BELLEVUE
REPORTER
NEWSLINE 425-453-4270
ELECTION | Candidates for 41st and 48th legislative districts state their positions as election nears [9-10]
Arts | ‘Mary Poppins’ to fly into Village Theatre in popular musical [15]
FRIDAY, OCTOBER 24, 2014
Commmunity | Football great (and dancing champ) Donald Driver talk of his past at Hopelink fundraiser [2]
UW expanding its worldwide draw in Bellevue Plans are underway for a new innovation center campus BY BRANDON MACZ BELLEVUE REPORTER
Bellevue City Councilmember John Chelminiak says the University of Washington
is eyeing the Bel-Red corridor to site a new innovation center proposed to pair students and faculty with companies and organizations to tackle global design and technology challenges. In his annual address on Oct. 15, UW President Michael Young announced the appointment of Vikram Jandhyala as vice provost for innovation, a new position to the university, to lead UW’s new “innovation agenda.”
Young wrote in a Seattle Times column the next day that agenda calls for a center in Bellevue that will attract faculty and students worldwide here to collaborate with companies and organizations “in solving some of the globe’s biggest design and technology challenges.” Young states UW is now negotiating with top research universities around the world to participate. Chelminiak said Monday that
BY JOSH STILTS
A prize horse has gone missing at the annual Scottsdale Arabian Horse Show and a shadowy figure lurks around every corner. But for Jordan Olerud, her service dog Baker, her nurse, Emma, and Jordan’s sister, Jessica, it’s just the first mystery to solve for the Giddy Up Girls. Based loosely on her own experiences in Arizona, the 14-year-old Bellevue author’s first novel, co-written with her friend and nurse Rachelle Sheets (Emma), with help from Jessica, 10, “Mystery at the Horse Show,” is so much more than just a book, it’s proof that no matter your situation, you can achieve greatness, she said.
Since birth Jordan has suffered from a series of medical conditions and unique genetic anomalies that limit her physical movement, which requires the use of a wheelchair, stunted her growth, and ability to speak. Jordan uses a program on an iPad to say what her body is unable to, expressing feelings, answering questions, and writing a book. “It was important to me to have a character in a wheelchair, because I want to show that people who have challenges can do a lot of fun things,” she said. “Both Emma and I like going on adventures, and we enjoy reading mysteries … After I had finished reading the last book in my SEE AUTHOR, 14
BY BRANDON MACZ
The Washington State Criminal Justice Training Commission is adding classes
and reopening a satellite facility in an effort to reduce its backlog of new police officers seeking basic training, which has a number of law enforcement agencies waiting months
VIKRAM JANDHYALA
Overall class sizes are down year-on-year but continued growth could cause problems BY JOSH STILTS BELLEVUE REPORTER
Photo courtesy of Rachelle Sheets.
Jordan Olerud, 14, poses for a photo with her friend, nurse and co-author Rachelle Sheets, and her service dog Baker.
Law enforcement facing training backlog for recruits BELLEVUE REPORTER
SEE UW, 21
Enrollment 46% above projections
Teen author launches new book using iPad BELLEVUE REPORTER
includes a Chinese university and Councilmember Conrad Lee added another in Europe may be involved in partnership discussions. Official announcements are expected to be made once memorandums of un-
to get in. The commission only operates one police training academy in Washington for the 285 law enforcement agencies it serves. At one
point, during the recession, the academy found itself reducing the number of basic training classes it offered, said SEE TRAINING, 21
Last year voters approved a $7 million levy to help reduce the average class size in the Bellevue School District, but it might not have been enough. This year, enrollment in Bellevue grew by 598 students, 278 more than projected for the 2014/2015 school year, according to the most recent figures supplied to the school board during Tuesday night’s meeting. Nearly all of the $7 million was originally going to be spent on additional staffing to meet the increasing number of students and decrease the average class size, but the growth is more rapid than expected, and additional classrooms were needed as well. Melissa deVita, deputy superintendent of finance and operation, told board members the average elementary class size dropped 1.2 students, but the overall number of students in kindergarten through fifth grade, grew 3.4 SEE ENROLLMENT, 21
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Gary Franke | 425-802-2783 | gary@achieve-alpha.com