Julie Silver wanted to be a school nurse from the time she was in nursing school. “It was fun because you got to do rotations through the different nursing careers and shadow them,” says Silver. “I really enjoyed going to do my shadows with the school nurses because it’s not just boo-boos and Band-Aids. There’s […]
On Tuesday, Feb. 1, the Buncombe County Board of Commissioners will vote on whether to award Haywood Street Community Development a $749,000 grant toward construction of a 45-unit project in the West End/Clingman Avenue neighborhood. Asheville City Council has already contributed $296,000 toward the project.
In April, Tanya Ledford left a 22-year-long education career teaching history and English at public schools in Henderson and Polk counties. But Ledford’s new job hasn’t taken her far from the classroom. She is now assisting Hispanic high school students, many of them the first in their family to seek a college education, through the […]
“Healthy relationships are the best protector against abusive relationships,” says Chaka-Khan Gordon of Helpmate, an Asheville nonprofit providing services and support for survivors of domestic violence.
“So it was a great relief to hear that at least a few local schools are protecting children against what I firmly believe are the real dangers of our time.”
“Early childhood education offers a better model of learning that honors and develops the whole human, but in later grades, schooling is equipped for an industrial world that no longer exists.”
“With fewer children in school because of home schooling, class size could now be an advantage for those who choose or have no choice but Buncombe County Schools.”
“If we take away support from our public schools, it will lead to wide inequity and discrimination.”
Last school year, Buncombe County Schools saw an average daily membership drop of over 1,500 students, its biggest in the past six years and about 6.4% from its 2019-20 figure of 23,712, with nearly 450 students moving to home schools. At the same time, area private, parochial and charter schools have also seen gains in enrollment.
Critical race theory, a set of ideas about the ways race influences society, drew 13 commenters at a June 3 meeting of the Buncombe County Board of Education. Officials at both the county and Asheville city school systems say they do not explicitly teach CRT and encourage students to develop their own judgments.
“The bloated Asheville City Schools needs to be heavily doctored and combined into Buncombe County Schools for the desired all-one effect.”
“There is no excuse that these educational professionals [did] not have a concrete and specific plan set in place before voting to send students back.”
New policies from the N.C. Department of Health and Human Services and the N.C. Department of Public Instruction recommend all elementary schools open for in-person learning under Plan A, which does not require 6-foot social distancing between students and teachers. Middle and high schools are encouraged to reopen in-person under Plan B, which requires 6-foot social distancing at all times.
While there’s light at the end of the proverbial COVID-19 tunnel, Western North Carolina residents cannot let down their guard. Over the last week, the percent of positive COVID-19 tests has risen to 7.8% in Buncombe County; the county’s daily COVID-19 case counts now average 100 or higher.
On Nov. 22, the N.C. Department of Health and Human Services reported 4,514 new cases of COVID-19 across the state, marking the latest record for the most cases recorded in a single day.
The collaborative effort is meant to quell community fears and rumors about COVID-19 in K-12 school settings, said Buncombe County Schools Superintendent Tony Baldwin. The first report, shared Nov. 5, identified eight cases across six schools.
Public comment on a grant application for federal coronavirus relief identified help with rent, mortgage and utility bills as the county’s greatest need. The Board of Commissioners is set to vote on a plan that would direct the aid, which will likely not be available until January, toward that purpose at its regular meeting of Tuesday, Oct. 6.
Beginning Monday, Oct. 5, elementary schools will have the option to return to the classroom at full capacity. According to the state’s Plan A guidelines, classrooms will have no restrictions on the number of K-5 students allowed, but safety measures including mandatory face coverings, COVID-19 symptom screening and social distancing will still be required.
Virtual schooling is a constant challenge for children with disabilities. School-based resources like speech and physical therapy are hard to deliver remotely — and federal limitations to Medicaid have kept families from filling an essential gap in help for their kids.
Despite a lack of definitive evidence that COVID-19 can spread through heating, ventilation and air conditioning systems, residential and commercial property owners are looking for ways to preemptively protect themselves and their customers from potential airborne transmission.
A week into the start of the academic year for Asheville and Buncombe County K-12 schools, local officials remain in open, weekly conversations with district administrators to help manage the spread of COVID-19.
