More must be done to address issues in the special education program in the Yellow Springs schools, especially in the upper levels, according to approximately 10 parents who came to a special meeting held on Wednesday, Dec. 2. The meeting was the second convened by school administrators to address the results of the special education parent survey the district conducted last summer.

For each of the several hundred people who attended her memorial service at Bryan Community Center on Saturday, Dec. 5, Deborah Benning meant something unique. But in all her roles as mother, step-mother, partner, friend, Village Council clerk and long-time village resident, she was consistently seen as a supportive leader and a touchstone others could depend on. She served in that way for family and friends as well as for the Village of Yellow Springs, and her death on Nov. 24 is as much a part of local history as the legacy of her family as an early part of the village’s African American community.

The Antioch College Board Pro Tempore announced on Wednesday, Dec. 9, the appointment of Matthew Derr as the college’s interim president. Derr was the chief transition officer who helped lead the two-year effort to win the college’s independence from Antioch University this past summer.

The second stage of the community visioning process kicks off this Saturday morning, Dec. 12, at 10 a.m. in the Yellow Springs High School gym, and it is not a meeting to miss, according to organizers. The 855 ideas generated by community members in the first round of public workshops stand sorted into 14 topic categories. Now, villagers and Miami Township residents are invited to help discern goals from these raw ideas that everyone can agree to move forward with.

Yellow Springs High School students Will Turner and Sady Sparks, left, cut down the last tree of the School Forest camp-out weekend for Sady’s mom, Sarah Strong, on Sunday, Dec. 6. This year’s foresters sold nearly 140 5–9-foot scotch pines and grossed over $4,000, more than the group has ever made on the weekend. The School Forest program started raising evergreen saplings in the spring of 1947 and began selling Christmas trees to the community in the winter of 1948.

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William Michael Traylor died Sunday, Nov. 22. He was 26 years of age.

Born at Wright Patterson Air Force Base, he was the eldest son of Latondra Traylor and William Milton Clay. He was the first grandchild in his family to graduate with a bachelors degree, which he received in May from Central State University, magna cum laude.

Deborah Lee Benning of Yellow Springs died Nov. 24, after a courageous battle with cancer, surrounded by her family. She was 62.

Deborah was born Sep. 12, 1947. She was a fixture in the community and an active participant in a number of civic activities. She was clerk for the Yellow Springs Council for 17 years. Deborah’s tenure at the Village completes 200 years of service by the Benning family, who first arrived in Yellow Springs in 1864.

The annual Yellow Springs High School alumni basketball tournament will take place Saturday and Sunday, Dec. 26 and 27, at the high school. Organizers ask that participants register by e-mailing bulldog.basketball@yahoo.com.

Jalana Lazar’s stint with the Peace Corps in Madagascar began inauspiciously. On her first day in the country, she was driven to the village of Nosiarina and dropped off with little fanfare. Remembering her initial dismay, she said, “They left me on the side of the road with a bike and my steel trunk.” She figured out the logistics of her new life on her own.