Prior to our current pandemic, nearly 20% of people experienced some form of mental illness. Now that we are in the middle of it, mental health challenges have affected even more people. Unfortunately, most of those affected by mental illness either delay seeking help, often for years, or not at all, primarily due to the stigma associated with it. Join us Tuesday, January 26th at 6:30 pm on Zoom for “Make It Ok to Talk About Mental Health” with Dr. Terry Haru, Ph.D.  The “Make It OK” presentation is designed to help reduce stigma by doing three things. First, to increase awareness... Read More

Today, it was announced that Steven Bahls will retire as president of Augustana College effective July 1, 2022, after a notable 19-year career leading the private Rock Island school. And, on the Iowa side of the Mississippi River, the head of the other major private university in the Quad-Cities, is also retiring. St. Ambrose University president Sister Joan Lescinski announced last summer she will retire effective August of 2021. A national search for the 14th president in the university’s 138-year history has been underway. Trustee alumni John Anderson ’87 and Renee Citera ’81 were appointed... Read More

Steven Bahls will retire as president of Augustana College effective July 1, 2022, after a notable 19-year career leading the private Rock Island school. Originally planning to retire in July 2021, Bahls, 66, delayed his retirement in order to lead the college through the challenging years of the pandemic. “It has been the highlight of my professional life to serve Augustana College, and I look forward to my next great adventure,” he said in a Monday announcement. The eighth president of the college, Bahls started his tenure at Augustana in the summer of 2003. Previously, he was dean at Capital... Read More

Davenport West High School is helping lead the way in providing future health care workers to fight national crises like the coronavirus pandemic. Data from the Association of American Medical Colleges (AAMC) shows that the number of people in the U.S. entering medical school in 2020 reached a two-decade high, with a total of 22,239 enrolled students. The AAMC is a not-for-profit association that leads and serves the academic medicine community. At West High School – 3505 W. Locust St., in Davenport – the student Falcons are flying high to meet the massive medical challenge presented by the... Read More

As part of the 2021 celebration of Black History Month at Western Illinois University, University of Missouri-Columbia Associate Professor Keona Ervin will deliver the keynote address, “Reimagining Liberation: Black Feminism from the Combahee River Collective to the Movement for Black Lives,” virtually from 6-7 p.m. Tuesday, Feb. 2. The address will provide an overview of the organizing work of radical Black feminists from the 1970s to present. It will include a discussion of the ways Black feminism has uniquely shaped and critiqued movements for social democracy. The virtual address... Read More

The Davenport Library offers a variety of virtual book clubs for adults covering a wide range of interests. Join us for one (or more!) of these engaging clubs! Shorts & Sweets – Second Mondays at 10:00 am – Discuss a new short story every month with a variety of different authors both current and classics. For more information, visit http://bit.ly/dpl-shortsandsweets West End Book Club – Second Tuesdays at 6:30 pm – The West End Book Club reads a variety of fiction and non-fiction books. Books are available at the drive-up window at the Fairmount Library. At this time, our meetings... Read More

Believe in Bigfoot? The Abominable Snowman (woman? person?)? Yetis??? They all exist! Just ask the folks behind The Great Yeti Hunt, taking place starting at midnight Monday and running through the day at Johnson County Reservation. There’s a yeti on the move, and she’s roaming through Johnson County Conservation parks! Help us track her over the next eight weeks. Every two weeks, the yeti will show up somewhere new – but in classic yeti style, she only roams in the most wild places – places with few visitors and few trails. Anyone tracking her should be comfortable navigating... Read More

The annual Smokin’ Hog fundraising event, put on by Western Illinois University’s Alpha Gamma Rho (AGR) fraternity, raised $10,000 for the WIU School of Agriculture and the WIU Food Pantry. This was the 28th year for the event, which had to be altered slightly because of the COVID-19 pandemic. The food was delivered in a drive-through format from the AGR house on North Lafayette Street. “We faced a lot of diversity this year due to current COVID-19 restrictions, not being able to have in person dining or a concert preceding the event,” said AGR President Cameron Kessling,... Read More

MACOMB/MOLINE, IL – For more than 20 years, the Western Illinois University and Big Brothers Big Sisters (BBBS) of McDonough and Warren counties connection has been strong, with nearly 73 percent of “Bigs” in McDonough and Warren counties composed of WIU faculty, staff, students and alumni. Because of that connection, members of the WIU community are invited to take part in the organization’s annual trivia contest fundraiser, which, like everything else these days, has gone virtual. The contest will be held over four days, and individuals and teams (up to 12 players) can participate... Read More

Looking for something to do during the dark days of winter? Join us for our Visible Mending programming! Over 8 weeks beginning January 19 at 2:00 pm, we’ll talk about visible mending and practice several mending techniques. Some examples include felt patches, boro patching, sashiko stitching, weaving, applique, and reverse applique. In the final episode, we’ll make an (optional) drawstring bag. Episode 1 can be caught up on here: https://youtu.be/Hkird9OjWpI A limited number of kits will be available which contain some but not all of the materials needed. You do NOT need a kit to participate... Read More