Stories
In the back of La Fama 2 Barbershop in Nashua, a group of men gather around black pleather couches, examining the vials and needles used to distribute the COVID-19 vaccine laid out on the coffee table. They tease each other about who’s brave enough to get the shot first. “Do you want me to hold…
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In the past year, student activists have been hard at work to make change in their communities. Among them: 16-year-old Minelle Sarfo-Adu. On a Tuesday in late May, Minelle and I sat at a picnic table by the South Burlington condo she lives in with her mom. When Minelle was in 8th grade, she moved…
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Vermont’s housing market, which was tight before the pandemic, has gotten even worse. The number of homes available in Vermont dropped by almost 70% over the past year, according to the Vermont Association of Realtors. The trend has jump-started conversations about supporting more middle-income housing across Vermont. State officials have spent a lot of time…
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Back when he was a sophomore at the University of Massachusetts Amherst, James Smith recalled he fell behind on his final housing payment after his family in Minnesota ran into financial problems. Smith said he promised to repay UMass, but the registrar withheld his transcript anyway. “It was sort of like communicating with a brick…
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Ten years ago this Tuesday, multiple tornadoes tore through western Massachusetts, killing three people, injuring 200, and causing more than $200 million in damages. The most violent of the tornadoes touched down at 4:17 p.m. in Westfield, churning into West Springfield, then Springfield, leaving streets blanketed with rubble and broken glass, road signs twisted, entire…
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Although Massachusetts has one of the highest COVID-19 vaccination rates in the country, Hampden County has the lowest rate in the state — with major racial and ethnic disparities among who is getting the shot. Local health departments are focused on making the vaccine as visible and convenient as possible for hard-to-reach populations, but that’s…
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Illustrator and author Eric Carle is being remembered for his many children’s books, including “The Very Hungry Caterpillar” — and the museum of picture book art he founded with his wife. Carle died this week at the age of 91, in Northampton, Massachusetts. Katrina Fitzpatrick and her two children, who are 4 and 2, visit…
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After five years on air, our weekly radio program NEXT is coming to an end. The show focused on New England at a time of change and featured stories from journalists across the New England News Collaborative. The good news is that these powerful stories aren’t going away. We will showcase our collaborative journalism on this website, NENC.news, and we are ramping up our next phase of New England reporting to bring you more news and conversations from the region.
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