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Storytellers and activities are set for the 2016 Corn Island Storytelling Festival.
The University of Louisville, Blackacre State Nature Preserve & Historic Homestead and the International Order of E.A.R.S. will present the Corn Island Storytelling Festival Oct. 21-22 with events kicking off at 7:30 p.m., Friday, Oct. 21.
Named after Louisville’s first settlement, the Corn Island Storytelling Festival was a nationally known autumn fixture that drew thousands of fans for three decades before ending its run in 2007. This will be the fifth year that UofL and the Corn Island organizers have partnered on the event. Blackacre joined the event last year.
Additional sponsors include Louisville Metro Government and Kentucky Homefront.
Storytellers and musicians for the weekend include:
- The Juggerloos, a local jug band that uses a mix of early jazz and ragtime tunes mixed with a few more modern covers.
- Leigh Ann Yost, Louisville storyteller and songwriter
- Graham Shelby, writer and professional storyteller. He’s performed in hundreds of venues including Actors Theatre of Louisville, the Texas Storytelling Festival and the Moth Mainstage in New York City.
- Roberta Simpson Brown, “The Queen of Cold-Blooded Tales,” a paranormal investigator and author of more than a dozen books and tapes of ghost stories.
Details for each day of the festival are below:
Friday, Oct. 21
Storytelling begins at 7:30 p.m. with a mix of family-friendly stories and spooky tales in the George J. Howe Red Barn, Belknap Campus. Col. Bob Thompson, storyteller and writer for the Kentucky Homefront radio program, will be the master of ceremonies.
Organizers will also host a series of free storytelling and music workshops during the afternoon on campus. Led by Brown, Yost, the Juggerloos and Louisville musician and storyteller John Gage, the workshops will cover topics including writing and performing.
All Friday events are free but registration is required at http://cornisland16.eventbrite.com.
Saturday, Oct. 22
Storytelling will be held at Blackacre State Nature Preserve & Historic Homestead, 3200 Tucker Station Rd.
Kids activities begin at 6 p.m. and storytelling begins at 7 p.m.
Saturday’s events are $7 for adults and $3 for children and tickets may be purchased onsite.
For more information on the festival, contact Bob Thompson, 502-553-2406.
In late August, residents and stakeholders of the neighborhoods surrounding the Urban Government Center attended a series of workshops hosted by Develop Louisville’s Office of Advanced Planning designed to gather community input on the proposed redevelopment of the Urban Government Center. Attendees offered suggestions on possible reuses of the 12-acre campus, which includes several buildings located at and around 810 Barret Avenue and a parking lot at 814 Vine Street.
Louisville Metro Government has been relocating the occupants of the Urban Government Center, and the remaining occupants will vacate the space by the end of the year. The buildings are in need of substantial repair and are larger than required for Louisville Metro Government’s needs. In the coming months, Louisville Metro Government will solicit proposals for the redevelopment of the Urban Government Center campus, which is a prominent part of the Paristown Pointe neighborhood.
Develop Louisville will conduct three follow up meetings to present the information gathered during the August workshops. Students from the University of Kentucky School of Architecture will present visual representations of community priorities expressed during the workshops, and additional community feedback will be collected to inform the redevelopment process.
Citizens are encouraged to attend one or more of the three upcoming meetings, which will take place on:
- Tuesday, October 18, 6 pm – 8 pm
- Saturday, October 22, 10 am – 12 pm
- Monday, October 24, 6 pm – 8 pm
All meetings will be held at 810 Barret Avenue in the first floor conference room.
For more information, please visit https://louisvilleky.gov/government/advanced-planning/urban-government-c…
This Tuesday, October 18th at 6:30 PM, there will be a town hall forum that will have candidates Harold Bratcher and Michael Payne available to take questions from community members.
Bratcher is running for the US House of Representatives for Kentucky’s 3rd district. The House of Representatives is one of half of the legislative branch at the federal level. Each state has a different number of representatives that correlate to the population of that state. Each term in the House is 2 years. Bratcher is running for Kentucky’s third district, which represents all of Jefferson County. Bratcher is opposing incumbent John Yarmuth, who has held the office since 2007 and is currently seeking re-election for his sixth term. More information about Harold Bratcher can be found on his website.
Michael Payne is running for State Representative, District 28. As seen with Congress at the federal level, each state has their own two-part legislature. District 28 represents a portion of the southwestern portion of the county, from parts of Pleasure Ridge Park south along Dixie Highway to West Point, including Valley Station, Valley Village, and Prairie Village. Each term for the State representatives is 2 years. Payne is opposing incumbent Charles Miller, who has held the office since 1999 and is currently seeking re-election for his tenth term. More information about Michael Payne can be found on his website.
The forum is a town hall style, meaning community members who attend will be able to ask questions directly to the candidates. The meeting is at La Carretta at 10105 Dixie Highway (due to construction, people traveling south on Dixie Highway will find it easier to access the shopping center parking lot by turning left at Valley Station Road, and turning left into the shopping center). The meeting starts at 6:30 PM.
Sustainability Week at the University of Louisville is Oct. 17-23 to raise awareness for responsible environmental, social and economic stewardship. This year’s focus is social justice.
The week, which coincides with homecoming festivities, begins Oct. 17 with “Weigh the Waste” at The Ville Grill, when plate scraps from a typical lunchtime in UofL’s busiest dining hall will be weighed before going into the compost bin to demonstrate how much food is discarded.
Oct. 19, a Campus Sustainability Day Fair featuring booths and information on UofL’s sustainability initiatives will be held in the Humanities Quad on Belknap Campus.
On the evening of Oct. 19, UofL will host the Louisville Sustainability Council’s monthly “Green Drinks” networking event for professionals interested in sustainability. The event will start at 6 p.m. with a campus sustainability tour leaving from in front of the University Club and end at Old Louisville Tavern, 1532 S. 4th St.
The week’s activities include:
- Oct. 18, noon – Diversity Dialogue Series: “Equity vs. Equality” (Cultural Center)
- Oct. 18, 6:30-8 p.m. – Race, Place and Perceptions: Making Louisville Home for Us All (Cultural Center)
- Oct. 18 (Health Sciences Campus, Kornhauser Plaza) and Oct. 20 (Belknap Campus, Humanities Quad) – Bike maintenance workshops
- Oct. 21, noon – EcoReps Lunch&Learn, “Sustainability at UofL,” Ekstrom Library, W210.
- Oct. 21, 2-3 p.m. – Garlic Planting Day! Garden Commons Workshop and Workday (Cultural Center)
- Oct. 23 –UofL Community Composting Volunteer Day, 200 block of E. Bloom St. (one block north of Cardinal Boulevard between Brook and Floyd streets)
For more information, contact Justin Mog, assistant to the provost for sustainability initiatives, at 502-852-8575.
Jefferson County Public Schools (JCPS) has named Fairdale High School Principal Brad Weston as Assistant Superintendent for Achievement Area 2.
Weston, who has served as principal since 2011, has led Fairdale through a dramatic academic turnaround during his tenure, including improving statewide assessment scores and adopting the Cambridge International Studies program. A former assistant principal at the high school, he has also worked directly with students as a math teacher and counselor at Fairdale and Doss high schools.
“I’m excited by the opportunity to positively impact several thousand students and several hundred teachers in 28 schools,” Weston said. He said while he will miss working with the Fairdale staff and students, “I am thrilled that this new opportunity will allow me to continue working for and with Fairdale High School.”
“Brad has a proven track record of improving student achievement, and he spent many years as a teacher in the classroom and as a principal,” said JCPS Superintendent Dr. Donna Hargens. “His experience will be invaluable as we look to increase student achievement across Area 2.”
Weston will stay on at the school until his replacement is named.
Weston holds a bachelor’s degree in math from the University of Louisville and a master’s degree in education with an emphasis in secondary school counseling from Western Kentucky University. His Rank 1 in administration is also from WKU.
The Louisville Metro Air Pollution Control District (District) proposes to issue an operating permit to Caldwell Tanks, Inc. (steel tank fabricator), 4000 Tower Rd. in accordance with Regulation 2.16. The 30-day public comment period starts October 15, 2016, and ends on November 15, 2016. A public hearing may be scheduled if the District determines that there are germane, unresolved issues or substantial public interest, in accordance with Regulation 2.07.
Drafts of the permit and summary are available at the District office, 701 W. Ormsby Ave., Louisville between 8:00 a.m. and 5:00 p.m., Monday through Friday by calling Paul Aud at (502) 574-6000, emailing airpermits @ louisvilleky.gov, or at the following website: http://www.louisvilleky.gov/APCD/docket. Copies of the application are available upon request. Written comments will be accepted at airpermits @ louisvilleky.gov until midnight, or at the District office until 5:00 PM on November 15, 2016.
With thousands of kindergarteners across Louisville successfully starting the school year, a special celebration today recognized one Jefferson County Public School (JCPS) district preschool for helping prepare its students to start classes ready to learn.
At the Unseld Early Learning Center in Newburg this morning, Mayor Greg Fischer, and Jefferson County Public Schools Superintendent Dr. Hargens joined Louisville Free Public Library (LFPL) Director Jim Blanton in congratulating Unseld Center staff for having 100 percent completion in the Library’s 1000 Books Before Kindergarten Challenge last school year. The 1000 Books Before Kindergarten Challenge, a free Louisville Free Public Library program, encourages families, caregivers, and educators to read at least 1,000 books with their young children before kindergarten.
“While 1,000 books may seem like a lot,” Blanton said, “it can be accomplished in less than a year by reading as little as 15 minutes a day—that’s just three picture books.”
The 1000 Books Before Kindergarten Challenge — sponsored by the Library Foundation and the Community Foundation of Louisville — is free and open to children beginning at birth, and their caregivers. Spending just 15 minutes a day reading to preschool-age children builds vocabulary, language skills, and helps prepare them with the skills they need for school.
“We want to encourage all families, caregivers and concerned citizens in Jefferson County to help us create a city where all our kids are reading at least 1,000 books before they enter kindergarten,” said Mayor Fischer. “The people here at the Unseld Early Childhood Center have shown us the way. Because of their work, hundreds of children started kindergarten this fall ready!”
Thanks to the Unseld Center’s commitment to the program, and having all 300 students complete the Challenge, the Center was the recipient of a $500 Barnes & Noble gift card prize drawing from the Library.
“Developing an early habit for reading not only builds our youngest student’s language skills and gets them ready for school, but it pays dividends for years to come by creating a lifelong love for learning,” said JCPS Superintendent Dr. Donna Hargens.
The 1000 Books Before Kindergarten Challenge, which originated at the Bremen Public Library in Bremen, Ind., was launched at the LFPL in January 2014. And the challenge to read has been met with great success. Since the program began, nearly 20,000 children have signed up—with more than 2800 having reached the 1,000 books milestone.
For more information, call (502) 574-1620 or visit LFPL.org/1000Books.
