WINCHESTER - Nine months after the death of its executive director, the Winchester Education Foundation is under new leadership. Larry Weiss, the former market manager for Centennial Broadcasting in Winchester who served as executive director of the Community Foundation of the Northern Shenandoah Valley from 2019 until his retirement in March, succeeds H.

While first-responders assured the Fredericksburg community they're doing everything they can to protect students from today's threats-ranging from the possibility of an active shooter to a fake report of a bomb in the school-another speaker encouraged the audience to embrace laughter as good medicine, both to live longer and to increase brain power.

Virginia's childhood obesity rate is roughly 15%, but young people in areas like Danville and Pittsylvania tend to be heavier than those in the rest of the commonwealth, according to state figures.

The portion of Roanoke City Public Schools elementary students classified as obese increased from 24% in 2019 to 29% in 2021. Those prepandemic to last year numbers are based on data provided by Roanoke City Public Schools, which gets included in the Roanoke Valley Community Healthy Living Index.

The state released school accreditation data that shows a slight decline in the number of accredited schools across the state since before the pandemic. For the 2022-2023 school year, 1,628 out of 1,830 schools are accredited, or 89%. This is a 3% decrease from 2019-2020, which was the last time the Department of Education calculated school ratings.

RICHMOND - It sounds like good news: Despite the intense challenges of the coronavirus pandemic, 89 percent of Virginia's public K-12 schools are fully accredited, compared with 92 percent in the 2019-2020 school year. But Gov.

WINCHESTER - Members of the Frederick County School Board had student dress code questions, concerns and proposals ready for administration Thursday night at the Student Conduct and Support Committee meeting. Frederick County Public Schools' current dress code was adopted a few years ago and drafted with input from students, staff and parents.

The Rockingham County School Board will vote on board member Matt Cross' parental notification policy despite some confusion from the state with the release of Gov. Glenn Youngkin's proposed policy revisions surrounding the protection of transgender student rights. Cross' policy, which was first introduced in May, is on the School Board agenda for a vote at Monday's meeting.

For the first time since 2014, for the 2022-23 school year, Virginia Middle School is among the 89% of schools across the Commonwealth of Virginia to receive accreditation. Virginia Middle School had been partially accredited since 2011. The announcement comes after two years when the accreditation process was suspended due to the COVID-19 pandemic.

The percentage of students in Virginia schools who have received the required basic vaccinations has been steadily declining since 2008. Last fall, 10% fewer Virginia public school kindergartners were adequately immunized than those who arrived in fall of 2018, according to Virginia Health Department data, which is counted on the first day of school.