Panthers, it has been a week. Has it been a good week? Not necessarily. But it has been a week, which means we are five days closer to Christmas break, so that is good. So after you get done crying because you realize we still have 158 days until the school year ends, take a look at these KICs. This week we have a Nobel Prize going to a Swedish professor, Kemp extending the gas tax break, Fayette County musicians in the North Georgia Orchestra, and jury selection in Kevin Spacey’s trial.    

October 3 – Nobel Prize goes to Swedish professor

The Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine was presented to Professor Svante Paabo from Sweden for his work on human evolution. He achieved the seemingly impossible task of cracking the genetic code of the human’s extinct relatives, the Neanderthals. 

Paabo also discovered the previously unknown human relative, the Denisovans. His work helped people explore their evolutionary history and how humans spread across the world. While other researchers relied on fresh DNA to conduct these experiments, Paabo relied on the ancestors’ old, contaminated, and degraded genetic material.

Paabo’s work primarily focused on hominins, the classification group of modern humans, and our extinct relatives. The Swedish genetics work gets to the heart of some of the most fundamental questions.

October 4 – Kemp extends gas tax suspension into November

Georgia Governor Brian Kemp is extending the gas tax suspension into late and mid-November, which will also affect the sales tax on train and locomotive fuel. 

In March 2022, Kemp signed a law that suspended the tax through May 2022. He then continued the suspension into May, July, August, and September. 

The suspension caused Georgia’s regular gas to be 18 cents above the price of last year, but makes Georgia one of eight states in the South to have average gallon prices below $3.25. The diesel gas price is 17 cents below last year’s price with an average of $4.57 a gallon. The suspension Kemp signed costs Georgia more than $150 million a month in tax revenue, but he to use the state’s surplus to make up for it.

October 5 – Fayette musicians featured in the North Georgia Honor Orchestra

One September 16 and 17 the North Georgia Honor Orchestra performed at Kennesaw State University with the KSU Symphony. Twenty-one different schools in Georgia nominated students to be a part of the orchestra, including McIntosh, Starr’s Mill, and Whitewater High School.

Twelve students from Fayette County were a part of the North Georgia Honor Orchestra, including junior Adeline Harper from Starr’s Mill. This is a great honor because the Orchestra consists of 75 students and is a statewide event. 

Being a part of the Honor Orchestra is no easy task and is an important accolade for all those who achieved it.

October 6 – Jury selection for Kevin Spacey trial begins

The civil case of Kevin Spacey’s alleged sexual abuse of fellow actor Anthony Rapp is slated to begin on October 6 in New York. The trial is beginning five years after the allegations were released to the public by Buzzfeed in 2017. 

Rapp alleges that in 1986 Spacey attempted to seduce him while he was 14. Spacey denied these allegations, stating that he apologizes for any drunken behavior of his.

The trial will focus on Rapp’s claims of battery and intentional infliction of emotional distress. Spacey is also to go to trial next year for the alleged sexual abuse of multiple men over the course of a decade.