Each year the Golden Apple Foundation honors 11 educators around Illinois with their Award for Excellence in Teaching. This year they honored Karen Engleman of Cobden Junior-Senior High School.The students and staff of Cobden Junior-senior high school filled the gym with cheers as family and consumer sciences teacher Karen Engleman walked in to a surprise assembly waiting to award her the Golden Apple Award for Excellence in Teaching.

The funding supports students in kindergarten through 12th grade.

It's a program that's been around for 50 years. Rebound in Carbondale is an alternative education program for Southern Illinois students. On Friday, they opened their doors to the community for a open house to help people understand their mission, and the students they serve.

We asked Illinois State Schools Superintendent to join us for today's In-Focus to dive deeper into issues facing education in Illinois. He talked about improvements in the teacher shortage, how the budgeting process is going for Illinois schools, and student proficiency.

The Illinois state board of education is in the process of updating their student assessment and school accountability programs. As part of the process, State Superintendent Tony Sanders and his staff are touring the state to get input.

In his state of the state address in February, Governor JB Pritzker called for a law banning cell phones in classrooms during his state of the state address last month. WSIU is exploring what area school districts are doing with cellphones in the classroom and how they think this law will impact their students.

The fermentation science institute is in the first semester or working with St. Nicholas Brewing to provide a co-op program for students.

They will award 15 college juniors $20,000 each over their junior and senior years of college.

Carbondale Elementary District 95 has received a $5 million dollar grant over 5 years.

The community schools framework will bring family resource centers into Parrish Elementary and Carbondale Middle School.