Austin’s Dirtiest Job: Cleaning Up ‘Dirty Sixth’ in the Dark of the Night

byLucy White

When the bars close, a team of city employees gets to work, scrubbing away the half-eaten pizza, the puddles of vomit other refuse and making the downtown bar district as clean as they can.

After Parkland: New Student Voices in the Gun Control Debate

byVicky Camarillo and Maleeha Syed

The shooting ignited activism in students too young to vote, and in some cases, even too young to drive. One student who supports gun rights said he felt pressured to stay silent about his views.

Few Austinites Are Flocking to the City’s $75 Chicken Coop Rebate

byCarlos Anchondo

Nearly a year into the program, only 14 people have received the rebates, which were designed to encourage chicken keeping to help reduce landfill waste.

UT Grapples with How to Improve Its Process for Reporting Sexual Harassment

byLouise Rodriguez, Kaulie Lewis, Omar Rodriguez-Ortiz and Alexandra Paez

Changes are underway to expand ways to report incidents and raise awareness of university resources for victims.

Aziz Ansari’s #MeToo Moment Spurs Debate About His Relationships Book

byVicky Camarillo

‘Modern Romance’ is required reading for 2 University of Texas classes. Students disagree about whether the allegations against him should disqualify the 2016 book.

Austin Women Are Underrepresented in Nonprofit Executive Ranks

byLucy White

Female CEOs at Austin-area nonprofits make far less money than men in similar positions, according to an analysis by Reporting Texas.

Austin School Board Begins Process of Changing Confederate Names of 5 Campuses

byChristopher De Los Santos

Reporting Texas explores the divide over renaming John H. Reagan High School, whose namesake was postmaster for the Confederacy but who later renounced slavery.

Update: UT President Fenves Responds on Calls to Help Academics in Puerto Rico

byOmar Rodriguez-Ortiz

Letter asks UT’s president to provide online access to libraries and other support.

The Time When Austin Learned to Start Worrying and Fear the Bomb

byLouise Rodriguez

There are eerie echoes today in a Cold War-era civil defense film about preparing for an atomic bomb attack.

The Dog Days of Summer Raise the Woof at Dell Diamond

byVirginia Scherer

Spike, the Round Rock mascot, has been a team mainstay since Day One. Just don’t ask the baseball team to reveal whose inside the custom.

Delicious and Dangerous, Avocados Can Be a Slippery Menace

byTaylor Jackson Buchanan

Avocados seem so innocent. But there’s a hidden danger in trying to dislodge their pits.

City’s First Artist in Residence Has an Unusual Assignment

byAlvaro Céspedes

Rehab El Sadek will spend the next nine months finding ways to bring her creative vision to the Watershed Protection Department,

Student, Parent, Teacher: She’s Seen All Sides of Gifted Education

byYi Li

Many parents of gifted children choose private schools that give kids more educational flexibility.

Hospice Austin Works to Break Down Barriers

byKaulie Lewis

At Hospice Austin, a disproportionate majority of clients across the organization are white, leaving minority communities underserved. A new outreach program seeks to fix that.

Church Finds New Path to Growth With a Mission of Diversity

byTaylor Jackson Buchanan

By building an ethnically diverse membership, Mosaic Church has quintupled the size of its congregation. “From the beginning, God has had a multi-ethnic church in mind,” Pastor Morgan Stephens said.

UT’s Teacher of the Aztec Language Looks Back on Two Years in Austin

byJesús Nazario

Nahuatl is still spoken by more than 1.5 million people in Mexico and has drawn attention from colleges in the U.S.

A World Record for Austin Spooners That Was Not to Be

byMegan Hix

UT students had the numbers, but they couldn’t comply with the strict standards of the Guinness Book.

AmeriCorps Cuts Would Hurt Nonprofit for Low-Income Students

byLouise Rodriguez

Breakthrough works with students from middle school through college. It depends on AmeriCorps for employees.

Lowriders Help an East Austin Neighborhood Protect a Park’s Personality

byYelitza Mandujano

City plans to build facilities for large events were shelved after residents said they wanted the park to remain user-friendly.

Austin Expands Efforts to Serve Non-English Speakers

byOmar Rodriguez Ortiz

Efforts will include translating essential documents into several languages and improving the translation feature of city websites.