Lawrence Journal-World 12-14-12

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L A W R E NC E

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Rivals team up to support player with cancer By Tom Keegan tkeegan@ljworld.com

Participants from both sides of tonight’s city high school basketball rivalry game at Lawrence High School will do everything in their power to try to win, even though they all know it’s not the most important battle touching

their lives at the moment. Players from both teams had their worlds rocked last weekend when they learned that Lawrence High junior Isaiah “Zay” Boldridge, 17, had received a diagnosis of Hodgkin’s

Partly cloudy

High: 56

lymphoma, a form of cancer with a high recovery found most often in teenagers and young adults. Boldridge underwent biopsy surgery Thursday, and his mother, Kalila Boldridge, said afterward

LAWRENCE HIGH basketball player Isaiah Boldridge, pictured in his hospital room, has been diagnosed with Hodgkin’s lymphoma.

they were awaiting results that would determine the stage to which the disease had progressed. Since news of the initial diagnosis broke, players, parents, teachers and coaches from both schools have teamed up to try to make the holidays

Special to the Journal-World

Please see CANCER, page 2A

Jayhawks help out with wish lists

Low: 43

Today’s forecast, page 12A

INSIDE KU cornerback leaving program Tyler Patmon will not be returning to the Kansas University football team next season, sources confirmed to the Journal-World on Thursday. Patmon, threePatmon year starter from Round Rock, Texas, finished the season with 58 tackles. Page 1B

QUOTABLE

To have the kind of reduction that the budget office recommended would be a severe reduction for us and would have, I believe, a significant effect on everything that we’re trying to do.” — KU Chancellor Bernadette GrayLittle, speaking about a proposed 8 percent budget cut to higher education. Page 3A

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INDEX Business 6A Classified 5B-12B Comics 11A Deaths 2A Events listings 12A, 2B Horoscope 11B Movies 4A Opinion 10A Puzzles 11B Sports 1B-4B Television 12A, 2B, 11B Vol.154/No.349 32 pages

Gunshot victim also a suspect ——

Robbery attempt backfired, police say

Richard Gwin/Journal-World Photo

KANSAS UNIVERSITY JUNIOR BASKETBALL FORWARD JUSTIN WESLEY SHOPS for Christmas gifts Thursday at Walmart, 3300 Iowa St. Members of the KU men’s basketball team shopped for families in need, each getting $100 per family member from funds raised from coach Bill Self’s Assists Foundation and a fund set up by Roger and Linda Morningstar. See the story, page 1B. Wesley broke his left pinkie finger at practice Thursday and will miss approximately three weeks of practice and games, Self said Thursday. See the story, page 3B.

Using Common Core standards much less costly than expected, audit finds By Peter Hancock phancock@ljworld.com

Implementing the new Common Core State Standards in reading and math will cost school districts an estimated $32 million to $60 million over the next five years, mainly to pay for new textbooks and teacher training, according to a Legislative Post Audit report released Thursday.

Meanwhile, the re- ies — one by the Pioneer port noted, the Kansas Institute and another by State Department of the Thomas B. Fordham Education will prob- Institute — that estiably save about mated the costs $9 million over in Kansas at $100 that time, commillion to $180 milpared with what it lion. would have spent But state eduif it had developed cation officials new reading and SCHOOLS said even the Post math standards inAudit report was house. probably high because That is significantly the cost of textbooks lower than estimates and professional develfrom two national stud- opment for teachers are

costs schools incur on a regular basis anyway, and they would continue to be incurred even if the state had not adopted the Common Core standards. “Every district has what they call a textbook revision cycle,” Education Commissioner Diane DeBacker told the Legislative Post Audit Committee,

By Shaun Hittle sdhittle@ljworld.com

A 21-year-old former Kansas University student is in jail, and another person is being treated for a gunshot wound to the arm following what police say was a botched armed robbery early Thursday morning. Alex Christopher Eftekhar was arrested on robbery, burglary and kidnapping charges stemming from an incident that began a few minutes after midnight Thursday, said Lawrence Police Sgt. Trent McKinley. McKinley gave this account: Two suspects, one of whom was Eftekhar, went to a residence in the 1200 block of New Jersey Street and announced that they were police. At least one of the suspects was wearing a ski mask and was armed with a rifle.

Please see CORE, page 2A

Please see SUSPECT, page 2A

Community Foundation exceeds $10 million mark By Matt Erickson merickson@ljworld.com

It took the Douglas County Community Foundation 10 years to distribute $5 million in grants to community groups. It took two more years to double that number. The foundation announced Thursday that it had surpassed $10 million in total grants awarded since its formation in 2000. “It means a lot of people in the community

have been very generous in supporting their neighbors and the service organizations that do great work every day,” said Chip Blaser, executive director of the foundation. The foundation’s grants have added up to about $2 million annually each of the last few years, Blaser said, and the total is likely to end up at about that level this year. “We’ve had quite a lot of grant activity over the last

couple of years,” he said. One reason for that, he said, is a number of community projects occurring in recent years, including capital campaigns for the Lawrence Public Library, Theatre Lawrence and the Lawrence Community Shelter. The Community Shelter was the beneficiary of the foundation’s largest grant awarded this year, worth $100,000. That grant, like the majority awarded by the

foundation, came from a donor-advised fund — funds committed to the foundation by individuals, families or businesses that then recommend donations to local nonprofit organizations. “The really gratifying thing about people setting up a charitable fund like this through the foundation is that they have made a commitment to make charitable giving to our community a part of their everyday way of

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life,” Blaser said. Other grants awarded this year were as small as $100. The foundation also has an unrestricted community grant fund, established with the $4 million gift from the late Tensie Oldfather that gave the foundation its start. Altogether, the foundation’s assets total more than $21 million. Since 2000, it has awarded more than 1,300 grants.


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