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Today's Headlines: November 20, 2024

Two months in, SPS superintendent says phone use policy is working

Halfway through the first semester under new cell phone use policies, Superintendent Adam Swinyard said the Spokane public school system is already seeing benefits.

This summer, Spokane Public Schools became the first large district in Washington to completely ban phone use during class for elementary and middle school students.

High schoolers can use their devices during non-instructional time — meaning moments between classes and lunchtime are fair game.

Swinyard said the policy change is getting kids more engaged.

“We're seeing some really interesting things in our data,” Swinyard told SPR News. “Discipline’s down; attendance is up. We're hearing from kids that they know more about their peers than they did last year at this time. They know more about their teachers.”

Swinyard credited part of the success to the unified efforts of the community.

“That collective power is really impactful, because then it mitigates the peer pressure that exists, where maybe one family, or one teacher, or one student is trying to make a shift,” he said.

The phone use policy is part of a broader SPS effort to provide more ways to get kids to take part in extracurricular activities and interact with each other offline.

New North Idaho College board members take office tonight

North Idaho College’s trustees board turns a page later today, when three new members take their seats and elect officers.

Those three trustees – Eve Knudtsen, Mary Havercroft and Rick Durbin – represent much-needed optimism about the college’s governance, said Christa Hazel, a spokesperson for the advocacy group Save NIC.

“We've spent two years talking about the problems at North Idaho College, but now it's time to start talking about solutions, especially when we have a board looking for solutions,” Hazel told SPR News.

Beginning in 2021, the NIC board was controlled by a three-person majority backed by the Kootenai County Republican Central Committee. The majority trio made a series of decisions that provoked civil lawsuits and landed the school in hot water with its accreditor: firing former NIC President Rick MacLennan for no cause, hiring a campaign contributor to be the college’s attorney, and attempting to fire MacLennan’s successor.

The college is currently on a show-cause status, meaning it has to persuade the Northwest Commission on Colleges and Universities not to revoke its accreditation.

Knudtsen, Havercroft and Durbin were backed by a group called Save NIC Now, which pledged the candidates were “here to clean up the board and get NIC back on track.” The group needed one seat to flip in order to gain a voting majority on the five-member board. They got all three.

“This was never about personalities or somebody in office versus somebody not,” Hazel said. “It was about good governance and maintaining North Idaho College as an option for our region.”

The North Idaho College Board of Trustees meeting will take place on the school’s Coeur d’Alene campus at 6:00 p.m.

Idaho economic forecast calls for strong revenue

Idaho’s Legislative Services Office Budget Division, the nonpartisan office advising state lawmakers on their spending plan, projects revenue in the coming fiscal year will be more than $6 billion.

The budget division’s manager, Keith Bybee, pointed to strong growth beginning in fiscal year 2026 and beyond in a recent presentation to the Joint Finance and Appropriations Committee.

He also complimented lawmakers on keeping a healthy reserve balance and not spending beyond its means in recent years.

“The legislature did a really nice job of managing its finances and really kind of minding the store on that front,” Bybee said.

Idaho is predicted to close this fiscal year at the end of June with $142 million in cash.

Agencies have requested a 4.5% spending increase for the upcoming budget totaling more than $5.5 billion.

Lawmakers will start considering those proposals in January.

Study: Avian flu is growing threat for Washington's wild birds

Dr. Katie Haman, a wildlife veterinarian at the state Department of Fish and Wildlife, said the highly pathogenic avian influenza virus was once only a threat in domestic birds.

“The virus itself has changed, and it is now being spread among wild bird populations,” Hama told KUOW public radio. “And historically, that was not how it operated.”

Haman and a team started paying close attention after Caspian terns began dying in Port Townsend in 2023.

“On that very first collection — site visit and carcass collection — I think we collected close to four 400 or more, maybe 450 carcasses, which is a lot of a lot of dead birds,” Haman said.

She plans to keep a close eye on the virus and wild bird populations.

Human transmission is not a major concern, but don't touch sick birds and keep your pets away from them.

You can report sightings of sick birds to the Washington Department of Wildlife.

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Reporting was contributed by Owen Henderson, Brandon Hollingsworth, James Dawson and Brooklyn Jamerson.