Wilmington, NC News

It’s uniform time for students at three Brunswick County elementary schools, but two of them didn’t exactly see it coming.

The vote to allow uniforms at Lincoln Elementary was on the agenda at last night’s school board meeting, but parents of students at Belville Elementary and Town Creek Elementary didn’t realize the vote would affect them too.

“I would have liked to have known when the meeting was going to be,” said Allyson Rathburn who is against uniforms.

Whether they like it or not, Belville Elementary moms will be sending their kids to school in uniforms.

Tuesday night’s school board agenda included voting on uniforms for Lincoln Elementary, not Belville and Town Creek. However, Brunswick County School Board Chair Shirley Babson said she felt it was a good time to discuss implementing uniforms at more than just one school. “We have to make decisions based on what is best for the children,” Babson said.

Lincoln elementary saw it coming, and teachers and parents seem happy with the outcome. “It would bring a sense of unity among the students,” said second grade teacher Carolyn Harrington.

The students are not exactly thrilled. “We’ll all look the same and everyone will say you copied me,” explained second grader Dreonna Tompkins.

Though Belville parents didn’t know about Tuesday’s vote, they were asked for input a couple weeks ago in a take-home survey.

“Some of the comments students made were they want to feel like everybody else, I want to be a part of something,” said Belville Principal Tracy Coston.

The school board said over the next few months they are going to look into uniforms for all the Brunswick County elementary schools.

North Carolina’s beautiful beaches and mountains draw millions to the state every year. Columbus County has come up with something else, in hopes of drawing a crowd.

The county has plans to build a 1930’s-style working farm. The plan is in the preliminary stages. The public is invited to give input at upcoming public meetings.

The completed project will have on-sight accommodations, where visitors can learn what the farming industry was like in the thirties and forties.

“There will be crop land. It’ll be mule-driven, crop-land. You’ll have an opportunity to actually take part in that. So it won’t be static,” said Jennifer Long of the Columbus County Tourism Bureau. “It’ll be fun for you to do; educational of course.”

Visitors will have the opportunity to purchase crops from the farmland. The tourism bureau has just decided on a location for the farm; next to Yogi Bear’s Jellystone Park in Tabor City.

State lawmakers want to give parents more input in the classroom when it comes to sex education.

A bill making its way through the state legislature would give parents the option of their children learning about sex beyond the current abstinence-only curriculum.

Parents would be able to choose a more comprehensive sex ed lesson, or nothing at all.

Currently, New Hanover County schools already give parents the option. Brunswick and Pender counties still teach abstinence only.

The bill has passed a committee, and is on its way to the State House for approval.