By Andy Brack, editor and publisher | Imagine if a gun shop started selling an accessory for an AR-15 rifle that offered to change the names of the three settings on the firing mechanism from (safety)-(single shot)-(full-auto) to F@CK-DONALD-TRUMP.
By Andy Brack, editor and publisher | State Superintendent Molly Spearman’s announcement last week that she wouldn’t seek reelection was an early surprise, but not particularly unexpected.
She’s made progress in upgrading the state’s perennially limp education system the last few years by helping to provide much-needed boosts to teacher pay, update the school bus fleet and consolidate some small districts, which should lead to better education in those areas.
But in the recent months of the pandemic, she struggled with her own Republican Party in efforts to keep students and teachers safe. Whether it was about mask mandates or virtual schools, the General Assembly and Gov. Henry McMaster always seemed to be poking their fingers in school business that should have been left to the state’s constitutional officer elected to deal with schools.
By Andy Brack, editor and publisher | A broad retrospective of the art of South Carolina-raised Jasper Johns is too much to absorb. Hundreds of paintings, prints, drawings and sculptures split between museums in New York and Philadelphia, cover several periods of the career of the artist, who still lives and works in Connecticut.
By Andy Brack, editor and publisher | When word came this week that a former journalism professor passed away, it led to thoughts about how people’s consumption and understanding of news has evolved.
Staff reports | Mount Pleasant painter Brad Carroll and Johns Island artist Lee Garrard will be featured Nov. 3 to Nov. 24 in a show at the Park Circle Gallery by the City of North Charleston Cultural Arts Department.
By Andy Brack, editor and publisher | A school-to-prison pipeline emboldened by what’s been called a vague disorderly conduct law is closed for now, but the state attorney general wants it back. Instead of appealing a law that has wrongly criminalized student behavior for too long, S.C. Attorney General Alan Wilson should let schools follow normal disciplinary protocols to do their jobs and stop wasting time in federal courts.
By Herb Frazier | A portrait of a Black Reconstruction-era state senator and Civil War hero sat in a Statehouse closet for 13 years before finally being put on display Thursday in the Senate chamber without a public ceremony.
IN THIS EDITION
FOCUS: Sanders-Clyde students are first in state to get group’s glasses
COMMENTARY, Brack: Vague school disciplinary law rightly blocked, but ruling appealed
IN THE SPOTLIGHT: SC Clips
NEWS BRIEFS: Portrait of Civil War hero now out of closet and on Senate wall
FEEDBACK: Send us your letters
MYSTERY PHOTO: Lots of vegetables in this image
CALENDAR: Holiday Festival of Lights returns in November
By Andy Brack, editor and publisher | Charter schools, by their very nature, have governing boards made up of parents. They’re publicly funded, which requires them to follow general state education rules and keeps teachers in the state system, but the schools also are independent operationally from county school boards. South Carolina has about 75, which is about 1 percent of the nation’s charter schools.
Unlike last week’s mystery, the one for this week might not be so easy. Hint: This dilapidated building is in Charleston County. But where? And can you tell us anything else about the photo? Send your best guess to editor@charlestoncurrents.com. And don’t forget to include your name and the town in which you live. And if you’ve got a clever mystery photo for our readers, send it to the same address (Try to stump us!)
Our previous Mystery Photo: Last week’s mystery, “Orange and blue,” was pretty easy for lots of regular Mystery Photo sleuths. It showed the tall steeple at St. Matthew’s Lutheran Church on King Street in Charleston.
We Can Do Better, South Carolina! (2019) by editor and publisher Andy Brack offers incisive commentaries on the American South, politics, the common good and interesting South Carolina leaders. Available exclusively for Kindle for $7.99. A paperback version will be ready soon. Learn more.
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