Vist us there!

Thanks to all who participated!

Highlights of the short tour include a Keene State graduate marveling at the changes to a room she occupied 40 years ago.

> SPRINGFIELD - Interim Springfield High School principal Larry Wight’s position will be made permanent. The Springfield School Board decided on Wight Thursday night after two interviews with the finalists.
>
> …
>
> Wight became the interim principal when former principal Judson Bolles left. Bolles’ contract was not renewed by the board. He left last month before finishing the school year.
>
> Wight has a bachelor’s in forestry from the University of New Hampshire. He was planning on becoming a chemist before he changed his major. He also holds a master’s from Keene State College.

He’s also got an agenda that would make any school proud:

> Wight said his top priorities at the school will be to reduce the dropout rate and increase student achievement. He wants to get students and parents more involved with the school.
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> He also said he plans on improving communication within the community.
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> “I think you have to be open and available to people, the community, the press and everyone else,” Wight said.

The salary is undetermined at this point, but with $153,686 budgeted for the principal and assistant principals’ salary, it is expected to be competitive.

When Marcia Murdock began teaching dance at Keene State College 22 years ago, the spring student and faculty performance consisted of about 20 minutes of short pieces. More than three decades later, it’s a tour de force that has put the program on the dance-world map.

The rest of the article details the student dances to be presented and includes explanations of the dances from some of the choreographers.

The only shame about the [online version](http://www.sentinelsource.com/main.asp?SectionID=44&SubSectionID=124&ArticleID=145053) of the story is it doesn’t include the stunning photo you get with the paper copy: if you can get to your newstand before noon tomorrow and grab a copy of the Thursday Sentinel, you really should.

_An Evening of Dance_ will be performed Wednesday through Saturday, April 18-21 at 7:30 p.m. At the Redfern Arts Center at Brickyard Pond. Tickets are $5 and $7. Call the box office at 358-2168, or see the [press release](http://www.keene.edu/newsevents/default.cfm?Type=NewsDetail&News_ID=1818).

The play was a winner: Nate Anderson, Keene State basketballer extraordinaire, was fed the ball right off the starting whistle and proceeded to slam dunk it for Keene State in the **first four seconds of the game**.

It was caught on less than stellar video:

We put it up anyway. We linked it only from the men’s basketball page and did no promotion on it.

Today we looked at it, expecting a couple hundred views.

The real number of views it got?

**1,216**.

Time to put up more YouTube clips…

But the Native American Film Festival isn’t just an event. It’s history in the making.

[Keene State College](http://www.keene.edu) has teamed up with the [Friends of the Oglala Lakota](http://www.lakotafriends.org/) to bring you the 1st Annual Keene State Native American Film Festival. (if you want to get technical, it’s our first, and their fifth).

The festival runs April 13-15. It kicks off on Friday with a tent reception at 6:30 p.m., followed by a presentation in the Putnam Lecture Hall by Barry Dana, a former Penobscot Chief, at 7:30 p.m. The first feature film of the festival, A Thousand Roads, will be presented directly after Mr. Dana’s lecture.

There’s limited seating for opening night, so you may want to buy your ticket in advance.

On Saturday, the film festival starts at 10 a.m. and runs through to 9:30 p.m.

Sunday is Family Day, with special pricing, and films run from 2 to 9:30 p.m.

All films are rated G or PG.

Ticket information [here](http://www.lakotafriends.org/5thfilmfest.html). Schedule of films [here](http://keenestateinfo.com/keenefeed/event-info/native-american-film-festival-keene-state/).

File this one under wonder: in October, Elaine Magliaro posted a call to arms on the Blue Rose Girls site, a blog focussed on children’s illustration. The call?

I am inviting you on behalf of Dr. David White, the director of the [Keene State College] Children’s Literature Festival, to be a contributor to the college’s Festival Owl Project. The college will celebrate its 100th anniversary in 2009. It is the goal of the Festival to have 100 owls [drawn by published children's literature artists] for that special occasion. (They now need about 30 more owls.) The Blue Rose Girls have already informed David of their intent to participate in the “owl” campaign.

Come join the Blue Rose Girls in helping Keene State College to reach its goal in time for their big celebration in 2009!

It took a bit of time, but eventually Matt Phelan responded to the call. You can see his owl here.

Inspired by Mr. Phelan, Elizabeth Dulemba went public with her own owl.

For the artists, the cool thing here is that through blogs they are doing what groups of artists have always done: encouraging each other in their work. For Keene State, the cool thing is we get two owls we might not have had.

And for the rest of us, we get to see these pieces early, which may be the best bargain of all.

More on the Owls Project here and the Children’s Literature Festival here.

Already being assistant principal at Riddle Brook didn’t guarantee her the promotion. Superintendent of Schools Tim Mayes said more than 20 candidates applied for the position, and McCarthy went through the entire process, from eight semifinalists to two finalists.

“That was the process we used and she was judged against the criteria just as every other candidate,” Mayes said. “She’s a leader who is very well-liked, and she’s well respected by the faculty, staff and parents at the school.”

The most striking thing to me was the number of students who had their hands up for questions. There’s a lot of talk about this generation of students being the most apolitical in years, and we’ve seen some evidence of that. For whatever reason, that was not on display last night: the students seemed very earnest and eager to be involved.

The winning question?

There are certain hot winds in southern California, named after a canyon – what are they called?

More on this story in The Nashua Telegraph.

(Oh, and the answer to the question above? The Santa Ana winds.)

A group of Keene State College journalism students will receive a regional award from the Society of Professional Journalists next month.

The students, under the leadership of professor Marianne Salcetti, Ph.D., wrote an investigative project called “Justice in New Hampshire: a 15-year retrospective of the Pamela Smart murder trial.”

And they note with pride that one of their journalists was involved:

The project’s student editor was Patrick J. Crowley, now a reporter for the Reformer. Crowley was executive editor of The Equinox, the student newspaper of KSC, when “Justice in New Hampshire” appeared as a special insert in April 2006.

After graduating, Crowley began work for the Reformer last October.

We’re proud too: of the award and the job. Congratulations (again) to Patrick Crowley and all those involved with this award-winning project.

The best part is she’ll be attending Keene State, at least for a year:

Though the award was completely unexpected, Boushie said it may have changed her career path. Although she is still not sure what she wants to do professionally, she is thinking about attending art school.

“When I first started the class, I thought maybe I want to go to art school, but I got discouraged. I thought senior year was too late to get started,” she said. “But after getting the award, I think I will take art classes.”

Now, she plans to go back to the high school’s summer art class, then spend next year taking English and art classes at Keene State College. She hopes to apply to art school the following year.

New Hampshire: Am I Blue?
7:30 p.m., Wed., Apr. 18
Mabel Brown Room, Student Center
Keene State College

This event is free and open to the public. For more information or to request accommodations for a disability, please contact Cheryl Spangler at 603-358-2723.

Sponsored by the Wallace E. Mason Library at Keene State College and The Keene Sentinel