Monday, March 19 marks the fourth anniversary of the U.S. invasion of Iraq. To remember the cost of this war, and to give the people of the Seattle metropolitan area a chance to take a few steps for peace, Peace Action of Washington will walk 655,000 steps — more than 230 miles – for five days, beginning Thursday, March 15 and ending Monday, March 19.

Eva Walker is not yet out of high school, but she's already dreaming big.
This year, for her senior project, Walker, 17, is doing her part to reduce the spread of HIV/AIDS in Africa.
A musician who plays the guitar and drums, Walker is mixing her passion for music with her desire to help others. Her HIV/AIDS Benefit Concert will be held Friday, March 30 from 7 to 9 p.m. at Summit K-12 School, 11051 34th Ave. N.E.

This image of Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. is Larentae Sanders' winning entry for the 2007 Black History Heroes Challenge 

Larentae Sanders, a fifth-grader at Dunlap Elementary School, has won the grand prize at the elementary school level for his entry in the 2007 Black History Heroes Challenge.
More than 500 students participated in the challenge in honor of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. Day and Black History Month. Students from across the state were encouraged to submit creative works describing their black history hero. The Seattle SuperSonics and the Museum of History and Industry sponsored the contest.
Larentae was recognized at the KeyArena center court on Feb. 26 at the Seattle Sonics vs. Portland Trailblazers game.

SAVELUGU, Ghana -- The little girl screams in pain and reaches for the hand slowly drawing a thin, white worm from her blistered foot.
"Stop it! Do stop it!" she begs.
Finally, the worm is out, and the veranda full of other infected children explodes in claps and shouts of congratulation.
It took six weeks to draw the worm out, and another is about to emerge from her other foot.
A 20-year fight to eradicate guinea worm disease, or dracunculiasis, is in the last and most difficult stages. It could be the first parasitic disease wiped out worldwide -- and only the second disease ever to be eliminated; the first was smallpox in 1979.
Ghana provides a glimpse of the serious obstacles that stand in the way of guinea worm being vanquished.
Enormous strides have been made since former President Jimmy Carter dedicated himself to the cause after seeing a worm emerging from a woman's breast in Ghana's remote north in 1988.
Carter, who rallied the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, UNICEF, the U.N. World Health Organization and the Japanese government to the effort, estimated it would be eradicated in 10 years. Now, at age 82, he hopes it will happen in his lifetime.

Drummer Obo Addy, left, leads a group of Ghanaian performers during the 50th Anniversary Celebration of Ghana's Independence at lunchtime Tuesday, March 6 in Pioneer Courthouse Square. The celebration began with a welcome to the crowd and a pouring of libations by Ghanaian Elder Kwaku Mensah, not pictured. The celebration continues with a dinner and a dance, beginning at 7 p.m. Saturday, March 10 at the Holiday Inn Airport. For tickets, call James Tetteh at 503-282-9955.

Call it a homecoming for Lavert Robertson. The new leader of the Arts and Technology Academy — one of the four new academies that will soon make up the whole of Jefferson High School – graduated from Jefferson in 1994.
He left Portland for a while – first to a administrator job at an elementary school and then to a position as a high school administrator in Champagne, Ill. — but Robertson says he always kept an eye on his hometown.
Now at the forefront of the most news-making high school in Portland, Robertson says he's used to being thrown into the hot seat.
"You can't make mistakes," he says about being a school administrator. "… Or you might end up in the news."

Two days before joining Sen. Hillary Clinton, D-N.Y., and former President Bill Clinton in Selma, Ala. to remember the civil rights marchers killed 42 years ago by riot police on Bloody Sunday, presidential hopeful Sen. Barack Obama, D-Ill., apologized to members of the Black press for not speaking to publishers and editors sooner; but said he is dedicated to winning over African American voters.

The boarded-up, single pane, leaky windows at the Ethos Music Center are now a thing of the past, says Director Charles Lewis. The nonprofit music education center, at the corner of Killingsworth Street and Williams Avenue, is in the midst of a cosmetic remodel after receiving a $20,000 storefront improvement grant from the Portland Development Commission.
More extensive renovations also are in store for Ethos now that the group's sale of the old Masonic Temple, two blocks away from Ethos at 5308 N. Commercial Ave., has gone through.

The U.S. Congress is expected to give special recognition to the Black Press on its 180th anniversary during the annual observance of Black Press Week, March 14-17.
A congressional resolution introduced by the leadership of the Congressional Black Caucus will be presented to officials of the National Newspaper Publishers Association Foundation, sponsors of Black Press Week, and the National Newspaper Publishers Association, the trade group for the more than 200 Black newspapers. The resolution will cite the historic role of the Black Press as the strong, influential voice of the Black community beginning with the anti-slavery movement and the founding of the first Black newspaper, Freedom's Journal on March 17, l827.

AUSTIN, Texas — Dennis Johnson, former player for the Seattle SuperSonics and the Boston Celtics died Thursday, Feb. 22, after collapsing at the end of his developmental team's practice. He was 52.
Johnson, coach of the Austin Toros, was unconscious and in cardiac arrest when paramedics arrived at Austin Convention Center. Paramedics tried to resuscitate him for 23 minutes before he was taken to a hospital and pronounced dead.
"He was one of the most underrated players in the history of the game, in my opinion, and one of the greatest Celtic acquisitions of all time," said former Boston teammate Danny Ainge, now the Celtics' executive director of basketball operations.