High childcare costs and limited access to high-quality programs are slowing positive economic momentum for the community’s most disadvantaged families. Inevitably, discussion about the issue — whether it’s at the local, state or national level — returns to cost, Gail Esterman, manager of the childcare quality program at Children, Youth ...

Charlottesville’s teachers are starting to design instruction that hinges less on tidbits of information, and focuses more on situations that grab students’ attention. School officials call it Project-based Learning, and they feel so strongly about the model’s potential to engage students, that it’s the first objective you ...

Toan Nguyen, Co-Founder and CEO, C'ville Central What are you innovating on right now?   At C'ville Central, we are building a company that can funnel some of the enormous economic wealth in the community to small women and minority-owned businesses in the Charlottesville area.     C'ville Central is ...

Charlottesville High School students recently received top statewide honors for demonstrating their detailed, savvy approach to solving today’s personal finance and economic challenges. In the Virginia Governor’s Challenge in Economics and Personal Finance, held this month, a four-person CHS team finished in second place statewide by developing a ...

Plans for a new streetscape on Charlottesville’s West Main Street are taking shape. Major goals include more trees, fewer traffic signals, better accommodations for bicyclists and pedestrians, and creative parking options. The planning area runs between the intersections at Ridge-McIntire and Jefferson Park Avenue, connecting the Downtown Mall and ...

Chris Gensic, Parks and Trails Planner, City of Charlottesville   Your job title is Parks and Trails Planner - what, in your own words, would you say you do?  I work to build a system of connected bike and hiking trails around the city between all parks and schools and business/commercial ...

Tuition at the University of Virginia could increase next year, with out-of-state students seeing a hike of more than $2,200. The university’s Board of Visitors will meet in Abingdon to vote on the issue Wednesday. The proposed increase for in-state students is 4.7 percent, or $468, which ...

In the past four years, two private event spaces have popped up in downtown Charlottesville. Executive chef Alex George anticipates opening the third next month. The Commonwealth Reserve is slated to join George’s other Downtown Mall endeavors Commonwealth Restaurant & Skybar and Just Curry. “When this opportunity came up, it ...

The funding future for an “intergenerational learning center” at Yancey Elementary is unclear after the Albemarle School Board met last week. “We need to define what the programming for an intergenerational center is to get a better vision of where we take this,” School Board Chair Ned Galloway said.  Dr ...

A bar and restaurant that wants to be a partner in the community and is slated to open on West Main Street this fall moved closer to reality Tuesday. The Charlottesville Board of Architectural Review granted approval for World of Beer to have an outdoor patio seating area with a ...

A public meeting to discuss the proposed design concept for West Main Street.   1. Introductions 2. Update/Follow-Up from March 26 Steering Committee Meeting – Discussion of the following:    a. 3 Streetscape options: “Woonerf,” Side Cycletrack, and Multi-Use Boulevard    b. 10th /Roosevelt Brown intersection    c. McIntire Road Intersection    d. Option A1 ...

The 492 homes sold in the Charlottesville region during the first three months of 2014 is even with the number sold during the first quarter of 2013, although this year’s median sales price is up 7.4 percent. According to the Charlottesville Area Association of Realtors, the median price ...

Charlottesville High School physics teacher Matt Shields can remember the day his students already knew the content he wanted to teach. “I felt like some of my power had been stolen from me,” Shields said of the class that had skipped ahead in the curriculum by watching YouTube videos. Now ...

After weeks of financial wrangling, the Charlottesville City Council on Friday unanimously approved a $150.7 million budget for fiscal year 2014-15 that was $130,867 more than initially proposed, thanks mainly to increased school funding and a few pet projects surviving the chopping block. The approval process took just ...

City Council will approve the budget for FY2015. 

Joel Selzer, Co-Founder and CEO, ArcheMedX What are you innovating on right now?   We launched ArcheMedX last year to transform the way clinicians learn online.  ArcheMedX provides an e-learning platform that enables healthcare organizations, such as the University of Virginia School of Medicine and the New Jersey Academy of Family ...

The Charlottesville School Board wasn’t sold on the latest school day scenario presented Thursday. The proposal, in which all students would have begun school after 8:00 a.m., was the fifth scenario the Board has reviewed during its month-long consideration of the start of the school day. The ...

The Charlottesville School Board will decide next month whether to tinker with the time students start their school days so middle-schoolers can get more sleep and a later start in the morning. And the new schedule could kick in as early as the next school year. For Chairman Juandiego Wade ...

Charlottesville’s McIntire Park may one day welcome not only skateboarders and visitors to a future botanical garden, but also residents commuting to work. A multi-use commuter path was one suggestion mulled by the PLACE Design Task Force at a meeting Thursday. “You could get around the entire city without ...

1. Public Comments        2. Downtown Mall Update        3. East Side McIntire Park Update      4. Subcommittee Reports      5. Matters from the Public 

Albemarle County’s budget deadline is nearing, but the fiscal waters aren’t becoming any less muddy for the school division. And exactly what the schools plan to cut if their funding request isn’t fully met is what Albemarle Supervisor Liz Palmer wanted to know during a meeting last ...

The local skateboarding community has begun sharing its wish lists for a future regional skate park in Charlottesville. At a workshop hosted Tuesday by the city, design firm Stantec picked the brains of more than 60 participants for their feedback and creative ideas. Skateboarders have spent the past year in ...

After more than two years of negotiations, the Charlottesville City Council and the Albemarle County Service Authority now have an agreement to determine how to share the costs of sewer projects, including a $33.3 million relocation of the Rivanna Pump Station. “This agreement is for all capital wastewater projects ...

Charlottesville City Manager Maurice Jones can now get a salary increase just as easily as the rest of his full-time employees. His annual salary jumped to $176,878 after a unanimous City Council gave him a 2 percent pay raise Monday night. The hike is retroactive to July 1, 2013 ...