Tagged: New Hampshire

Numbers from the state show that unemployment in New Hampshire have fallen to 5.3 percent.

In the past, rates dropped because people seeking work stopped applying for jobs.

But this time, economist Annette Nielsen of the NH Employment Security says there has been job growth.

Two separate black bear sightings in Portsmouth earlier this week startled residents and raised new questions about bears in urban areas.

Early this week, two Portsmouth residents reported black bear sightings to police. Officers responding to the calls said they believed the bears were cubs, but were unsure if a larger bear was with them. Bear sightings are rare instances in the Seacoast, but N.H. Fish and Game’s Wildlife Damage Specialist Rob Calvert says that this behavior isn’t entirely out of character.

Eric Masterson is a blogger and the author of Birdwatching in New Hampshire, and joins us for a hyper-local guide to spotting species around the state.

Junior high school can be an awkward, unsettling experience for anyone. Especially for teachers; imagine having survived it once, then witnesses cavorting teens finding their way over and over again. Jessica Lahey is an English, Latin, and Writing teacher at Crossroads Academy in Lyme, New Hampshire. She also writes about education and parenting for the New York Times and other publications, and on her blog, Coming of Age in the Middle. Her article, “A Dress-Code Enforcer’s Struggle for the Soul of the Middle-School Girl” was recently published in The Atlantic and she joins us to discuss the worry over dress codes and the chaotic middle years.

President Obama’s newly unveiled budget is making political waves…he’s pushing for publicly funded “preschool for all,” paid for with a new tax on cigarettes. Here in New Hampshire, there’s been a different kind of preschool push…toward teaching kids outside. So-called nature preschools and forest kindergartens may sound like more fun than foundational, but this approach to early learning is gaining popularity for teaching the basics, while getting kids away from screens into the wilderness.