Tim Carpenter

2 days ago | hastingstribune.com | Tim Carpenter

By Tim Carpenter Sen. Beverly Gossage of Eudora, center, and Rep. Kristey Williams of Augusta, right, agreed Kansas ought to increase pressure on parents to encourage their children to repeat a grade level if confronted with fundamental academic deficiencies. Other members of the Kansas Legislature's school finance task force pushed back, saying repeating a grade carried unintended consequences for students. (Kansas Reflector screen capture of Kansas Legislature's YouTube channel)

3 days ago | kansasreflector.com | Tim Carpenter

TOPEKA — Rep. Kristey Williams and Sen. Beverly Gossage landed on the same page Wednesday in terms of altering the state’s public education system to encourage students to address academic deficiencies by retaking a grade. “Are we doing these children a favor by just moving them through the grades?” said Gossage, a Eudora Republican serving on the Kansas Legislature’s school finance task force.

3 days ago | kansasreflector.com | Tim Carpenter

TOPEKA — Members of the Kansas congressional delegation participated in a moment of silence on the U.S. House floor to honor the memory of a couple slain in May during an apparent antisemitic attack outside the Capital Jewish Museum in Washington, D.C.Federal lawmakers stood in tribute for Sarah Milgrim, who grew up in Prairie Village, Kansas, and her partner, Yaron Lischinsky. Both were staff members at the Israeli embassy.

3 days ago | hastingstribune.com | Tim Carpenter

Hailey Seel, the daughter of convicted murderer Dana Chandler, returns to her seat by passing her mother at the defense table in the Pottawatomie County Courthouse, after delivering a victim impact statement at Chandler's sentencing for shooting to death Mike Sisco, Seel's father and Chandler's ex-husband, and Sisco's fiancee, Karen Harkness, in 2002. Chandler, who tried to hide from photographers, was sentenced to consecutive life sentences without a chance for parole for 50 years.

3 days ago | kansasreflector.com | Tim Carpenter

WESTMORELAND — Family and friends of the late Mike Sisco and Karen Harkness sat in a courtroom gallery Tuesday for sentencing of Dana Chandler to consecutive life sentences without an opportunity for parole for 50 years for shooting the couple to death while they slept. It was an emotional closure to a legal odyssey that began July 7, 2002, with the murder of Chandler’s ex-husband, Sisco, and his fiancee, Harkness, in Topeka.