\u2014 Asm. Bonta\u2019s office<\/p>\n
Kiwanis Club honors local Hope of America eighth-graders<\/p>\n
The Kiwanis Club of Alameda (KCA) on March 11 celebrated eight exceptional eighth-graders as Hope of America awardees for 2026. The club invited the students, their teachers and their families to a luncheon held at Alameda\u2019s Elks Lodge.<\/p>\n
Alameda Mayor Marilyn Ezzy Ashcraft and Ryan LaLonde, the Alameda Unified School Board\u2019s president, presented their congratulations with remarks. Each student received a plaque from KCA President Laila Grassley and an official certificate from the mayor.<\/p>\n
The honored students were Shea Chhoth (Wood Middle School), Carver Cruz (Nea Community Learning Center), Dylan Cruz (St. Joseph Elementary), Josephine Gilmore (Encinal Junior & Senior High), DeVonn Harding (Academy of Alameda), Isabelle Kim (Coastline Christian School), Elena Svec (St. Philip Neri) and Kairi Williams (Wood Middle).<\/p>\n
The Hope of America Award is given to outstanding eighth-graders who continuously demonstrate leadership, character, peer outreach, community service and school spirit. Every school in Alameda with an eighth-grade class invites teachers to nominate students matching these criteria. These young Hope of America awardees inspire their peers to respect and welcome all students. For more details visit k01025.site.kiwanis.org<\/a> online.<\/p>\n \u2014 KCA<\/p>\n USS Hornet Sea, Air & Space Museum officials invite the public to join them in commemorating National Vietnam War Veterans Day from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. March 29. In conjunction with the Alameda Veterans Affairs Commission, the main event starting at 1 p.m. will feature keynote speaker Nicholas \u201cNapa Nick\u201d Sanza.<\/p>\n Sanza conducting dangerous underground missions during the Vietnam War in Viet Cong tunnel systems in search of American prisoners of war and the remains of missing service members. Sanza says that, armed with a 3.5-foot bamboo stick with a slit cut on one end, a 14-inch World War II Japanese bayonet and a silenced .38 Special revolver pistol, he was deep underground in the tunnel system, wearing the same clothing and eating the same food as the enemy and using their skills to hear in the dark what his eyes could not see.<\/p>\n After the war, Sanza says he built a successful career in film and television as \u201cNapa Nick,\u201d working on the CBS series \u201cFalcon Crest\u201d and numerous network productions as a producer, production manager, stuntman and investigative journalist. For more details on the Hornet\u2019s activities for March 29, visit uss-hornet.org\/event\/national-vietnam-war-veterans-day-2026<\/a>.<\/p>\n \u2014 USS Hornet<\/p>\n To submit an item for the Alameda Journal\u2019s \u201cIn brief\u201d section, which is now usually published in print on each month\u2019s third Friday, please email it, at least three days before print publication, to njackson@bayareanewsgroup.com<\/a>. Each item should be 90 to 180 words and include a short headline along with the name of the group or individual to credit for it.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"ALAMEDA California Assemblymember Mia Bonta, D-Alameda, alongside a coalition of 60 organizations, on Tuesday introduced Assembly Bill 2600…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":60728,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[34],"tags":[3764,143,145,144],"class_list":["post-225849","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-oakland","tag-community-briefs","tag-oakland","tag-oakland-headlines","tag-oakland-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/225849","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=225849"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/225849\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/60728"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=225849"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=225849"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=225849"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}![\"The](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/03\/ALJ-L-BRIEFS-0320-1.jpg\")
The Kiwanis Club of Alameda on March 11 honored eight local eighth-graders as 2026 Hope of America awardees in a luncheon for the students, their teachers and their families at Alameda’s Elks Lodge. (photo courtesy Al Wright Raintree Studios via Patricia Bowen)\u00a0
\n\u2018Napa Nick\u2019 to speak at Hornet on Vietnam War Veterans Day<\/p>\n