Local News

With the month of February celebrating Career and Technical Education, it seemed appropriate for the Electrical Construction/ Maintenance (ECM) students to hear some motivational and informative talks about the construction trades.

Integrated Math Instructor Mr. Stofko spoke to the ECM students about the importance of integrating Construction Math with their electrical construction/maintenance instruction.

In preparing for a future in their trade, the student's instruction consist of about 33 percent bookwork and 66 percent hands-on experience.

"Did you know that if you text someone and say, 'I think you are gay,' you can be arrested?" asked Pennsylvania State Police Trooper First Class Rick Williams while addressing an assembly at Pleasant Valley Middle School on Cyberbullying.

Williams told the group of eighth and ninth grade students that making statements like that can be considered a form of cyberbullying.

Cyberbullying occurs when new technologies such as computers and mobile phones are used to harass or bully somebody. The perpetrators often use SMS, e-mail, chat rooms and Facebook to spread their message.

Although the district attorney opposed it, Derrick M. Donchak, 19, of Shenandoah, was paroled by President Judge Willliam E. Baldwin after a brief hearing held Tuesday in Schuylkill County Court. Donchak was one of two youths who served time in the county prison for the fatal beating in July 2008 of an illegal Mexican immigrant in Shenandoah.

The trial brought national attention because of its racis motiff.

Agents of the Attorney General's Child Predator Unit have arrested a Monroe County man who is accused of using the internet chat rooms to sexually proposition what he believed was a 13-year-old girl, as well as sending numerous nude or pornographic photos.

Salvatore J. Cottone, 26, of 21 Cobblewood Drive, Mt. Pocono, has been charged.