North Carolina Now; North Carolina Now Episode from 12/17/1997

The movement of the US I'll be told you know that I was with you that's Wednesday December 17. Tonight for the sickening thing a meeting of course or something because I mean I'm not a peep in the lighted Super Bowl but I'm speaking the language of our state's growing multicultural society in North Carolina. Nell. Good evening everyone I hope you had a wonderful Wednesday thanks for joining us tonight. As you look at the people calling North Carolina home these days you'll find our state is becoming quite diverse not only with residents from throughout the nation but also from all around the

world. Tonight we take a look at two programs designed to help these new North Carolinians fill it home while preparing all Tar Hill residents to compete in what's quickly becoming a global marketplace. Plus as our state continues to grow many North Carolinians will soon find themselves with new area codes. Tonight we'll explain the area code switch with our guest Kathy Hawkins from Bell South. But we begin tonight in the Queen City making sure North Carolina students are thoroughly prepared for the 21st century as a concern we all share. Especially since the environment they will compete in is almost guaranteed to be a global one. Tonight we take you to Sedgefield elementary school in Charlotte where you'll see a Japanese immersion program that's certain to give some of North Carolina's youngest students a head start on the future. How to bridge the cultural gap in today's global marketplace. Sounds like an agenda item at a business meeting. But for some in Charlotte these lessons are starting much earlier. Centerfield

Elementary is the Japanese language and cultural magnet school in the Charlotte Mecklenburg School System. I think the philosophy behind it when it was when a grant was written is the fact that we do have a significant Japanese population here in the business community there's over a thousand families and also that Japanese is a up and coming language for business. And you know there are so many corporations that are based here and in Japan and there's a lot of flow back and forth between one kindergarten class and one first grade class are defined as full immersion. But the rest of the classes field also benefit from daily classes in Japanese. There are also festivals and special events taking place throughout the school year. A margin to us and our grant me. It's in the kindergarten 80 percent of the day is taught in Japanese so we have native born speakers from Japan who are certified teachers and they work with the children and they use nothing but sign language in Japanese and the children learn to communicate in

Japanese and they have one period of day for about an hour that they learn the typical kindergarten curriculum in English reading readiness. And as we progress into farce because the difficulty of the language and in Japanese and the fact that we're dealing with a whole different set of characters you know you have hiragana and all those types of things as a different system for our children from the alphabet so we've had written into the grant that it would be 50/50 so half of the day in first grade is in Japanese and half is in English so all the classes that are taught in Japanese we are doing the state of North Carolina's curriculum. But it's being taught in that language immersion schools are popular throughout the country. And surely it offers programs in French Spanish and German but Sedgefield Elementary does double duty with the dual immersion system. This is the only dual immersion program in the United States. Most There are other Japanese or margin programs in the United

States but they're not make sing together and combining in one classroom. Japanese nationals and U.S. citizens. And so this is a very unique program that you've come to see that you can see Charlotte Professor Maria D'Amato is coordinator for Japanese language for Charlotte Mecklenburg schools. She also serves as the executive director of the Japanese American society and works with many North Carolina companies interested in learning about the Japanese culture as we move into the 21st century the children that we are now educating have to be more than just literate in English. It's a new century that is now only three years away and it's an international century we can't be isolated that more and more it has become a world where not just economically but artistically socially. We need to understand other cultures. And it's great that there's been that vision here in Charlotte making the

vision work takes coordination lead teacher Keiko Akashi works with administrators and teachers to design the curriculum. She also translates materials to Japanese and guidance teachers as they incorporate Japanese teaching methods in an American classroom. But one teaching tool you need to do all immersion that she is especially proud of is the natural sharing taking place among the children of the American student pick up the you know the Japanese student speaks like you open this in a land or and then also the for the Japanese students they catch up with these from the peers and then instead of the using the Japanese you know and they start in speaking English and explaining what the teachers say to the peers. So that's why you know it's been walking and so on.

A celebration of many faces. That's the very appropriate motto at Sedgefield elementary school. From the mural in the cafeteria done partly by a visiting Japanese artist to the informal language lessons that continue even on the playground. This celebration of diversity is giving these youngsters an excellent beginning. What better way to create a global community because that is really when these children become 23 and 24 and 25. You have to cooperate grow quickly and they're learning how to do it when they're far. So it's an exciting program to be piling up. The dual immersion process serves parents to such filth has morning classes where Japanese parents learn English and American parents learn to speak Japanese and students who start out at Sedgefield elementary have the opportunity to continue the language program at Smith middle school language academy. Well coming up how a green goal man uses the airwaves to reach out to our state's Hispanic population. But first

let's check in with Michel Louis for a summary of today's statewide headlines. I'm it. Hello Shannon. Good evening everyone. Topping our news the Clinton administration has announced a multimillion dollar grant campaign to aid the nation's small and minority farmers. The proposed plan would make available 600 million dollars to those who to thousands who qualify for loans and grants would allow 1000 farmers to buy their land and another 12000 would get financial help operating their farms. President Clinton is meeting this evening with a delegation of black farmers representing North Carolina and a number of other states. The head of the National Black Farmers Association says his members will talk about civil rights in light of appending a lawsuit filed against the U.S. Agriculture Department on behalf of black farmers. A number of North Carolina hospitals will have to take part in a nationwide review of organ transplant programs. The federal government is calling on the review of 29 such programs across the country. The programs in question have reportedly shown lower than expected survival rates for heart liver and kidney transplants over a six year

period. Included on the list are Duke University Medical Center in Durham Winston-Salem North Carolina Baptist Hospital and Grimbal's Pitt County Memorial Hospital. According to the 1997 report of the center specific Grafton patients survival rates between 1998 in 1904. Those three hospitals had organ transplant survival rates that were between eight and 20 percentage points lower than expected. That apartment of Health and Human Services that some have shown improvement over the years and still others have closed. Some tough questions are helping legislators shape their recommendations on the governor's proposal to expand Medicaid coverage to thousands of children. Republican Representative Lanier canceller says many people would simply cancel their own insurance and opt for the state handout. David Bruton the head of the state welfare agency agrees some people may prefer to rely on the state but that it's a cost the state should be willing to pay. Proposal would extend insurance to children and families that earn up to double the federal poverty level. A demolition project on the Neuse River promises to improve fish

habitats in the eastern region of the state. Interior Secretary Bruce Babbitt was on hand to kick off the removal project. The demolition of the CPA nails Quaker NEC dam is expected to restore the striped bass and a variety of other fish to a 75 mile stretch of the Neuse River waters and an additional 1000 miles of tributaries. We're removing a dam today and we're removing that dam in order to restore the river and by restoring this river and its fisheries we restore and recapture an important part of. The Carolina parrot the Quaker neck dam was originally constructed in 1052 and demolition is expected to be completed sometime in January. The state attorney general's office has won a temporary restraining order against 9 out of state lottery companies preying on the elderly. Attorney General Mike Easley SAS thousands of senior citizens in North Carolina are being built out of

500 million dollars a year and lottery rip offs. The restraining order forbids the companies from doing any more business in the state to avoid being victimized. People are being encouraged to avoid giving credit card and bank account numbers over the telephone and request information in writing. State transportation officials say all four lanes of Interstate 40 near the Tennessee border will reopen on Monday. That's nearly six months after a series of rockslides shut down the highway two lanes of the interstate have been open since mid-September but traffic slowdowns were still happening on the main route through the mountains. For the past six months crews have removed tons of debris and cut back 200 feet of mountainside fences and bolts have been installed to hold the rest of the rock in place. And now for a look at tomorrow's weather seasonably mild temperatures are forecast for Thursday. A fairly even band of mid to high 50 degree temps will spread across the state. Expect mostly sunny skies statewide. In business news Winston-Salem based BB&T is branching out into the nation's capital with a new bank purchase. BB&T is acquiring

Franklin Bancorp and a stock swap worth one hundred sixty five million dollars. And in fact BBN is paying a price 26 times Franklin's projected one thousand nine hundred seven earnings. BB&T is chief executive officer says the deal will give his bank a substantial presence and a growing vibrant market. BB&T is the nation's 30th largest bank and has about 27 billion dollars in assets. State agriculture secretary Jim Graham signs a 3 percent increase in the peanut quota is good news for growers. The increase will raise peanut production in North Carolina by more than six million pounds and grazing peanut growers income by two million dollars. North Carolina ranks fourth nationally in total peanut production last year talk will farmers raise three hundred sixty seven million pounds of peanuts. And now for a look at what happened on Wall Street today. Earlier

this week the trial became the first area in North Carolina to switch over to new area codes. But it wasn't it won't be the last. Recently Sunny Williams spoke with Cathy Hawkins from Bell South to learn more about the area code switch as well as some of BellSouth other projects. Cathy Hawkins thank you so much for joining us. Let's start by talking a little bit about net day. That's a major bills out the initiative. What exactly is net day and how does that work. Certainly a sign here we were delighted as a company Bell South to participate in the net day effort region wide. But in North Carolina particularly

last October in 1996 we helped wire all the schools in North Carolina. We spent about four million dollars plus we had all of our active retired and employees to volunteer at the schools to actually wire each classroom for the use of the Internet. OK. Now what has that meant I guess for schools across the state. Well it's been terrific It means that our children now have access to the Internet. The classrooms are wired BellSouth has decided to go a step farther. We are now providing access kits to the school the Internet a Celts to the school as well as to the teachers at home so they can learn how to use this technology in the classroom and some training. We've been very instrumental in providing training for the teachers. There are lots of. I guess extra additives for the education system in North Carolina. So let's switch gears a little bit now. Congress mandated in 1906 the

Telecommunications Act of 1996 which requires buildout to open its markets to the local competitors. How have those efforts been going good. Good question. And BellSouth was very supportive of that deal. The Telecom Act of 1996 and what it actually does it's it opens all of the market it opens the long distance market to local companies like Bell crowd and to other providers like cable companies electric companies. It's going very well here in North Carolina. We have local competition in place now. There have been many many companies that have been approved by the North Carolina commission Utilities Commission to offer local service and they are doing that in return wants. Once the local competition is up in going we'll Bell South. We will be able to get into the long distance business and we are working diligently to do that. About do you have any idea how

long can it take for the local companies to get up and going in for BellSouth to get into the long distance when the local companies are upping going I mean there you have a choice for your local service. If you were a business customer they are providing business service. We have applied to the North Carolina Utilities Commission for approval to offer long distance in North Carolina. Once we get that approval then we expect that in December. Our next step is to go to the FCC for their approval. OK. Let's talk a little bit now about area codes. And there there is there's been some controversy about the changes in area codes across the state particularly in the Triad. They're saying they've been changing so much in recent years. Explain to us first of all what we can expect as North Carolinians as far as area code changes. Well actually it's regretful that anyone is having to change their area. First and foremost we would like for all of our customers to be able to keep the same area code. But in the southeast we are experiencing so much Greg and and so

much use and new telecommunications things such as the fax machines pages. Fact is paging The second glance for your computer at home that we're just running out of numbers so our state will have three heads. And their recorders and they are. We will have the area code 2 5 2 which will be in the Rocky Mount calling area and then the triangle the Raleigh area will Langtang 9 1 9 the Wilmington and parts of the Fayetteville area will retain the 9 1 0 0 0 area code and in the Triad and parts of the Charlotte calling zone will get the need 3 3 6 code and the Charlotte proper will maintain 7 of the war and in the Asheville western part and

outlying areas of Charlotte will get 8 to 8. Now I know some of the smaller companies have had suggested in the past the overlay system where as I know when a region gets too many phone numbers and they just simply add another area code rather than having the whole region change their area code. Why would this system not work in this instance. Well the system could work. And overlay has been used in two states that I know of. Marilyn in Pennsylvania we propose to the North Carolina utilities commission as an industry to to do a split where you divide it out one. Geographic area keeps the code. Another gets the new cut. The commission ruled in favor of that. One of the disadvantages of an overlap is that if you added a new phone line to your home you could actually have two area codes in your same house. So it was more convenient I guess to go with this current system the current system that will

start in December. We certainly have more experience in this rather than the overlap. OK what can we expect I guess in terms of telecommunications over the next few years any exciting new breakthroughs on the way. Well of course we have to expect that you'll have an opportunity to choose companies for various products and services. We you will just see all kinds of new types of startup companies and as a result of that the economy will improve. It's just an exciting time in our industry where we look forward to all those changes underway and we thank you so much for taking the time to join us this evening. Thank you Sanya. North Carolina's Hispanic population is quite diverse but for some Hispanics who speak

only Spanish. Adjusting to life in the Tar Heel state can be a bit challenging. As Michel Lewis reports in eastern North Carolina there is a familiar voice that serves as a communicator to the Latino community as well as an advocate for their causes. One of the yes I would be don't you know that I was not you know they're going to sue you all the way with basic money in Fannie Mae and of course on their giving because I mean a lot of they and the light is a boyish thing that if you happen to be in downtown Greenville near where w o o w radio on Saturday mornings you'll probably see this man city of you know he is the host of Lovaza Latino. The Latin voice a radio show geared toward Hispanic listeners because studio originally from Managua Nicaragua has lived in Greenville for 11 years. He says his work in the Hispanic community began as a Spanish translator during mass at St. Gabriel's Catholic Church and that led to other endeavors. One Sunday afternoon no friend was talking to me in church so you know

there's so many Spanish speaking people here and we don't have any things in communication. We don't have any way to communicate. Do you think that maybe we have a radio program or newspaper or something that we can communicate with people. And that's how the most Latino radio program started the program has been on the air since 1991 and is still going strong. Not only does love Oz Latino It provides entertainment for its listeners but also vital information. We present programs on the roof talking about health issues attorneys talking about law. Especially And we have to have moved. You know there are certain scenes they need to know you know how do you obtain a right of life in North Carolina how to go about you know becoming a productive citizen or or how to function better in the society we live in. Because Steele's life revolves around communicating when he's not on the radio he's vice president of LBA international incorporated a provider of telecommunications services and broadcast equipment. His Spanish comes in handy as he conducts

business with companies throughout Latin America to steal Spanish speaking skills have been an asset on television as well during hurricanes Murtha and ran. He made public service announcements in Spanish. The studio is also a television advocate for his community as a member of the cable Advisory Commission in Greenville. Since 1992 he has been petitioning local cable operators to provide Spanish programming. There is a need for Spanish. We have to look at it. If you want to go into service where there's a need there is a market. There's so many here the need to communicate to many jobs. They could benefit when people learned to communicate with the refrains Spanish. The more multicultural we are the better we're going to be in the world. This studio is also an advocate in promoting true representation of his people and dispelling stereotypes he says as it concerns him deeply when some people claim that Hispanics don't make contributions to society especially when it comes to

paying taxes. You know that the moment you walk into a store and you buy something you paid a 6 percent tax you buy a vehicle you pay a tax if you buy something from somebody you're contributing to the economy and the money is multiplying. There are situations that I've been saying that they don't file income tax returns well because some of them are not legal and by immigration they fear. So what happened. They have a reform coming to them. They forfeit that refund. So who gets the money. It is Castillo's hope that one day the negative labels placed on Hispanics will be removed. He also believes that more should be done to improve communication between North Carolinians and their Spanish speaking counterparts especially now that we live in the age of global markets and the Internet. He says that could start within the state's education system by having bilingual teachers. They're good teachers some of them and they know a thing but if they released it they need to do more effort to teach more the language to open the world where people ask me where you

go in Central America or than your cancer's we need to focus a little bit change you know geography history languages. So our kids are going to be better citizens citizen Castillo's efforts to help his fellow man has made him somewhat of a legend in his community. But he takes his accomplishments with great humility on TRC-M a guy that probably due to factors in life. We're a little bit of something. I was a good source like a link. I would say we use now are using Internet firms. You know there was a link to other links basically. Gas dealer says he would like to see immigration reform that would give Hispanic workers who are considered illegal a special U.S. residency status based upon proof that they are working. He says the status will be beneficial to Hispanics as well as to their employers. Well that's it for tonight show please join us tomorrow night when we investigate the impact that they do alcohol syndrome is having on children throughout our state. Plus we'll have some advice to

help get you through the not so jolly aspects of the holidays. Our guest will be Dr. Linda Jordan who will have some tips on how to help a friend or family member who is grieving over a lost loved one this holiday season. Well Siggins MOORE Not everyone have a great evening.