ROSEMEAD: Bruce C. Davis, principal at Ralph...

ROSEMEAD: Bruce C. Davis, principal at Ralph Waldo Emerson Elementary School in the Garvey Unified School District, has been named a 1995 Readers’s Digest American Hero in Education. The annual award, presented Friday, honors 10 outstanding educators nationwide who are working to solve problems facing American schools. Selected from a field of 650 nominees for his programs on school/parent partnerships and student recognition, Davis makes more than 40 phone calls each weekend to let parents know how their children are doing. Davis received $5,000 and his school received $10,000.

WALNUT: About 50 students at Mount San Antonio Community College staged a rally March 30, protesting the cancellation of controversial guest speaker Romona Africa. Africa, the sole adult survivor of the Philadelphia police fire bombing of the MOVE organization in 1985, was denied a speaking engagement at the college by the Associated Students, who were to fund Africa’s talk. Students from the campus African Student Alliance and MECHA, a Latino student group, claimed Africa was banned from speaking because of her radical views, but Associated Students President Alina Ebadi said the group canceled because they objected to paying for Africa’s bodyguard.