The San Fernando Valley celebrated the annual 818 Day with events throughout the community. The annual celebration that positively acknowledges the community in the 818 area code is appropriately held on Aug. 18.
At Osceola Elementary School in Sylmar, a mural was unveiled honoring women who’ve made a difference.
The mural, located right below the entrance to the school, prominently features five women: former United States Vice President Kamala Harris; former U.S. Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg; human rights activist Rigoberta Menchú; LA Mayor Karen Bass; and Theresa Derchan, a teacher at Osceola Elementary School.
Painted onto the mural was the phrase, “Voices that Transformed Our History.”
The mural was completed by artists from Muralism, a nonprofit supported by the LA County Department of Arts and Culture, but 130 students were also given the opportunity to help with the painting at certain phases.
Principal Jose Velasquez hosted the unveiling in front of parents, students, teachers and dignitaries – including Bass, LA City Councilmember Monica Rodriguez, LAUSD Board Member Kelly Gonez and Superintendent Alberto Carvalho – speaking passionately about each of the featured women and their many contributions.
Velasquez told the San Fernando Valley Sun/el Sol the school received three grants from arts programs last year, totaling around $25,000, to create a school mural. While thinking of a theme, Velasquez and the school administration came to the idea of not only creating a mural about important voices in history, but those that belonged to women “because a lot of times they don’t always get a voice.”
“My goal [with the mural] is for students to feel that [their] voice is important,” Velasquez said. “We have women representing our community and, more importantly, our future. So for our children, [it teaches them] that they should respect themselves, and they should do their very best to not only be civil and responsible, but respectful to the future generations that are coming.”
There wasn’t a specific criterion from which these women were chosen. They were selected either due to an impactful speech they made or through helping other women to find their voice. Harris, for instance, was chosen for her acceptance speech as vice president at Joe Biden’s inauguration, while Ginsburg advocated for gender equality and women’s rights during her tenure on the Supreme Court, challenging many discriminatory practices and becoming a feminist icon.
But perhaps the most unique inclusion in the mural is Derchan, who began her 36th year of teaching last Thursday. While she may not have the same celebrity as the other women, to Velasquez and the school community, her addition was a no-brainer due to her dedication to helping each and every one of her students grow.
“Derchan is the one who’s had the most impact as far as I’m concerned,” Velasquez said. “She’s a heroine up there.”
Derchan, who teaches fourth-grade students, recalled that she learned about her inclusion in the mural only about a couple of days before work on it began last August. When she received the news, she said she felt extremely humbled.
She added that to be on the same wall as other important female figures “is absolutely amazing. These are women that I know a lot about, that I’ve always looked up to as being leaders in the community, and now to be considered slightly among them is overwhelming and just so amazing that I have no words for it.”
Some of her students from last year’s class even had a hand in painting her in the mural. Derchan humorously recounted how one student excitedly told her how she got to paint her and made sure to keep out her gray hairs.
Derchan said the mural is one of the biggest highlights of her career, and hopes that when students see it, they understand the message that their voice is important.
“[I’m] a regular teacher amongst a vice president, a Supreme Court justice and a mayor, so it’s wonderful for students to see that they too can strive for anything,” she said. “It doesn’t matter where you come from or what you do. … All of us are important.”
