UNF students install new sculptures at local parks
Lena Pringle, Anchor/traffic and general assignment reporter
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JACKSONVILLE, Fla. – New art is coming to life in River City just in time for the summer.
Students at the University of North Florida are beautifying local parks with new sculptures.
“If we don’t have art, I mean we have nothing. Art is everything. It’s all around us,” said Kori Sares, a senior at UNF.
Sares is one of eight students who will be installing their personally designed sculptures in James Weldon Johnson and Seaside Sculpture Parks over the next two weeks.
While Jacksonville’s unemployment rate rose in March, University of North Florida economist Albert Loh said the data points to an improving economy.
“The labor market condition looks much better than what the slight uptick in unemployment rate may lead one to believe,” Loh said.
The Florida Department of Economic Opportunity reported April 16 that the jobless rate in the Jacksonville metropolitan area of Duval, Baker, Clay, Nassau and St. Johns counties rose from 4.2% in February to 4.4% in March.
The state agency does not adjust the Jacksonville data for seasonal factors but even when it’s adjusted, the area’s jobless rate still rose by 0.35 percentage points to 4.51%, Loh said.
George H. Dorion, a chemist by trade at the Bacardi spirits company founded by his great-grandfather and a philanthropist who supported a myriad of causes and helped found the River Run, died Wednesday at his Jacksonville home two days before his 92nd birthday.
He had prostate cancer that had metastasized, according to his wife of 63 years, Dorothy Dottie Dorion, a former hospice nurse. Despite his illness, he had been up and around until a week or so before his death. He was holding onto my arm, looked me in the eye, gave me a little smile and he was gone, she said. We had wonderful times. … I couldn t have picked a better mate.
From poodle skirts to traditional African wrap skirts and head ties the students at Douglas Anderson School of the Arts Theatre of Color class tell a story of their school and city s history from segregation to present-day all in a matter of 40 minutes. DA HANDS, the first production from the theater class, is a devised piece that tells the story of the school s namesake, local civil rights activist Douglas Anderson. It celebrates Black culture and progress in Jacksonville with a mix of traditional African dancing, powerful monologues and nuance. We visit current Douglas Anderson, we jump to the Fifties when it was an all-Black school and then we jump to the Twenties when our amazing school was founded by Douglas Anderson, a Black man, said Danyel Clark, a senior who plays the role of Robin.
The event follows an incident where a student posted QR codes that led to antisemitic and white supremacist propaganda on the doors of Jewish faculty and staff members classrooms and offices. Reflecting on recent events, this is a space for a variety of things we might need right now, Matt Hartley, the Associate Director for Interfaith said. It s a forum to speak on things that have hurt us and harmed us. There may be some things you need to say about that or frustrations to share. There may be things you need from the UNF community. This is the place to share them.