The weather is finally starting to become brighter, but regardless of whether it’s rainy or sunny, there’s always sunny news in the Quad-Cities! Every month, we at QuadCities.com, in partnership with our friends at KWQC-TV6’s “Paula Sands Live,” present you with a smattering of that positive news in our What’s The Good News? column. So, what’s the good news for May? Read on… Bettendorf Teacher wins Art Education Leadership Award Herbert Hoover Elementary School and Mark Twain Elementary School art instructor Meghan Purcell is the recipient of Artsonia’s 2022 Art Education Leadership... Read More

The Moline Human Rights Commission is seeking input from residents in an effort to identify – and ultimately address – issues of inequality, discrimination or other challenges to inclusivity and rights that may be outstanding in the community. The seven-member committee, appointed by Mayor Sangeetha Rayapati in the fall of 2021, has created a Moline Human Rights Community Questionnaire that is available on the city’s website and social media platforms. The questionnaire asks respondents to share their experiences in areas such as equal opportunity in employment, housing and other services... Read More

MACOMB/MOLINE, IL – When Guiyou Huang started his tenure as Western Illinois University’s 12th president in January 2021, one of his core initiatives was to further the University’s diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) initiatives and efforts. Huang has created a new Anti-Racism Task Force (ARTF), composed of approximately 22 faculty, staff, students from both campuses, as well as community members. The task force recently held its first meeting, which included training presentations from Jessica C. Harris, vice chancellor for Equity, Diversity and Inclusion at Southern Illinois... Read More

The weather outside is frightful, but the good news is so delightful! We’re back again with What’s The Good News, our team-up every month with KWQC-TV6’s “Paula Sands Live” to highlight some of the great news going on in and around the Quad-Cities! So, what’s the good news for January, Quad-Cities? Glad you asked! Rock Island Math And Science Helps QC Paws Rock Island Center for Math & Science raised $1,000 for QC Paws through its Leader in Me service project “Cause for 4 Paws”! Students and staff raised funds through various fundraisers the school held and presented... Read More

Community Home Partners in Rock Island, Illinois is thrilled to welcome our new CEO John Chow. For 22 years, Susan Anderson led Community Home Partners (CHP) as CEO. She’s now retiring in January 2022, and John will be carrying on her hard work. The media is invited to attend a welcome reception for John on Tuesday, December 14, 2021 at the Community Home Partners Offices at 227 21st Street, Rock Island, Illinois 61201 from 5-7 p.m. Doors will open at 4:45 p.m. For additional information, contact Kathleen Vondran at 563-590-4762. John comes to us from the Housing Authority of Joliet where he... Read More

There are only TWO more chances to see “Disenchanted” at Circa ’21 in Rock Island — today and Friday! “Disenchanted!” runs through Nov. 6 and has scheduled performances on Wednesday and Friday evenings at 7:45 p.m., and Wednesday matinées at 1:30 p.m. Ticket prices are $56.55 for the evening dinner-and-show productions and $49.73 for the plated-lunch matinées. Reservations are available through the Circa ’21 ticket office. Contact the theater at 1828 3rd Ave., Rock Island or by calling 309-786-7733 ext. 2. Due to state requirements, masks must be worn by all Circa... Read More

Diversity in the arts is the latest hot topic on the Quad-Cities arts scene, and it’s certainly a welcome one, as the discussion has long been overdue. There is a definite shortage of minority voices across the arts spectrum, and that needs to be corrected. The only way it will be corrected is by it being acknowledged and addressed. Some groups have certainly been doing so, and deserve credit for it. Tristan Tapscott’s The Mockingbird On Main has been one of the most forward thinking theaters on the subject, with casts and shows that have distinctly featured minority performers and... Read More

Three of the buzziest buzzwords nationwide now are diversity, equity and inclusion. Everyone it seems wants to do better in those key areas (be it in their workplace, nonprofit or volunteer organization), and that includes the Quad-Cities theater community. Thanks to a Quad City Arts grant and two professional facilitators, the 73-year-old Quad City Music Guild hosted a 90-minute discussion on these issues Saturday at the Prospect Park theater in Moline – led by the quote: “The beauty of the world lies in the diversity of its people.” It was attended by about 45 people (fewer than 10 of whom... Read More

Saturday in the Arts is a weekly feature covering a trend, subject, event or personality of local interest. It runs every Saturday morning on your site for the best entertainment and arts coverage in the area, QuadCities.com! How do you solve a problem like diversity in live theater? From Broadway to the Quad-Cities, theatrical organizations of all kinds are wrestling with this thorny issue, now more than ever. Long before the widespread racial reckoning that’s taken place nationwide in the past 17 months (post-George Floyd, Breonna Taylor and Black Lives Matter, which has only intensified),... Read More

A long-standing hallmark of the Western Illinois University Physics Department has been the commitment of faculty to provide one-on-one research experiences to both graduate and undergraduate students. The efforts of the faculty in mentoring and professional development of students extends beyond graduation, as exemplified by the recent research accomplishments of the Astrophysics Research Laboratory. WIU Physics Professor Esteban Araya, lead of the laboratory, said most scientific projects in physics take many years of research to complete, and typically a project extends well beyond the time... Read More