Month: May 2015

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Magazines Village

Fur friendly: A traveling petting zoo offers kids and pets playtime

Photo: Amanda Maglione

Christine Eichler’s fondest childhood memories are of running around with all the sheep, horses and rabbits at her grandparents’ animal farm in New Jersey.

“It was like the SPCA of the county,” she said with a laugh, recalling how her grandparents happily took in farm animals that needed homes. “That was always my happy place, so I knew one day I would want that.”

Now the proud owner of more than a dozen of her own farm animals on a 30-acre piece of land northeast of the city, she’s embarking on a new business venture that is bringing her life full circle. At the end of April, Eichler loaded up several of her beloved four- (and two-) legged friends and transported them across town for a children’s birthday party, her first official gig running the Foxboro Farm Traveling Petting Zoo.

The idea was born last year after she attended an event where a woman had schlepped a trailer full of animals more than three hours to work an event in the area. She couldn’t help but wonder what effect that kind of travel time had on the animals, though, and that’s what got the wheels turning. At that point she already had a house full of dogs and cats, plus a pony and pigs outside, and the upkeep was getting pricey—she and her husband had always joked that they needed to put the animals to work so they could earn their keep.

“That’s really all I wanted to do; I’m just looking to cover animal expenses so I can have this because it’s something I enjoy,” Eichler said. “So I did some research, and there was nothing within an hour and a half radius. So I said, ‘We already have the pony, we already have the pig, we’re just missing a few little things. Let’s do it.’”

The traveling petting zoo, available for kids’ birthday parties and events like school fundraisers, will include animals like a miniature pony, two playful little mini Nubian goats that just want to prance around and show off their tricks all day, a couple of fluffball rabbits, and a pot-bellied pig named Mavis that rolls over like a dog when you scratch her belly. The animals will be held in little exercise pens, and kids will be free to roam among the enclosures and experience the pig’s oddly spikey coat and the fluffy, cloud-like feathers on Peggy the buff orpington, which Eichler said is known as one of the friendliest chicken breeds.

Along with a small crew occasionally including her 5-year-old daughter—who already loves “helping” by chasing the ducks and chickens all around the pens when it’s time to settle in at night—Eichler will be on hand to answer any questions the kids may have about the animals. But it will be an open setup with no established program or itinerary, she said, so guests can roam freely and spend time with each animal.

For more information, check out facebook.com/foxborofarmpettingzoo or e-mail Eichler at foxborofarmpettingzoo@gmail.com.

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Magazines Village

Stay sharp: Six ways to keep the wheels turning this summer

Live Arts. Photo: Martyn Kyle

We love swim team and beach trips and even the occasional lazy day at home just as much as the next person, but it can be all too easy to let your kids’ brains go into hibernation mode during the summer months. Luckily for kids (and parents) in the area, schools and organizations in Charlottesville and the surrounding counties are gearing up for summer programs that will strike the perfect balance between entertaining and educational. Some of these may be so much fun that your kids won’t even notice they’re learning things—don’t worry, we won’t tell them.

KidsCollege@PVCC

Every summer, Piedmont Virginia Community College offers a full schedule of week-long camps and academies for kids in third to ninth grade. Whether your son or daughter is into fashion design, app development or physics, there’s bound to be at least one PVCC camp that keeps their heads from filling with cobwebs. Here’s just a snapshot of what’s available:

For third to sixth graders: Minecraft designers; LEGO and stop action films; jewelry making

For sixth to ninth graders: French adventures, architecture, dance, music, geometry and algebra

For more information, visit pvcc.edu/kidscollege.

ACAC camps/academies

ACAC offers quintessential day camps featuring sports, crafts and swimming, but for something a little different, there’re also week-long day programs like Judy’s Baking Academy, Circus Academy and Bricks for Kids Academy.

For more information, visit ssl.acac.com/acaccamp/academies.aspx.

WriterHouse youth programs

Don’t let your kids lose their writing chops over the summer. At WriterHouse, children as young as rising third graders all the way up to 2015 high school grads can enroll in afternoon writing programs. Fees cover the cost of snacks, a writer’s notebook and a copy of the camp magazine, which will feature a piece of work done by each writer. Families and friends are invited to a reading at the end of each session so everyone can show off the fiction, non-fiction, movie scripts and poetry they worked so hard on.

For more information, visit writerhouse.org.

Light House Studio workshops

Aaand…action! Light House Studio offers summer workshops for kids ages 8-18, including young directors, intro to animation, exploring filmmaking and even courses on creating documentaries and music videos.

For more information, visit lighthousestudio.org/summer-camp.

Live Arts camps

Calling all actors (and directors, comedians, writers and singers)! Live Arts is taking registrations for its summer programs for kids and teenagers. There are sessions for musical theater, one-act plays, “mini camps for wee ones” for kids as young as 4 and a comedy camp that’s new this year.

For more information, visit livearts.org/youth.

Music Resource Center workshops

Registration is open for the Music Resource Center’s summer workshops teaching everything from guitar and drums to songwriting and dance. And this year, the center is offering a five-day master class for ninth-12th graders, which will feature different local artists like John D’earth, Eli Cook and Brad Savage.

For more information, visit musicresourcecenter.org/workshops.

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Magazines Village

Closing the gap: Boys & Girls Club director James Pierce picks up where schools leave off

Photo: Rammelkamp Foto

Like a lot of us in this town, James Pierce ended up in Charlottesville by accident. Shortly after graduating from William & Mary in 1996, he had a stack of 12 job applications in the backseat of his car. All but three of them flew out the sunroof never to be seen again; one of the reminders was for a gig at Charlottesville High School, where he thus began his career as an educator. He’s since been a teacher, baseball coach, assistant principal and principal at three different city public schools.

In 2009, representatives from the Boys & Girls Clubs of Central Virginia (BGCCVA) approached Pierce and asked if he was the guy who had gone to meet all of his new students and their families the summer before his first year as principal at Clark Elementary. (He was.) The organization, which provides diverse youth programs after school and during school breaks, was seeking a new executive director. After conducting an unsuccessful national search to fill the position, it turned out the guy for the job was practically next door all along.

Fast forward to 2015. Since taking on the role of executive director, Pierce has guided the BGCCVA, which serves Albemarle, Charlottesville, Madison and Orange, through implementing new programs, establishing new relationships with other community groups and opening a sixth club location. He’s also been recognized by the Boys & Girls Clubs of America with the Robert M. Sykes Award for Professional Excellence, but he’s adamant that the award should go to the entire team, not just him.

“I just happen to be lucky enough to be the one sitting in this chair,” Pierce says, noting that the team consists of more than 30 volunteer board members plus staff at all six club locations. “These people are amazing, and the passion and dedication they bring to their work is inspiring and humbling. I’ve always tried to be the hardest working person wherever I am, and I’ve given up.”

Pierce made the transition from schools to the club because he wanted to see for himself how his students spent their time out of school, and be a part of an effort to make that time more valuable and enriching. Not only does he believe that every kid deserves the same opportunities as the next, but having worked with elementary, middle and high school students for nearly two decades, he sees every child as being potentially “at risk” in one way or another. He did the best he could to address issues as an educator, but the BGCCVA’s mission aligns with his desire to provide opportunities for kids outside the limited school environment.

“Schools cannot do this alone,” he says. “There are three times that I think are really valuable for closing any gaps that might be out there: preschool, after school time and summer time. Those are the three things that really, in my career as an educator, were a little bit beyond my grasp.”

Pierce says he misses being in the classroom and working closely with the kids. Luckily his office is in the basement of the Cherry Avenue club, which means even on the way to and from meetings with potential partners or donors, he can swing through the main floor to offer a couple high fives to the groups of kids doing homework or playing basketball.

“Kids have a lot to teach us,” Pierce said. “We really need to listen to them and add a little bit of what we know as adults and professionals, but really be guided by what they tell us they want to get involved in and be sure to connect them to those resources.”

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Magazines Village

Shy children: What’s normal and what you can do

File photo

Children’s birthday parties typically offer a bird’s-eye view of the broad spectrum of human temperaments. You’ll likely see socially bold kids, vying to be first in line for the piñata; socially comfortable yet milder-mannered kids, who prefer to exuberantly observe the piñata mayhem; and socially reticent children, who hang way back and mutely shake their heads when concerned grown-ups encourage them to join in the “fun.” If you’re a parent of a kid in the third camp, you might be concerned. After all, every kid loves a birthday bash filled with cake and noise and flying candy, right?

Not necessarily. The truth is that your child’s shyness may be temporary or he might never be the life of the party, but that doesn’t mean he has social anxiety disorder.

“People come into the world wired differently. It’s not pathological to be shy,” says Dr. Amy E. Wilson, a Charlottesville clinical psychologist who specializes in cognitive behavioral interventions for anxiety-related disorders.

Wilson explains that shyness only becomes a treatable condition when it results in avoidance of normal social functioning or interferes with social or emotional development.

Exposure needed for social development and competence

Wilson says it’s important for children to develop normal social skills through regular social interaction. That means parents of shyer kids may need to gradually expose their kids to uncomfortable situations.

“You don’t want to push them so far that they have a negative experience,” says Wilson, “but anxiety isn’t dangerous, and having kids work through their fears and get to the other side is very valuable.”

According to Wilson, many parents mistakenly compensate for shy children in the spirit of easing the anxiety, but that only perpetuates the shyness or seeds an even bigger problem through social avoidance. 

“I know of very competent teenagers whose parents still order for them at restaurants,” she says.

When further help is warranted

Some shy kids may always be slower to warm up in social situations, and that’s O.K. as long as they can handle normative social situations without too much discomfort. If, however, your child can’t seem to deal with day-to-day social interactions such as school, it may be time to seek outside help. A first step might be to consult a school counselor, who will be trained to evaluate your child’s social development and offer an action plan.

First steps

Desensitize shy kids through an activity they already enjoy

“A lot of kids work through their shyness when they are motivated to do something that requires social interaction,” says Dr. Amy E. Wilson. Summer classes and camps can be great for this, but don’t throw them into the deep end of the pool, so to speak, too fast. Also don’t hold their hands the entire time, she advises.

Arts and crafts lessons or science and engineering activities side-by-side with other children would allow for gradual social interaction. Some options:

Bricks 4 Kidz Lego-building activities

charlottesville@bricks4kidz.com

Curry School of Education, the Saturday and Summer Enrichment Program for gifted students

curry.virginia.edu/community-programs/student-enrichment/sep

Les Fabriques Sewing Workshops and Camp Stitch

lesfabriquesinc.com

McGuffey Art Center Classes and Camps for Kids and Teens

mcguffeyartcenter.com/kids-teens

A group physical activity that stresses health, confidence-building and other life skills would provide more supportive incremental socialization than a competitive team. For example:

Bend Yoga

bendcville.com

The Little Gym

thelittlegym.com/charlottesvilleva

SuperStarters Tennis & Teamwork

(917) 834-5717

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News

School bus mom: Child hit back of her car

Dana Monroe said she did not disregard a stopped school bus when a child was hit in Belmont. Photo Martyn Kyle

Dana Monroe said she could see the school bus at the top of the hill at Rives and Vine streets as she turned out of Ridgecrest Drive in Belmont. And when she felt something hit her car, she pulled over.

Monroe was charged May 15 for disregarding a stopped school bus in an incident in which a 5-year-old boy was struck by her vehicle, according to police. But she said, “He ran into the back tire of my car. If he’d run in front of my car, I would have seen him.”

The 30-year-old mother of three was driving two of her children to school, and said the bus stopped as she went past it in the opposite direction. “Children are pretty observant,” she said. “I’m pretty sure my children would have been screaming, Mom, if the stop signs were out on the bus.”

According to police, four witnesses and the bus driver said its stop signs were displayed. Monroe said she was told the bus has a camera. “If the camera says I’m wrong, I’m willing to take responsibility for my action,” she said. “I have children myself.”

C-VILLE has made multiple requests to view video footage, and at press time police were still checking on that.

The statute Monroe was charged under is a reckless driving charge, which is a Class 1 misdemeanor, said defense attorney Dave Heilberg, who is not connected with this case.

As for the reliability of eyewitnesses, Heilberg has written the book, or rather, a chapter in the book called “Eyewitness Identification Procedures” in Defending Criminal Cases in Virginia. Said the attorney, “It depends.”

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Magazines Village

Let’s talk shots: The HPV conversation isn’t easy, but it’s important

Assistant Professors at the University of Virginia's School of Nursing, Emma Mitchell (left) and Jessica Keim-Malpass (right) teach students how to approach the topic of HPV vaccinations with parents of young children. Photo: Amanda Maglione

Less than 30 percent of Virginia’s adolescent girls were vaccinated for human papillomavirus (HPV) last year, despite the fact that the Commonwealth was one of the first to pass legislation mandating the vaccine for sixth grade girls. The National Cancer Institute (NCI) wants to know why vaccination rates for HPV—the most common sexually transmitted disease in the U.S., which can lead to at least six types of cancer—are so low among girls and boys, and granted $138,000 to the University of Virginia Health System for a study to map out compliance rates across the state.

“What we’ve started doing is addressing both individualized factors and bigger policy factors that are really limiting young kids from getting the vaccine,” said assistant professor of nursing Jessica Keim-Malpass, who’s spearheading the study alongside her university colleague Emma Mitchell.

Since its release, Gardasil has been commonly known as the vaccine that could prevent cervical cancer, but Keim-Malpass wants parents and patients to know that HPV has the potential to affect anybody who’s sexually active, male or female, and can cause cancer in both men and women.

“A lot of parents only associate HPV with cervical cancer, and don’t understand why boys need it too,” she said.

HPV is passed through intimate skin-to-skin contact, and symptoms like warts (papillomas) may take years to develop. Genital warts as a result of an HPV infection can lead to precancerous lesions, and ultimately cancer of the cervix, vagina, anus, penis, mouth and throat. Despite the fact that the vaccine could prevent several types of cancer, Keim-Malpass said a lot of providers and parents alike are uncomfortable talking about vaccinating kids for a sexually transmitted disease when they’re still so young.

“Some parents think it doesn’t apply to them because their kid isn’t sexually active. But that’s how it works—you get it before you’re sexually active,” she said. “Because they’re so far removed, they don’t see the impacts of cancer until decades later, so it can be really hard to make that decision for families.”

Virginia mandates that girls receive the vaccine in sixth grade (no passed legislation includes males in the mandate yet), but Keim-Malpass said because opt-outs are so broad, the policy can only be so effective. The goal of the study is to learn about the contributing factors behind why people decide to opt out of the vaccine, and to understand how communication and policy affect vaccination rates.

According to Keim-Malpass, improved communication between providers and parents could lead to higher vaccination rates. Some providers are very upfront with parents and patients, and present Gardasil as one of the several vaccines that kids are due for at age 11. Because it’s associated with sex, though, she said a lot of providers tend to be squeamish about it, and almost offer it apologetically, and as something to “think about” rather than follow through with.

“When a provider doesn’t make a strong recommendation, a parent certainly isn’t going to follow through,” Keim-Malpass said.

Ultimately, though, she said it’s up to the parents. It should be a provider’s responsibility to present the facts and educate to the extent that they can, and then respect a parent’s decision.

“One thing [providers] can be better about is being concrete about what’s due,” she said. “But we respect people’s decisions. That’s central to how we approach things.”

The vaccine: by the numbers

2006

The year Gardasil, which helps protect against four types of HPV, came onto the market.

Three

The number of injections your child receives over the course of six months.

9-26 years

The age range Gardasil recommends girls get vaccinated. For boys, it’s 9-21.

11 or 12

The age The Center for Disease Control and Prevention recommends the vaccine for boys and girls.

Categories
Living

Out of town: When the pets can’t come along

Taking a summer vacation? Leaving your pet in the hands of a professional caretaker will relieve their stress, and yours.

With the weather finally turning its back on an all-too-frosty winter, it’s the time of year when thoughts turn to sunny beaches, cross-country road trips and foreign excursions. But even the happiest summer plans can be darkened by the problem of what to do with the pets while you’re away.

As the owner of a North American Stresshound, I’m sympathetic. I have the sort of dog that desperately tries to eat through the walls if I step out to check the mail, so the thought of leaving him for a week gives me indigestion. But there’s no way around it. Once in a while, we humans have places to go.

You may be lucky enough to have nearby friends or family willing to pet-sit in your absence. For anxiety-prone animals, this might be the lowest stress option, especially if your pets are already familiar with those people and they can stay at your home.

More often than not, though, you’re going to need to rely on boarding to keep your critters safe while you’re gone. Nobody likes to board their pets. We think about them sitting alone and bored, one Sarah McLachlan song away from being the saddest thing ever. But with a little bit of planning, it’s really not so bad.

Of course, it’s a good idea to visit prospective boarding kennels in advance to scope out the amenities. If your dog is big and boisterous, she might benefit from a kennel that has large amounts of space to stretch her legs or an associated daycare program to keep her occupied. If your pet is small and timid (or a cat), he might be perfectly content with less space in a quieter environment.

Most kennels allow you to drop off a few home comforts to keep the experience from being too jarring —maybe a favorite bed or stuffed animal, and regular food and treats. And if you’re really worried about how your pet will take to the change, it’s not a bad idea to schedule him for a one or two night test run to see how it goes. It will probably turn out that you’re far more anxious than he is.

While most boarding experiences are uneventful, medical problems can rear their head. Prevention is, of course, your first defense, and your pets should be up-to-date on any appropriate vaccines. These shots don’t take effect immediately, however, and need to be given about two weeks beforehand. It’s also worth making sure your kennel requires that its other residents are properly vaccinated. Just as in people, immunity works best when everybody is covered, and outbreaks are more likely when the safety net has holes.

Boarding facilities are generally well-equipped to handle routine medical needs. If your pet is on any medication or requires a particular diet, they should be able to accommodate you without any hassle. But should an emergency arise, it’s important that you’ve left the staff with your primary veterinarian’s contact information.

Apart from all the details, it’s still worth mentioning one important thing: The kinds of people who work at boarding kennels absolutely love animals, and yours are no exception. They’re likely to stop and spend time with your pet if he looks upset or bored. Is it the same as being home with the family? Of course not. But they are in the hands of people who genuinely do care. That alone should make it easier to enjoy your vacation, and your pets will be waiting happily when you return.

Dr. Fietz is a small animal veterinarian at Georgetown Veterinary Hospital. He received his veterinary degree from Cornell University in 2003.

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Arts

Film review: Tomorrowland takes good intentions over the edge

Director Brad Bird constructs a idealistic search for a brighter future in Disney’s societal fixer-upper Tomorrowland. Photo: Walt Disney Studios

There is far more wrong than right with Disney’s Tomorrowland, but there is one bright, gleaming asset to the film that should be taken into as much consideration as its (many, many) setbacks. It’s been noted that apocalypse fatigue has set in among moviegoers who are beginning to wonder how many times they can witness the deaths of thousands of unseen people in entertainment before it becomes meaningless, and director Brad Bird deserves credit for calling out the world’s numbness to disaster in his new live action Disney film.

Bird’s enthusiasm for layered storytelling is infectious, and it’s refreshing to see the man behind such thematically rich family entertainment as The Iron Giant and The Incredibles still trusts the intelligence of children to understand conflict on a deeper, more existential level than bad guys versus good guys. It’s vital to Bird that the world sees critical thinking and questioning what you’ve been told as preferable to punching the baddie until he gives up, a crucial lesson for children and other filmmakers alike.

If only the film’s premise, execution and message lived up to its good intentions. The premise is that there is an interdimensional city known as Tomorrowland, a kind of Disney-fied Galt’s Gulch that is created by earth’s greatest minds who pursue their life’s ambitions free from political, financial or social considerations. The city’s decline is somehow tied in with the earth’s impending doom, a riddle that needs to be solved by whiz kid Casey Newton (Britt Robertson) and jilted, exiled Tomorrowland recruit Frank Walker (George Clooney). The execution centers on boring the audience to death with exposition about the history and significance of Tomorrowland for the first hour, then finally arriving and immediately embarking on an entirely new plot thread that has almost nothing to do with everything we were told before. And finally, the message is that complainers like George Orwell need to stop being such negative Nancies and start fixing things, darnit. (This is not an exaggeration; early in the film, Casey’s English teacher is speechless while waving a copy of 1984 after she asks “Well, what can we do about it?”)

Even if you look past the ideology—which Bird and co-writer Damon Lindelof make nearly impossible, as they tie every aspect of it to their vision of a kinder, softer reading of Ayn Rand—Tomorrowland is an extremely strange and uneven film with a story better suited to 90 minutes than 130.

Bird has no idea what to do with his characters beyond making them mouthpieces, leading to uneven performances by an otherwise terrific cast. The two leads feel like they’re pulled from different movies; Robertson is a delight as her interpretation of Casey as energetic and intelligent falls into none of the pitfalls awaiting intellectually engaged young women in fiction, while Clooney’s spastic, spiteful grump routine hits every familiar note. This same fate befalls the city of Tomorrowland itself, which never rises above a pretty metaphor and feels uninhabited due to muddled world building and uneven production design.

To be clear, it is fully possible to enjoy a film that you disagree with politically. The same themes of society securing its own doom by holding back its greatest assets was a crucial part of The Incredibles, but it was a springboard to a more relatable story rather than a foundation for an objectivist fairy tale. The most interesting thing it has to say is that one can go Galt (deprive society of your contribution as a Nietzschean übermensch) out of magnanimity rather than out of spite, but the only way to enjoy Tomorrowland is to agree with its message or actively ignore it. If you’ve visited Epcot, seen Clooney’s performance in Intolerable Cruelty and struggled to reason with a college friend who just discovered Atlas Shrugged, you’ve already experienced Disney’s Tomorrowland. Come to think of it, Galt’s Gulch does sound like a fun roller coaster.

Playing this week

The Age of Adeline

Avengers: Age of Ultron

Ex Machina

Far from the Madding Crowd

Hot Pursuit

Mad Max: Fury Road

Paul Blart: Mall Cop 2

Pitch Perfect 2

Poltergeist

Regal Stonefield 14 and IMAX
244-3213

Categories
News

Light House Studio buys Vinegar Hill Theatre

Vinegar Hill could not compete against the corporate muscle of the Regal Cinemas movie theater chain in a closed market. File photo

Charlottesville’s iconic independent movie theater, Vinegar Hill, which has been shuttered for two years, has been sold to Light House Studio, a nonprofit that encourages young filmmakers, for $850,000.

Light House initially was interested in the space as a rental. “Back in November, we realized in sort of an aha moment that we could put everything under one roof,” said executive director Deanna Gould.

The studio raised $1 million in eight weeks, and is still fundraising for money to renovate the space. The theater will remain, said Gould, and summer camp kicks off June 8 in the former restaurant portion of the building.

“The theater is loved by so many,” said Gould. “No one wanted to see it torn down. People are happy the theater will retain its film legacy.”

And Gould thinks having young filmmakers in the building is a good thing. “I think it will add a lot of life to the theater,” she said.

Categories
Arts

ARTS Pick: Lilly Hiatt

Lilly Hiatt pulls from many influences (including her dad) to fit neatly into rock’s current lineup of post-punk front women. Photo: Greg Groth

When you’re the daughter of a well-respected singer-songwriter and blazing a trail with your own talent, it stands to reason that you’d feel some added pressure. Lilly Hiatt shines brightly enough to illuminate the shadow of her Americana rock star dad John, and kicks it up a notch through a blend of punk, indie and California folk rock that’s loaded with attitude. Her press kit describes the younger Hiatt’s style as anything but demure. “I’d rather throw a punch than bat my eye,” she said. 

Thursday 5/28. Free, 8pm. The Garage, 100 E. Jefferson St. thegarage-cville.com.