Posted: 25 Jun 2010 12:35 AM PDT

Claudette Riley covers K-12 education for the News-Leader.

She became interested in writing and journalism at an early age, joining the yearbook staff in fifth grade. She has worked for student or professional publications ever since.

Claudette has covered education for more than eight years, working in Missouri and Tennessee.

A curiosity about the way schools operate, teachers teach and students learn started with her upbringing. Born in western Kansas, a series of moves exposed her to many different schools - public and private, rural and urban, religious and secular, plus Montessori and homeschooling.

She lives in Springfield with her husband and daughter.

[contact me]

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Home is the road for Celtic-pop band ShaeLaurel

Posted: 25 Jun 2010 02:02 AM PDT

FAIRBANKS — What do you do when a one-year family experiment to tour as a busking Celtic-pop band goes right?

If you're ShaeLaurel, comprised of the six-member Witchger family, you just keep on going and going.

ShaeLaurel will be in Fairbanks Saturday playing a free Celtic concert 7:30 p.m. at the Pioneer Park Civic Center and at the 9:30 a.m. St. Raphael's Catholic Church Sunday mass. Donations are welcome at the concert, with a portion of the proceeds going to benefit Fairbanks Counseling and Adoption.

The band started as a simple idea to see each other more. Dad — and guitarist — Andrew Witchger explained that he was working a lot and not seeing much of his family. He and his wife, Janet, tried homeschooling their four children — Andy, now 21, Jessica, 20, Kathryn,18, and Christian, 17 — as a way to try to spend more time together, but it still wasn't as much as they wanted.

So the kids, who were all studying violin, suggested forming a family band.

Dad went with it. They left their California home, sold all their possessions, took up residence in a 25-foot bus and hit the road.

They weren't sure how long they would be able to sustain their lifestyle, but one year turned into two, then two became 10.

"It was scary, but fun," Andrew Witchger said via phone from Homer, where the band performs before heading north to Anchorage and then Fairbanks. "It all seemed to work so we kept doing it."

Now the children are older and the bus is bigger, but the band remains intact. And, Witchger insists, not sick of each other.

"It was an adjustment at first," he said. "But the bottom line is we're a family, we love each other."

Each member of the family plays -a different instrument, though some of them switch off to keep it interesting. Jessica is the lead vocalist but sometimes joins Kathryn on fiddle. Kathryn is the lead fiddler but also plays harp.

The result is a Celtic-bluegrass-pop fusion. Witchger said that many of ShaeLaurel's songs have a lot of Irish melodies that are infused with a more modern vibe.

But it's more than a jig. There is traditional Irish dancing mixed more energetic American clogging and even some gymnastics — Witchger said oldest son Andy is a gymnast.

"We do some crazy acrobatics," he said. "It takes a lot of energy."

In the last decade the band has released eight CDs and multiple DVDs. Witchger said they play about 300 shows a year, all over the world, including Europe and China.

But after 10 years they're getting ready to change their act. In the fall Andy will be heading to Duquesne University in Pittsburgh to study math and physics.

That means retooling the act to include five instead of six. He's not sure what that exactly means for the band, but he thinks it will still be fun.

"The ShaeLaurel Five," he said. "It should be exciting."

Contact features writer Suzanna Caldwell at 459-7504.

IF YOU GO

What: ShaeLaurel

When: 7:30 p.m. Saturday

Where: Pioneer Park Civic Center

Tickets: Free

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Vanderveen pursues equestrian dreams - roanoke.com

Posted: 23 Jun 2010 10:43 PM PDT

JARED SOARES The Roanoke Times

Kristen Vanderveen rode in her first Grand Prix event at age 13 and recently won a Grand Prix in Florida.

JARED SOARES The Roanoke Times

Kristen Vanderveen and her horse Bull Run's Amazing Grace participate in the $7,500 Welcome Jumper Stake Tuesday night at the Roanoke Valley Horse Show in Salem. She finished seventh in the event.

Kristen Vanderveen rode a jumper in her first Grand Prix at age 13. Three years later, she was so busy in junior competitions that she began a homeschooling program on the way to a high school diploma.

Five years later, she's no longer in school and rarely home. It's been quite an education.

Not that there was anything formal about her education the past three years, unless you're talking about the formal riding attire required for jumper competition. There were some intense family discussions when Vanderveen pitched the idea of waiving college in order to pursue her equestrian dreams.

"It's always what I knew I wanted to do, but I wasn't sure how it would go over with my parents, the whole not doing college thing" she said. "Especially for my mom, it was a very new idea."

Beth Vanderveen was skeptical. By then, the daughter had pretty much already won her father Keith over to her side of the discussion. The two of them eventually prevailed. Vanderveen turned pro at age 18.

Now it's all horses all the time, winters spent showing out of a leased farm in Wellington, Fla., the rest of the year on the road from show to show. Every now and then she gets back home to Chicago for a visit.

The support of her parents has been key to her fortunes all along. Her father, a financial advisor with Wells Fargo, was particularly helpful in sorting out the intricacies of the dollars-and-cents side of the equestrian industry.

"He's done a lot to help me with the business aspect of it and helping me with thinking things through the right way and making sure we run things like a business and not a hobby," she said.

This week, the stop is the Roanoke Valley Horse Show at the Salem Civic Center. This is her first year here.

"There's really nice jumper money here," she said. "I like the area. Virginia is really convenient for my show schedule with the geography. With the jumper money, there's a lot each night with the jumper classes. The Grand Prix is really good money for us."

Plans call for her to ride in each of the evening jumper classes. She started with the $7,500 Welcome Jumper Stake Tuesday.

Riding a relatively untested new Holsteiner mare named Bull Run's Amazing Grace, Vanderveen finished seventh behind blue ribbon winner Aaron Vale on Mi Phone.

Bull Run's Amazing Grace, an 8-year-old, was imported from Germany about six months ago.

"Everybody's so fast here that you have to go real fast to try and win, so you might have a couple [rails] down," she said. "So I took that as a chance and my horse got a little flat at the end."

She was scheduled to ride La Bamba, her best horse, in Wednesday night's speed class and another horse, Alpha & Omega, in today's $7,500 jumper class. She'll ride both horses in Saturday's Grand Prix of Roanoke.

Vanderveen rode La Bamba to victory in a Grand Prix in Florida earlier this year.

Ultimately, she has several goals. She'd like to show in Europe and she'd like to make the Olympic team, for two. Eventually, she sees herself mostly in the importation and sales part of the industry. She hopes to always be known first for her integrity.

"I want to make an impact," she said.

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Homeschooling

Friday, June 25, 2010

“KC residents challenge Missouri budget cut” plus 2 more

“KC residents challenge Missouri budget cut” plus 2 more

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