TOPEKA, Kan. (AP) Fifty-five public schools throughout Kansas are being honored for doing well on state tests despite serving disadvantaged students. The Confidence in Kansas Public Education Task Force identified the recipients of the 2011 Challenge Awards. The winners will be honored Wednesday at Junction City Middle School. The state education department says the certificate recognizes reading and math test scores that are higher than what students living in lower-income households normally achieve. Typically, students who qualify for free or reduced price lunches don’t fare as well on tests as their peers from more affluent families. Task force chairman Charles…
Author: KMAN Staff
EMPORIA, Kan. (AP) The second of four finalists for the presidency of Emporia State University visits the eastern Kansas campus this week. University officials say Todd Diacon and his wife were scheduled to meet with campus and community groups Monday and Tuesday. Diacon is a native of Wellington, Kan., currently serving as deputy chancellor at the University of Massachusetts’ flagship campus. He previously spent 21 years in leadership positions at the University of Tennessee in Knoxville. Last week, Emporia State was visited by another finalist for the presidency Michael Shonrock, a senior vice president at Texas Tech. The university is…
HUTCHINSON, Kan. (AP) Most of Reno County Courthouse’s 10 elected officials with terms expiring in the 2012 election cycle say that, so far, they will likely run for re-election. The Hutchinson News reports that Reno County Register of Deeds Carol Sallee is the only Reno County officer last week who was undecided about the race. The 70-year-old Republican won her first term in 2000, and has won each election by a comfortable margin. The State Legislature this year moved up the candidate filing deadline by about 10 days, to noon June 1, 2012. All four congressional seats in Kansas will…
WICHITA, Kan. (AP) A Wichita woman charged with stabbing a friend to death is set to go on trial. The second-degree murder trial of 22-year-old Catherine Collins is scheduled to start Monday in in Sedgwick County District Court. She was arrested in September 2010 after the death of 20-year-old Boston Sicard. KFDI reports that Sicard was found lying in a parking lot of a Wichita gas station. Collins was arrested after police followed a trail of blood to an apartment. Detectives say Sicard was stabbed after arguing with Collins about another person.
TOPEKA, Kan. (AP) Leaders of a Topeka church plan to pray without ceasing for 42 hours this weekend. The Topeka House of Prayer will host the event, which begins at 5 p.m. Friday and ends at noon Sunday at the Faith Family Life Centre. Organizers say the event will focus on praying for Topeka, the state of Kansas and the United States. The Rev. Mike Shinkle, pastor of Open Way Church and an organizer of the event, said people of all denominations are welcome to the event. The Topeka Capital-Journal reports that 101 interns from the International House of Prayer…
TOPEKA, Kan. (AP) Some advocates say the Topeka school district could help reduce bullying if it adds sexual orientation and transgender people to its anti-discrimination policy. The district last week approved the first reading of a proposal to include the categories to its policy. Further action will be required before the change is official. The Topeka Capital-Journal reports that the Topeka district is believed to be one of the few districts in the state to consider the issue. The district’s attorney, Cindy Kelly, says federal education officials recommend the policy additions because bullying due to sexual orientation or gender identity…
LAWRENCE, Kan. (AP) A Lawrence man is suing Washburn University and a health care contractor at a Kansas prison over his dismissal from a graduate program that he says was caused by his attention deficit disorder. The Lawrence Journal-World reportsRyan Talley, 30, alleges that he was dismissed from the clinical psychology graduate program because he needed medication to treat his ADHD. Talley was working as an intern at the Topeka Correctional Facility in 2010 who needed a daily dose of Aderall to treat his ADHD. He says six months into his internship, a guard made him take his medication before…
WICHITA, Kan. (AP) A survivor of a deadly grain elevator explosion in Atchison remains at a Kansas City hospital, while another has been released. The University of Kansas Hospital said Monday that Pat Maxwell remains in critical condition. The other survivor, Clinton Ellerman, was released Friday evening. The two victims were injured in the Oct. 29 explosion at the Bartlett Grain Co. elevator in Atchison that killed six others.
OMAHA, Neb. (AP) The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers says it will change its approach to managing the Missouri River following a summer of record flooding that damaged or destroyed nearly 400 homes, led to millions of dollars in road repairs and forced communities to scramble to build temporary levees. The corps announced Monday that it will make the changes in the coming winter and spring. Those changes include getting as much water out of the river basin’s reservoir system as possible this fall and winter, as well as analyzing how much more reservoir space might be reserved to ease…
HUTCHINSON, Kan. (AP) Authorities say a 39-year-old woman died after she fell from a zipline at a private home in Reno County. The woman, Jeanie Weve of Pretty Prairie, died Sunday. The Reno County Sheriff’s office said in a news release that Weve was with family and friends riding a zipline in southeast Reno County when the accident occurred. Witnesses told she appeared to freeze when she jumped off the zipline, causing her to let go of the handles and fall about 20 feet. She died later at Via Christie St Frances in Wichita.