achl bc 7 presents "profiles of excellence." >> hello. for the past 26 yrs through our "profiles of excellence" series, we've featured ople in the bay area who are makng important contributions to the communiy. today we celebrate the bay ea's cultural diversity with the exploratorium as the backdrop for our speal program. sitting right on the san ancisco bay, the exploratorium is a place for creativity and an openmind. for more than 40 years the innovative exhibits and interactive activities have encouraged people of all ages have explore science, art and the imagination. here you can discov new ways to understand how our world works. with 600 exhibits inside and out, the exploratorium is not to

be missed. you'll see more of this expansive location throughout our show. our fst profile explores the exciting brazilian art form. macia founded it in 1991 and it's grown into an important cultural bridge between brazil and the bay area. ♪ >> reporter: when y hear the sounds of brazil and see this beautiful yet dangerous movements that resemble a fight, you're witnessing the artistry. >> it's a brazilian art form. originally it came from the afghan people that brought brazil slaves. so it's a martial art. it incorporates dance, music, singing and acrotics.>> up. briba >>rt is braz maartist,one of only ao ho.

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that y be really other. >> rep wrsform aclnd outside instruments, siaditional and to hephepace andgy up f tcircle. it's the ll this energ allgether is of ou've got to be very focused. you need to be focused. you have go reflects. and really in harmony with the other person. you need to be in tune with the other person. because it's fun. but what is the person really trying to kick you for real. you need t know how you defend yourself and keep a good conversation. >> at abada, children are also

encouraged to try it. >> it's perfect for kids. they'reoing to dance. they're gng to do gymnastics, the self-defense, sing, play instruments. all improvisatio they develop this aspect that's naral to kids. to be spontaneous d be free. you learn disciine without being rigid. >> reporter: at any age, it offers culture, exercise and artistryll in one and macia is always looking for new students. >> the best thing of my da is when i'm teaching. i'm gl to be able to be promotin brazilian culture. when i tea capuera, i'm teaching a littleit of brazil to everyone. ♪ >> our congratulationso macia for her success in bringing capuera to audiences across the bay area. now stay with . next we'll meethe woman at the head of an historic bay area ...we need to break up.

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excellent." our next profile, president of mills college in oakland. it's beenan institution in women's education since 1852. a alicia carries on this important legacy. >> wh part of the east coast? >> new jesey. >> new jersey. good. welcome. >> if you come to mills clege, you will find a community that is here to suprt you. you will find a community that expects that you will do well and will do everything psible to help you do well. mills is a place wre we expect excellence, an mills is a place filled with people who expect excellencef you. >> reporter: as president of mills college in oakland, alicia has high expectations for her studen and herself. a mindset she learned at an early age. >> i come from a long line of very strg, independent women.

and so my mother,my aunts, they were all role mode for me. they are the ones who instilled in me my love of education, my work ethic, my values system, ou know, all of the things that are the foundation of who and what i am i think came from them. >> reporter: after a 30-year career at eli lilly a company, alicia decided to explore a new path of education. >> throughout my career al of my volunteer work was in educati or services for women and girls. so to be able to combine them with women's education was almost anatural. so i was very lucky when i got the call from mills college, and here i am. >> reporter: when she took on this exciting new role at the well-respected liberal arts college for women in 2011, alicia also stepped into mills history books as their first minority president. >> i know that when i arrived, there were an awful lot of mills alumni and students who are so excited or who were so excited to have someone who, in their

words, looked like them. in the presidency. and so anying that i can do to make sure that all of our alumni are connected to each other and to mills, i'm happy to do that. and ifthe fact that i'm the first minority president brings them here,hen that's a wonderful thing. >> the students are almost all women although men are allowed into the graduate studies program. >>fter they arrive, they begin to understand the vue of being in a place where they are surrounded by women role models. and so i think that as long as we have so many disparities in this world and where women are not equall footed with men, that there continu to be a need for women's colleges. >> reporter: living on keeps ampus keeps the president directl connected to the lives of students and staff. >> they're very smart. they're very savvy. d they make me proud. and so the ability that i have, and quite frankly the privilege

that i have of being here and learning alongside our students, i learn from em. very selfishly, i just want to come and learn again. >> reporter: the president leads mills college by example. her thirst for knowledge, her love of learning and the hope she has for every mills student push them to achieve. even beyond th walls of the picturesque campus. >> i think that our students who come here fully appreciate the voice that they have before they arrive, and yet ty know by the time they leave that it's a much more powerful voice. and so i would say go out and use that voice and use it r the good of all. >> our gratitude to alicia for her dedication to the education and success all of her students. stayith us. en we come back, meet a man helping to provide a support system for aging g and lesbian seniors and we'll itroduce you to the longstanding service

to the longstanding service serving our bay area's

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our next profile introdes us to the man overseeing an important organization that provides vital support to lgbt elders in the bay area. seth kilborn and his team at open house are keeping the seniors engaged in their community. these san francisc seniors have come together to learn new ideas about healthy aging. but what's really happening is the buildi of community. that's exactly what seth, executive director of open house, loves to see. >> community is the number onen older.hey health

have a supportive will keeou l kp you l indeply and it will you vital >> theond open house ivide a supporttem for a lesbian, gay, transgender older adults through housing and community programs. >> lt seniors face unique challenges as they get older. for mst of their lifimes, lgbt seniors ha developed families of choice. otherinds of coping mechanisms. other kinds of ways of protecting themselves from an often very hostile environment. and society. because of the challenges that they fac, there's a reluctance to get the assistance and get support that they need sort of soon enough. and so what ends up happening is that there are disparities that

get created around health issues, housing issues and others. >> reporter: open house offers housing assistance on several fronts. from helping people stay in the own homes -- >> if they need in-home assistance or they need some renovations done in order to make it easr for them to live there, that is extraordinarily important, and that's really what we want to do first. >> reporter: to creasing access to affordable housing. >> we have a whole housing assistance program to really work with folks on how to fill out the applications, how t get into the system. >> reporter: they're even building their own affordae housing complex. it's known as 55 laguna and will offerup to 110 brand-new lgbt welcoming housing units. >> our vison for 55 laguna is really for it to be a hub a a so of central point where people can access the resources they need, engage in their community, take advantage of our services so that it will be really a home for everybody. >> reporter: for theocal elders able to stay in theirwn homes, caring connecti, the

friendly visitor program provides a direct link toheir community by bringing a volunteer dirtly to them. >> the friendly visitor pogram is really, you know, designed to reduce that isolation th all seniors, but lgbt seniors in particular are vulnerable to. and we want to makesure that they stay connected to the community. >> reporter: and open house offers activities, worksps and resources. they truly strive to have something for everne. >> every year w offer about at least 1,000 hours of activity programs that range from yoga to, you know, a workshop on medicare to a worksh on healthy aging. >> reporter: the feedback from the senrs themselves keeps seth and histeam moving forward. >> mostly, you know, i hear "i'm really, really glad thatopen house exists because i really fe like i have a place i can come and feel safe." >> our best goes out to seth kilborn and everyone at open house as they creat positive environments for our local

seniors. our next profile looks at the oldest deaf-ntrolled agency in the nation, dcara serves as a role modelor other deaf agencies around the world. >> hello. >> good afternoon. this is the referral agency. my name is katie. how can i help you? yes. i need to speak with a supervisor reese. is she available? >>eporter: for the past 52 years, dcara has been an importan for the deaf and hard of hearg community with multiple locations around the bay area. >> we work with parents and falies who have recently diagnosed deaf, hard of hearing, blind or late deafened all the wayto senior citizens. our mission is to promote respect of american sign language aseing on par with

english to lobby for deaf people, foster education for deaf people and foster the cultural identity of the deaf community. >> reporter: dcara offers a wide range of serves from advocacy and peer counseling to parent and family services. the deaf employmenttraining center in san jose fers accessie work force training r people who face multiple barriers to work. >> we realize that many of the people who come through our doors en't job ready. they still need some basic skills. hard skills related to lteracy in english, math, cmputer skills as well as the whate call the soft skills, social skills, ethics, social boundaries. >> reporter: dcara is proud to staff a dicated team that reflects its clients. the head of community relations got startedthere as a student. >> dcara invited me t come and eventually interviewed me for a position, and ty hired me. that was a very interesting day, going there for the interview. because they all hugged me.

and they all wished me good luck. and i thought, wow! this is fascinating. >> reporter: the conveniently located deaf community center in san leandro offers a variety of clses and is a source of hope for deaf immigrants. >> all too often, in their countries, they may kno little or no sign language of their home country. ando when they come he tou.s., begin toearn a language, and they have a desire, a passion, an enthusiasm to learn, a they work so hard to learn that sign lauage. and they really appreciate this because they kow there's really nothing for them back home. >> reporter: the broths are originally from guatemala. >> with my family, we use, like, family sign language. >> reporter: learning american sign language is helping with more than just better communication at home. >> immigration, they wanted him to be able to express the reason

why he want to stay here in the u.s. rather than going back home to hisome country. so the dilem is how can he possibly exess this if he doesn't have basic languag to begin with? so we hado teach him what we call survival american sign language at first. and while he was learning these basic survival signs, i had to work with an immigration lawyer and educate them, educatehe court. >> reporter: dcara offers more than just programming. the agency empowers the lives it touches. >> i'm thankful to dcara because theve given me that inner strengtthat allows me to do my job. >> our thanks to dcara for their pport of the deaf and hard-ofearing communities from santa cruz all the way up to the oregon border. stay tuned. when we come back, we'll mee when we come back, we'll mee silicon valley's award-winning

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bubble was starting to collapse. raj wasworking on the assembly line in the south bay, and he witnessed his fellow temp workers struggling to make ends meet. sfoo wh >> what weound was a whole political identity, ctural identity, social identity of the people thatork and live and make up silon valley but had no public voice, h no public platform. >> reporter: ad so he helped co-found sicon valley d-bug, initially as a nonprofit magazine to share their personal powerful stories. >> we created a camarerie out of that experience. and so the question became what originally was what do you want to write about to wha do you want to do about it. and people wanted toimpact the world that they existed in. >> reporter: the members of debug decided to focus their energy to fighting social inequities and advocating for justice. they expanded their reach, adding regular productions in rad, television and the web. they also grew an entrepreneurial arm to house an

incubate enterprises developed by debug members. >> t most transformative part of the work has been our community organizing. what we found was it also allowed folks who were at the heart of asocial injustice to becomehe transformers of that issuerom a problem into a solution. >> thugh debug's organizing model, the albert justice project was created. it's an innovative program for families to learnow to navigate their local crimil justice system so they can bring their loved ones home. >> mass incarceration has not yield any real benefit, only has broken apa families and commities. ramon vasquez, for example, falsely arested for a gang-related murder. totally innocent. we worked with his family. and through his family's vigilance, he was able to come home after six months.

they actually got a factual finding of innocence by the court. >> reporter: they help families becomeore active in the defense strategy. eir victories are counted the number of days and weeks that are saved as a result of dismissed charges and reduced sentences. >> we found that w saved over 1,800 years of time saved. so that's 1,800 years of time of families being together, of people being contributing members of society, of fathers home with their sons and moms home with their daughters. do you want to give a quick update? >> reporter: other evidence of success, the enthusiasm ofast clients who return as organizers. >> i got started because of one of my sons. he was getting into some trouble. and it was not right the way he was being treated in juvenile hall. >> that person is notby themselves. they have a whole community behind them. and so we're kind of, like, balancing the scales of justice. >> sometimes just to see when a case has been won, that a family is being kept together or that

perha a person that was going to get a long,lengthy sentence,isentence, it's been reduced that's what's rewarding. >> what i'm most proud of, we built an imobable organization and community and had very unexpected victories all through a belief in one another and all through maintaining an integrity relationship to one another. >> our kudos to raj and the dedicated team at silicon valley debug for sharing their modelf empowering commities and transforming the court system. we hope you've enjoyed our profiles of excellence. each of them make such an important contribution to our bay area from the exploratorium in san francisco, i'm katie marzullo. thank you for watching.

♪ coming up today on "intelligence for your life" is your teenager helpless? we have a short list of things your teen should be able to do right now. can they cook a simple meal and do their own laundry? is it time for a social media prenup? it might be if your partner is always posting about your relationship. the latest from dermatologist. what happens to your skin when you go to sleep with your makeup on? there is a sleep position that could improve your skin tone? don't miss our list of inappropriate wedding toasts you need to avoid. number one? i hope it's better than your last marriage. people say these things and we'll share the full list. that's all coming up today on "intelnc