News

Your digital life has a life of its own. Whether you’re on Facebook, Flickr, Twitter or linked in to any social network server, it’s likely that your online existence will outlive you. Authors John Romano and Evan Carroll started thinking about what happens to people’s online presence once they die. They found that much of the information – from emails and blog postings to financial records and photographs – is at risk of being lost forever in cyberspace. Their book, “Your Digital Afterlife” (New Riders Press/2010), tells readers how to preserve and protect their online legacies.

James Augustus McLean was a powerful force in North Carolina's art world for most of the 20th century. He studied at the Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Arts and turned down an offer to teach at the prestigious school to return to his home state. His fledgling art school in Raleigh fell victim to the Great Depression, but McLean continued to create and inspire other artists throughout North Carolina until his death in 1989. McLean is the subject of a new exhibit at Gallery C, which has recently moved from its longtime home in Raleigh's Ridgewood Shopping Center to an historic building downtown.

Feature films, documentaries and short films that examine and celebrate gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender culture are coming to the Carolina Theatre in downtown Durham for the 16th year of the North Carolina Gay and Lesbian Film Festival.

Legal Aid of North Carolina is closing three offices due to budget cuts totaling more than $2 million. Legal Aid serves poor people who can't afford legal help with issues like mortgage assistance and domestic violence. The non-profit is facing cuts from both the federal and state government. Legal Aid of North Carolina Executive Director George Hausen says they're closing the rural offices in Henderson, Boone, and Smithfield.

Personal information on 1,800 school children was accidentally posted online by NC State researchers.

The security failure affected elementary students who attended Wilson and Richmond County schools from 2003 to 2006. The personal information posted online included names, dates of birth, and social security numbers.

A parent was the first to notice the error. NC State removed the data when it became aware of the situation late last month and has begun the process of trying to contact affected families.

The Army is looking to hire more substance abuse counselors at Fort Bragg.

The head of the Army's substance abuse program says the number of troops abusing alcohol has doubled in the last five years. About 11,000 soldiers were treated for alcohol abuse in 2010. 2,000 more were using drugs like marijuana and cocaine. Military doctors say some soldiers resort to substance abuse after going through the stressful cycle of training, fighting overseas and readjusting to life at home. The Army is calling for 130 more counselors at major bases, including 10 at Fort Bragg.

Dr. Myron Cohen presented a paper at this summer's Global AIDS Conference in Rome that caused a sensation. Cohen, a Distinguished Professor of Medicine, Microbiology and Immunology and Public Health at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, displayed a new treatment that would allow people with HIV to have normal sex lives without worrying about infecting their partners.

If you tune into WUNC on Sunday nights at 6 p.m., you'll hear Eric Hodge's familiar voice talking to you about his favorite subject: music. After seven years of anchoring the news during “Morning Edition,” on North Carolina Public Radio, Hodge is adding a nighttime groove to his repertoire. His show, “Last Motel,” features music about and inspired by the American South.

When Suepinda Keith and her husband Kevin Hicks moved to Chapel Hill, they were struck by how few young people they saw on bicycles. Avid riders themselves, they began a youth cycling program called Spoke ‘n Revolutions. When the group started riding last year, they had no idea how far it would take them – 1,800 miles, to be exact. That’s how far they biked this summer with a group of nine students from Chapel Hill High School. They were following the long path of the Underground Railroad all the way from Mobile, Alabama to Niagara Falls, biking roughly 60 miles a day for 33 days—something none of them had done before.

North Carolina will be one of the states seeking a waiver from the Department of Education, exempting it from parts of No Child Left Behind. U.S. Secretary of Education Arne Duncan announced this week that he will allow some states to opt out of the controversial education law.

State Superintendent June Atkinson says educators have become increasingly unhappy with No Child Left Behind's all-or-nothing system of judging schools.