Page 7 - Mid Valley Times 7-18-19 E-edition

Split personality with the doctor and his friend Mr. Hyde
By Juanita Adame
Mid Valley Times
Reedley's River City Theatre was busy with excitement on the evening of July 10 as performers rehearsed for the opening night of their latest musical production.
"We are doing 'Jekyll and Hyde' the musical, and that is running from July 12 through July 28," said Jeff Lusk. "The story is about man's duality, good versus evil, right versus wrong and one man's struggle with that."
David Angel, a Reedley native, will play the lead of Jekyll and Hyde.
He said it's exciting for him to be back on the stage. "This is my first time back in the theater," Angel said. "I was gone for seven years. I enlisted in the Marine Cops in 2013. So this is my first show being back, so I am very excited to be a
part of this.
"I was very involved with
this theatre company since it started in 2004. I've spent a lot of time in this building reuniting with old friends and making new ones."
The theatre company has
Juanita Adame / Mid Valley Times
Reedley River City Theatre Company performs "Jekyll and Hyde" at a recent dress rehearsal. David Angel, who plays Jekyll and Hyde, acts out a scene singing in the beginning of the musical, right.
under direction of the new board, the company hopes to rent the venue out for a variety of events.
"This will allow us to reach out to the community more. Hopefully it can start to become much more self sufficient," he said.
Cady Mejias plays one of the main characters in the musical. She said she is looking forward to performing for the community.
"I play Lucy Harris in this production of 'Jekyll and Hyde.' She is the main entertainer at the Red Rat, and also works as a prostitute," Mejias said.
"She ends up falling in love with Jekyll because he is the first gentleman who has ever showed her respect."
Mejias said she's been performing since the age of 11 and has always loved the stage.
"Performing is a lot of fun for me," she said. "I love doing it."
Other performers include Rebecca Potts, a Fresno native and former Miss California Sweetheart.
Potts, who has been performing since she was a toddler, said she feels honored to be part of the
See HYDEonpageA8
By Mike Nemeth
Mid Valley Times
Bobbi-Ann Phillips pointed out the solar village devised and created by the students in the SAM Academy’s summer Bots to Biology Camp.
Overhead copper wires connected a cityscape grid of tiny homes and businesses, powering lights and services. And all operated from a central solar array.
“The whole class contributed,” Phillips said. “Look at that little (swimming) pool, the laundromat, the water tower with cell signal boosters all over. Even a McDonalds. They (also) decided they needed an airport, which is over there.”
But community planning, green energy or the future scientists SAM will likely produce wasn’t what Phillips wanted to direct attention to on the morning of July 8. That was in the academy’s main conference room.
Behind the glass door that separates the two halves of the SAM Academy, Steve Kerlin, Ph.D. and director of education for the Avondale, Pa.-based Stroud Water Research Agency, led a seminar that explained to school teachers how best to turn their students on to environmental science. Later that morning, Kerlin, who appeared as comfortable in the field as he was in a climate- controlled environment, brought his class to an irrigation canal at the base of the Sierra foothills, east on McKinley Avenue.
Kerlin’s presence and that of other scientists that day indicated the growing sophistication of the Sanger, Calif. science and arts academy that strives to bring the latest
Mike Nemeth / Mid Valley Times
Steve Kerlin, director of education for the Stroud Water Research Center, supervises as water samples are retrieved for testing, top. The water vial will be tested for dissolved oxygen, right. Below, a bag of debris collected from the irrigation canal is tested in class.
Valadez said finding a waterway with current slow enough to place a “leaf pack” sometime earlier proved difficult. The leaf pack, which is in actuality a mesh bag, collects debris and whatever else flows down the water way. Valadez said Sierra runoff was of particularly high volume this season, contributing to a recreation closure, since ended, on the Kings River. The added runoff heightened current speed in many nearby waterways.
The canal water ran as clear as a mountain stream. And about as cold at 57 degrees.
Lauren Twohey, a science teacher at Parlier Jr. High, joined Kerlin in the water. “A lot of planaria today,” Kerlin said, stirring through one of the water samples.
Their mission likely will be replicated by most, if not all, of the teachers attending the seminar. The next time, the teachers would bring their students. Tests run in the field that day by Kerlin and the teachers included macroinvertebrate collection, measuring turbidity, or amount of suspended material in the water, calculating amounts of dissolved oxygen and taking the water temperatures in celsius.
Back in the classroom, students would hunt for the organisms using wifi-connected portable microscopes. In this case, the teachers did. They also planned to test for phosphates, nitrates and other elements. Valadez offered the teachers the possibility of continuing education credits.
“We’re hoping for big diversity, especially for some (organisms) sensitive
been located on 10th Street in downtown Reedley since it opened in 1902. It was known back then as The Jansen Opera House and subsequently became the Reedley Opera House.
In 2004, the River City Theatre Company was
formed and has been operating under that name ever since.
Mark Luzania, who also is involved in theatre, said there have been some recent changes to the theater, and they hope to include some better and
bigger shows in the future. "We have a brand new board, and they're very active. In fact, they just met here and they're going to be very involved," he said. "I'm just really excited because
we're turning a corner." Luzania also said that
Bringing water science to classrooms
in scientific instruction to educators and students, many underprivileged, in the central San Joaquin Valley. Sanger is one of three sites in the country — the others are Richmond, Va. and Philadelphia — that are part of the Centers for the WATERS project.
The acronym refers to Watershed Awareness Using Technology and Environmental Research for Sustainability.
“We are putting Sanger on the map,” said Jerry Valadez, SAM president and chief executive. “And we do this all the time.”
At the rather steep canal bank and surrounded by orange orchards, Kerlin stood knee deep in the cold rushing water, explaining how to recover the greatest representative number of macroinvertebrates in water samples.
“Have a bucket or sieve downstream,” he said, demonstrating his technique of disturbing the canal bed to dislodge the tiny creatures. “Pick it up, take it with you and it’s
back to the classroom.” Stroud, which seeks to advance knowledge and stewardship of freshwater systems through global research, education and watershed restoration, produces a water testing and analyzation kit that can accommodate the needs of a classroom. The mission that day was to pass along the techniques amongst a class of educators from around the Central Valley
using that system.
See WATER on page A8