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Miss North Carolina and Miss NC's Outstanding Teen To Visit

Miss North Carolina, Katherine Southard (left) and Miss North Carolina's Outstanding Teen, Katherine Puryear (right) during a recent holiday gala.

Miss North Carolina, Katherine Southard and Katherine Puryear, Miss North Carolina's Outstanding Teen will be special guests at an upcoming informational session for the Miss Greater Pee Dee Pageant.

"The visit from 'The Two Katherines,' as they are affectionately called throughout the state, will give our young people a rare opportunity to meet two of  North Carolina's finest, face to face said Subrina Hough, local pageant committee chairman.  "This is as good as it gets!" she added.

The Miss Greater Pee Dee informational session is designed to address any concerns or questions prospective contestants may have.  Pageant officials say it will also awaken young ladies' imaginations to the possibilities before them.

The pageant is being sponsored by HOLLA!, a local grassroots organization aiming to motivate children to succeed.  The group also sponsors the Anson Idol singing competition and co-sponsors the HOLLA!/Hampton B. Allen Library Literary Festival which has brought scores of notable authors to the area.

The pageant has made some changes from last year when it was the Miss Anson County Pageant.  Then, the contestant pool was limited to Anson County.  This year, the pageant has been opened up to include Anson, Union, Richmond and Montgomery counties.  Wadesboro's Lillie Templeton was the winner of the Miss Anson County Pageant.

The Miss Greater Pee Dee Informational Session will be held 5:00 Tuesday, December 29 at the Hampton B. Allen Library.  It will begin with a reception.  

The public is encouraged to attend.  For more information, call 704.694.3552 or visit www.wadesboro.com.

Anson New Tech Named National Demonstration Site

In August of 2006, Anson New Tech High School in Wadesboro, NC opened with the great fanfare and the expectation of success.  This week, two years later, a key measure of success has been realized as the New Tech Network honored Anson New Tech, naming it one of 19 national demonstration sites in the United States. 

That means Anson New Tech will be a referral site for education stakeholders, elected officials and others who are interested in learning more about the New Tech approach so they, too, might use the New Tech approach to improve learning for students. Based in Napa, Calif., the New Tech Network is a school development organization that supports the start-up and implementation of innovative high schools marked by project-based learning in a technology-rich environment.

This achievement is rare-an honor fewer than half of the schools in the New Tech Network achieve. As such, Anson New Tech will serve as a visitation site for those interested in seeing how the approach works and a site that will train school staff for prospective New Tech schools.

Unlike students in traditional high schools, where most teachers lecture and use textbooks as a teaching approach, teachers in New Tech high schools design rigorous, real-world projects tied to state and district standards and customize them to their location and the interests of students.  The result: students who are deeply engaged in learning and develop important skills such as critical thinking and collaboration.

Monica Martinez, president of New Tech, commended Anson New Tech on its honor.

Anson New Tech will play a key role in the development of the New Tech Network because we will use it and other sites to help national, state and local schools and school districts experience what engaged learning looks like, how teaching can be re-imagined, and how technology facilitates both of these, Martinez said. Seeing New Tech sites up close can help them understand the power of the model, so they too can think about doing this where they live.

Martinez said Anson New Tech and the other locations will also play an important role as a training site for the newest New Tech teachers and leaders as they prepare to open their own schools by spending time in demonstration sites.