Pennsylvania Gov. Tom Corbett plans to attend a memorial service for former Penn State football coach Joe Paterno at a church in Harrisburg.

Corbett’s office says the governor doesn’t plan to make remarks at the Wednesday afternoon tribute, organized by Harrisburg-area alumni.

The late coach’s son Scott is scheduled to speak on behalf of the family, and former Penn State players are expected to attend.

It’s being held at the Cathedral Parish of Saint Patrick, a Roman Catholic church in downtown Harrisburg.

Paterno died last month after a brief battle with lung cancer. He had been fired as coach in November following child-sex abuse charges filed against former assistant Jerry Sandusky.

Thousands attended a public memorial for the 85-year-old coach at Penn State’s Bryce Jordan Center following his burial.

Mike deGruy, a filmmaker, marine biologist and N.C. State University graduate who through the lens of his submersible cameras transported viewers to the deepest crags of the oceans and face to face with swirling, pulsing sea creatures, died Saturday in a helicopter crash in Australia. He was 60.

National Geographic, for which deGruy made many television documentaries, said in a statement that he and Andrew Wight, 52, a pilot and also a filmmaker, were killed when their Robinson R44 helicopter went down shortly after takeoff from an airstrip in Jasper’s Brush, 80 miles south of Sydney.

Last summer, DeGruy was featured in an NCSU alumni magazine cover story that looked at his return to the Gulf Coast, near where he grew up, to document the aftermath of the catastrophic oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico in 2010.

In more than two-dozen documentaries over three decades, deGruy (pronounced de-GREE) filmed killer whales snatching sea lion pups off the beaches of Patagonia; lobsters migrating in the Bahamas; tiger sharks feeding on albatross in Hawaii; hydrothermal vents deep in the Atlantic and the Pacific; and the diversity of cephalopods such as squid, cuttlefish and octopi.

In 2002, his cinematography on “The Blue Planet: Seas of Life,” an overview of the world’s oceans and their inhabitants shown on the Discovery Channel and the BBC, won both an Emmy and an award from the British Academy of Film and Television Arts.

DeGruy also documented threats to the world’s coral reefs, the devastating impact of El Nino on California’s marine mammals, and the dwindling of shark populations in the Great Barrier Reef, among other projects. He was usually not only behind the camera in these films but sometimes served as host as well.

In 2005, working with James Cameron, the Academy Award-winning director of “Titanic,” deGruy supervised underwater photography for “Last Mysteries of the Titanic,” a Discovery Channel documentary series in which submersible cameras roamed the labyrinth of the ship to reveal rooms and artifacts not seen since it sank in 1912.

An ocean warrior

In a statement, Cameron called deGruy “one of the ocean’s warriors – a man who spoke for the wonders of the sea as a biologist, filmmaker and submersible pilot, and who spoke against those who would destroy the sea’s web of life.”

Michael Verloin deGruy was born in Mobile, Ala., on Dec. 29, 1951, to Frank and Katherine deGruy. He swam in the swamps of the streams emptying into Mobile Bay as a boy, was a springboard diver on his high school swim team, and took up scuba diving along the Gulf Coast.

He graduated from NCSU, where he was a member of the dive team, with a degree in marine zoology, then moved to Hawaii and eventually became a curator at the Waikiki Aquarium. He later moved to the Marshall Islands, where he was manager of the Mid-Pacific Marine Laboratory. He also learned the complexities of underwater photography and began making documentaries.

DUCHESNE Bob Hoopes has been a teacher at Duchesne Elementary School for the past 32 years.

“I even did my student teaching here,” Hoopes said Monday with an ebullient smile.

But this school year is different than any in the past.

In addition to teaching his fifth-graders, Hoopes now teaches a special 30-minute math class each day for a combined class of fourth-, fifth- and sixth-graders. The students are placed in the class based on their standardized testing scores from the 2010-11 school year.

The new program groups students together based on their mathematic proficiency to provide focused instruction that helps them improve their skills, said Duchesne Elementary Principal Jason Young.

“You have the kids that you’re going too slow for them, and they’ve got it and they’re bored. They’re ready to move on,” Young said. “You’ve got other students that can’t catch up. You have this wide range, and it’s frustrating to everyone.”

Young and his faculty based their math program on a similar one being used in the Sevier School District. Both the Duchesne and Sevier school districts are among 10 districts and 13 charter schools in the state that use Northwest Evaluation Association testing as part of a pilot program, according to the Utah State Office of Education.

NWEA scores provide educators with a wealth of specific data on areas of strength and weakness in various subcategories of language arts, reading and math. That information allows teachers to pinpoint their instruction to help kids succeed, Young said.

“Some students, they struggle with a certain area, so they just say, ‘Oh, I’m not good at math,’ and that’s it,” he said. “We’re hoping with this (program) we can catch those gaps and give them some confidence.”

Students at Duchesne Elementary still get one hour of math instruction each day, on top of the new, specialized math class. The program is in its first year, so empirical data hasn’t been gathered about its impact on learning. But anecdotal evidence shows it’s working.

“The feedback I’ve had from parents, from students themselves and from our teachers are that our students are doing better in math,” Young said. “They’re understanding and they’re able to progress at a quicker pace in the regular math class because of the extra help.”

Hoopes said his students’ frustrations with math have faded this year.

“I’m having more fun right now than I’ve ever had in my whole career,” Hoopes said. “It’s kind of hard to think about retirement.”

The new math program has parents excited as well, the veteran teacher said.

“Any time you take a kid by the hand, you take their parents right by the heart,” Hoopes said. “That’s a good thing, and parents are really supportive.”

About this ad

Clemson coach Brad Brownell got plenty of congratulations from Tigers fans content with the strong effort they saw in a 73-66 loss to No. 8 Duke.

Brownell’s not buying that for a minute.

“We lost and we’re here to win games,” a disappointed Brownell said Sunday night.

Clemson (9-8, 1-2 Atlantic Coast Conference) did lots of things right against the Blue Devils.

The Tigers started fast, played tight defense to hold Duke’s Austin Rivers and Seth Curry to half their combined scoring average and made several big shots down the stretch to cut the Blue Devils’ 13-point second half lead to 68-64 in the final minute. In the end, Andre Dawkins took over with 24 points off five 3-pointers as Duke (15-2, 3-0) to beat Clemson for the 26th time in 28 meetings.

“We’re not having a great year at all, so everybody can say we had a good effort or that it was a good try,” Brownell said. “You can’t let that fool you.”

Clemson didn’t help itself at the foul line, either, making just half its 20 chances. Milton Jennings, who led the Tigers with 16 points, was 1 of 4 on free throws.

“How many times do you shoot more free throws than Duke?” Brownell said. The Blue Devils were 15 of 18 from the line.

In the end, it was simply too much of Dawkins, Duke’s 6-foot-4 junior.

“Andre is capable of that if we do a good job getting him open,” Duke forward Mason Plumlee said. “He created stuff for himself as well. He met the challenge today and played just unbelievable.”

Dawkins made three foul shots down the stretch after Clemson cut the lead to four points on two 3-pointers by Andre Young, helping the Blue Devils beat Clemson for the 26th time in the last 28 meetings.

If Dawkins “has a bad night, we’re going to win the game,” Tigers coach Brad Brownell said.

Milton Jennings had 16 points for the Tigers and Devin Booker added 12 points and 13 rebounds.

Duke looked as if it had put the game out of reach when it opened the second half on a 14-7 run. Quinn Cook had a jumper and a 3-pointer and Seth Curry added a bucket. Miles Plumlee put back his brother Mason’s miss for two more points. By the time Dawkins made his third 3-pointer of the game, the Blue Devils were ahead 46-33.

The Blue Devils were still in front by 10 points on Rivers’ layup less with less than seven minutes to go when Clemson put on a final charge. Andre Young hit a 3-pointer and K.J. McDaniel a basket to cut the lead to 65-61.

After Dawkins answered with his final three, Young came back with another long-range shot to bring the Tigers within four one last time. That’s when Dawkins extended the margin with his foul shots and Clemson could not respond.

Mason Plumlee scored 12 points and Cook had 10 for the Blue Devils. Miles Plumlee had a game-high 14 rebounds.

Clemson drew a large crowd to Littlejohn Coliseum, partly because of last week’s 20-point win over Florida State in the ACC opener and partly because of the football team’s visiting recruits.

Duke gutted out a 61-58 win over No. 16 Virginia on Thursday night and was prepared for a similar struggle at Littlejohn Coliseum. The Blue Devils came in having won 10 of their past 11 games at Littlejohn Coliseum.

Krzyzewski was so upset after Tanner Smith’s unchallenged drive to the hoop, he called timeout less than two minutes in and replaced his five starters. Clemson’s lead eventually reached 16-7 on Devin Coleman’s foul shot with 11:46 to go in the half.

That’s when Duke began to find its offense. Ryan Kelly scored five points in a two minute span to draw the Blue Devils to 18-14. Mason Plumlee’s three-point play with 5:29 left gave Duke its first lead of the game, 21-20. Seth Curry followed with a high-arcing 3-pointer over Clemson’s 7-foot-2 center Catalin Baciu. Andre Dawkins closed the half with eight straight points and Duke took a 32-28 lead into the break.

The Tigers lost a second straight ACC game after opening league play with a 79-59 win over Florida State last week.

The state is laying the groundwork for education improvements using its federal Race to the Top grant, but slow hiring of the dozens of employees needed to do the work have hampered progress, according to a federal report.

The U.S. Department of Education is releasing one-year progress reports today on states that won the education improvement grants. North Carolina won a $400 million, four-year grant in 2010.

By October 2011, the state had hired about 80 percent of the 118 people needed for the professional development and technology-intensive efforts, according to the report. The state “underestimated the time necessary to move from planning to implementation,” the report said.

Bill Harrison, chairman of the Governor’s Education Transformation Commission, said hiring for some jobs took longer than anticipated, but those overseeing the changes are pleased with the overall progress.

“We feel great about what we’re doing,” said Harrison, who is also state Board of Education chairman. “We’ll be able to see the fruits of those dollars in a couple of years through student achievement.”

Thousands of teachers and principals have participated in professional development activities related to Race to the Top goals, Harrison said, and the state board is pleased with the progress on new teacher and principal effectiveness measures.

In its proposal, the state set targets for student improvement, including a goal of raising the graduation rate to 85 percent in 2016, and promised to implement “turnaround” plans for low-performing schools.

Scores on national reading and math tests for 4th- and 8th-grade students missed their targets in 2011, according to the report. Only the 8th-grade reading score was significantly higher in 2011 compared to 2009.

State progress on closing the achievement gap is a mixed bag. Considering English test scores, the gap between white and minority students narrowed, while the achievement gap between children with disabilities and non-disabled children grew.

North Carolina, like other states that won grants, promised to make specific, long-lasting improvements to education. But the money cannot be used to hire classroom teachers or principals to compensate for state budget cuts.