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How Positive Outlier Districts Create a Strong and Stable Teaching Force
Caitlin Scott
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This brief summarizes successful strategies for creating a strong and stable teaching force. These strategies are drawn from "positive outlier" districts in California that have excelled at helping African American, Latino/a, and White students achieve at high levels on assessments of academic standards in English language arts and mathematics. Case studies of seven of these districts indicate several effective strategies for recruiting, developing, and retaining high-quality teachers. These strategies include a clear philosophy and effective process for teacher hiring, a well-developed teacher pipeline, a strategic long-term commitment to professional growth, and a focus on teacher retention.
The full report on which this brief is based is available here.
Teachers are essential to student success. Indeed, student achievement tends to be greater when school districts invest in teacher quality, including recruiting, developing, and retaining well-prepared teachers.Ferguson, R. (1991). Paying for public education: New evidence on how and why money matters. Harvard Journal on Legislation, 28, 465–498; Wenglinsky, H. (1997). How money matters: The effect of school district spending on academic achievement. Sociology of Education, 70(3), 221–237; Elmore, R. F., & Burney, D. (1999). "Investing in Teacher Learning: Staff Development and Instructional Improvement" in Darling-Hammond, L., & Sykes, G. (Eds.). Teaching as the Learning Profession: A Handbook of Policy and Practice (pp. 263–291). San Francisco, CA: Jossey-Bass.
Recognizing the importance of teachers, effective districts often establish practices and policies aimed at ensuring a strong teaching staff.Leithwood, K. (2010). Characteristics of school districts that are exceptionally effective in closing the achievement gap. Leadership and Policy in Schools, 9(3), 245–291. What do these district efforts to create a strong and stable teaching force look like?
This question was addressed as part of a series of Learning Policy Institute studies. First, researchers identified "positive outlier districts" in California in which—accounting for differences in socioeconomic status (SES)—African American, Latino/a, and White students substantially outperformed their peers on California's state assessments.The measures of district performance are the residual scores produced by a statistical model that assessed the difference between districts' predicted California Assessment of Student Performance and Progress English language arts and math scores and their actual average scores in 2014–15, 2015–16, and 2016–17 for African American, Latino/a, and White students. (See Figure 1.) Districts in the top right quadrant of Figure 1 were identified as positive outlier districts because African American and Latino/a students, as well as White students, excelled in both mathematics and English language arts.
In the initial analysis of district performance, which controlled for the SES of families, teacher qualifications stood out as the in-school factor most strongly associated with students' success.Podolsky, A., Darling-Hammond, L., Doss, C., & Reardon, S. F. (2019). California's positive outliers: Districts beating the odds. Palo Alto, CA: Learning Policy Institute. On average in this study, the lower the percentage of teachers with substandard credentials, including permit, waiver, or intern credentials, the higher the student achievement. In addition, teachers' average experience level within a district was positively associated with achievement for African American and Latino/a students.
The researchers then conducted individual case studies, including interviews and reviews of administrative data, in seven of the positive outlier districts, selected for their geographic and demographic diversity. The goal was to understand more deeply the factors that may account for the success of their students, in particular their students of color. This brief describes insights about the teacher workforce gleaned from an analysis of all seven district case studies.
These districts employed a variety of purposeful strategies that focus on attracting and selecting well-prepared teacher candidates, developing their skills further, and creating working conditions that help retain these effective educators. The districts' strategies included a clear philosophy and effective process for teacher hiring, a well-developed teacher and leader pipeline, a strategic long-term commitment to professional growth, and a focus on teacher retention. This brief summarizes the district strategies and concludes with lessons learned and guidance for policymakers.
The Positive Outlier Case Study Districts
This brief summarizes lessons learned from case studies conducted at seven positive outlier school districts in California.Burns, D., Darling-Hammond, L., & Scott, C. (with Allbright, T., Carver-Thomas, D., Daramola, E. J., David, J. L., Hernández, L. E., Kennedy, K. E., Marsh, J. A., Moore, C. A., Podolsky, A., Shields, P. M., & Talbert, J. E.). (2019). Closing the opportunity gap: How positive outlier districts in California are pursuing equitable access to deeper learning. Palo Alto, CA: Learning Policy Institute. Table 1 provides more information about these districts.
Demographics and Achievement
As Table 1 shows, the districts typically have higher-than-average percentages of English learners and/or students from low-income families, but they outperform other California districts serving students with similar socioeconomic status (SES). Achievement levels are shown as "residual" scores, which express the difference between students' actual scores and the average performance of similar students in other districts. Any number above zero is a positive difference. Residuals near 0.2 or above are exceptional.
Stable Teaching Force
Based on an analysis of staffing data, all seven of the case study districts also have more stable teaching forces and fewer teachers with substandard credentials than is typical in California. Several of the case study districts reported that they have also been less impacted by recent teacher shortages, thanks to their low turnover.
For example, from the 2015–16 to 2016–17 school years:
3.5% of teachers statewide left to work in other districts, while in the case study districts the average was just 1.8%.
8.5% of California teachers left the state or the profession, compared to just 6.9% of teachers in these districts.
Along with these low attrition rates, the case study districts have smaller proportions of underprepared teachers, calculated based on the number of intern credentials, permits, and waivers among their teaching force. In 2016–17, just 2.5% of teachers in these districts were underprepared, as compared to 4.0% statewide.
A Clear Philosophy and Effective Process for Teacher Hiring
All the districts had well-developed hiring processes that emphasized a robust body of teaching knowledge and skills, as well as candidates' dispositions to teach all children well. The districts involved both central office and school-level staff in making decisions about hiring—and used data including demonstration lessons as well as multiple interviews to ascertain candidates' abilities.
Clovis Unified, a district of more than 42,000 students in Fresno County, provides an example. The district's unique approach to hiring teachers was articulated in "Doc's Charge," developed by the district's founding superintendent, Dr. Floyd Buchanan (1960–91). The document asked teachers to be role models, because developing "winning" students requires surrounding them with winning adults. It states:
We've got a Clovis image to keep up, and we're looking for people a cut above the average. We're concerned about your appearance, your attitude, your teaching skills, your ability to work with students, but most of all we're concerned about your character and your values.
To get hired at Clovis, teachers must be committed to teaching all students, regardless of the students' backgrounds. Teacher hiring was a staged process of between four and seven interviews plus direct evidence of teaching skill. Initial screening by school principals, typically together with a school-based panel, involved several interviews or a demonstration lesson. The principal then took selected candidates for an interview with the area superintendent. If that interview was a success, the area superintendent took the candidate for a final interview with the district superintendent, who determined whether to offer the applicant a contract.
In Chula Vista Elementary District, a 30,053-student k–6 district in San Diego County, the teacher hiring process occurred at the site level, but in a way that emulated the district's philosophy related to hiring for leadership roles. To meet the district's goal of cultivating a team of "A-players," the hiring process involved defining the desired key competencies and attracting a pool of high-quality candidates. It also emphasized consensus on hiring decisions from the community to ensure the best candidates were chosen to meet community needs.
Long Beach Unified, one of California's largest school districts, with more than 76,000 students, also emphasized teachers' character and disposition in its hiring goals. A senior district administrator described the qualities they seek in prospective teachers:
First and foremost, we value [the applicant's] character.… And we value the teacher who will say, "You can put me at any school" because the city of Long Beach is so diverse, … the district is so diverse, … we prefer the teacher who has that attitude that they can teach at any school.
An equity orientation was central to Long Beach's hiring process, and the interview process sought to assess teachers' attitudes toward teaching students of all backgrounds and levels and to hire only those who believe all students can be successful.
Thoughtful and Collaborative Development of a Teacher Pipeline
The case study districts did not wait for excellent, highly qualified staff magically to appear and knock on their doors. They used proactive strategies to develop educator pipelines. This included creating strong partnerships with initial teacher education programs and developing Grow-Your-Own strategies.
Strong Partnerships With Initial Teacher Education Programs
Several studies show that graduates of teacher preparation programs often take their first teaching assignments in familiar locations, either near where they student teach or near their hometowns.Boyd, D., Lankford, H., Loeb, S., & Wyckoff, J. (2005). The draw of home: How teachers' preferences for proximity disadvantage urban schools. Journal of Policy Analysis and Management: The Journal of the Association for Public Policy Analysis and Management, 24(1), 113–132; Krieg, J. M., Theobald, R., & Goldhaber, D. (2016). A foot in the door: Exploring the role of student teaching assignments in teachers' initial job placements. Educational Evaluation and Policy Analysis, 38(2), 364–388. Most of the case study districts cited proximity to, and strong collaborative relationships with, initial teacher education programs as factors in the recruitment of teaching staff. Research also indicates that high-quality teacher preparation programs are important for teacher retention,Darling-Hammond, L., Sutcher, L., & Carver-Thomas, D. (2018). Teacher shortages in California: Status, sources, and potential solutions [Technical report]. Stanford, CA: Stanford University and Policy Analysis for California Education (PACE). and several of the case study districts were notable in the ways they worked with nearby programs.
San Diego Unified, with more than 128,000 students, is California's second-largest school district. Many of the district's early career educators came from local universities and had typically interned or student taught in the district. The district–university relationships were built and strengthened over many years with substantive give-and-take about the nature of preparation so that teachers and leaders would be familiar with the district's approach, including a distinctive language- and literature-rich approach to literacy development represented in both university training and district practice.
Similarly, Long Beach educators and postsecondary teacher education faculty at California State University at Long Beach collaborated to develop the coursework, fieldwork, and professional development for current and future Long Beach teachers. A district administrator commented:
It's a nice symbiotic relationship.… Many of our students will stay within the city. They will go to Long Beach City College. They will go to Cal State Long Beach. They'll get their teacher credential, and they're back in our system. That, I think, is something that just creates a nice synergy over time that has gone on now for 50-plus years.
The synergy extended further because experienced educators from Long Beach Unified often went on to become instructors at Cal State Long Beach, and thus former teachers from the district were involved as instructors in the preparation of its future teachers. In addition, current Long Beach teachers often acted as cooperating teachers for student-teachers and as co-instructors in some courses. Several teachers commented that having their colleagues as teacher educators provided a smooth transition into the district for prospective teachers.
District and school representatives at Gridley Unified, a district of about 2,000 students in rural Butte County, said that close partnerships with university teacher education programs gave the district an advantage in teacher hiring. They indicated that, unlike many districts in the state and, particularly, rural districts, Gridley had not faced teacher shortages. As one principal noted, "We're very close to UC Davis and Chico State. And so we get very good, qualified teachers. I mean, I can't remember hiring one that did not have a credential."
Grow-Your-Own Strategies
Long Beach was also among several case study districts to use Grow-Your-Own strategies that encouraged local youth to return to the district as teachers. As part of a long-standing agreement known as the Long Beach College Promise, Long Beach students receive their first year of study at Long Beach City College tuition free and are also guaranteed admission to Cal State Long Beach if they meet the entrance requirements. This has provided Long Beach students, including those interested in teacher education, with an incentive to undertake training locally. This strategy can have the extra benefit of helping districts diversify their future teaching workforce and ultimately their administrative workforce as well.
Clovis also used a Grow-Your-Own approach, and administrators estimated that 40–50% of teachers had themselves once been students in Clovis schools. Their Grow-Your-Own approach involved two main elements. The first was that all five high schools in the district offer an education pathway as part of their Career Technical Education (CTE) programs. The district also reported that a number of graduates of its parent academies—offered in Spanish, English, and Hmong, and primarily intended to serve as a bridge between home and school—had later gone on to work in the district as instructional aides.
A second element was that Clovis provided training for existing instructional aides seeking to become teachers. Realizing that around 50% of the district aides working in after-school and preschool programs were themselves seeking to become credentialed teachers, the district initiated a program for these staff to receive monthly professional learning in literacy instruction, lesson observation, and peer feedback.
A Strategic Long-Term Commitment to Professional Growth
The positive outlier case study districts used collaborative professional learning as a key to their implementation of the new Common Core State Standards, their improvement of student outcomes, and ultimately their retention of successful staff. They invested in a variety of supports to make their collaborative professional learning effective, including working with external coaches and analyzing student data in order to implement professional learning cycles.
Collaborative Professional Learning for Teachers
In the case study districts, processes were in place to promote collaboration in professional learning across classrooms and schools, and often across roles, with strategies for sharing practices systemwide. In each case, practice was increasingly deprivatized: It became public and shared as educators were expected to learn from one another and to develop common norms and practices, not close the door and do their own thing. (See "Professional Learning Supports in Long Beach Unified School District" for a description of collaboration in Long Beach).
For example, many of the districts used a long-standing practice—professional learning communities (PLCs)—to bring teacher teams together regularly to understand standards, plan instruction, reflect on student work, revisit lessons accordingly, and plan interventions and enrichment to ensure that all students learn.
Sanger Unified, a Fresno County district with almost 12,000 students, first invested in PLCs in 2005 as its primary strategy for turning around student performance. Their approach has evolved over time, including transitioning to a continuous improvement PLC strategy. In that context, the district invested heavily in developing teacher leadership, creating positions in schools to support teacher learning (curriculum support providers), and focusing principals on leading learning in their schools' PLCs. PLCs have become the way of doing business among teachers and administrators alike. By 2012, the district had developed effective systems and routines for professionals at all levels who work together to ensure that all students achieve to high standards.
Chula Vista also used PLCs across multiple levels. Meetings of central office administrators included in-depth discussions of research related to instruction and leadership. Cohorts of principals met monthly to discuss data, problem-solve, conduct school walk-throughs, and share best practices and resources. Instructional leadership teams, which included school site administrators and teacher leaders, attended district professional learning sessions together and then determined how the content could be incorporated into their school's professional learning structure. At school sites, whole-staff sessions and grade-level PLCs discussed learnings from the instructional leadership teams, and then had time to experiment with new teaching strategies, observe peers, and discuss implementation.
Professional Learning Supports in Long Beach Unified School District
In Long Beach, the approach to cross-role collaboration and professional learning engaged educators across schools to help ensure effective practices were shared. The district put a number of supports in place for this purpose.
Curriculum specialists: A team of curriculum specialists creates curricular materials, co-teaches lessons with teachers to model instructional strategies, guides staff discussions about content and standards, and facilitates several other professional learning strategies.
Instructional leadership teams: A principal and at least two or three teachers from each school attend district-level professional learning sessions together two to three times a year. They are expected to bring the training back to their schools to help facilitate school improvements.
Collaborative inquiry visits: Each school is in a network with approximately three other schools. Teachers and administrators visit each other's schools to give each other feedback in the areas they are working on and to learn about practices they might implement in their own schools. An online platform called ObserveMe facilitates scheduling of these visits.
Unit lesson study: District instructional coaches work with teams of teachers at a school site to take a "deep dive" into what students should know and then plan a lesson together, teach the lesson while watching each other, and review outcome data to determine how to improve upon the lesson. Teachers thus practice the steps necessary to collaborate together and gain a better understanding of the standards and instructional practices needed to support student learning.
Principal meetings: Principals attend district meetings focused on teaching, learning, and student data, especially as they relate to supporting instructional shifts. Principal meetings had existed in the district for several years, but they became more focused on teaching and learning after 2014–15.
MyPD: The district compiled instructional resources and videos of teachers from across the district delivering lessons on different topics and addressing different standards. This convenient video platform provides personalized, self-paced courses for teachers and helps educators see what effective teaching and learning looks like in Long Beach classrooms.
Staff meetings: A Long Beach philosophy is that every meeting is professional development. School leaders are encouraged to make sure that every whole-school, grade-level, or department meeting is dedicated to helping teachers meet the school's goals, rather than focusing on administrative or logistical issues.
Professional Learning Cycles and Coaching
The districts took a phased approach to the implementation of the new standards, focusing first on providing time for teachers to unpack the standards and understand their expectations, then engaging in professional learning cycles to support instructional shifts. These cycles centered on using student data for three purposes: (1) to inform instruction in the classroom, (2) to target extra supports to students' needs, and (3) to evaluate the effectiveness of strategies. Supporting teachers well through this process contributed to teacher retention.
Most districts brought on instructional coaches to support these learning cycles. In Hawthorne, which serves about 8,500 students in Los Angeles County, each school had two coaches—one for literacy and one for mathematics—who led professional learning cycles. The coaches worked with teachers to identify a focus area, meet to discuss lesson plans, observe a lesson, and meet again to guide teacher reflection on the lesson and future changes. Coaches emphasized that their role was not to judge teachers, but rather to offer support for instructional improvement. A mathematics coach described it as follows:
I'm not evaluative. I'm a peer coach.… It's a really collaborative piece with teachers. It's not like, "You did this great, you did this poorly." No, that's not my job. My job is, "If we're going to have your kids access this curriculum, how can I help you do that?"
Along with developing internal structures and supports for improvement, the case study districts engaged with external partners such as universities, county offices of education, and nonprofit organizations. The districts were strategic in their approaches to such partnerships, identifying specific areas of learning needed and selecting partners able to provide these. The districts also favored sustained engagements with external partners over short-term arrangements, and several used such partnerships to address specific issues of equity.
For example, San Diego Unified engaged deeply with two organizations on issues of equity. One partner guided the district in analyzing barriers to more equitable enrollment in Advanced Placement and International Baccalaureate classes and facilitating greater enrollment in classes that meet California's university entrance requirements. The other partnership helped with the development of a districtwide equity vision, identifying five equity levers for change and using these to translate the vision into concrete practices. Specifically, the work brought attention to professional learning to support students of color and students from low-income families.
A Focus on Teacher Retention
The districts' high rates of teacher retention were a function of the hiring of well-prepared teachers (who typically stay in the profession longer), of supporting teachers' development, and of establishing a positive district culture committed to teachers' professional growth.
In Sanger, both administrators and teachers attributed the stable teaching force to the district's collaborative culture. In Gridley, teachers mentioned the supports they received when they needed things for their classrooms, allowing them to focus on teaching.
In Hawthorne, district leaders intentionally built relationships grounded in collaboration and shared purpose. An associate superintendent said:
I think people really feel like they play a role and their voice is heard. I think that that's part of what makes people stay in their jobs. It's not always the paycheck. It's that sense of purpose, being a part of a bigger effort, satisfaction, [and] feeling valued. I feel like people feel that here.
In Clovis, several teachers and administrators talked about the systems in place to support teachers and about the culture of high performance. One teacher mentioned the district's structures and supports to help teachers with challenges in their work. These included support staff for students' social and emotional well-being and "transition teams" to help high-need students adjust in moving from elementary to intermediate and from intermediate to high school. He added, "[Administrators] are supportive.… If I need help, I can ask someone for some help, and I feel like they will value that question from me."
Developing a culture and climate of support can be challenging, especially in larger districts. In Long Beach, the district has a dedicated Teacher Quality and Retention Office focused on supporting and keeping teachers. Staffing surveys revealed that teachers identified opportunities for professional development as the main reason they would choose to stay in the district.
Strategies for Building a Strong, Stable Teacher Workforce
The seven positive outlier school districts highlighted in this brief are among the leading districts in California in providing learning opportunities for all students in ways that promote greater equity. They do not hold all the answers for creating a strong, stable teaching force, but their approaches related to recruiting, hiring, developing, and retaining effective teachers provide lessons for local schools and districts, as well as guidance for both state and federal policymakers.
Lessons for Schools and Districts
The case study districts enjoy greater-than-average stability among their teachers, enabling them to avoid teacher shortages that have plagued many school districts in California. Their intentional strategies and staffing-related practices are worthy of consideration by local district and school leaders looking to build a strong and stable workforce and improve student learning.
Consistent and intentional hiring practices distinguished the case study districts. Most had a clearly articulated philosophy regarding the character and disposition of the teaching candidates they were looking for. That included a commitment to teaching all students and confidence in students' ability to succeed. Using different approaches, the case study districts also balanced school and district input into hiring teachers and the processes they employed to do so.
Proactive strategies related to recruitment were also standard practice in the case study districts. This included the development of close partnerships with the teacher preparation programs at nearby universities. Grow-Your-Own strategies helped to feed the teacher pipeline in those programs and also support staff diversity.
Intentional efforts to develop and retain teachers included a focus on staffing, and districts built pipelines and systems to recruit and—importantly—keep good teachers. They sought and helped train strong candidates to hire, often in partnership with nearby schools of education; ensured supportive mentoring; and invested in ongoing professional learning. They identified and developed leadership talent among teachers to enable them to mentor, coach, and lead school improvement. They treated educators as a valuable resource—not as interchangeable widgets—hiring carefully and supporting them once hired. These teachers were essential to instruction as schools worked to implement rigorous and meaningful learning opportunities for all students.
Guidance for Federal, State, and Local Policy
Policymakers at the federal and state levels can support strategies and practices that strengthen the teacher workforce. To ensure that all districts are able to build and retain a similarly strong and stable educator workforce, policymakers have a responsibility both to produce an adequate supply of well-prepared teachers and to support opportunities for professional learning. These policymakers can:
Help expand high-retention pathways into teaching that research shows can both recruit and retain teachers, such as teacher and school leader residencies and Grow-Your-Own programs that recruit and prepare diverse candidates from the community who are committed to serve there.
Provide incentives in certain high-need fields (special education, math, science, and bilingual education) and locations, given ongoing teacher shortages in these areas.
Invest in a strong, readily available infrastructure of high-quality professional learning opportunities that build the collective capacity of schools and districts to teach for 21st-century standards and to meet the full range of students' academic, social, and emotional needs.
Teachers' professional preparation and ongoing learning are vital components in developing and sustaining a strong teacher workforce. State and federal policymakers can signal this importance—and support it—by allocating funds for these purposes. In addition, at both the state and federal levels, investing in a strong, readily available infrastructure of high-quality professional learning opportunities is an effective way to build the collective capacity of schools and districts.
District-level policies and priorities play a crucial part in making the practices found in the seven positive outlier districts possible and effective. Related to hiring, district leaders should consider:
Taking a systematic approach to building a teacher pipeline by considering all available opportunities, from the creation of teaching pathways in high school CTE programs to cultivating active partnerships with local teacher preparation programs.
Making it a priority to hire and mentor well-prepared teachers with the disposition and commitment to teach every child and creating hiring processes accordingly, including finding the right balance between district and school input into the hiring process.
School districts can support capacity by focusing not only on outcomes but on the learning of educators to help all children meet those outcomes. These include PLCs and focused professional learning cycles to implement new instructional strategies and develop them in practice, supported by observation, feedback, and coaching. Districts can reach out to experts in areas that are the focus for improvement, while also harnessing expertise among existing staff. As seen in the positive outlier districts, these investments in teachers' and leaders' professional learning pay off in much stronger student learning.
By definition, the positive outlier districts in our study are exceptions to the norm. They succeed in ways that are relatively rare in the system as a whole. Often, districts identified as performing at high levels are those that serve affluent, advantaged students who have substantial home and school resources. Those districts, however, offer few lessons about creating a strong and stable teacher workforce that can successfully serve a more socioeconomically diverse group of students without extraordinary resources.
Our study captured lessons from California districts succeeding with African American, Latino/a, and White students and attaining high levels of achievement on assessments of academic standards in English language arts and mathematics. Among a much larger number of positive outliers in California, we chose to study districts from diverse contexts—geographically dispersed; large and small; urban, suburban, and rural—and found some common themes in district and school leadership.
We found that these districts employed a variety of purposeful strategies focused on attracting and selecting well-prepared teacher candidates, developing their skills further, and creating working conditions that help retain these effective educators. The districts' strategies included a clear philosophy and effective process for teacher hiring, a well-developed teacher pipeline, a strategic long-term commitment to professional growth, and a focus on teacher retention. The accomplishments of these positive outlier districts show that, by acting intentionally, districts can work to create a strong and stable workforce and help ensure all students have effective teachers.
How Positive Outlier Districts Create a Strong and Stable Teaching Force by Dion Burns, Linda Darling-Hammond, and Caitlin Scott is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License.
Funding for this project and the deeper learning work of the Learning Policy Institute has been provided by the Heising-Simons Foundation, Raikes Foundation, Sandler Foundation, and William and Flora Hewlett Foundation.
Cover photo provided with permission by Clovis Unified School District.
Educator QualityEquitable Resources and Access
Burns, D., Darling-Hammond, L., & Scott, C. (2020). How positive outlier districts create a strong and stable teaching force (research brief). Palo Alto, CA: Learning Policy Institute.
California's Positive Outliers: Districts Beating the Odds (report and brief)
Closing the Opportunity Gap: How Positive Outlier Districts in California Are Pursuing Equitable Access to Deeper Learning (report, brief, and case studies)
Positive Outliers: Understanding Extraordinary School Districts (blog)
California's Positive Outliers: Promising District Approaches for Achieving Educational Equity (event)
Instructionally Engaged Leaders in Positive Outlier Districts (brief)
Inequitable Opportunity to Learn: Student Access to Certified and Experienced Teachers
Access to fully certified and experienced teachers matters for student outcomes and achievement, yet many states have hired uncertified and inexperienced teachers to fill gaps created by persistent teacher shortages. These teachers are disproportionately found in schools with high enrollments of students of color, according to LPI analysis of the most recent U.S. Department of Education Civil Rights Data Collection, which has proposed cutting key data collection questions related to school funding and educator experience.
The California Way: The Golden State's Quest to Build an Equitable and Excellent Education System
California students, families, educators, and policymakers are at the center of one of the most ambitious, equity-focused education reforms in the country. Changes include a bold, new approach to equitable funding, a more holistic vision of student and school success, and community engagement in decision making. This study analyzes the impact of the reforms on opportunities and outcomes, and identifies the challenges ahead for California.
Taking the Long View: State Efforts to Solve Teacher Shortages by Strengthening the Profession
Most states have been struggling to address teacher shortages for several years, often filling the vacuum with underprepared teachers. Governors and legislators in many of these states are now working to turn the tide. A new report from the Learning Policy Institute focuses on six evidence-based policies that states are pursuing to address their teacher shortages that can help states build long-term sustainable systems to attract, develop, and retain a strong and stable teacher workforce.


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Lion Real Estate Group Moves Headquarters to Dallas from Los Angeles
DALLAS, Texas (MO.Properties) – Lion Real Estate Group, LLC ("LREG"), a real estate investment and asset management firm focused on acquiring value-add and opportunistic multifamily and creative office properties, today announced the relocation of its corporate headquarters from Los Angeles to Dallas, Texas. The firm has taken space at 3811 Turtle Creek Blvd., less than five miles from Dallas' Main Street District, and will retain its Los Angeles office to support West Coast operations.
"The decision to relocate our corporate headquarters to Dallas aligns with our strategy of acquiring desirable multifamily assets outside of the urban core, both here in Texas and in other high-growth cities across the Sunbelt and Southeast," said Jeff Weller, Co-Founder and Managing Principal of LREG. "We also feel that the move will help us expand our network of family offices and High Net Worth individuals that are seeing the type of bespoke, long-term real estate investment opportunities that we offer on a one-off basis and via our Lion Funds."
"We are proactively on the lookout for attractive multi-family housing properties in areas with attractive economic prospects, extensive amenities, and convenient access to a mix of urban centers and major freeways in strong growth markets," said Mory Barak, Co-Founder and Managing Principal of LREG. "Having a physical presence in Dallas-Fort Worth-Arlington checks many of these boxes and will improve our ability to secure direct deals on attractive terms with strong potential rates of return."
Texas is already a key location for LREG, which has a national portfolio of 27 properties exceeding $900 million in estimated value as of December 29, 2020. The firm owns five residential properties in the Lone Star State, including Embry Apartments (2210 Marsh Lane), a 151-unit multifamily property in Carrollton, 13 miles northwest of downtown Dallas. As of August 2020, Dallas-Fort Worth-Arlington is one of the nation's 12 largest metropolitan statistical areas (U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics).
Where feasible, LREG's investment strategy also includes financing customized renovation projects to improve property values, tenant living experiences and the portfolio's overall performance. The firm, for example, entered the greater Atlanta market in September by acquiring two Gwinnett County apartment complexes for a combined $83 million, a deal that also included a $6.73 million three-year renovation plan to improve each site's cap rate.
About Lion Real Estate Group
Lion Real Estate Group ('Lion') is a real estate investment and asset management firm founded in 2007 by Jeff Weller and Mory Barak and headquartered in Dallas, Texas. With an estimated $900 million in assets under management, Lion focuses on the acquisition of value-add and opportunistic multifamily and creative office properties by leveraging its principals' experience to create value for investors through renovation, repositioning, better management and optimum capitalization of its properties. Lion has participated in real estate transactions collectively exceeding $1.5 billion. The firm currently owns and operates 5,065 multifamily units and three office properties, located in the Dallas, Los Angeles, Nashville, Denver, Durham, Austin, Atlanta, and Salt Lake City areas. For more information, visit www.lionreg.com.
Categories: Press Release Tags: Dallas Texas
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In the subsequent sections will discuss about how mSOP can be used in the manufacturing and product maintenance domain.


DODINGTON, George (c.1681-1757), of Horsington, Som.
b. c.1681, o. surv. s. of William Dodington of London (nephew of Sir Francis Dodington of Dodington, Som., gd.-fa. of George Dodington) by Edith, da. of Thomas Rookes, stationer of London. m. (1) Alicia (d. June 1745), da. of William Gifford of Horsington and h. of her bro. Benjamin, s.p.; (2) 1746, Mary Bennet, s.p. suc. fa. 1708.
He died 14 Apr. 1757, aged 76.
1. Dodington Diary, 466, 468.


4400 Hanover is a spacious and stunning traditional home in the heart of UniversityPark was taken down to the studs and added onto including a second floor and guest quarters over the two car garage in 2000. It features a very open floor plan with four bedrooms, four baths, a study, formals and a kitchen that opens into a family room with a vaulted ceiling and French doors out to a deck and the back yard.
There are wood floors throughout the first floor and new carpet and tile in the bedrooms and baths upstairs. The home also features two fireplaces, one in the master bedroom and one in the formal living area. The kitchen has granite countertops and stainless-steel Jenn-Air appliances. In addition to a wood deck in the backyard there are two side porches that are ideal for grilling and access to the side yards.
The large master suite has vaulted ceilings in the bedroom and the bath. The master bath includes a steam shower with a bench, jetted tub, marble countertops, dual sinks, and a large walk-in closet with custom built-ins. The two other upstairs bedrooms are very spacious with vaulted ceilings, large closets, a Jack and Jill bath with new tile and lots of natural light. Other features include a spacious downstairs study with a separate storage room, wainscoting, wood burning fireplace in the living room, plantation shutters, large utility room, and a very nice bonus room / guesthouse with full bath above the garage. Located on a 60-foot tree shaded lot within walking distance to Highland Park High School. An ideal family home in the Hyer elementary school district that is ready to move in and enjoy.For More Information Click Here.


Sure, the inaugural People Magazine Awards, which took place on Thursday evening at the Beverly Hilton in Los Angeles and was televised nationally on NBC, was a blatant "pseudoevent," in the sense that it only existed as an excuse to generate attention for those associated with it: People, the 40-year-old weekly fan magazine; Entertainment Weekly, its sister publication; and whatever celebrities they could get to show up and accept prizes and/or perform in person.
But, even so, for those who were chosen and did show up and happen to also be in the hunt for Oscar nominations, the evening offered a nice opportunity to get a little free publicity before the town shuts down for the holidays — in the midst of which nomination voting will begin, on Dec. 29.
The most prominent Oscar hopeful in the room was fan favorite Jennifer Aniston, the former Friendsstar-turned-serious dramatic actress, whose performance as a woman suffering from chronic pain in the indie Cake — for which she has already been recognized with best actress SAG, Golden Globe and Critics' Choice noms — was celebrated with the Movie Performance of the Year Award (Actress).
The evening also featured a rousing performance by two other Oscar hopefuls, best original song contenders Gwen Stefani (who also collected the Style Icon of the Year Award) andPharrell Williams. The duo are actively promoting the song "Shine" from the moviePaddington, but performed Stefani's new single "Spark the Fire," which Williams produced and also features.


Coventry City have met the asking price for Walsall forward Amadou Bakayoko and could beat off competition from Bristol Rovers to land him, CoventryLive understands.
Rovers had a bid accepted by the Saddlers for the young striker, but we understand that the Sky Blues have matched that valuation as Mark Robins searches for another forward before Thursday's deadline.
Having lost last season's top scorer Marc McNulty to Championship outfit Reading, Coventry have been searching for an attacker who could help to shoulder the burden of finding the net on a regular basis as the League One campaign gets underway.
Portsmouth forward Conor Chaplin was a long-term target for Robins, but with no headway made on that front it looks as though he's switched his attentions to Bakayoko, who is behind Morgan Ferrier and Andy Cook in the Saddlers pecking order.
Now, Bakayoko has to choose which club he'd rather ply his trade at next term, though it would appear that Coventry have something of an advantage as they are able to offer him the chance to remain in the West Midlands.
Sierra Leone-born Bakayoko has scored 18 times over the course of the last two seasons for Walsall, and has previously had loan spells at non-league Southport, Telford and Worcester City.
How much could he cost?
It's reported by BristolLive that City will pay around £200,000 for Bakayoko, who is also wanted by Bristol Rovers.
Walsall boss Dean Keates confirmed recently that there was interest in Bakayoko that had led to a bid being accepted.
"We've had an offer for him. We've accepted it and given him permission to go to speak to the team," he said.
"We will know more in the next few days. As it stands, he's our player.
"If he doesn't get what he wants and he can't agree terms with the other club, he will be back with us.
"We've had a few tentative calls regarding him and an offer the other week that was nowhere near what we wanted and we turned it down.
Nick_Robbo90: Just seen/heard about this, Bakayoko is a strong and relatively quick striker from what I've heard, not overly prolific, but it's wrong to write someone off before they've kicked a ball for a new team. If the player signs, then welcome to CCFC.
TalkCoventry: I'm thinking about Walsall fans saying how shocking he is but he'll be getting much better chances created in our squad than he would have been in theirs.
DannySWhite: Same fans saying don't sign Bakayoko without seeing him play are the same one saying sign Chaplin without seeing him play either! Judging opinions on Wikipedia statistics. Mindboggling stuff.
DanBallinger5: Very happy with the Bakayoko deal, shows that players want to play under Robins and he seems to be a key player.
Essjayarr: Majority of Robins signings have done very well for us... I trust him more than I trust us lot at home tweeting about it. If he thinks he can improve our squad then so be it. I don't think he'd spend 200K for no reason.
AaronNash95: I remember when everyone was slating McNulty at the start of last season... look how that turned out.
Anthony_Hornsby: Highlights reel of Bakayoko makes him look really useful. As quick as anything, impressive for 6ft 4", strong, can beat a man. Seems entirely left-footed which is good as right-sided players always seem to find themselves on the wrong foot.
Brett1Davies: Looks like a decent signing exciting player that can play in different positions.
What has Robins said about transfers?
Robins, after the Sky Blues' 2-1 reverse at home to Scunthorpe in the League One curtain raiser over the weekend, admitted he was still on the look out for another centre-forward after capturing Jordy Hiwula of Huddersfield Town on a two-year deal.
"We have brought in Jordy Hiwula and we still need another body, possibly two," Robins confirmed after the defeat.


The courageous environmentalist who has lived in the branches of a thousand-year-old redwood tree since December 1997 to protest strip logging of the Headwaters Redwood Forest tells her story, including details of surviving El Ni±o storms, helicopter harassment, and a siege by company security. Reprint. 50,000 first printing.


It was a day of small price range but active buying and selling in the indices. The indices are in their daily and monthly Squeezes with increasing buying pressure.
Dow Transportation shot up on market open as it equalizes itself with the futures market on market open. It traded sharply upward in the first hour and half before range trading for the most part of the day. Further buying came in the latter part of the day before it closed with a bullish Marubozu candle. Pivot momentum remains upward. Short term volumetric buying pressure is at 100%. It close above previous daily fractal resistance and the new fractal support and resistance are at 6644.17 and 7652.8 respectively. The index is in a daily Squeeze.
Dow Industrial shot up sharply on market open as it continued trading upward for the first hour and half. It pulled back and range traded for the rest of the day and closed with small spinning top doji candle. Pivot momentum remains upward. Short term volumetric buying pressure is at 100%. Fractal support and resistance are at 15863.72 and 16510.98 respectively. The Dow Industrial is in a daily and monthly Squeeze.
Russell 2000 shot up sharply on market open and continued trading upward in the first hour of trading. It subsequently sold off and managed to recover towards the end of the day to close with a small inverted hammer. Pivot momentum remains downward. Short term volumetric buying pressure is at 25.48% which means weak buyingpressure. Fractal support and resistance are at 958.47 and 1037.27. The index is in a daily Squeeze.
Nasdaq 100 shot up sharply in the first hour and half of trading before pulling back. It then range traded for the rest of the day and closed with a small doji candle. Pivot momentum remains downward. Short term volumetric buying pressure is at 76.59% which means increasing volume is coming into the buy side. Fractal support and resistance are at 4111.93 and 4301.63 respectively. The index is in a daily and monthly Squeeze.
S&P 500 shot up sharply on market open in the first hour and half before pulling back. It range traded for the rest of the day and closed with a small doji candle. Pivot momentum remains downward. Volumetric buying pressure is at 98.58% which means a strong buying pressure. Fractal support and resistance are at 1872.7 and 1947.2 respectively. The S&P 500 is in a monthly Squeeze.
Vix remains at 21.84. Oil pulled back slightly and is now trading at $31.72 per barrel. Gold is trading at 1156.3 an ounce and continues to show strong volumetric buying pressure at 100%. With the exception of the Russell 2000, the rest of the indices are in Squeeze either in their daily or monthly charts or both.
Market sentiment remains bullish. Market breadth has turned upward. The indices are grinding upward and in their daily and monthly Squeezes. The prognosis is that the indices are grinding upward and with the strong volumetric buying pressure, we expect the indices to exit their Squeezes to the upside.


text:
WP7: NFC coming to Mango? [Rumor]
By Owen Williams Neowin @findingnewo · Jun 26, 2011 19:52 EDT · Hot! with 16 comments
This one's based on pure speculation, with nothing official from Microsoft or Nokia, but after seeing the Nokia "Sea Ray" device's "accidental leak" last week by CEO Stephen Elop we could see NFC support in Mango if the device is truly identical to the Nokia N9.
We know Microsoft hasn't said anything about this at all, but it's been widely speculated for some time that Mango could enable this capability. Paul Thurrott over at Windows Phone Secrets points out the specifications of the N9 are:
A masterfully made, single-piece body that comes in multiple, scratch-resistant colors; a 3.9-inch AMOLED screen with curved Gorilla Glass; an 8 megapixel, wide-angle, 16:9 HD auto-focus camera with Carl Zeiss optics, superior low-light performance, and 720p HD video at 30 FPS capabilities; 1 GB of RAM; 16 or 64 GB of storage; a 1 GHz dual-core ARM processor; and up to 11 hours of talk time, 450 hours of standby time, and 50 hours of music playback time. Also included are turn-by-turn navigation and NFC capabilities.
It's likely that if they're identical devices that this does mean that Microsoft is probably testing out the NFC technology at the very least. Business Week reported back in March that the Redmond software company was working on a "version of its Windows Phone software that will let users buy merchandise with a flick of the handset at a checkout counter," citing two sources.
To confirm our suspicions even more, Business Week says that "Microsoft is likely to get support in its mobile payments effort from Nokia Oyj." They also point out that Microsoft holds 14 patents that reference NFC currently.
This rumor is up in the air but it makes sense for Microsoft to jump on the NFC bandwagon now, especially with the impending release of Google Wallet and Google's recent announcement to make it cross-platform compatible.
Gaming news round up: June 24-26
Team Fortress 2 Free-to-play currently Steam's most played game
Windows 10 build 18936 starts work towards removing the old Edge browser in Front Page News
Amazon is selling a year of Office 365 Home for $69.99, ends soon
Gears 5 has all smoking references removed, following raised concerns


text:
Rebuilding Ukraine could cost hundreds of billions of dollars
Ashish Valentine, Justine Kenin
Published May 20, 2022 at 3:35 PM CDT
In fits and starts, Russia is making inroads in Ukraine. The city of Mariupol is now in Russian hands. Even as the war pounds on, Western governments are already trying to figure out how to rebuild the country after the war someday ends. The European Commission released a plan to start financing that process through a mix of grants and loans.
Here to tell us more about what it would take to rebuild the country is UC Berkeley economist Yuriy Gorodnichenko. Welcome.
YURIY GORODNICHENKO: Thank you.
KELLY: I want to start with the damage that's already been inflicted on Ukraine and what it would cost to rebuild. I imagine it's a staggering number. Can we put even a ballpark figure on it at this point?
GORODNICHENKO: One way to look at this is to do an inventory of damaged bridges, buildings and so on and calculate the cost of replacement. That would be easily in somewhere between 100- and $200 billion. It's a huge number.
We can also look at other measures and also, you know, similar efforts that were done in the past. For example, what was the cost of reconstructing Iraq or Afghanistan? If you look at the size of those countries, the level of damage, and scale everything to the Ukrainian case, you come to somewhere between $500 billion, maybe $1 trillion.
KELLY: And I gather you argue that there's an opportunity here to eventually rebuild Ukraine better than it was before, to build better public transportation and housing while you're at it, to focus on features like carbon neutrality. That all feels like a very long way away with the war still raging, but you believe that's possible?
GORODNICHENKO: Yes, of course. There is no point in rebuilding Ukraine the way it was. We had a lot of legacy buildings and everything from the Soviet era, which was very energy inefficient. We should really rebuild Ukraine up to modern standards. And this is going to be good not only in terms of climate change and everything like that, but Ukraine is going to be less dependent on Russian energy, oil and gas.
KELLY: Who pays for all this?
GORODNICHENKO: In principle, you can find multiple sources to do this. One would be Russian assets, which are frozen now in the U.S. and in other countries. It's probably tricky to make it available to Ukraine, but the proposal put together by the European Union suggest that the European Union itself is willing to pay for the majority of the cost, and obviously other countries are welcome to chip in if they have resources to do so.
KELLY: And Russia, which inflicted all this damage - is there any way of securing any kind of help, contribution from them?
GORODNICHENKO: Well, so seized assets is one option. Another, based on the precedent we had before when Iraq invaded Kuwait, is to have effectively a tax on Russian energy. And a fraction of that tax is going to flow to Ukraine to pay for their reconstruction.
KELLY: Are there past models that might be instructive - the Marshall Plan, for example, that rebuilt Europe after World War II?
GORODNICHENKO: We can learn a lot from the Marshall Plan - the way it was organized, the way conditionality was done, the way coordination was set up on the ground between American authorities and European authorities. That will be, I think, really a template for successful reconstruction of Ukraine.
One thing, however, is going to be different, is that Ukraine has an aspiration to become a member of the European Union. And so it is natural to align the reconstruction of Ukraine, you know, physical infrastructure with modernization of the country in terms of institutions so that Ukraine is going to be at some point a member of the EU family.
KELLY: That makes sense - so that the rebuilding is integrated with the joining and becoming politically more aligned with Europe.
GORODNICHENKO: Yes, that's right.
KELLY: Last question, which is, is speed of the essence here? Is there evidence to suggest that aid, whether it's in grants, loans, whatever form - that it is more valuable if it's delivered early than the same amount of aid that gets held up by months and months of red tape?
GORODNICHENKO: Yes, absolutely. This is why those conversations about the reconstruction of Ukraine should be happening now. And again, if we go back to the Marshall Plan, remember, the aid did not flow to Europe immediately. It was a couple years between 1945 and when the Marshall Plan really started to help Europe. And this were very, very difficult years for Europe. We should learn from our mistakes and make sure that there is no unnecessary suffering in Ukraine.
KELLY: Yuriy Gorodnichenko is an economist at UC Berkeley. Thanks so much for speaking with us.
GORODNICHENKO: Thank you, Mary Louise. Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.
Ashish Valentine
Ashish Valentine joined NPR as its second-ever Reflect America fellow and is now a production assistant at All Things Considered. As well as producing the daily show and sometimes reporting stories himself, his job is to help the network's coverage better represent the perspectives of marginalized communities.
See stories by Ashish Valentine


text:
Q: What does a [] square bracket mean in pointer class in C++? class Box
{
public:
    // Constructor definition
    Box(double l = 2.0, double b = 2.0, double h = 2.0)
    {
        cout << "Constructor called." << endl;
        length = l;
        breadth = b;
        height = h;
    }
    double Volume()
    {
        return length * breadth * height;
    }
private:
    double length;     // Length of a box
    double breadth;    // Breadth of a box
    double height;     // Height of a box
};

int main(void)
{
    Box Box1(3.3, 1.2, 1.5);    // Declare box1
    Box Box2(8.5, 6.0, 2.0);    // Declare box2
    Box *ptrBox;                // Declare pointer to a class.

                                // Save the address of first object
    ptrBox = &Box1;

    ptrBox[0]; // <--- What does it do?

}

A: ptrBox[0]

Is equivalent to:
*ptrBox

Pointers support the same indexing operator that arrays do. Aside from the associated storage, an array variable is just a pointer to the first element of an array, so it makes sense that pointers and arrays can be indexed in a semantically identical way.

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaStackExchange


you can learn more about EarthShips around the d.people d.collective https://www.facebook.com/d.collective.space/ which celebrate their first year in New Collogne. I recommend this very special group of d_school alumni and other young "live designers and livers"
and the neighboring Betahouse and Modulo also in the place of the Design Academy at Moritzplatz. This is one of the places where Berlin thrives.


text:
Q: gt() table - header color How do I add color to the header (i.e the column names) of my data frame using the gt() function in R
gt_Head <-
  gt_Head %>%
  tab_header(
  title = md("**Table of First 10 Observations**")
  )%>%
  tab_style(
    style = cell_text(weight = "bold"),
    locations = cells_body(
      rows = 0
    )
  )

A: You can use the column_labels.background.color option (see all options here), e.g.
library(gt)
head(mtcars, 10) |>
  gt() |>
  tab_header(
    title = md("**Table of First 10 Observations**")
  ) |>
  tab_options(column_labels.background.color = "blue")

A: Here is an example using exibble dataset from gt package.
As you can find here in the documentation https://gt.rstudio.com/reference/tab_options.html we could use heading.background.color argument:
library(gt)
library(dplyr)

tab_1 <-
  exibble %>%
  dplyr::select(-c(fctr, date, time, datetime)) %>%
  gt(
    rowname_col = "row",
    groupname_col = "group"
  ) %>%
  tab_options(
    heading.background.color = "#eebf00",
    heading.border.bottom.color = "#eebd00",
    heading.border.bottom.width = "5px",
    heading.border.lr.color = "#aae100",
    heading.border.lr.width = "50px",   #no effect
  ) %>%
  tab_header(
    title = md("Data listing from **exibble**"),
    subtitle = md("`exibble` is an R dataset")
  ) %>%
  fmt_number(columns = num) %>%
  fmt_currency(columns = currency) %>%
  tab_footnote(
    footnote = "Using commas for separators.",
    locations = cells_body(
      columns = num,
      rows = num > 1000
    )
  ) %>%
  tab_footnote(
    footnote = "Using commas for separators.",
    locations = cells_body(
      columns = currency,
      rows = currency > 1000
    )
  ) %>%
  tab_footnote(
    footnote = "Alphabetical fruit.",
    locations = cells_column_labels(columns = char)
  )

tab_1


Apollo 12 launched on schedule from Kennedy Space Center, during a rainstorm. It was the first rocket launch attended by an incumbent US president, Richard Nixon. Thirty-six-and-a-half seconds after lift-off, the vehicle triggered a lightning discharge through itself and down to the Earth through the Saturn's ionized plume. Protective circuits on the fuel cells in the service module (SM) detected overloads and took all three fuel cells offline, along with much of the command and service module (CSM) instrumentation. A second strike at 52 seconds after launch knocked out the "8-ball" attitude indicator. The telemetry stream at Mission Control was garbled. However, the vehicle continued to fly correctly; the strikes had not affected the Saturn V Instrument Unit.
New interesting posts: Real Planet Neptune, Solar System Preschool Craft Ideas, Nasa Photos Of Earth With Stars, Cheapest Solar System, Escape Mcc Chicago, Nasa Sls Side, 1929 Original Hubble Diagram, Edible Asteroids, Dark Matter Research. Tom And Jerry Blast Off To Mars Jerry. Black Hole The Great Attractor. Aristotle's Solar System In English. Greenhouse Nasa Moon Base. Planets Surface From Outer Space.


I think my half leaser was more excited than I was for the girth… the whole girth extender thing has been a real pain hahaha.
Wow, that pad fits amazing under your jump saddle! Nothing bothers me more than a jump pad whose flap shape doesn't fit the saddle.
Right! My ECP was PERFECT for my albion… but I really have to shift it around to get it to look ok under my stubben. I will still use both, but I'm definitely happy with how it looks.
When riding warehouse was having a sale last month I bought three new Haas brushes, and I love them so far. I already had a super stiff one I got as a gift the previous Christmas so I got some softer ones and a mud remover and so far (when I can get out to see him) Juice is so shiny and not dandruffy. I need to do a post on it once I'm using them more.
oh I would LOVE all new brushes. I got a couple through the blogger exchange, so it's given me the bug.
Gah that saddle pad looks awesome!
It's super cool. Suede-like on the outside.
Those LeMieux pads are super awesome. I have been on a bit of a saddle pad spending spree lately because my jump saddle didn't really work with any of my dressage saddle pads, imagine that.
Hahaha So far, I am really happy with mine!
Looks like a great haul! The pad fits your saddle PERFECTLY!
I saw that pad in Dover the other day! It's pretty.
Hahah I really wanted to check out another tack shop in Cincinnati that came highly recommended… but I knew that if I walked in there, I was going to walk out with MORE stuff.
So jealous of your saddle pad. I want one of those. That girth looks really cool too.
Thanks! The saddle pad is definitely my favorite (other than the helmet).
That LeMieux saddle pad looks very interesting!
That saddle pad looks awesome, albeit pricey. Then again, if you use it for shows and take care of it it will probably last forever. Plus I love navy. That girth looks super cool! You will have ot report back how you like everything after using it awhile.
I will! The pad is definitely a "special occasions" thing, but the girth will get regular use/abuse. Fingers crossed that it holds up!


I can't believe this story hasn't gotten out, and neither can the very very few people who know about it.
Anyone who claims to have gnostic wisdom about John Kelly's future in the White House should prepare to be embarrassed. Not even Donald Trump knows what will happen.
That said, I've chatted with people close to every part of this saga. And I've learned four facts that I hope will help you make sense of all the messy reporting, gossip, innuendo, and Beltway speculation about the president's chief of staff.
1. Privately, Trump is always looking for excuses to bash Kelly. Trump has long chafed at Kelly's efforts to control him. He genuinely resented Kelly's claim to Fox News' Bret Baier that Trump had "evolved" on immigration. So Kelly's bungling of the Rob Porter disaster just cemented a view the president would have held regardless.
"If he's so good, if he knows all this stuff, well how come the first time he gets a problem like this he doesn't know what to do?" Trump told one associate of Kelly. "He wants to handle me, but doesn't know how to handle problems like this."
2. Trump hasn't made an ask. People very close to Kevin McCarthy, Gary Cohn and Mick Mulvaney — the top three contenders to replace Kelly — tell me definitively that the president has not broached the subject with them. There's a sense among their allies that the president may want them to come to him and ask for the job, which would be in character for Trump. However, I doubt any of them would do so, because if they did they'd have to take the job on Trump's terms.
Trump has been asking third parties about these men: "What do you think about Kevin?", "What do you think about Mick?", "What should we do about Gary?" Trump values the advice of all three men. He views Cohn as "a total killer" who's "done it all on Wall Street" even though he's a "globalist." Trump regularly asks Mulvaney for his thoughts on matters ranging far beyond his Budget portfolio, including immigration, healthcare, and what he thinks of certain White House officials. Same with McCarthy.
Bottom line: Trump resents Kelly, and no longer gives him the benefit of the doubt. But he hasn't decided what to do about that.
A senior administration official tells me he expects Congress will "take another look" at background check legislation that John Cornyn pushed late last year.
"U.S. Sen. John Cornyn announced the release of bipartisan legislation Thursday aimed at strengthening the federal background check database following the recent mass shooting in Sutherland Springs.
"The Texas Republican's bill, known as the Fix NICS Act, tries to ensure federal and state authorities accurately report relevant information, including criminal history, to the National Instant Criminal Background Check System."
Bottom line: Cornyn's bill won't come close to satisfying gun control advocates, but it may be all that's politically possible under a Republican-controlled Congress.
Democrats have more midterm anxiety than you might think, given most pundits are confidently predicting Republicans will lose the House.
Two sources with direct knowledge tell me that at the recent Democratic Senate retreat at Mount Vernon, they invited a focus group of voters to discuss the issues they care about and the political landscape.
What the voters kept saying: "Republicans have the wrong agenda; Democrats have no agenda."
A Senate aide told me leadership is acutely aware of this problem, and hopes immigration will fill their agenda gap. Another top Senate aide, however, told me their messaging will highlight a broader set of issues, including pensions, opioid funding, child care, and student loans. They will boast that they moved the ball forward on these issues with the budget deal.
Their toughest challenge: keeping this message from being totally drowned out by coverage of the President's alleged affairs, the Russia probe, the Robert Porter domestic violence cover-up, and other wild stories. Democrats are aware that cable news producers would much rather air segments on Stormy Daniels than pension reform.
By the way: Hillary Clinton had this problem too. Her campaign staff always bemoaned the fact that the national media showed infinitely more interest in Trump's JFK conspiracy theories than her white papers on Alzheimer's.
On top of that: Several top Hill Democrats told me they worry too many of their colleagues think they can flip the House just by bashing Trump and talking about Russia. If the focus groups at the retreat showed them anything, it's that that won't be enough.
Monday: Trump expected to return to D.C. from Mar-a-Lago.
Tuesday: The president will receive his intelligence briefing, have lunch with Defense Secretary Mattis, and will host the public safety "Medal of Valor" awards ceremony.
Wednesday: Trump will receive his intelligence briefing and host a "listening session" with high school students and teachers.
Thursday: Trump will receive his intelligence briefing and meet with state and local officials on school safety.
Friday: Trump will make a speech to the Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC). The president and the First Lady will host at the White House the Australian Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull. Trump will also meet with Rex Tillerson.
Because of a court order, people with concealed-carry permits can now take their guns into D.C. restaurants, the Washington City Paper reports, unless those restaurants have "No Guns Allowed" signs.
Some D.C. restauranteurs are looking for tasteful ways to display these signs without frightening customers, according to the paper.
Quote of the year: "We're doing it on a chalkboard so it's integrated into our space," the Cork Wine Bar & Market co-owner, Diane Gross, told the paper. "There's a balance because you don't want people to be scared."


text:
{generate_api_description(/messages:get)}

## Usage examples

{start_tabs}
{tab|python}

{generate_code_example(python)|/messages:get|example}

{tab|js}

More examples and documentation can be found [here](https://github.com/zulip/zulip-js).
```js
const zulip = require('zulip-js');

// Pass the path to your zuliprc file here.
const config = {
    zuliprc: 'zuliprc',
};

zulip(config).then((client) => {
    const readParams = {
        stream,
        type: 'stream',
        anchor: res.id,
        num_before: 1,
        num_after: 1,
    };

    // Fetch messages anchored around id (1 before, 1 after)
    return client.messages.retrieve(readParams);
}).then(console.log);
```

{tab|curl}

{generate_code_example(curl, exclude=["client_gravatar", "apply_markdown", "use_first_unread_anchor"])|/messages:get|example}

{end_tabs}

## Arguments

{generate_api_arguments_table|zulip.yaml|/messages:get}

## Response

#### Return values

When a request is successful, this endpoint returns a dictionary
containing the following (in addition to the `msg` and `result` keys
present in all Zulip API responses).

{generate_return_values_table|zulip.yaml|/messages:get}

#### Example response

A typical successful JSON response may look like:

{generate_code_example|/messages:get|fixture(200)}

[status-messages]: /help/format-your-message-using-markdown#status-messages
[linkification-filters]: /help/add-a-custom-linkification-filter
[message-flags]: /api/update-message-flags#available-flags

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaGithub


text:
Hitman: Contracts (Xbox)
Developer: Io Interactive
Publisher: Eidos Interactive
Release Date: April 20, 2004 (US)
M for Mature: Blood and Gore, Intense Violence, Strong Language, Strong Sexual Content, Use of Drugs
By Justin Leeper | Apr 22, 2004
Killing people has never had so much style, and it's not just because of Agent 47's pimpin' suit.
Great level designs; open-ended gameplay; gory blood effects.
Not a lot of replay; suspect A.I. at times.
Unless you've been living as a mango picker in Guatemala as part of the witness relocation program for the last six months, chances are you've been bombarded with Hitman: Contracts previews (check this out if you are one of the painfully uninformed). Thus, I'll dispense with the game summary and get to my impressions and opinions. Dig?
Hitman: Contracts isn't a drastic step in any direction from Hitman 2: Silent Assassin, and I wouldn't have it any other way. It refines a lot of part two's gameplay dynamics and strings together a better selection of missions, connected via an interesting story of Agent 47 in peril. IO Interactive doesn't go out of its way to add multiplayer elements or tongue-in-cheek unlockables; what it does in Hitman: Contracts is make an even cooler (game about a guy who kills people) than before.
Shootin' & Sneakin'
My in-game personality is that of a serial killer. A job isn't a job well done until I eliminate every survivor on the map. I don't go out guns blazing, mind you; I pick and choose my spots to stalk and hunt down my prey. In Hitman 2, many of the goals were geared toward curbing that tendency, and forcing me to use stealth. Contracts lets up on that leash a bit, while still giving you many other alternatives to tackling your tasks. In this way, it's more appealing to a broader range of gamers.
Disguises are a trademark of the Hitman series, and I'm still a fan of them. I really enjoy the suspense of walking past some bikers while dressed like them, hoping they don't either find the dead guy you stripped bare or notice you don't look right. Costumes seem to be more prevalent than before, and you may don as many as four in the span of a level. Dress like a mechanic to get into the docks, grab a terrorist costume to work your way onto the ship, do the deed, then grab a cop uniform to make a hasty retreat.
Not all the death in the game was caused by you.
I like that you'll often come across sections with metal detectors or pat-downs, and you'll have to ditch your weapons if you want to avoid a ruckus. Of course, you may relish a romping ruckus, but that can be costly in later levels, where enemies have more firepower and snipers can take you out with one well-placed shot.
Agent 47 will wield more guns than a plumber's got pliers, and many of them are level-specific. The main categories are handguns, smaller automatics, rifles, shotguns, and snipers. Miniguns and other oddities pop up sporadically. Melee accoutrements -- meat hooks, butcher knives, pool cues -- abound as well, but you won't get too far if you rely too heavily on them. I'm not a big fan of the standard-issue equipment. The fiber wire is good for silent snuffing, but I never got the hang of the syringes. Night vision rarely is useful, and the binoculars are only worth it if you're in a higher difficulty level without as detailed of a map.
Most action movies are judged by their high-spots -- amazing and unforgettable scenes. Video games are finally catching up to this, and Hitman is at the forefront. For example, there's a part in the slaughterhouse level where you come across a bloody corpse that used to be a young girl, hanging from the ceiling of a candle-lit room. There's a pool of blood under her, and dozens of pine-tree air fresheners hanging around her. On a nearby crate are pictures of her, and one of Gibby Haynes of the Butthole Surfers. The song, "Put Your Head On My Shoulder" plays sweetly in the background.
Hitman: Contracts at IGN
Hitman: Contracts Cheats at IGN
Hitman: Contracts Guide at IGN
Hitman: Contracts at GameSpy
Hitman: Contracts at TeamXbox
Hitman: Contracts at GameStats


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New Mexico Towns & Places - Socorro County
Socorro Plaza on Saturday, Farmer's Market day
Socorro was first settled in 1598 in a location above the Rio Grande bosques but still on the Camino Real. The downtown of the old city reflects that Hispanic heritage: The center of town is a large plaza, with any "buildings of significance" built right around that old plaza. I drove in on a Saturday morning in late July and the local Farmer's Market was in full swing. There was an interesting assortment of stuff for sale...
Anyway, parts of the old town are in good shape and parts aren't. Most of the original construction around the plaza is still in use, although the Post Office is relatively new and kinda sticks out among all the Pueblo and Territorial architecture.
It looks like any new business development is taking place along the strip mall that connects exits 147 and 150 of the I-25 (the Socorro north and south exits)
New Mexico Technical Institute is located about 1 mile west of downtown Socorro, much closer to that large, high chunk of rock that defines Socorro's western horizon.
From the late 1880's to the 1920's, there was a railroad line running west from Socorro to a head end at Magdalena, 37 miles west. The railhead marked the eastern terminus of the Magdalena Livestock Driveway, a trail that ran from Springerville, Arizona to Magdalena, and carried hundreds of thousands of cattle and sheep to the eastern markets in its time.
Back in 1598, a group of Spanish settlers led by Juan de Onate emerged from the Jornada del Muerto (the barren desert just south of Socorro) and were welcomed by the Piro Indians of Teypana. The Spanish renamed Teypana as Socorro, and later renamed the nearby Piro pueblo of Pilabo as Socorro, also.
The first Catholic mission, Nuestra Senora de Socorro, was established here about 1626. During the Pueblo Revolt of 1680, many Spanish refugees holed up in the pueblo of Socorro before continuing further south to safety in Mexico. When the Spaniards left, many Piro Indians followed them. Without Spanish protection, the Apaches and other tribes attacked the pueblo of Socorro and destroyed it, killing any Piro Indians that had stayed behind.
The area was left untouched by the Spaniards on their return in 1692, until Governor Fernando Chacon gave the order to resettle the area in 1800. Even then, no one settled in the Socorro area until about 1815. A group of Belen residents petitioned the crown for land in the Socorro area in 1817, but that effort was interrupted by the Mexican Revolution in 1820. By 1833, the Socorro census listed more than 400 residents in the village with about 1,774 in the area. It was around that time that the mission of San Miguel de Socorro was built on top of the ruins of the old Nuestra Senora de Socorro.
The Socorro Historical District Scenic Byway is a three-mile route that winds its way through the historical areas of old Socorro. Most of the photos on this page were taken along that route.
On Socorro Plaza
Socorro City Hall
On Manzanares Street
Val Verde Hotel
Socorro Heritage & Visitor's Center
Fast Facts about Socorro, New Mexico
Socorro, Socorro County, NM 87801
Graduate or Professional Degree: 11.7%
2011 Cost of Living Index for Socorro: 84.4
Educational Services, Lodging & Food Services, Health Care, Construction, Government, Professional Services, Social Services, Finance & Insurance Services, Waste Management Services, Transportation Services
Unemployed (March 2011): 6.3%
Population Demographics: 2010
Males 4,732
Females 4,319
18 & over 7,089
20-24 1,048
Population by Ethnicity
Hispanic or Latino 4,885
Non Hispanic or Latino 4,166
Population by Race
White 7,307
African-American 139
Native American 351
Hawaiian or Pacific Islander 6
Two or more 312
Socorro County Related Pages
Magdalena - San Antonio - Socorro County
New Mexico Tech - Fort Craig National Historic Site - Gordys Hill - The VLA
The Box Recreation Area - Socorro Nature Area
Quebradas Back Country Byway - San Lorenzo Canyon - Cibola National Forest
Mt. Withington Wilderness - Apache Kid Wilderness - Bosque del Apache Wilderness
Bosque del Apache National Wildlife Refuge - Sevilleta National Wildlife Refuge
El Camino Real Scenic & Historic Byway
More New Mexico Information, Photos and Maps


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• Michigan 6-6 guard/small forward Zak Irvin. Averaged 13.0 points, 4.5 rebounds and 3.0 assists while shooting 45.3 percent from the field and 34.4 percent on threes (54 for 147). Aggressive defender and third in three-pointers in Michigan history.
• Pittsburgh 6-9 forward Jamel Artis. Averaged 18.2 points and 4.9 rebounds while shooting 47.5 percent from the field and 39.2 percent on threes (74 for 189) last season.
• Monmouth 5-8 guard Justin Robinson. The diminutive point guard was a two-time MAAC Player of the Year and averaged 19.7 points, 4.8 rebounds and 1.4 seals last season, while shooting 41.7 percent from the field and 40.3 percent on threes (96 for 238).
• UCF 6-5 guard Matt Williams. Averaged 15.1 points and 4.3 rebounds. Shot just 39.1 percent from the field and never shot 40 percent or better in any of his four seasons at UCF. He was 38.4 percent on threes last season (126 for 328).
Miami Heat's president Pat Riley compares the team's 2017 First Round Draft Pick Bam Adebayo, with NBA Legends Shawn Kemp and Kevin Garnett.
After selecting Kentucky power forward/center Bam Adebayo with its only draft pick, the Heat also added former BYU 6-10 forward Eric Mika, who averaged 20.3 points and 9.2 rebounds last season while shooting 52.8 percent from the field.
Also committing to the Heat's summer league program: Mississippi 6-9 forward Sabastian Saiz, who averaged 15.1 points and 11.4 rebounds last season while shooting 46.9 percent from the field and 28.8 percent on threes (21 for 73).
The Heat is expected to add more undrafted players to its summer league roster and we will update those as they are identified.
The Heat also reportedly has added two players who played overseas to its summer league teams: former Notre Dame center Zach Auguste, who went undrafted in 2016 and center Norvel Pelle, who went undrafted in 2013 after not attending college and has bounced around foreign leagues and the D-League.
Meanwhile, analyst reaction on the Heat's selection of Adebayo hasn't been very good.
We mentioned in posts this week that Miami was looking to take a big man at No. 14 if Luke Kennard and Donovan Mitchell were off the board (they were) and mentioned Adebayo was an option but would be more appealing if the Heat picked around 20th.
Some analysts apparently felt he was overdrafted, with not a single mock draft that I saw having him as high as 20.
Miami Heat President Pat Riley holds a news conference after the Heat chose Bam Adebayo as its first pick in the NBA draft on Thursday, June 22, 2017 at the AmericanAirlines Area in downtown Miami.
Some reaction:
• Chad Ford gave Miami a C plus, his second-worst grade ahead of only Milwaukee: "Bam Adebayo looks the part of a lottery pick, with an NBA body, long arms and explosive athleticism. He has particularly quick feet for a player his size, allowing him to guard multiple positions on the floor.
But there seemed to be something missing during his freshman year. He didn't always rebound or play with intensity. Despite his size and athleticism he struggled to finish over length. And while he reportedly has a nice perimeter game, he didn't show it at Kentucky.
Perhaps he'll be like Skal Labissiere and blossom outside of Kentucky. But I'm a little skeptical and I would've taken Harry Giles."
• The Ringer gave Miami a C: "Everyone said the draft would open up after the first dozen picks were off the board, and the Heat made the first real shocker of the night when they selected Adebayo, who was seen as a late-first-round pick through most of the draft process. . . . There will always be a place in the NBA for a player with Adebayo's size and speed, but big men who don't protect the rim and can't space the floor have become much less valuable in the last few years."
• Fox Sports gave the Heat a C-: "Pat Riley and the Heat made the night's first truly surprising pick at No. 14, taking Adebayo as a likely backup to Hassan Whiteside. The former Kentucky big man has the size and strength to become a force on offense, but he's not much of a defender, and he doesn't stretch the floor."
• Yahoo gave Miami a C-: "Bam Adebayo helped himself by improving his jump shot during the pre-draft process, but what we saw on tape from his lone collegiate season is a broken release point that yielded little return. A terrific athlete with good hands, Bam will rim-run with the best of them, but his lack of offensive prowess presents a significant issue considering he isn't a prolific shot-blocker, either."
Here's a look at everything Pat Riley had to say in his late-night press conference Thursday night.
Here are more tidbits on Adebayo and why the Heat passed on some bigger names.
barry-jackson
Heat's Riley addresses Adebayo pick, other issues in late-night news conference
heat-check
Experts don't like Heat's pick of Adebayo, but Riley explains why he does


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'Popstar' Premiere: Lonely Island Members Talk Trying to Hit the Right Notes
12:35 PM PDT 5/25/2016 by Ted Simmons
Rob Kim/Getty Images
From left: Akiva Schaffer, Andy Samberg and Jorma Taccone at Tuesday night's 'Popstar' premiere in New York
Former collaborator Michael Bolton, who appears in the film, praises the Andy Samberg-led group's dual mastery of music and film.
Through their digital shorts on Saturday Night Live and collaborations with various musicians and stars, Andy Samberg, Jorma Taccone and Akiva Schaffer's The Lonely Island have established themselves as masters of modern music parody. It comes as no surprise then, that for what Samberg calls the group's first movie from the ground up, the trio have expanded upon that notion, creating Popstar: Never Stop Never Stopping.
"It was very intentional, to do something we could incorporate music into. That was the whole idea," Samberg told The Hollywood Reporter at the film's New York premiere on Tuesday night. "We wanted to make a musical," Schaffer added, "We had a few ideas we were bandying about. And then Judd [Apatow] really basically pitched this idea to us out of nowhere and we were like, 'We've been talking about that too!' and that really set us on this track."
Popstar takes the form of a mockumentary, following Samberg's Connor4Real as he navigates the treacheries of pop stardom. Taccone and Schaffer play his childhood friends and former bandmates, with Sarah Silverman, Maya Rudolph, Tim Meadows and more filling out the team that surrounds and supports Connor.
But even though Popstar is a mockumentary, Taccone, who also directed the film with Schaffer, explains that the team behind the movie still tried to have the music be authentic, one thing it shares with previous films in the genre like This Is Spinal Tap and Walk Hard.
"It's not necessarily that we're referencing those, but I would say that a similarity between that movie and movies like Spinal Tap are that there's a real attention to detail of the songs sounding correct and there's a real attention to detail paid," he said. "I'm not comparing ourselves to any of those movies. Spinal Tap is the gold standard of those movies, of this format, but we really care about the music sounding good in the same way."
To that end, Popstar showcases the group's mind for music as much as the bandmembers' comedy chops. Whether Connor is flourishing or flailing, he's always equipped with a catchy ear worm every bit as sonically polished as it absurd. Michael Bolton, who collaborated with the trio on the 2011 digital short Jack Sparrow and likewise appears in the film, can't explain The Lonely Island's dual mastery, but he's astonished by it.
"It's a very strange, high level of awareness of notes and timing and different genres of music. They're obviously very, very current, or as current as they need to be, but they know how to stack backgrounds," said Bolton. "I'm not easily impressed by musicians, I gotta see what they do, but these guys heard all the harmony parts." He continued: "I don't know where they get that mutant gene where it's both music and film, where they know exactly what they need to make this great outcome, but that's what their gift is."
Popstar: Never Stop Never Stopping is set to hit theaters June 3, with the soundtrack to be released the same day. Beyond what the film does at the box office, is The Lonely Island preparing for a hit on the Billboard charts? "100% yes," said Samberg. "We always expect to go No. 1. We're aiming for the new [Justin] Timberlake. The Trolls song, ['Can't Stop the Feeling']."


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'IT' Trailer (Mental) Breakdown
The Backseat Driver Reviews Posted on March 29, 2017 by Dan Pollitt March 29, 2017
Beep-Beep readers, as some of you may know I'm the resident Stephen King fanboy around these parts and as a few may have seen, the trailer for IT just hit. So I lost my damn mind and wrote a lot about it. Enjoy.
We open on Bill making a paper boat for George, the most noticeable difference in this scene is that Bill is not sick in a bed and their mother is not playing the piano over the whole affair. This is only a small difference, but it'll be interesting to see how they tackle Bill's guilt over not accompanying George to sail his boat. Bill being sick makes it reasonable that he wouldn't have been able to go outside, but if he's perfectly well then it makes him just kind of a shitty person. He may still be sick and it's just not emphasised in this part of the trailer. Although, I will give them points for the Gulf Wax box, as it hints they may include the Turtle. If they pull off the Turtle at the end, I'll be amazed.
Next, we have George sailing his little paper boat down Jackson Street, which is a nice touch from the book. The fact it's pouring with rain leads to one of theories about the IT creature and it's connection to water. It lives in a wet place and mostly appears in it's clown form during times when water is involved. In any event, we see George's boat disappear down the storm drain and as he goes after it we wait… and wait…. and wait for the appearance of Pennywise. This moment is maybe the most iconic from the TV movie and the book. My quibble here is the new version of Pennywise looks too terriying for any kid to not run from screaming. She appears suddenly and looks terrifying , although George not running could be explained by the fact that Pennywise is psychic and could be luring him George in by some mental trick.
We then get a great establishing shot of Derry, showing it as your typical small town USA. The kids ride their bikes in the street, with Bill riding his beloved bike Silver. Some teenagers, who are presumably Henry Bowers, Belch Huggins, and Victor Criss, hang out by a car, which would make sense because in this version, IMDb lists Henry's father Crazy Butch Bowers as a police officer rather than a dirt-poor farmer. We see a curfew sign, which is likely from the thick of the murders, as the kids are leaving on the last day of school, when Ben has his run in with the Bowers gang and meets Bill and Eddie for the first time.
The single shot of Patrick Hockstedder's missing poster gives me so much hope for this remake as we're finally getting one of the creepier King characters on screen. Those who have read the book with know exactly how malicious this character is, and how he's up there with Pennywise for King's most horrific characters.
After that we get our first variation from the novel: we see Ben sitting in the Derry library. This is presumably the adult's section, but it would look like the the place where he's writing his love postcard to Beverly Marsh. But he sees one of Pennywise's balloons, which means Pennywise has her claws in to the kids regularly from a much earlier point this time around. Instead of Ben's encounter with The Mummy a few weeks earlier – which he acknowledges was his first sight of IT – we see here that IT comes for him much more subtly.
Then we see the Losers Club acting as a group, first entering the sewer pipe, which is likely third act stuff from the film. We also see them talking about Pennywise in the middle of the street. This again is earlier than in the novel. They only discuss the weird event they've all seen while building the dam in The Barrens, which is meant to be a sign they've all clicked as a group. Here it looks like a smaller collection of them are sharing memories of a clown and not the entities that Pennywise sent in her place. I hope they didn't lose The Barrens as the Losers Club base because it just felt right that they were on the outskirts of Derry society and town limits. We also get a flash of 29 Neibolt Street which I'll dork out about further down.
From there we cut to the slide show sequence, this is an update from the book I think works really well, Rather than have Bill flip through a photo album, it encompasses the town of Derry's sewer system (which is essential to the story) and shows the group bonding. This shows how Pennywise is messing with them at every turn: that she is always watching them. It's just a good, creepy scene that will hopefully play even better in the final product. The switching to family pictures and slow reveal of Pennywise is just a good scare on film.
Cut to Eddie running presumably from the Leaper outside 29 Neilbolt Street, another part from the book I'm glad made it over to the film. Henry Bowers approaching one of Pennywise's balloons which hints at his mental state being effected by the clown, which will eventually lead to him becoming a servant of the creature to terrorise the kids both then and later as adults.
The shot of clawed fingers poking through Pennywise's gloves hints that this scene takes place inside 29 Neibolt Street and is the Were-Clown from the book. The constant tranformation of Pennywise is what scares the kids, and it's what makes her such a compelling villain, as she is fear incarnate. Neibolt Street is perfectly designed: some may say the house is too overly creepy, but it works with the idea of what kids imagine the "old creepy house" looks like.
Mike's encounter with Pennywise seems to have changed as well. Rather than the giant bird attack at the former Kitchener Iron Works (which likely couldn't be done for budget) we get an effectively creepy scene of dead hands poking out from inside a door. This may take a little bit from Stan's encounter with the dead kids in the Derry Standpipe, but from a few frames it's hard to tell context. But this shot feels sufficiently creepy, if borrowing slightly from the first issue/episode of The Walking Dead.
Bev's encounter with IT appears the be very much intact, although it may have amped up a bit. We see her getting hit by fire hose of black slime from the sink rather than a balloon popping and turning into blood. This shot has a very Evil Dead 2 vibe about it, with the sheer amount of disgusting-looking liquid with which the character is being hit.
The final sequence in the trailer is by far the strongest: Bill in the basement, confronted with a ghostly George, who is screaming about him "floating". I really like how "We all float" is being embraced as the tagline for the film, as it's creepy in the novel and even creepier in this version of the film. It being screamed and repated by dead Geroge is unnerving enough, but to have Pennywise appear from out of the dank basement water looking like a predatory crocodile and then attacking Bill… it works so well. Could be the editing in the trailer, but the way Pennywise moves is crazed and perfect for scaring the shit out the audience.
Overall, my only gripes about this trailer are that Bill doesn't stutter. He's called Stuttering Bill for a reason, in the book he can barely get a few words out with devolving in nearly incomprehensible speech. As someone with a similar impediment, this is what drew me to the character to begin: that he has this problem but was also the leader of this little group. My hope is that it's rectified in the film proper. My other gripe: Pennywise is way too out in the open. In the book, he sends other things to scare the kids. I get that for budget and licensing reasons they might not have been able to get the Universal Monsters as they are in the book. But it seems to be a bit of a feedback loop that people are scared of clowns because of Pennywise, but in a world where she hasn't existed in pop culture, would the appearance of a clown still scare people? (Erin's note: hells to the bells yes, Dan.)
But this trailer is overall pretty darn strong and it says a lot that the moments I liked the most weren't present in the book at all. Although an unapologetic IT fanboy, this film gives me a lot of hope that the story has been told properly now and I look forward to reviewing the film and book later in the year in my Hail to the King column.
Posted in Adaptation, Cool Stuff, Hail to the King, Horror	permalink