Asheville Citizen-Times – Five mountain artists have received 2006-07 North Carolina Arts Council Fellowship Awards. They were among 14 N.C. visual and film artists and two choreographers chosen among more than 325 applicants. Awards, $8,000, are for continued work.
Recipients include Jody Servon, a visual artist from Blowing Rock and gallery director of Appalachian State University, whose recent work includes an installation of painted walls, projected video, sound, drawings, photographs and sculptures. Read the full article

Raleigh Charter is state’s only school with answers missing. Exam officials apologize but pass blame

Raleigh News and Observer – Caitlin McDevitt spent hours each week studying and working with tutors for her Advanced Placement exams to get what she thought would be the payoff: college credit. But the Raleigh Charter High School student is instead getting apologies from the College Board, the nonprofit group that owns the AP exams, because her tests have disappeared.
Though many parents and students may not realize it, the College Board says 1,000 AP answer sheets are typically lost each year.
This year, they include five filled out by current and former Raleigh Charter students, who have three choices: retake the tests, get a refund or let the College Board project their scores.

Rob Poe will retake the calculus and psychology exams in January if they aren’t found. The Appalachian State University freshman won’t get the credits he wants unless he does. He plans to spend his winter break cramming.
It has been several months since he took both AP classes, so his mother isn’t optimistic. She anticipates paying $1,600 for a summer session at Appalachian in Boone. Read the full article

WWAY – Gov. Mike Easley announced Thursday that five UNC campuses are ranked in top 50 “best values” by Kiplinger’s Personal Finance report. Read the full article

Winston-Salem Journal – Stroll down the brick and stone walkways of Old Salem, and it’s obvious that the buildings and artifacts preserved there represent an irreplaceable link to the past.

Another collection, however, has been quietly growing in importance over the years – the large stock of heirloom seeds gathered and saved by Old Salem’s gardeners.

Such diversity protects the genetic stock that a plant species could need some day to overcome problems posed by disease or pests, said Christoff den Biggelaar, an agroecologist in the Goodnight Family Sustainable Development Program at Appalachian State University.

“If you look at common crops such as corn, you’re only talking about five or six different types of seed that dominate the market,” den Biggelaar said. “That means that if a disease breaks out, you’re going to have a disaster, because your genetic diversity is so small. When fewer and fewer seeds are grown, then we’re cutting the legs out from under ourselves.”

Heirloom seeds have often been bred to fit conditions in a particular place. That means that a local gardener probably won’t have to take special measures – such as using commercial chemicals or constantly watering – to make them grow well, den Biggelaar said. Read the full article

Asheville Citizen-Times – UNC Asheville rose from 50th to 32nd as a best value in public colleges for in-state students and from 56th to 38th as a best value in public colleges for out-of-state students, according to Kiplinger’s Personal Finance magazine.

Appalachian State University ranked 34th the nation in terms of best value for undergraduate costs and 42nd in terms of cost for an out-of-state undergraduate education, according to the Kiplinger ranking, with UNC Chapel Hill topping both lists. Read the full article

Triangle Business Journal – For the sixth consecutive time, the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill has been named the best value among public colleges, according to an annual report by Kiplinger’s Personal Finance. Appalachian State University ranked 34th. Read the full article

ASU alums have 2 sites and a 3rd on the way

Charlotte Observer – Jon West and Chad Ledford, high school friends and May grads from Appalachian State University, never wanted to work for anyone but themselves.

So the pair, both 22, started a business in January — while in school — and by June they’d sold half of it to an interactive marketing company in Atlanta, fetching about $500,000.

If you are a recent college grad discovering how sometimes reality bites — either because you have a job or are still looking for one — you might envy West and Ledford.

Here’s what happened to West, who majored in computer information systems, and Ledford, who majored in business management.

One day last September, West was going to Introduction to Entrepreneurship in Germany, a prerequisite to a two-week class trip to the country where he was born. Everyone in class had to present an idea for a business.

West had no idea to present — until one came to him on his walk to class. He was thinking of how to capitalize on aging baby boomers and he thought of a Web site that would sell embarrassing health products (i.e. adult diapers and condoms).

The idea got rave reviews from his class and his professor, West said.

Everyone’s idea was entered in ASU’s entrepreneurship contest in October. West’s idea, EmbarrassingHealthProducts.com, won “Most Likely to Succeed Online.”

Come November, West and Ledford were in Germany with their class, drinking beer and saying “Let’s do this company.” Read the full article

Winston-Salem Journal – Recent census estimates confirm what many residents of Northwest North Carolina’s mountain counties have long figured: The elderly population is growing markedly. It’s part of a statewide trend. And, just as other parts of the state, Northwest North Carolina must prepare itself to deal with that elderly population. The aging mountain population will more than double in the coming decades, said Ed Rosenberg of Appalachian State University. Read the full article

Colleges teaching homeland security

Winston-Salem Journal – The homeland-security class at Appalachian State University is held in a classroom like any other on the rambling, mountain-valley campus.

It’s a little too hot. It’s packed with students crammed into small desks, hunched over, taking notes.

Then there’s the textbook – Homeland Security: A Complete Guide to Understanding, Preventing and Surviving Terrorism, a dictionary-thick tome with a photograph of the burning Pentagon on the cover.

“So why is al-Qaida so angry at our country?” Andrew Ferguson asks his class, pacing in front of a PowerPoint slide showing a photograph of a man in a headscarf. Read the full article

Catawba County Schools names Cynthia Haas its new Teacher of the Year.

Hickory Daily Record – Cynthia Haas first tried to teach her sisters. When they got bored playing school, she settled for instructing the shrubbery outside her rural North Carolina home. “My only consolation was that they didn’t talk back as much,” Haas wrote in her Teacher of the Year portfolio. Haas was born to teach. Her affirmation came when she was 17. She read a book called “A Circle of Children.” That lead to an internship her senior year in high school. She worked with mentally handicapped clients. “I fell in love and began a career which has lasted 18 years, so far,” Haas wrote. On Friday, Haas was named Catawba County Schools teacher of the year. Haas, an exceptional children’s teacher at Mountain View Elementary, was stunned. “It’s such a privilege and a blessing,” Haas said. “I feel like I’m at the top of the pyramid, and it’s such a great feeling. There are so many people supporting me.” Haas received her bachelor’s and master’s degrees from Appalachian State University. Read the full article

Salisbury Post – Appalachian State University has found a way to help counties in its region gear up for the future by increasing graduation rates and enabling more young people to go to college.

Maybe App can inspire other communities to try the same approach.

With a six-year, $6.8 million grant from the U.S. Department of Education – and local funds to match – the Appalachian GEAR UP Partnership is working this year with nearly 3,500 students in Alleghany, Burke and Avery counties and the city of Hickory, according to a university publication, Appalachian Today. Read the full article

ZD Net – A three-dimensional computer environment created by Appalachian State University professors has received the 2006 Campus Technology Innovators Award, reports Appalachian State University News

The Appalachian Education Technology Zone program is utilized for online courses in instructional technology, library science, educational leadership, and curriculum and instruction programs.

“We were concerned that the planned and serendipitous interactions among students and faculty weren’t there,” Riedl said. “We wanted to do more than just push content,” commented professor Richard Riedl, one of three creators of the program. Read the full article

Asheville Citizen Times – Biologists are developing plans to protect the fragile rock outcroppings at the Carl Sandburg Home National Historic Site in Flat Rock.

The plans are aimed at protecting the areas from non-native, exotic plants and protecting mosses and lichens on the sites from trampling by visitors.

“A problem the park faces is they have to manage for plants and for visitors,” said Gary Walker, biology professor at Appalachian State University. “We try to mediate those two and accommodate visitation. We want the historical aspect preserved for people as well.” Read the full article

Elderly population growing markedly, census finds

Winston-Salem Journal – The elderly population in Northwest North Carolina mountain counties is growing markedly, according to recent census estimates.

The numbers support a common perception that a lot of retirees are moving to the area. Experts say that improved medical care also promotes longer life spans that account for part of the increase.

Census data in a statistical area made up of Ashe, Watauga, Avery, Mitchell and Yancey counties show that 17.6 percent of the household population now is older than 65. That compares with 11.7 percent of household population older than 65 in North Carolina as a whole.

A recent study that ranked states according to the number of new elderly residents showed North Carolina in third place, after Florida and Arizona, said Ed Rosenberg, the director of the gerontology graduate program at ASU.

Census estimates show an 11.8 percent drop in ages 35 to 44 in Ashe, Watauga, Avery, Mitchell and Yancey counties. Those figures are more a reflection of cycles of births and the age groupings of the statistics than an exodus of young-er people leaving the mountains, Rosenberg said.

He said, however, that the aging mountain population will more than double in the coming decades.

Rosenberg has gathered figures that predict a 150 percent increase by 2030 in the number of people 65 and older in Ashe, Burke, Avery, Caldwell, Wilkes and Watauga counties. There is a similar increase for the population of people 85 and older.

“We’re going to look very different in the Western part of the state in another 20 to 25 years,” Rosenberg said. Read full article

Charlotte Observer – Ask Jim Rogers, the chief executive officer of Duke Energy. He has stated publicly that carbon emissions contribute to the phenomenon of human-induced global warming. Yet in his new position at the Charlotte-based utility company, Rogers is aggressively pursuing the addition of two massive coal units at the Cliffside power station in Rutherford and Cleveland counties….

Energy efficiency alternatives are readily available and full of economic potential for the state. Appalachian State University calculates that energy efficiency programs in North Carolina could save $3 billion per year and support over 150,000 jobs at an annual salary of $42,000. Read full article