Jackson County Schools Board of Education has selected Dr. Dana Ayers as its new superintendent beginning June 1. 

I’ve missed chaotic mornings fighting for the bathroom, looking for shoes under beds, packing lunches, slinging bagels in the toaster and yelling for kids to get in the car. After a year of strangeness, all students are back in school, and it’s offering a thirst-quenching sense of normalcy. 

North Carolina State legislators have voted to send more students back to in-person learning with the passage of Senate Bill 220. Titled “The Reopen Our Schools Act of 2021,” the bill will require districts to offer full-time, in-person learning for K-5 students, where previously school districts could choose what plans to offer K-5. It also gives districts the option to offer Plan A, fully in-person learning, or Plan B, a hybrid plan with remote and in-person learning, to students in grades 6-12. 

Last week, North Carolina officials recommended that all schools return to in-person learning as soon as possible. 

Cullowhee Valley School will no longer be represented by the Rebel mascot, which is personified by an old, white, confederate general.

The Haywood County School Board and central office administration will undergo unconscious bias training on Tuesday, Jan. 26. The training has been scheduled as part of the plan, created by Superintendent Dr. Bill Nolte in response to the situation created by a Facebook post of Nolte’s last year. 

At a school board meeting Monday, Dec. 14, Haywood County School Board members were split on how to pay for renovations to the new central office building. 

North Carolina is regularly ranked as one of the 10 hungriest states in the nation. According to Feeding America data from 2018, North Carolina had a child food insecurity rate of 19.3 percent, with Haywood County at a rate of 21 percent. During the pandemic, Feeding America found that a majority of food banks report seeing a record increase in the number of people needing help, with an average increase of 60 percent across the country. 

Macon County School Board has two new members following the 2020 election and a special appointment to fill a recent vacancy. 

Haywood County Schools Central Office began the process of relocating to Central Elementary last week.