Author: Shea O'Rourke

Kana Mabon isn’t the average teacher. Before she became staff-development coordinator at Memphis City Schools’ Teaching and Learning Academy, Mabon taught at Cypress High. And her approach has always been hands-on, to say the least.

“On my cleaning period, I would go to the principal and say, ‘Could I go get this child? He wasn’t sick yesterday, so he couldn’t be sick today,'” Mabon recalls. “So I’d go and get them — knock on the door and say, ‘You’re not sick; you need to come to school.’ And I’d … bring them to school.”

On August 14th, Mabon will take her commitment to a new level as founding principal of the New Small High School (NSHS) in North Memphis. Currently housed in the top floor of Caldwell Elementary, the NSHS will have 60 students and five teachers per grade.

The size takes aim at a common problem: average students — even those with learning disabilities — often get overlooked in large student populations that allow for little personal attention. Forty-seven percent of students who drop out do so because they feel bored or disengaged in school, according to a March 2006 survey by Civic Enterprises. Among the nation’s 50 largest school districts, MCS is ranked 40th in terms of its drop-out rate (51.5 percent), according to a June 2006 report by Education Week.

NSHS’ message could potentially change the way that Memphis approaches public education. The school is the result of a $100,000 grant given by the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation through the Coalition of Essential Schools’ Small Schools Project.

Students will receive personal attention in advisory groups of 10 to 15 that will meet at least twice a week. “They’re going to feel like they’re a part of something,” Mabon says.

In addition to traditional learning, NSHS students will learn by shadowing workers in fields that interest them. “My goal is to have them do a full internship during the second semester of their senior year,” Mabon says.

Even for students whose goals aren’t clear, NSHS will provide a strong, dual-path education. “Whether they choose to be an artist, a hair designer for stage, or a brain surgeon, they’ll be prepared academically,” Mabon says. “I want to help them create a back-up plan just in case, because things happen.”

Each student will work with a guidance counselor to form a personalized four-year plan that will suit his or her career goals. “They’re going to be aware of all the prerequisites for their first year of college, and then they’re going to backtrack and make sure that their four-year plan meets it,” Mabon says.

When NSHS opens it August, it will serve only ninth-graders, and a higher-grade will be added each subsequent year. NSHS will be re-named by parents and teachers soon after opening day and will move to a to-be-determined location next year.

It’s hard to explain why some reality-TV shows are mega-hits while others are short-lived. Unfortunately, ABC’s The One entered the latter category last week when the network canceled it after two rounds of competition, eliminating not just one but all competitors.

It was an odd hybrid of reality TV — think The Real World meets American Idol — but it was also the vehicle for Memphian Austin Carroll to prove himself to the world. Before the show’s cancellation, the Flyer talked with Carroll to see how he was enjoying his time in Los Angeles. — by Shea O’Rourke

Flyer: How did you hear about the show?

Austin Carroll: I got a call from the Memphis Music Commission. In Memphis, they did the auditions by invitation only. There were probably like 100 or 200 people auditioning.

What’s your musical background?

I sing on the weekends at Hope Presbyterian [Church] — my dad is the worship leader out there. I also do a lot of session work and a lot of jingle work with Baker and Associates. I was raised in a musical family. My dad was a Christian artist. He won two Grammys and seven Dove Awards. He had a big career before deciding to become a worship leader.

What makes you stand out from your competition?

I think that we’re all pretty different stylistically. It just depends on whether or not America’s going to accept the style that I have to offer.

Do you get along with the other contestants?

We’ve had our little drama moments, which I’m sure you’ll see, but we’ve been doing well. We get a little stir-crazy at times, but I think that we’re all really grateful for the experience of being able to work with such professional people. And the house itself is just amazing. It’s like 11,000 square feet.

Do you get nervous performing live?

Not really. It’s not really that different from singing in church. That’s actually the easiest part for me — the live performing. The reality side is what makes me nervous. It’s weird being [microphoned] and being on camera all the time.

What’s it been like to work with professional trainers and coaches?

The training has been pretty intense. They’re trying to keep us all grounded and make us do the best job that we can do. It’s been a great chance to learn from professionals. We’ve all learned a lot that we didn’t know beforehand.

Any Memphian driving during this election season is likely to pass thousands of political signs. They’re little, they’re big, they’re red, black, blue … and they’re everywhere. With the biggest ballot Shelby County’s ever seen — 144 candidates — those signs represent a heap of cash.

“You have some local guys that are smaller and not running for state appointments,” says James Daniels, co-owner and operation manager for GDC Screen Printing. “Usually they’re on a budget and try to be practical about their money because they have to spread it across their whole campaign. The larger guys are usually ready to spend more money.”

No matter how much one wants to spend, many candidates use a significant portion of their budget on signs. “If I was going to guess, the average smaller political guy will be spending $2,000 to $5,000, and the bigger guys will be spending into the hundreds of thousands,” Daniels says.

The price depends on individual size, the number of colors, and the number of signs. A one-color, screen-printed sign in the common 18-by-24-inch size costs about $2 each, while a one-color sign that is 4-by-8-feet costs about $55. If a candidate wants a photograph of their family on their poster, the cost can be up to $100.

And that’s just for the sign itself — the wooden or wire stand can be an additional $50. Multiply that by thousands of signs, and it’s serious money.

Direct-mail companies are also experiencing an influx of election projects.

“We’re doing a large percentage of political mail, and I get pretty tired,” says Robert Hummell, who owns ByteMail, a company that distributes direct mailings. “It’s the busiest year I’ve ever had. … [The work] goes into the night.”

Hummell’s increase began last November when candidates started sending out invitations to early fund-raisers. From there, it’s only gotten busier: Hummell sends mail for 20 candidates in the judicial sector and several congressional and state candidates. One politician might send out as many as 50,000 items of mail at a time.

The cost for candidates might be worthwhile in the long run.

“Direct mail and signs are key to any campaign,” says Joe Cooper, Democratic candidate for the Shelby County Commission’s District 5 seat. “Sometimes it can be about 40 percent of your budget.”

Cooper is a perennial candidate, having run in various elections in the last 25 years. Each election season, he schedules three mail-outs and posts 3,000 to 4,000 signs, collecting as many as possible afterward to reuse.

“If you’re going to do it more than once, you kind of need to save them,” Cooper says. “And for a person just starting out, it can be quite expensive.”

Another option, Cooper notes, are billboards, which he says “separate the men from the boys.” And they should, at several-thousand dollars per month.

Still, printers enjoy the political season.

“If it were year-round, that’d be great,” says Daniels.

Downtown’s residential neighborhood bills itself as “walkable, never pedestrian.” But is it bike-able?

Last week, the Memphis City Council approved a $62,640 plan to install at least 16 more bike racks downtown. Although the number of bike-riders in downtown Memphis is not documented, it doesn’t take statistics to show the need for more biker-friendly parking.

“Just from an intuitive standpoint, over the last three or four years the number of downtown residents has been growing very quickly,” said Dottie Jones, administrator in the city’s office of intergovernmental relations. “Obviously, there’s a greater number of bicycles downtown than there ever has been, so there’s a need for more racks.”

The city will pay approximately $9,600 for the racks’ construction and installation. An additional $3,000 will come from the Downtown Neighborhood Association (DNA), the organization that initially presented the project to the City Council several years ago. The remaining $50,000 will come from funds left over from a Tennessee Department of Transportation (TDOT) grant for a 1999 project.

“The grant was written for 16 new bike racks, but I’ve kind of re-tooled the idea of how we’re building them, and I’m hoping to squeeze 25 bike racks out of this,” said DNA vice president Tommy Volinchak. “We’ve consulted with some of the folks who are bikers in the downtown area. We’re trying to incorporate their functional needs and still make the racks artistic.”

The designer of the racks has not yet been chosen. “It’ll be a local Memphis metal artist,” Volinchak said. “We’ve started talking with the Ornamental Metal Museum, and we’ll step up those conversations once the approval process is completed.”

The racks will be installed in “the hotspots where most of us like to park our car and patronize,” Volinchak said, citing the farmers market at Central Station, Peabody Place, AutoZone Park, and local banks as potential candidates. “The idea is to help the many businesses that patronize our organization and make it easier for cyclists to patronize those businesses.”

The locations have not been determined yet, and the DNA is open to suggestions, which can be made at www.MemphisDNA.org. “We would love to hear from bikers or businesses that would like to have a bike rack,” Volinchak said.

Seven racks were installed by the city in 2002 in collaboration with the county, the DNA, and the UrbanArt Commission. Those racks were designed by local artist Jill Turman. In 2003, the city opened a Memphis Bike Route, 60 miles of on-road route tours of the city, marked by signs and equipped with rest stops and several bike racks. But for people making their daily rounds at spots that aren’t tourist attractions, the new racks will be a welcome addition.

“Some of these people who live on their bikes can’t hang out downtown because their bikes will take off on them,” Volinchak said. “I just recently bought a bike and have been riding around downtown, and I’ve wanted to stop at Dyer’s or something for a burger, but there’s no place to park my bike. … We’ve had requests from cyclists that they would like to have racks, and it’ll probably bring more bikers into the area.”