Charter schools are too valuable to dismiss

It is frustrating that we continue to hear some education officials and “experts” naming charter schools among the “threats” to public education [“Back To School,” May 1 Xpress]. This attitude, asserted by people who influence public understanding, is territorial, unfounded and has gone on for too many years now. Lumping charter schools into a category […]

Back to school: Advocates see threats to public education in current legislatio­n

They had to keep rolling out chairs April 23 for what was billed as a “Conversation about Public Education in North Carolina,” held at the Asheville City Schools board room on Mountain Street. A larger-than-anticipated audience of 60 people — educators, elected officials, parents, advocates — came to talk about the status of public education, and to offer some opinions.

Advocates see threats to public education in current legislatio­n

They had to keep rolling out chairs Tuesday night for what was billed as a “Conversation about Public Education in North Carolina,” held at the Asheville City Schools board room on Mountain Street. A larger-than-anticipated audience of 60 people — educators, elected officials, parents, advocates — came to talk about the status of public education, and to offer some opinions. And in a nutshell, the program message was that the status of public education in the state — which has been quantifiably climbing for years — is about to take a drastic plunge. (photos by Max Cooper)

Wilson, N.C., becomes first community in N.C. to offer ultra-fast Internet

Remember Asheville’s bid to get Google’s 100 gigabit Internet service? Consider that the average Internet speed in the U.S. is about 7 megabytes per second (hint: that’s so much slower than gigabit service, it feels like old dial-up speeds), that about 48,000 Western North Carolinians don’t have access to 4 Mbps service (the FCC definition of a broadband minimum), that North Carolina ranks 27th in broadband speeds (10 spots behind Guam). Now take a look at what one small town down east has done on its own.

Bought & Sold: Forgotten documents highlight local slave history

In Buncombe County, thousands of slaves toiled as cooks, farmers, tour guides, maids, blacksmiths, tailors, miners, farmers, road builders and more, local records show. And after mostly ignoring that troubled history for a century and a half, the county is now taking groundbreaking steps to honor the contributions of those former residents by making its slave records readily available online.

Start the presses

Student journalism is nothing new: Guided by faculty advisers, kids have been producing yearbooks, literary magazines, in-house news broadcasts and school newspapers for many years. Now, however, even those traditional activities have become another means of teaching media literacy.

Fryar apologizes for harsh words, calls for A-B Tech trustees to resign

In a letter sent to several local media outlets, Buncombe County Commissioner Mike Fryar apologized for calling A-B Tech President Hank Dunn a “little Hitler” and a “sick little puppy.” But the freshman commissioner continues to lambast the president in the new letter, arguing that Dunn acted outside his job description in a way that “undermines the authority of the full Board of Trustees.” He also calls for trustees who worked with Dunn on the maneuver to resign.