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Students, Families Celebrate at West Contra Costa Unified’s First Prom for Students With Special Needs

Students with special needs at West Contra Costa Unified were full of smiles and laughter Saturday as they danced and partied at a prom event specifically tailored for them. Saturday’s event, the first of its kind at West Contra Costa Unified, was planned for students with extensive support needs such as autism and moderate to severe intellectual abilities for whom the traditional prom — with loud music and extensive light displays — might be overstimulating.

Published

3 years ago

May 12, 2023

Oakland Post

Dozens of students and their families attended the event, which featured a sensory room, soft lights and support staff in order to comfort students experiencing sensory overload, which people with disabilities that cause hypersensitivity are prone to.

By Ali Tadayon
EdSource

Students with special needs at West Contra Costa Unified were full of smiles and laughter Saturday as they danced and partied at a prom event specifically tailored for them.

Saturday’s event, the first of its kind at West Contra Costa Unified, was planned for students with extensive support needs such as autism and moderate to severe intellectual abilities for whom the traditional prom — with loud music and extensive light displays — might be overstimulating.

For Sonja Neely-Johnson, the district’s special education local plan area director, the prom was a milestone event. Apart from being one of the event’s organizers, she’s also the mother of a 21-year-old with special needs. When she saw him walk into the event Saturday, she said she was flooded with memories of doctors saying he would never be able to walk at all and other grim prognoses.

“Just being able to see my son walk into a dance, yeah, he has to have his little device with him because he needs that; it just warms my heart. I’ve actually been emotional all day,” Neely-Johnson said.

Students dressed up in tuxedos and prom dresses, danced, played games like limbo and posed for pictures in the high school cafeteria, which was selected because the building is smaller and slightly darker than a gym, in order to not overstimulate the students, said Guthrie Fleischman, director of secondary special education programs at West Contra Costa Unified.

According to the advocacy group Autism Speaks, many people on the autism spectrum experience hypersensitivity to bright lights or certain light wavelengths, such as LED or fluorescent lights. The dance floor also featured fewer lights than that of a typical prom. Still, the music was loud enough to fill the room, and the DJ played popular hit songs.

Student Bianca Rios said her favorite part of the prom was being with all of her friends. Another student, Corinn Phillips, said she enjoyed dancing, especially to her favorite songs by Katy Perry.

One of the rooms in the cafeteria building was designated as a “sensory room” and staffed with an occupational therapist for students who felt overwhelmed. The room had beanbag chairs and soft lighting to comfort students, as well as sensory toys that students could spin, squish and stretch, to engage and regulate sensory needs.

The district’s special education department also made personal communication boards with pictures of phrases such as “It’s too loud,” “I like the decorations” and “I need a break” that nonverbal students could use to communicate.

In addition to the occupational therapists at the event, the prom also had about a 1:1 ratio of paraprofessionals to students, he said.

“It’s a different level of support that would be difficult to present in a traditional prom setting,” Fleischman said.

The idea for the prom came because families of students with special needs at West Contra Costa Unified organized a prom of their own last year, held at a charter school within the district. Though the event was small, the families who attended told the district’s special education department they had a great time, and department officials decided to throw an official West Contra Costa Unified one, inviting students in the transition program serving students aged 18 to 22.

Neely-Johnson said the goal is to eventually make traditional proms inclusive enough that all students and their families are comfortable attending — a prospect that worries some parents who fear their children with special needs would feel ostracized.

“I think until we get to a point as a society, we’re going to have both (proms for special needs students and traditional proms),” Neely-Johnson said.

Dozens of families attended Saturday’s event. Denise Miles, whose son Devin Phillips is 22 and in his last year of the transition program, said many of the families have known each other for years as their children grew up in classes together. Miles said she felt differently when Devin went to his high school’s traditional prom a few years earlier.

“When he went to the prom, I didn’t know a lot of those parents in general ed because we don’t really mix and mingle like that,” she said. “I hope (the district) continues to have something special for our kids.”

The biggest difference between this prom and a traditional one, Miles said, was that everyone was accepting of each other, and though her son is oftentimes “hollering and spinning,” people weren’t looking at him.

“They could just be themselves, whatever that is, and no one’s looking at them crazy and judging,” Miles said. “As a SPED (special education) parent, it’s a really good feeling to see because you always want your child to be accepted, and we have that here.”

Copyright © 2023 Bay City News, Inc. All rights reserved. Republication, rebroadcast or redistribution without the express written consent of Bay City News, Inc. is prohibited. Bay City News is a 24/7 news service covering the greater Bay Area.

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Arts and Culture

COMMENTARY: Black Music is the Sound of Black Freedom: Let Us Reclaim Both This Juneteenth

Black Music Month started when Black Music Association members Ed Wright, Kenny Gamble and his wife, journalist and radio host Dyanna Williams were able to persuade President Jimmy Carter to establish the observation on June 7, 1979.

Published

3 days ago

June 9, 2026

Oakland Post

Robert Johnson (1911-1938) is thought of as the godfather of blues music, especially Delta blues. The 29 songs recorded by him during his short life have been of massive inspiration to guitarists and musicians over the last 80 years. Public domain photo.

By Wanda Ravernell

Black Music Month and Juneteenth are inextricably linked – Black music is the sound of our freedom.

From the plaintive moans of the enslaved Africans’ ‘sorrow songs,’ to the fields of Civil War battle where Black soldiers picked up abandoned bugles, to the upright piano played in juke joints on Saturday night and churches come Sunday morning, our ancestors’ innovation in the face of want, fear, degradation, and hopelessness has yielded genres of music imitated ’round the world.

In 2000, Congress made it official. In 2009, Pres. Barack Obama changed the name to African American Music Heritage Month and in 2023, Pres. Joe Biden changed it back to Black Music Month, two years after he declared Juneteenth a national holiday, the result of a movement led by Opal Lee.

Our ancestors battle for freedom over these last 400 years and the music that allowed them expression of their humanity deserved to be honored.

But we may be losing sight of the value of their sacrifices.

‘Sing a Song Full of the Faith That the Dark past Has Taught Us…’

Along with the long-known exploitation of Black musicians whose recordings were stolen by record companies, the commercialization of Juneteenth feels like another kind of theft.

I had never heard of Juneteenth until I moved to the Bay Area from my hometown of Philadelphia. I didn’t know it was one of many freedom festivals celebrated by descendants of enslaved people in the United States.

Emancipation Day was Jan. 1 in Pennsylvania, April 16 in Wash., D.C., May 20 in Florida, and Aug. 8 in Kentucky. But Juneteenth, June 19, has the most renown, known in Texas as the ‘colored peoples’ Fourth of July.’

It was marked by parades, beauty pageants, rodeos, backyard barbecues and church picnics.

Yes, church.

The formerly enslaved began the day praying in thanks for their freedom just as they had prayed for Jubilee – the day of freedom – when they had chains on their feet and hands. They ‘testified’ about their past suffering and how they had managed to overcome.

And they sang.

Although, we will not hold it this year, Omnira Institute’s Juneteenth Ritual of Remembrance recalled this part of Juneteenth with prayers in the languages of the African captives. In the middle of the ceremony, a soloist would lead us in singing “Many Thousand Gone” while we took turns reciting portions of the Emancipation Proclamation, the news of freedom that took more than two years to reach Texas – two months after the Civil War ended.

“Many Thousand Gone” was famously recorded by Black luminary Paul Robeson in 1947:

“No more auction block for me,

No more, no more

No more auction black for me

Many thousand gone.”

Other verses refer to the ‘pint of salt’ and the ‘driver’s lash,’ the realities of enslavement that they had survived.

‘Sing a Song Full of the Hope That the Present has Brought Us’

All of the genres of African American music have at their root songs like that, the essence being, as Stevie Wonder, wrote, “the joy inside our pain.” So Black music is not just music. It is our story, our history, our very strength.

During the Civil Rights Movement, which peaked 100 years after slavery ended, the people testified that it was the freedom songs – based on spirituals – that gave them the heart to march, face attack dogs, fire hoses, beatings, and shootouts with vigilantes.

The music reminded them that power was in the people. That music, our music, can do so again. We don’t have to accept the commodification of the products of our culture.

The power of those songs is showing a resurgence across the South as we battle again for the right to self-determination through the ballot box.

Those songs are the voices of our ancestors, voices forged in their blood, their sweat, their tears, joy and, above all, faith. Those songs, those prayers live in our blood and our very breath.

This Juneteenth, let us reclaim those holy voices expressed in Black music for ourselves. It is our birthright. It can neither be bought nor sold. No more. Never again.

Wanda Ravernell is the executive director of Omnira Institute, sponsor for 18 years of the Juneteenth Ritual of Remembrance and Oakland’s 11^th Annual Black-Eyed Pea Festival, which will take place on Sept. 12.

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Oakland Post: Week of June 3 – 9, 2026

The printed Weekly Edition of the Oakland Post: Week of June 3 – 9, 2026

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3 days ago

June 9, 2026

Oakland Post

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Study: Waiting Lists for Child Care Assistance Nearly Doubled

BLACKPRESS USA NEWSWIRE — “Since the expiration of tens of billions of dollars in federal child care funding in 2023 and 2024, an already fragile child care system has been pushed even closer to the brink.”
The post Study: Waiting Lists for Child Care Assistance Nearly Doubled appeared first on BlackPressUSA.

Published

4 days ago

June 8, 2026

Oakland Post

By National Women’s Law Center

The National Women’s Law Center released its annual State Child Care Assistance Policies report, finding that the number of children placed on waiting lists for federally funded child care assistance nearly doubled between 2024 and 2025 — and that number has only continued to grow.

The report serves as a key resource for state lawmakers, advocates, and policymakers by tracking state child care assistance policies and identifying where states are strengthening support for families and early educators — or falling behind.

“This deeply troubling increase in the number of children on child care waiting lists is the result of a failure to invest in this crucial sector,” said Karen Schulman, senior director of state child care policy and author of the report. “Since the expiration of tens of billions of dollars in federal child care funding in 2023 and 2024, an already fragile child care system has been pushed even closer to the brink.”

Key findings in the report related to waiting lists for child care assistance include:

• 17 states had waiting lists or a freeze on intake for child care assistance in February 2025, up from 13 states in February 2024.

• Approximately 106,700 children nationwide were added to waiting lists between February 2024 and February 2025, bringing the total to 225,500 children in February 2025 — a 90 percent increase compared to February 2024.

• The numbers climbed even further between February 2025 and summer/fall 2025, with more than 175,000 additional children added to state waiting lists in just a few months — a 78 percent increase.

• At least seven states newly began placing families on waiting lists or freezing intake, while at least 10 additional states saw their waiting lists grow, after February 2025.

The report also includes state-by-state data on key child care assistance policies, including income eligibility limits, parent copayments, provider payment rates, and eligibility policies for parents searching for work.

Click the link to learn more: Warning Signs: State Child Care Assistance Policies 2025.

The post Study: Waiting Lists for Child Care Assistance Nearly Doubled appeared first on BlackPressUSA.