u/AustinStatesman

The State Board of Education has given initial approval to a first-of-its-kind book list that would require all Texas public school students to read passages of the Bible.

The Republican-led board on Friday approved the draft list, proposed by member Keven Ellis, R-Lufkin, in a party-line 9-5 vote, with all Democrats opposed.

The list is a pared-down version of one put forward by the Texas Education Agency, which members criticized as too long to be feasibly taught.

They cut nearly a hundred titles, such as “Snow White and the Seven Dwarves” and “The Great Gatsby,” but left intact all excerpts from Exodus, Psalms, Ecclesiastes, Matthew, Luke, and other books of the New and Old Testaments.

There are also required Bible-inspired stories, beginning with "Noah's Ark" in first grade.

Fallout from the city of Austin’s recent IT firings is now spilling into a broader political fight over how the city manages its technology systems, with the municipal workers union using the controversy to push back against a proposed consolidation.

The tension follows an American-Statesman investigation that found several top Austin technology officials were fired after holding undisclosed outside jobs — including positions with the city of Dallas’ IT department — while working full time for Austin.

The three high-ranking IT executives abruptly fired by the city last month were terminated after officials discovered they had undisclosed second jobs, including two who were also working for the city of Dallas in similar roles, the American-Statesman has learned.

If you're looking for some affordable, family-friendly fun this spring, you're in luck: Strawberries are ripe and waiting to be picked.

Strawberry season in Central Texas runs from March through May, making April a peak picking time. Here are a few Austin-area farms with pick-your-own strawberry fields.

These days, it can seem like the weirdest thing about Austin is how fast it changes.

Now, from the transportation corridor of Interstate 35 and major airport expansions to high-rises, hospitals and mixed-use developments across the metro areas, billions of dollars worth of projects are underway or in the pipeline.

To help you keep track of Austin's construction projects, the Statesman rounded up some of the most significant developments in and around the city.

While snorkeling for fossils, University of Texas paleontologist John Moretti discovered fragments of a giant tortoise and an armadillo relative called a “pampathere,” which was about the size of a lion, along with dozens of other fossils.

“There were fossils everywhere, just everywhere, in a way that I haven’t seen in any other cave,” said Moretti. “It was just bones all over the floor.” 

Moretti suggests that the water-cave fossils might be from the last interglacial, a warm period around 100,000 years ago during the last Ice Age. 

Other major finds include a claw from a giant ground sloth and bones from saber-tooth cats, camels and mastodons.

The Texas Rangers have joined a sweeping state investigation into the actions of Camp Mystic during the July 4 floods that left 28 people — including 26 campers, two counselors and the camp director — dead.

The average air traveler makes 5.3 trips per year, according to trade group Airlines for America. Billionaire Elon Musk makes more trips than that in a month as the jet-setter takes off for business trips, to schmooze with politicians or kick back in vacation spots.

One day, he might be in Austin viewing a prototype of Tesla Inc.’s new Cybercab and the next he’s in Europe talking about SpaceX’s plans for future Mars missions.

The full extent of his travel is hard to pin down but here’s a sampling of where the world’s richest man was in January.