UNH, all state colleges ‘intend’ to open to students in fall

By Staff
Seacoastonline.com

Leah Zarrilli right, photographs her friends and fellow senior classmates, dressed with their graduation caps, at the University of New Hampshire in Durham, Friday, May 8, 2020. Commencement ceremonies, which were scheduled for May 16, were postponed due to the COVID-19 virus outbreak. From left are Kelly Anderson, Devin Paquette, Megan Nolan and Zarrilli. The school has stated students have made it clear they want an in-person ceremony and UNH has not yet announced a date for commencement to be rescheduled. [AP Photo/Charles Krupa]

CONCORD -- The University of New Hampshire and all the colleges of the University System of New Hampshire and the Community College System of New Hampshire announced Friday they “intend to welcome students back to campuses for the fall term” amid the coronavirus pandemic.

The schools announced they are “working closely with state leaders and health professionals to develop guidelines and criteria that institutions will follow to support a safe return.”

USNH enrolls 32,000 students combined at UNH, Keene State College, Plymouth State University and Granite State College. The state’s community college system includes Great Bay Community College in Portsmouth and Rochester.

Lisa Thorne of USNH said said the announcement reflects the intentions of the schools, but they also acknowledge the pandemic creates continued uncertainty.

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These articles are being shared by partners in The Granite State News Collaborative. For more information visit collaborativenh.org. 

The Show Might Go On, The Show Won’t Go On, The Show Must Go On: The State of Theater in N.H.

By SEAN HURLEY
NH Public Radio

The Copenhagen Cast rehearsing on Zoom (top row, left to right): Amy Agostino, James Sears and Wayne Asbury.

In a normal year, theaters around the state would be preparing for their summer seasons. With gatherings currently forbidden and uncertainty hanging over their heads, many are simply canceling the whole season. Others are postponing or, as NHPR’s Sean Hurley found out, discovering new ways to reach an audience. 

Once again I find myself sitting down at my computer for a video conference call. But this time it’s different. This time I’m watching a play, a rehearsal anyway, of Michael Frayn’s Copenhagen:

Margrethe: Why did he come? What was he trying to tell you?
Bohr: He did explain later.
Margrethe: He explained over and over again. Each time he explained it became more obscure. 

In full rehearsal since January, Director Gary Locke and his three actors had to stop meeting in person, but continued to work on the play via Zoom. “I couldn’t imagine not doing it,” Locke says. “This is a monster, this play, for the actors. And I had one of my actors started working on this in October. The other two were working on it in November. Well how could I, in March, say to them, ‘Nah. Hang it up.’ No. But I think we're further along than anybody else. I'm quite sure of that.” 

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These articles are being shared by partners in The Granite State News Collaborative. For more information visit collaborativenh.org. 

Under Covid, paid leave becomes a reality in NH

Federal, state programs put focus on long-debated policy

By  Bob Sanders
NH Business Review

For Nikki Curran of Windham, it didn’t seem she had much of a choice. Her employer for the last 11 years, Autism Bridges, a private company headquartered in Bedford, had closed its four therapy centers in three states in response to Covid-19.

Instead, the firm sent its staffers into clients’ homes. But Curran was afraid to go. The Windham schools had sent their students home, and Curran’s 12-year-old son has chronic breathing issues, putting him at high risk should he get the virus.

“We are very careful and very scared,” said Curran.

At first, she and her husband — who teaches middle school in Derry and was soon working remotely — juggled their schedule. But on April 1, Autism Bridges gave Curran roughly half-time office work and some telemedicine jobs and provided her with paid family leave for the rest.

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Venerable but vulnerable: Centenarians hit hard by virus

The Telegraph

In this photo taken on April 1, 2020, 103-year-old Ada Zanusso, poses with a nurse at the old people's home "Maria Grazia" in Lessona, northern Italy, after recovering from Covid-19 infection. To recover from coronavirus infection, as she did, Zanusso recommends courage and faith, the same qualities that have served her well in her nearly 104 years on Earth. The new coronavirus causes mild or moderate symptoms for most people, but for some, especially older adults and people with existing health problems, it can cause more severe illness or death. (Residenza Maria Grazia Lessona via AP Photo)

BOSTON (AP) — Centenarians have always been a rare breed. Now they’re an endangered species.

The 100-plus crowd — those most venerable of human beings — is succumbing rapidly and heartbreakingly to the coronavirus pandemic. Entire limbs are being lopped off family trees, and their wisdom and lore are dying with them.

“We’ve been really upset,” said Thomas Perls, a professor of medicine and geriatrics at Boston University who directs the New England Centenarian Study. “We’re seeing a higher rate of people passing away … cutting these incredible lives shorter.”

“For families, they’re the pride and joy, the anchor, the link to the family’s history. They’re a huge big deal,” he said. “If you have a healthy centenarian who’s cognitively intact with no signs of Alzheimer’s, to me they’re practically immortal. COVID has interfered with that formula for sure.”

Reliable estimates of the numbers of centenarians who have perished in the pandemic are elusive, primarily because most state and government health agencies tracking deaths lump them into an 85-and-older demographic. That age bracket has seen more deaths than any other, according to data from Johns Hopkins University, the COVID-19 Tracking Project and the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

But anecdotal evidence, including newspaper and online death notices, suggests that COVID-19 is exacting a grim toll among the estimated 70,000 centenarians in the U.S. In tiny Rhode Island alone, at least eight people aged 100 or older have died, public health officials say.

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Despite economic stumble, luxury real estate market remains solid

By ADAM DRAPCHO
THE LACONIA DAILY SUN

A sunset over a beach in Laconia. For people quarantined in Boston or New York, real estate in the Lakes Region is looking more appealing than ever, according to local real estate agents. (Courtesy photo)

For a professional couple at or near retirement age who own an apartment in Manhattan, or a family stuck in a Boston home as they watch through social media as their neighbors ride out a quarantine at their lakehouse, the prospect of owning a weekend or vacation home in the Lakes Region seems at least as good as ever.

Those, combined with low inventory, are some of the reasons why prices in the local real estate market have held steady, even during a time of historic unemployment due to the COVID-19 pandemic. And that spike in interest is occurring when real estate professionals now have more tools at their disposal to show homes and meet with clients in a virtual capacity.

Real estate agents said that prices are being buoyed by a lack of inventory, which predated the coronavirus by months and has continued into the spring selling season.

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These articles are being shared by partners in The Granite State News Collaborative. For more information visit collaborativenh.org.