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Today’s Email Announcements

23rd Annual Wayne C. Henderson Music Festival and Guitar Competition at Grayson Highlands State Park Saturday, June 17

Registration is open for guitarists who wish to compete in the 23rd annual Wayne C. Henderson Music Festival and Guitar Competition at Grayson Highlands State Park. The winner will be awarded a handmade Henderson guitar.

Applications must be received between April 1 and May 1. To register, send a completed application form and a $20 fee by personal check or money order payable to the Wayne C. Henderson Guitar Competition. Download the form from www.waynehenderson.org and mail it to: Wayne Henderson Guitar Competition, c/o Herb Key, 1423 Dragway Road, Wilkesboro, NC 28697.

Twenty contestant applications and 10 alternate contestant applications will be selected. The first 20 will be drawn at random and approved as contestants by the contestant selection committee. The next 10 will be drawn at random and approved as alternates. Other prizes are second place, $250; third, $150, fourth, $100; and fifth, $75. (These winners also will be eligible for the 2018 contest by simply sending in an application and fee.) All competitors receive free passes to the festival.

The family-friendly festival will be Saturday, June 17, rain or shine, at Grayson Highlands State Park in Mouth of Wilson, Virginia. Performing will be the Krüger Brothers, Rob Ickes and Trey Hensley, the Looping Brothers, Betty and the Bullet, Strictly Strings, and Wayne Henderson and Friends. Free children’s events and music are scheduled, too. Admission is $20, and children 12 and younger get in free. There is a state park parking fee.

Since the festival began in 1995, more than $160,500 has been awarded to aid young, local, traditional musicians in continuing their music exploration and education. Details at www.waynehenderson.org.

Sugar Mountain Resort’s Summit Crawl and Classic Car Cruise-in to Be Held Saturday, July 1 

Run, hike, or crawl as fast as you can to Sugar Mountain’s 5,300’ peak by way of the Easy Street, Gunther’s Way, and Northridge slopes. Summit Crawl registration is available anytime online, or in person Monday through Friday from 8 a.m. until 4 p.m., through Friday, June 30 at Sugar Mountain Resort. Entry fee includes a t-shirt and downhill transportation on the Summit Express lift. Start time is 10 a.m.

Cruise into Sugar Mountain Resort with your classic car or truck, which must be 25 years old or older, and park it in the classic car parking area before 9 a.m. If you’d like, send an RSVP to events@skisugar.com to let us know that you’ll be showing off your treasure.

Summit Express lift rides will operate for the public from 10 a.m. until 5:30 p.m.and live music will play from 11 a.m. until 2 p.m. Food and refreshments will be available for purchase and the Sugar Mountain Sports Shop will be open too.

For more information call 800-SUGAR-MT or visit www.skisugar.com/crawl.

The Watauga Soil and Water District Board to Hold Board Meeting Wednesday, April 26

The Watauga Soil and Water District Board will have a regular board meeting on Wednesday, April 26, 2017 at 8 a.m. The public is invited to attend. The meeting will take place at 971 West King Street in Boone.

Ashe Campus of Wilkes Community College to Present 17th Annual Professional Women’s Seminar Thursday, April 20

The Ashe Campus of Wilkes Community College will offer the 17thAnnual Professional Women’s Seminar on Thursday, April 20, from 1-3 p.m. The keynote presentation will be “Time Management for Businesses: The 90-Day Focus” by Lady Bizness. The event will take place at Blue Ridge Energy, which is located on Hwy 163 in West Jefferson. Pre-registration is required, and seating is limited to the first 50 to register. There is no charge to register.

This seminar, offered at no charge, is great for anyone who want to make changes in their personal, professional and business lives. The event will open with a networking opportunity for participants before the keynote presentation. Chisa Pennix-Brown, Lady Bizness, will discuss the importance of effective time management. She says that all business owners and workers face certain challenges; but, sometimes women entrepreneurs face additional challenges and obstacles. Working mothers often experience additional demands on time, energy and resources. This interactive seminar will help participants develop techniques to:

  • change habits that impede productivity
  • use specific tools to increase productivity
  • create weekly and monthly actionable items that enrich professional goals
  • stay focused on creating lifelong habits for successful time management

The afternoon will wrap up with a drawing for door prizes.

With more than 14 years of experience in business coaching, community outreach, and social media insight, Chisa Pennix-Brown has transformed adaptability and a long-time vision of helping her peers into Lady Bizness, an organization committed to fostering healthy relationships, creating business opportunities, and providing events for entrepreneurs in North Carolina’s Piedmont Triad community. Her most recent accomplishment is becoming the author of “The 90 Day Focus: Your Action Plan for Success,” which helps readers transform their mindset towards prioritization and goal-setting to help complete their passion project.

The event is presented by the Ashe Campus of Wilkes Community College and the WCC Small Business Center. It is sponsored by Blue Ridge Energy, Wilkes Community College and WCC Small Business Center.

The deadline to preregister for the seminar is April 13. For more information about the event or to pre-register, contact Laurie Brintle-Jarvis at 336-838-6166 or emailLsbrintle336@wilkescc.edu.

Wilkes Community College, a member of the North Carolina Community College System, is a public, two-year, open-door institution serving the people of Wilkes, Ashe and Alleghany counties and beyond. Established in 1965, WCC continues to build on a strong history of meeting the educational needs and cultural interests of our students, community and workforce. WCC prepares learners for success in a dynamic world.

Dr. Curt Fields, Living Historian and Re-enactor, Brings Ulysses S. Grant to Campus and Area Schools April 24-28

As part of a continued exploration of Civil War themes this semester, the Department of History at Appalachian State University will host Dr. Curt Fields for “An Evening with General Ulysses S. Grant: The Man Behind the Uniform,” Monday, April 24. Fields is the National Park Service representative for Grant. He has portrayed the commanding general of the Union Army in films, posters and re-enactments.

Fields will be visiting campus Monday, April 24, through Friday, April 28. Monday evening’s performance is a free public lecture in I.G. Greer Auditorium at 7 p.m. During his visit, Fields will be speaking to students on campus and also to public school students in Watauga and Ashe counties.

Fields was selected to portray Grant at the 150th anniversary of Lee’s surrender to Grant at Appomattox Court House, Virginia, in 2015. He was featured as Grant, and as a Grant authority, in the Discovery Channel three-part documentary series “How Booze Built America.” Fields is the same height and body style as the general and represents a true-to-life image of the man as he would have looked. He does extensive research in order to share an accurate portrayal. His presentations are made in the first person, quoting from memoirs, articles and letters the general wrote, statements he made in interviews and first-person accounts of people who knew the general or were with him and witnessed him during events.

“It’s eerie. Dr. Curt Fields becomes Gen. Ulysses S. Grant . . . and history comes alive,” said James Goff, professor and chair of the Department of History.

Fields has a bachelor’s and a master’s degree in education from the University of Memphis in Tennessee. He earned a second master’s in secondary education and a Ph.D. in educational administration and curriculum from Michigan State University. He spent eight years at the junior and senior high school levels teaching before serving 25 years as a high school administrator. He teaches as an adjunct sociology professor at the University of Memphis and in education for Belhaven University, Memphis. He is now an educational consultant and a living historian.

Fields is a frequent contributor to the monthly newsletter “The Civil War Courier,” and is a member of the Tennessee Historical Society, the West Tennessee Historical Society, the Shelby County Historical Society, the Nathan Bedford Forrest Historical Society, the Tennessee Civil War Preservation Association, the Appomattox 1865 Foundation, the 290 Foundation – dedicated to the Civil War Navies, the Civil War Trust and the Ulysses S. Grant Association.

This event is co-sponsored by the Department of History, Department of Communication and Department of Military Science, as well as the Reich College of Education and College Arts and Sciences. For questions about Fields’ visit, contact Dr. Rwany Sibaja at 828-262-8476 or sibajaro@appstate.edu. To learn more about the speaker and to see him in action, visit his website, http://generalgrantbyhimself.com.

About the Department of History

The Department of History at Appalachian State University offers a broad curriculum in local, national, regional and world history at both the undergraduate and graduate level, which encourages history majors to develop a comparative approach to human problems. The study of history is an essential part of a liberal arts education and offers valuable preparation for many careers, such as law, journalism, public history, public service and business, as well as in teaching and the advanced discipline of history. Learn more at https://history.appstate.edu

About the College of Arts and Sciences

The College of Arts and Sciences is home to 16 academic departments, three stand-alone programs, two centers and one residential college. These units span the humanities, social sciences, and the mathematical and natural sciences. The College of Arts and Sciences aims to develop a distinctive identity built upon our university’s strengths, traditions and unique location. Our values lie not only in service to the university and local community, but through inspiring, training, educating and sustaining the development of our students as global citizens. There are approximately 5,850 student majors in the college. As the college is also largely responsible for implementing Appalachian’s general education curriculum, it is heavily involved in the education of all students at the university, including those pursuing majors in other colleges.

About the Reich College of Education

Appalachian offers one of the largest undergraduate teacher preparation programs in North Carolina, graduating about 500 teachers a year. The Reich College of Education enrolls approximately 2,400 students in its bachelor’s, master’s, education specialist and doctoral degree programs. With so many teacher education graduates working in the state, there is at least one RCOE graduate teaching in every county in North Carolina.

About Appalachian State University

Appalachian State University, in North Carolina’s Blue Ridge Mountains, prepares students to lead purposeful lives as global citizens who understand and engage their responsibilities in creating a sustainable future for all. The transformational Appalachian experience promotes a spirit of inclusion that brings people together in inspiring ways to acquire and create knowledge, to grow holistically, to act with passion and determination, and embrace diversity and difference. As one of 17 campuses in the University of North Carolina system, Appalachian enrolls about 18,000 students, has a low student-to-faculty ratio and offers more than 150 undergraduate and graduate majors.