Cheers: To Eric Saueracker, Southwest Washington’s Teacher of the Year. The 29-year-old teaches Advanced Placement calculus and physics courses at Hudson’s Bay High School in Vancouver. The job must be challenging — Bay enrolls students from diverse economic backgrounds, the classes are optional and challenging, and the high school is directly across the street from Clark College, where students may tackle the same subjects for college credit through Running Start. But Saueracker’s ability to connect with students has actually resulted in large enrollment increases in those subjects. Saueracker was honored this week, along with eight other regional top teachers, at a reception at Seattle’s Experience Music Project.
Jeers: To The Grange. No, not the original Patrons of Husbandry, but to the proposed megacasino project east of Portland that co-opts the fraternal organization’s venerable name. If you haven’t noticed, Portland TV is bombarded with advertising that touts the supposed benefits of this proposed privately owned facility. At the same time it would offer as many slots as a Las Vegas casino, the owners promise family entertainment out of the other corner of their mouths.
Oregon voters would do well to reject Measure 82, which would allow these privately owned casinos, and Measure 83, which would specifically authorize The Grange to be built at the site of the old Multnomah Kennel Club greyhound track in Wood Village.
Cheers: To fat cats. Not to be confused with the ones eager to solicit your vote, these porcine purrers can be found at the Humane Society for Southwest Washington, where an ingenious adoption special found many of them a new home. Not surprisingly, most folks who go to the shelter to adopt a pet fall in love with the kittens, leaving the adult cats, and particularly the overweight ones, to linger. A promotion running through September offers discounts to those who will adopt a larger cat.