TODAY'S NEWS

Broad Acres teacher Kimberly Oliver meets with President Bush.
Broad Acres teacher Kimberly Oliver meets with President Bush. (By Ron Edmonds -- Associated Press)
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Thursday, April 27, 2006

Broad Acres' Oliver Is Teacher of the Year

· Kimberly Oliver, a teacher who makes her Maryland kindergarten students feel special, had her own special moment yesterday. She met President Bush at the White House.

Oliver, who teaches at Broad Acres Elementary in Silver Spring, is the 2006 National Teacher of the Year. The 2005 winner also was local: D.C. middle-school teacher Jason Kamras.

In her six years at Broad Acres, Oliver has helped students raise their test scores and gotten parents involved in what goes on at school.

She and other teachers being honored this year were invited to a ceremony in the White House Rose Garden.

And there's more excitement ahead: Gov. Robert L. Ehrlich is declaring Monday "Kimberly Oliver Day" in Maryland. (A note to Maryland readers: Yes, you have to go to school.)

Ohno, It's Math!

· Would you rather clean your room or do math homework? In a recent survey, 84 percent of middle-schoolers picked cleaning, eating their veggies, taking out the garbage or going to the dentist over math.

At MathMovesU.com, they want to change that. And they've enlisted the help of big-name athletes including Tony Hawk, Lisa Leslie and Mia Hamm.

Speedskater Apolo Anton Ohno got things moving yesterday by skating around a fountain on Capitol Hill.

How is that math?

The distance around the fountain is 460 feet. Ohno is the current Olympic champ at 500 meters. How many times did he have to skate around the fountain to equal his gold-medal distance?

It helps to know that there are about 3.28 feet in a meter.

So, Ohno had to circle the fountain 3 1/2 times.



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