Central Texas top stories for June 27, 2024. SXSW will no longer partner with the military or weapons manufacturers for sponsorship. More criminal charges have been dismissed against people who participated in pro-Palestinian protests in April. The construction of new toll lanes along 183 will take longer than expected.
Texas State
How Mexico supplanted China as the nation’s top trade partner
A shooting at one of the most famous megachurches in Texas, Joel Osteen’s Lakewood Church in Houston, leaves one dead and a child in critical condition. We’ll have the latest.
For most of the past few decades, the title of “top trading partner to the U.S.” has belonged to China – but the U.S. Census Bureau reports that last year, the United States’ biggest trading partner was Mexico.
Civil rights groups have filed a federal complaint against Bonham ISD alleging disciplinary discrimination against Black and disabled students.
The latest on a mysterious listeria outbreak.
And Russian propagandists twisting the narrative over border standoff between the Biden administration and Gov. Greg Abbott.
A Texas program pushes drivers to pay old tickets – and over 600,000 have lost their licenses
A federal courtroom was filled with anger and tears as relatives of the victims of the 2019 mass shooting at an El Paso Walmart faced the gunman ahead of his sentencing. Julián Aguilar of the Texas Newsroom shares more.
A program aimed at helping Texans pay off old tickets has left hundreds of thousands without driver’s licenses and tangled in red tape.
Amid a stalemate between House and Senate Republicans over property taxes, House Democrats weigh in with a plan.
A new study has found air pollution from U.S. oil and gas production is responsible for $77 billion in health impacts every year, with Texas among the states with the highest proportion of health damages.
Houston is celebrating 50 years of hip-hop with an exhibit and film screenings at the Houston Museum of African American Culture.
And the week in politics with the Texas Tribune.
A deep dive on big plans at the Texas State Aquarium
The Texas State Aquarium in Corpus Christi will soon take on a new role: the largest coastal wildlife rescue facility in the state, and one of the largest in the country.
Should taxpayers cover the multimillion-dollar settlement in a whistleblower case against Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton? Sergio Martínez-Beltrán of The Texas Newsroom joins us with the latest.
Black and Hispanic Texans say they don’t trust the quality of their water, according to a new survey.
More book bans in Texas? How a strategy used by abortion opponents may be used to take on librarians.
And the feds are cracking down on a financial maneuver that could implicate questions of freedom of speech.
Texas Standard: September 15, 2020
No other state has shown as many cracks in its system of counting COVID-19 cases as Texas. Now the numbers are set to shift again. Why is Texas having such trouble with Coronavirus case counts? Edgar Walters of the Texas Tribune has the latest. Also, a plan for affordable housing gets slammed as a tax windfall for developers, we’ll hear why. And an indigenous tribe pushes the University of Texas to hand over Native American remains. Plus the ultimate how to book for those ready to leave it all behind: How to Astronaut. Those stories and so much more today on the Texas Standard:
Texas Standard: October 2, 2019
Guilty. A jury has convicted a former Dallas Police officer of murdering her neighbor in his own apartment. We’ll have reaction and a look ahead to sentencing. Also, Texas State University under scrutiny for under-reporting sexual assaults on campus. We’ll take a look at what happened and why. Meanwhile, the state’s first black city is at risk of being overtaken by developers. A look at the history we’re about to lose. And California is going to let college athletes profit off their images despite NCAA rules. Why Texas should care. All of that and then some today on the Texas Standard:
Texas Standard: August 22, 2019
Students just now returning to school, and report cards already? A-F grades go out statewide rating public schools, but are they fair? We’ll explore. As schools reopen, so do sign ups for sports, and something new in Texas: an effort to track related concussions across the Lone Star State. Also, is Texas an ATM for Democratic politicians? An AP reporter following the money spots another sign of a profound shift in Texas politics in the run up to 2020. Those stories and a whole lot more today on the Texas Standard:
Texas Standard: April 12, 2019
A push for teacher pay raises, but what about other state workers? State employees take to the streets in protest, we’ll have the latest. Also, the student government at Texas State university votes to ban a conservative student group. What the president of Texas State has to say about allegations of an attempt to curb conservative speech at the university. And there’s Lollapalooza, there’s ACL fest, and a new music festival for west Texas? Many locals say not so fast. Plus the week in Texas politics with the Texas Tribune and a whole lot more today on the Friday edition of the Texas Standard:
Texas Standard: November 15, 2017
A death at a college campus: now Texas State joins the ranks of universities nationwide putting greek life on hold, perhaps for good? We’ll have the latest. Also, 26 people were killed by the shooter at Sutherland Springs, but there’s something in those numbers that goes beyond the horror of mass shootings and it appears firmly grounded in the debate over abortion, we’ll hear how and why. And after outrages over the improper use of police force, many Texas cities embraced body cameras. But not all as readily as others, a report card. And do you know who’s listening to your cell phone call? Could it be the Texas military? Those stories and so much more today on the Texas Standard:
Debra Monroe
Debra Monroe
Debra Monroe is an award winning author of six books and acclaimed university professor. But she was, in her own words, “ raised to be a farmer’s wife, a shopkeeper’s wife, a telephone man’s wife.”
In her most recent memoir, My Unsentimental Education, Monroe chronicles her journey from the backstreet bars and the presumed limited opportunities of her small Wisconsin hometown to a seat in the ivory tower. Along the way she battles the discouraging voices of her parents, her professors, and a series of poorly chosen lovers. With her passion for literature and her undefeatable spirit, Monroe not only reaches her goals as a writer and an academic, but also achieves a hard won confidence. The book is a beautiful and often hilarious chronicle of one woman’s battle to be exactly who she wants to be.
Whether trying LSD for the first time, unintentionally accepting a job at a pornographic movie theater, or discussing her love life with religiously conservative neighbors, Monroe manages to move her life and career forward. With a wit that helps ease the hurt, we travel with Monroe through heartbreaking relationships with every sort of wrong man. She makes her way through marriages and romances that quickly announce themselves as mistakes.
Men fear her ambitions, are intimidated by her intellect, or simply have no desire to move as she rockets forward. As Monroe finds her way, she also finds herself. Her story charts the difficult task of leaving behind one’s socially assigned identities to find the authentic self. My Unsentimental Education is a celebration of misadventures, surprises, and powering forward against all odds.
This Monroe’s second memoir. Her first, On the Outskirts of Normal, came out in 2010 and traced her experiences adopting a black child while living in a small Texas town. Monroe is also the author of two novels and two collections of short stories. Her first collection, The Source of Trouble, won the Flannery O’Conner Award for Fiction in 1990 and launched her into the national literary scene. From there she wrote a second collection of stories, A Wild, Cold State, in 1995 and the novels Newfangled in 1998 and Shambles in 2004.
Monroe has often been praised for her honest portrayal of the darker corners of American life. She doesn’t back away from images of poverty, crime, and abuse. Her writing is, as the Boston Globe describes it, “fine and funky, marbled with warmth and romantic confusion, but not a hint of sentimentality.” She’s known for using humor to highlight the humanity of her characters.
A conversation with Monroe is a true delight rich with humor and insight. On this episode of the Write Up, we talk about the different challenges of writing memoirs and novels, the rewards of teaching students in the Texas State University MFA program, and the importance of discovering who one really is.
TX Standard 23: Freshman Year in a Car
We meet the Texas State student who spent his first year of college with a secret: his home was his auto.