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Daily Corinthian Vol. 116, No. 188
• Corinth, Mississippi •
BY BRANT SAPPINGTON
There is no stop in Mallie Kate Williams. The 12 year-old has faced her share of challenges throughout her young life. Each obstacle has given the oldest child of Ritchie and Ginger Williams the opportunity to let God work. “I really trust the Lord and the plan he has for my life,” said a smiling Williams. “I know He can take care of every need.” The Alcorn Central seventhgrader has had a rare blood disease called Pyruvate Kinase or PK Deficiency since birth. The blood disorder, which also effects her younger brother Hayden, is an inherited lack of the enzyme py-
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BY BOBBY J. SMITH bjsmith@dailycorinthian.com
Allen said he wants the area to
Monday’s Celebration of Excellence in Education will be a significant step forward for that area’s schools, according to local education leaders. Beginning at 8:30 a.m. at the Crossroads Arena, the event will celebrate and honor the hard work and dedication of the educational staff in Corinth and Alcorn County. The key speaker for the event will be Ron Clark, a renowned educator, speaker and author. It is sponsored by the Commission for the Future of Alcorn County in cooperation with the Pierce Foundation and CARE Community Foundation. “I view it as a pretty significant and timely event for several reasons,” said Sandy Williams, chairman of the CARE board and member of the Committee for the Future of Alcorn County’s steering committee. “One, this may be the first time both our school districts have come together to host their staffs and get them off to a good start for the school year.” Another important factor is the number of distinguished education leaders in attendance. Dr. Wayne Gann, the recently elected chairman of the State Board of Education will present “The Charge” to the educators in attendance. “This will perhaps be the first public meeting where he will be recognized,” said Williams. Also in attendance will be the former and longtime chair of the State Board of Education, Tupelo resident
Please see NEMCC | 2A
Please see CELEBRATION | 3A
Staff photo by Brant Sappington
The dramatic east entrance to Northeast Mississippi Community College’s new student services building will echo design themes seen in other buildings on campus, including the large curved window and the fluted stone details surrounding the doors. which will include plantings, benches, a fountain and more. The space is meant to be a gath-
Sweet dream comes true for local seventh-grader BY STEVE BEAVERS
Tonight
Districts kick off year with joint celebration
bsappington@dailycorinthian.com
sbeavers@dailycorinthian.com
Today
20 pages • Two sections
Transition focused on students BOONEVILLE — When students return to Northeast Mississippi Community College next Thursday for the first day of regular classes, they’ll find a campus on the move and in the midst of a major transition. College officials and employees have been hard at work this summer sprucing up buildings, improving parking and moving toward the completion of one of the largest construction projects in the school’s history. NEMCC President Dr. Johnny Allen said all of the work currently being done on campus and the projects planned for the years to come are centered on one basic idea - putting the students and their needs first. “It’s all about making the college more accessible for the students,” he said. The most visible sign of progress on the campus is the ongoing construction of the Jack T. Ramsey Student Services Building. Located on the eastern end of Cunningham Boulevard at the center of the campus, the building will bring all student service offices under a single roof for the first time. The first floor of the building houses the college’s admissions, business, financial aid, records and student housing offices, along with counseling offices and other student-related services. Allen said these offices are located on the ground floor, with easy access from all four sides of the building, to make it more convenient for students to find the offices they most commonly need to visit. These offices have previously been scattered in multiple buildings across the college campus. The second floor houses the offices of the president, chief financial officer, deans and other key college officials, keeping them all close together to facilitate interaction among the departments. The west side of the building also includes a large plaza stretching west to the western side of the Union property
T-storms
ruvate kinase, which is used by red blood cells. Without the enzyme, red blood cells break down too easily, resulting in hemolytic anemia. Both Hayden and Mallie Kate had transfusions when they were only five days old. By the age of two, Mallie Kate had her spleen removed to reduce the destruction of her red blood cells. The Williams’ middle child, John Riley, does not have the blood disorder. “They both are doing extremely better than expected,” added their mother. Getting a wish The Make-A-Wish Foundation Please see DREAM | 11A
ering place for students to relax, study and to hold events such as pep rallies or other gatherings.
Chinese drywall turns dream home into nightmare BY BOBBY J. SMITH bjsmith@dailycorinthian.com
It’s early on a rainy and dreary day. Emily, a 40-year-old mother of three, is sitting in her car, looking across the driveway at the four-year-old home she bought last April. She thought it would be her dream home, but her experience has been more like a nightmare. In the yard sits a large metal container. It looks like a shipping container that would be used on a boat. The container holds the recently stripped out interior of her home, the toxic Chinese drywall that cost Emily and her family so much — even their health. “I thought I bought my dream home,” said Emily. “I had pictures of the front of my house plastered everywhere, at work, on my fridge. It was my first house as a single woman. I thought I did everything right. I brought in a home inspec-
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tor, I asked all the right questions. How did this happen to me?” Emily bought the house from its previous owner in August of 2011. She works hard every day in the medical field, and after saving for a year and a half, she wanted to do everything right. So, she called in a home inspector. After spending over two hours in the house, the home inspector told Emily it was perfect. He couldn’t find anything wrong with it, he said. A second home inspection would also get the thumbs up. Soon the air conditioning went out. She called one of the big air conditioning companies in town and workers said her AC was low on freon. They had to refill her air conditioning system with Freon four times from August to the following March. “Finally that company called me and said the EPA would not allow
them to continue putting Freon in my unit without doing a leak test,” Emily remembered. “It was high dollar already. I had only been in the house six months — how can it already be a money pit?” Emily enlisted Jeff Crabb, of Crabb’s Heating & Air, to do the leak test. “He wasn’t in the house but a couple of minutes and he detected it,” Emily said. “It was Chinese drywall. The gases from it corroded the copper in my unit. That’s why the Freon was leaking out.” Chinese drywall is defective drywall imported from Chinese manufacturers beginning in the first years of the 21st century. Lab tests have identified emissions of several sulfurous gasses — carbon disulfide, carbonyl sulfide and hydrogen sulfide — coming from the drywall. Please see DRYWALL | 5A
On this day in history 150 years ago A force of 2,600 Confederates under former Vice President John C. Breckenridge attacks an equal number of Federals at Baton Rouge, Louisiana. Union gunboats are the deciding factor in the engagement and the Southerners are forced to abandon the expedition.
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