added,“educators are notoriously bad atadopting others’ good ideas.”

Anderson illustrates the poten-tial and the challenge. Much asthe school has improved, its A.P.I.score still falls just below the up-per half of the county’s elemen-tary schools. While 71 percent ofits students are proficient inmath, only 53 percent are in read-ing and writing.

When Glen Ishiwata becamesuperintendent of the MorelandSchool District in July 2006, hechose for Anderson a young newprincipal, Destiny Ortega, and as-sistant principal, Karen Allard.They overhauled the core in-struction, tested all students toestablish their skill levels and in-sisted on a can-do attitude.

The despairing mentality of“What are we going to do withthese kids?” ended quickly, Mrs.

MONICA ALMEIDA/THE NEW YORK TIMES

Kathleen Martin, a first-grade teacher in San Jose, uses BoardMath to acquaint children with formal mathematical terminology.

Continued on Following Page

Learning to Teach to Bridge the Achievement GapMaking Gains

THE NEW YORK TIMESSource: Santa Clara County Office of Education

Leroy Anderson Elementary’s Academic Performance Index, an achievement measure based on standardized test scores, improved significantly in 2008-9, surpassing the county average.

While the performance of all students in Santa Clara County has improved since 2000, Hispanics and blacks continue to score much lower than Asians and whites.

Academic Performance Index Academic Performance Indexat Santa Clara County schools

200

400

600

800

1,000

200

400

600

800

1,000Asian

Santa Clara County

California

Leroy AndersonElementary

White

Hispanic

Black

’00 ’02 ’04 ’06 ’09’00 ’02 ’04 ’06 ’09

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