By David Curtis

Making the rounds in teacher’s email inboxes is a story about an educator from Arkansas who taught her students an invaluable lesson on the right to an education.

I am pretty sure I am going to get lashed for saying this, especially as an English teacher, but I do not really believe there is much that can be done to improve one’s ability to spell words. I haven’t done the research, but it has always seemed to me that good spellers are born, not made, that the ability to spell is as genetic as freckles or male pattern baldness.

By Michael Beadle

The tired diatribes of partisan politics may continue to capture the headlines in the coming campaign months, but there is one issue President Bush, Republicans, Democrats, student activists, Hollywood actors and most world governments are all agreeing on — Burma’s long-running military regime must end its repressive campaign against its own people.

A major road is in the planning stages, and neighbors and others in the community feel like it’s more of a runaway train that will help developers, encourage sprawl, and subsequently change their future forever rather than a consensus-building project to provide taxpaying citizens with an answer to their transportation woes.

By David Curtis

If you are driving west along U.S. 23/74 and nearing exit 102, the Waynesville exit, you will see growing along side the road, a tree radiating a brilliant red. Chances are, you will also say something like, “Wow! That’s a nice one.”

By Stephanie Wampler

I walked across the floor, the crowds cheering, the woman smiling as she handed me an award. Then the crowd fell utterly silent. I turned towards the camera man, smiled, and held up my plaque. It was a timeless moment, and I could think only one thing: How did I get here? No, really, how did I get here?

I miss all those Sundays at my grandma’s house, so many Sundays, so many years. Once upon a time, it seemed we would never run out of them. It seemed as if there would always be cars lined up like dominos in the driveway, a couple of the trucks pulled up into the yard. It seemed as if the smell of frying chicken would always waft into the living room from the kitchen, drawing the men’s attention momentarily away from the Redskins-Cowboys football game and their talk of work and weather. It seemed as if the women would always be opening doors with their elbows, their arms full of casseroles or pies or three-bean salads.

The decision by Michell Hicks, chief of the Eastern Band of Cherokee, to do away with a column in The Cherokee One Feather was a mistake.

Our story last week about a fund that helps women pay for breast cancer testing and treatment pointed out cracks in the health care system. It’s not surprising that this situation exists, and while we hope the funding issues for this cancer program are solved, we hope — more importantly — that the health care debate that takes place every presidential election cycle will gain some traction this time.

On a political talk show recently, a well-known Republican political consultant spent a lot of time attacking public schools in North Carolina and the people who run them. No surprise there.