Here is a collection of my top clips from Virginia Commonwealth University's student newspaper "The Commonwealth Times," the VCU Public Relations Office and other publications.

1. Home Print Edition News Teaching residency
program helps revitalize Richmond public schools
Teaching residency
program helps revitalize
Richmond public
schools
September 29, 2014
Sterling Giles
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2. On Friday, T.C. Boushall Middle School hosted U.S. Senator Tim
Kaine, VCU President Michael Rao and Richmond public schools
superintendent Dana Bedden to discuss and observe VCU’s
Richmond Teaching Residency graduate program. Photo by
Miranda Leung.
Matt Leonard
Contributing Writer
Online Content Editor
VCU President Michael Rao and U.S. Senator Tim Kaine
visited T.C. Boushall Middle School to observe the Richmond
Teachers Residence graduate program on Friday.
RTR is a four-year residency program that provides aspiring
teachers with training and field experience in the classroom
while awarding university credit. The program requires
enrollment in a one-year residency and obligation to teach a
minimum of three years in a difficult area within the
Richmond Public School system in an effort to revitalize
system’s chronically low performance.
The visit to T.C. Boushall began in Samantha Martin’s eighth
grade physical science class. Students were working on a lab
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Island University at Bill Feck Field. Game 1 The
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maternity leave. The girls defeated

3. where they observed the rate of diffusion for food coloring in
beakers containing hot and cold water.
Martin is a clinical residence coach (CRC) for the program.
This means she mentors a graduate student who is in the
residency program.
The graduate student Martin is mentoring is Christal Corey.
Kaine spoke with Corey briefly about how she became
involved with the program before she took over the class and
began talking to the students about molecules and their
movement through water.
Kaine and Rao walked back to the “We the People” room at
T.C. Boushall where they had a discussion about RTR with
people involved in the program including Dana Bedden,
superintendent of Richmond Public Schools; Christine
Walther-Thomas, the dean of VCU’s school of education; and
Wildad Abed, the principal of T.C. Boushall.
The day before this meeting the RTR program learned they
had received a $7.5 million Teacher Quality Enhancement
Program grant from the U.S. Department of Education.
Walther-Thomas said this would fund the program for 5
years. A $5.8 million grant started and has maintained the
program for the last five years.
Residents have the ability to choose from either the SE
(special/exceptional education) or secondary track. The
secondary track is designed to teach core subjects such as
biology, English and math. The program was developed in
2010 in response to the needs of the RPS.
“There was a need for strong, dedicated core teachers,” said
Kristi Harris, an SE-track resident. “That’s how the program
SECTION
ART & CULTURE

4. started.”
The SE track was introduced this year and was developed in
response to the growing desire for special education teachers
in the Richmond metro area. Residents complete specialized
three-month training courses led by the CRCs over the
summer. When the school year begins, the residents typically
teach four days a week and participate in seminars on
Fridays.
In the classroom, the CRCs take the lead during lessons, but
the residents gradually receive more teaching time as the
year continues under observation and critique by their
mentor.
“I have been provided with a little bit of extra breathing room
for me to try out new, engaging and innovative lessons and
teaching practices with the students,” said Gregory Palmer, a
secondary track math resident.
Palmer was enthusiastic about this structural aspect of the
program, because he said it allows him to incorporate
creative methods in his lessons.
“It’s a safety net,” Harris said regarding the convenience the
program provides. “It’s great to have someone there so
everything doesn’t fall on you.”
Harris and Palmer both agreed the residency program is far
more effective than the prior training they received as
substitute and volunteer teachers. These programs would
only consist of a six to eight week training period after which
participants were immediately thrust into the school system
with no further assistance.
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"
"

5. The SE mentor coordinator, Cecilia Batalo, Ph.D., said she
thinks the secondary tract has had much success among its
residents and school system and is similarly enthusiastic
about the future of the newer SE path.
“The program is evolving nicely and the students are all
doing well in their placements,” Batalo said. “This is showing
the same with our SE residents even though they are just
beginning their year of residency,” she added.
A recurring theme within the RTR program is establishing
residents as effective and accessible resources for their
students. Harris stressed the importance of building
relationships with the students. An example of this is when
last week, the residents visited some of the low-income
neighborhoods their students inhabit to better understanding
their home environment.
“I think it’s the same whether you’re teaching general
education or special education but the key is you have to
learn your kids,” Harris said. “Meet them where they are to
bring them where they need to be.”
RTR is not the only VCU program dedicated to better serving
the city’s education system.
The Institute for Education Sciences, IES, a sect of the U.S.
Department of Education, offered a different grant to VCU
professors Bryce McLeod and Kevin Sutherland to research
behavioral problems in local preschool children. The four-
year grant totaled up to $1.6 million.
For the last seven years, Sutherland, a professor in VCU’s
School of Education, has been working on developing early
intervention programs for preschools in the Richmond area
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Highlight 23rd
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Film Festival
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"
"
"

6. after finding that there is a correlation between poverty and
behavioral problems.
“We know that 18 to 25 percent of students that show up
from preschool show problem behaviors,” he said.
The objective of the programs was to develop measures to
assess the practices teachers were using in the classroom to
deal with children with behavioral problems.
Sutherland’s programs differ from prior research because his
work explores methods of intervention executed by the
teachers in the classroom opposed to focusing solely on
emotionally supportive classrooms and teachers.
He stressed that the key to implementing effective
intervention programs is to detect the signs sooner than
later. Examples of early signs of behavioral problems in
students include having difficulty sitting still in the classroom
and being incompatible with their classmates and teachers.
“You have a young child that has a problem behavior and
when we don’t help that child to be more successful in school,
over time those things get magnified,” Sutherland said.
As he delved further into his research, however, Sutherland
realized he would require more funding. He teamed up with
VCU psychology professor Bryce McLeod and developed a
grant proposal that would be sent to IES.
The process of being accepted proved to be incredibly
competitive for the duo because of the depleted available
funds resulting from federal budget cuts. With much
persistence, the team was awarded the grant money with
their third attempted proposal submission.

7. AT-RISK STUDENTS BEHAVIORAL RESEARCH
GRADUATE STUDENT GRANT MATT LEONARD
MICHAEL RAO PRESCHOOL PUBLIC EDUCATION
RESIDENCY PROGRAM RICHMOND PUBLIC SCHOOLS
RICHMOND TEACHER RESIDENCY SCHOOL
STERLING GILES STUDENT TEACHER
T.C. BOUSHALL MIDDLE SCHOOL
TEACHER QUALITY ENHANCEMENT PROGRAM
TIM KAINE U.S. DEPARTMENT OF EDUCATION
Presently, the two are planning to continue developing
intervention programs for schools in the Richmond area.
Despite the relativity of the RTR program and the duo’s
study, the two are not working in unison. However,
Sutherland was involved in the RTR program over the
summer where he served as a CRC for SE residents. Harris
was one of Sutherland’s trainees during the summer.
“The (residents) are bright, they are motivated, and they are
enthusiastic,” Sutherland said. “They have all these traits you
would hope for teachers that I would like to have teach my
own children.”
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8. VCU students’ #BlackExcellence video goes viral
Sterling Giles, Capital News Service
Published: February 23, 2016, 10:57 am
VCU students (left to right): Schyler Landrum, Terry Everret,Terrence Everett and Jonathan Brooks
RICHMOND – Rap cyphers started in the early days of hip-hop on urban playgrounds and in
concert halls. But recently, they have garnered notable attention on social media.
Zip Code Get a Quote

9. The latest cypher sensation on YouTube, Twitter and other platforms is by a group of Virginia
Commonwealth University students rapping about their majors in the medical field. Over the
past month, the group’s breakout video (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fJGifLjjsaY) has
been watched more than 37 million times and received national attention.
Donning dapper suits and ties, first-year students Jonathan Brooks and twin brothers Terrence
and Terry Everett were the participants in the 30-second video. Schyler Landrum, who lives on
the same dormitory floor, recorded the cypher on a smartphone.
“We were just sitting around in the dorm, and we didn’t really have anything to do. So we were
like, ‘Let’s bust a rhyme really quick for Twitter.’ We didn’t expect it to blow [up] like this but it
did, and that’s a blessing,” Terry Everett said in an interview with a local culture blog, Rich City.
The students posted the video on Twitter on Martin Luther King Day with the hashtag
#BlackExcellence – shorthand for looking smart and being smart. Within days, the video
exploded all over social media. It was reposted on numerous social media sites, amassing a
combined 37 million views. Since then, the young men have added two more videos
(https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCX4h8iTxHTIUOaggKs_eONw) to the “Black Excellence”
series.
The original video has received an outpouring of support from social media blogs, celebrities
and the local community. Sway Calloway, host of the popular satellite talk show “Sway In The
Morning,” has asked to feature the students on his show.
The #BlackExcellence video was in part an answer to the “Geeked Up Challenges” – raps
circulating on social media that often include explicit content about sex, drugs and violence.

10. “We just wanted to take something negative and turn it positive and to show kids how attractive
intelligence can be,” Terrence Everett said in the Rich City interview.
For their efforts, the aspiring doctors have received branding opportunities from necktie
companies and invitations to speaking engagements.
Family members helped out by creating a website, www.bthemovement.com
(http://www.bthemovement.com/). It accepts donations and sells “Black Excellence” wristbands,
with all proceeds going toward the students’ tuition.
Last week, the Everett brothers and Brooks collaborated with a local producer and released
their first full-length track, “Black Excellence Movement – Be the Movement.” It is available for
free on SoundCloud (https://soundcloud.com/user-211838429/black-excellence-movement-be-
the-movement-1).
“If we join hands together and touch youth of all colors, we can be a movement that personifies
excellence of children of all colors,” the group said on its website. “Dr. Martin Luther King had a
dream that one day we would all join together for a greater good. We embody his philosophy
and are doing our part to make our nation greater.”
Editor’s note: CNS reporter Sterling Giles is a writer and social media representative for Rich City, a
blog about art, music and culture in Richmond.

11. VCU NEWS
Wednesday, April 13, 2016
Students shine at local underground music festival
By Sterling Giles
University Public Affairs
Friday, Aug. 21, 2015
Music festivals occur all over the globe but few feature underground artists exclusively. Richmond is home to one of those few —
Epic Fest, an annual music festival hosted by Slapdash, a local music promotion agency.
Virginia Commonwealth University senior Marques “M.arques B.erry” Berry, an English major, and sophomore Jake Barkley, a
creative advertising major, made their Epic Fest debuts this summer. Recalling the emphatic crowds at the venues as well as the
uniqueness and talent of the other artists, both agreed the experience was a blast. They also appreciated Slapdash’s hard work in
organizing the festival and making sure it ran smoothly.
“I loved the energy that was there,” Barkley said. “You could really feel the vibe that something special was going on.”
That’s what the organizers had intended. Richmond natives Derail “Cain McCoy” Hampton, a VCU alumnus, and Robert “Octavion
X” Markum founded Slapdash in 2009 to provide venues for local artists.
The first Epic Fest, in 2010, originally consisted of a single-day event in which artists performed at a local venue. Now in its fifth
year, the festival lasts an entire week, taking place at several venues. This year’s Epic Fest, held in late June, featured more than
50 graphic and performing artists from the city and beyond.

12. Jake Barkley performing at Epic Fest.

13. “All of the artists on the bill are bubbling — so essentially we are breaking artists to you guys that you normally wouldn’t hear
about,” Hampton said.
This year’s first event, Epic Art Battle, took place at Gallery 5 and featured performances from local musicians as well as
showcases from graphic artists.
Barkley and Berry performed a set together. Despite their differences in rap flows, they said they had one of the best sets of the
evening.
“I feel we stood out from the rest of the performers — our set meshed really well,” Barkley said.
Berry and Barkley plan to pursue careers as performing artists after graduation. However, as students, they constantly battle with
balancing school and their respective crafts. Berry said the balance can prove difficult, but he believes ultimately his academic
studies are strengthening his artistic pursuits.
Barkley feels the same way.
“This is my mentality — take what you learn from your formal education and apply it to your life,” he said.
Slapdash founders and Richmond natives Robert “Octavion X” Markum (left) and Derail “Cain McCoy” Hampton, a VCU alumnus.
This is my mentality — take what you learn from your formal education and
apply it to your life.
“
”

14. Subscribe to the weekly
VCU News email
newsletter
at http://newsletter.news.vcu.edu/ and receive a selection of stories, videos, photos, news clips and event listings in your inbox
every Thursday.
ques “M.arques B.erry” Berry at Epic Fest.
”
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