State test results show that student learning suffered greatly last year as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic. Fewer than half of students – 45.4% – in grades K-12 passed state reading, math and science exams during the 2020-21 school year. The much-anticipated scores were released this week during the State Board of Education’s regular meeting.
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Many North Carolinians who could benefit from a COVID-19 therapy lack information and access Treatment with special proteins called monoclonal antibodies is keeping some COVID-19 patients out of hospitals and is likely saving some lives. But North Carolina has huge information and delivery gaps to fill before many people who might qualify for the therapy know about it and can get it.
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A contentious state road project in Pittsboro hit a detour last week, after town leaders unanimously directed transportation officials to analyze yet another alternate route for the $30 million North Chatham Park Way, one that would avoid lopping off part of the bucolic North Woods neighborhood.
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Two weeks into in-person instruction at UNC System campuses, faculty members at universities small and large are pushing for more flexibility to deal with the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic, including, in some cases, a temporary shift back to online classes. On Tuesday, Duke University announced new protocols as its campus deals with a spike in infections, largely among vaccinated students. These include giving professors the ability to shift to online-only classes for the next two weeks.
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For the first time, the North Carolina General Assembly is considering the characteristics of various communities as it redraws voting districts based on the latest census numbers. In so doing, lawmakers will examine geographic areas in which individuals have a commonality of shared interests that could affect legislation and should therefore be grouped together.
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As Policy Watch reported earlier this month, the North Carolina Senate passed a bill (HB 398) that would repeal the state’s pistol purchase permit requirement. Though the bill is likely to see a veto from Gov. Roy Cooper, elimination of the state permit requirement has for years been a conservative goal that has at times divided Republicans and law enforcement in the state.
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The Port of Wilmington is a 284-acre maze of steel, cable and concrete where ships as long as three football fields maneuver through the channel. Cranes hoist shipping containers and stack them like Lego blocks. Inbound or outbound, they are crammed with goods — grains and wood, chemicals and clothes — and are headed for the railroad, the highway, or 26 miles down the river to the open sea.
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Tuesday morning was warm and muggy. Eyeglasses above tightly fitted masks fogged over with each breath. At Bethesda Elementary School in Durham, students, teachers and staff members all complied with the district’s mandate to wear masks while indoors. It was the first day of classes for thousands of Durham Public Schools students who attend schools operating on a traditional calendar. Most of the state’s 1.5 million students started classes this week.
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Gov. Cooper remains excluded from negotiations, but some members of his party are trying to change that Rep. Garland Pierce said his support for the $25.7 billion budget written by House Republicans is rooted in a meeting between local elected officials from the Democrat’s rural district and House Speaker Tim Moore and his staff where the local leaders laid out their budget hopes.
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Lt. Gov. Robinson reports on complaints to oversight task force, while Senate committee approves controversial legislation White shaming, "sexualization" of children and Critical Race Theory are among six overarching themes Lt. Gov. Mark Robinson says emerged during his recently completed examination of North Carolina schools.
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As a student reporter and editor at the Daily Tar Heel, Andy Thomason was at ground zero for the UNC-Chapel Hill “paper classes” athletics scandal that broke in 2010. He helped direct coverage at the independent student paper during the rest of his college career and followed it for the Chronicle of Higher Education after landing a reporting job there in 2014.
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WASHINGTON — The U.S. has its first fully approved vaccine against COVID-19, with federal health officials announcing Monday the approval of Pfizer-BioNTech’s two-dose vaccine. The green light from the U.S. Food and Drug Administration to move Pfizer’s vaccine from emergency use to full approval is a milestone in the national pandemic response, and one that comes as the country battles another surge in infections and hospitalizations due to the Delta variant.
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As lawmakers move forward with drawing new maps, experts explain the tricks of the trade, how we can do better, and why gerrymandering is so hard to eradicate State lawmakers voted to approve the new criteria for redrawing congressional, state House and Senate districts last week. Operating under the new criteria, legislators still have a lot of leeway, and it remains to be seen how the process plays out./p> ...
Chair of two House education committees failed to disclose his wife's connection to charter school Rep. John Torbett, chairman of the state’s influential House Education K-12 Committee, is the target of a Legislative Ethics Committee complaint alleging the Gaston County Republican failed to disclose that his wife serves on a charter school board that receives state funding.
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