Whomever we elect to lead us for the next two years, we’ll need to confront two gaping holes in our governance: strategic planning and ethics.

Most of us can remember times in our childhood when things at home weren’t going well, when the ambient air was charged with electricity and discord and we knew things were out of whack. For others, the disharmony wasn’t noticeable because friction was the norm and moments of tranquility were, sadly, greeted with suspicion and distrust.

Fourteen years ago, on the first anniversary of the Sept. 11, 2001 attacks, VPR assembled a series of commentaries reflecting on the events, still fresh in our memories. Then-Gov. Howard Dean was among those who offered their thoughts.

Vermont’s Agency of Education has just released statewide results for standardized tests in language arts and math given in grades three through eight, and eleven. In general it would appear that Vermont students improve in language arts as they progress through school, with about 54 percent of third graders achieving proficiency, and almost 59 percent of eighth graders hitting that mark. In math, though, students seem to lose skills over time, from a 56 percent proficiency level in third grade

This is a year of milestones in my life, a year of decades. I'm in my seventh decade now and my daughter-in-law just entered her third. For my granddaughter, turning five years old, it's her first half-decade. Milestones for us all, markers of miles, telling us how far we’ve come but not what lies ahead - which is what really tweaks my curiosity, wanting to know what lies around the next corner.

I’m on the board of the Vermont Council on World Affairs, a 65-year old group founded by, among others, Vermont Sen. Warren G. Austin the first American ambassador to the U.N.

On September 4, 2015, German chancellor Angela Merkel and the Austrian chancellor at the time, Werner Faymann, agreed to let some 7,000 refugees enter their respective countries from Hungary. The refugees, most of them from Syria, Iraq, and Afghanistan, had been stranded for days at a Budapest train station, which had become a de facto refugee camp with abysmal conditions.

Route 100 from Morrisville to the Northeast Kingdom is stunning in high summer. I traveled that way to Lake Memphramagog to accompany - in a kayak, for safety- my friend Martha who was competing in a ten mile open water swim.

As we mark the fifth anniversary of Tropical Storm Irene, meteorologists are warning that the current hurricane season may be more active than originally predicted, meaning we may need more storm names than we might have thought.

As Tropical Storm Irene roared through Vermont, I was at home in the Northeast Kingdom, anxiously waiting for the rain and winds to make their way to my house in Lyndonville. A reporter at the time, I’d placed my hip boots, rain jacket and pants by the door, filled my car’s gas tank, and was ready to head out into the weather to report on damage and talk to victims.