The Appalachia you DIDN'T see in the Diane Sawyer 20/20 show (Lexington: credit, live)

[missymomof3]

Originally Posted by Visvaldis

Here's a great radio station located in Whitesburg, Ky. Good music, interesting news, and real people. I'd smoke some with them anyday! It's people that want to preserve their authentic culture, improve living conditions and protect their environment.
WMMT FM 88.7 | Real People Radio

Hey thank you so much for making me aware of this station, I listen to it all the time now, I love it!

[peepops]

I dont know why Ohio people have to come down here they need to stay at the house. Why cant they drive the speed limit or faster why they always drivin 10 mph lower.

[tibor75]

I had to laugh looking at those pictures leading this thread. if those are the best pictures you can find of Eastern Kentucky, that is just sad.

Considering that eastern KY has the worst life expectancy in the entire US, what do you expect the media to show? The nice areas? Bwww haa haa haa

[Jamie40829]

The media shows what gets ratings. Diane Sawyer should be ashamed of herself. She was actually born in Glasgow. Which in all honesty isnt much better than alot of Eastern Kentucky. ABC came in here with their cameras and went to the most poor, run down shacks they could find. They didnt bother showing the most state of the art High School in the state in Harlan County High School. Nor did they bothern to mention that Harlan High School recieved THE highest arts and humanities test scores in the entire state in 2006. They didnt bother to recognize countless programs going on in our community to fight drugs. Yes, at times it may seem things in Appalachia are pretty bad. But in all honesty, its not no worse here than it is in many other parts of the country.

[tibor75]

Originally Posted by Jamie40829

The media shows what gets ratings. Diane Sawyer should be ashamed of herself. She was actually born in Glasgow. Which in all honesty isnt much better than alot of Eastern Kentucky. ABC came in here with their cameras and went to the most poor, run down shacks they could find. They didnt bother showing the most state of the art High School in the state in Harlan County High School. Nor did they bothern to mention that Harlan High School recieved THE highest arts and humanities test scores in the entire state in 2006. They didnt bother to recognize countless programs going on in our community to fight drugs. Yes, at times it may seem things in Appalachia are pretty bad. But in all honesty, its not no worse here than it is in many other parts of the country.

I just gotta laugh at this. Ok, there are worse areas of the country, Indian reservations for example. But eastern KY and WV are pretty bad, and a couple of laughable pictures of Ashland don't change that. By any objective measure - poverty rates, life expectancy, levels of education - the area is seriously lacking. You can whine and cry when the media does their job, but that doesn't change the facts.

[EclecticEars]

Originally Posted by tibor75

I just gotta laugh at this. Ok, there are worse areas of the country, Indian reservations for example. But eastern KY and WV are pretty bad, and a couple of laughable pictures of Ashland don't change that. By any objective measure - poverty rates, life expectancy, levels of education - the area is seriously lacking. You can whine and cry when the media does their job, but that doesn't change the facts.

Pretty much sums it up!

There are a few neighborhoods around Ashland, Greenup, Pikeville, Hazard, Corbin, and London with any significant amount of wealth. And, even at that, the largest town in the bunch is Ashland at only 21,000, a town rapidly in decline since the 1970s. This wealth accounts for such a miniscule segment of their local populations that it's almost insignificant.

I know Jamie40829 strongly pushes Harlan Co. Public Schools, but top scores in one category and a nice, new, state-of-the-art high school do not alone comprise a decent system. The ONLY systems in E. Ky. that even have anything halfway decent to offer overall are Russell (the best of the list,) Ashland, Raceland-Worthington, Pikeville, and Corbin. This is the entire eastern half of Kentucky here! Not even Lexington has an impressively good school system (but, ooooh, aaaaah, it's Lexington, home of UK, "big city," horse farm wealth, high taxes, blah blah blah...) The BEST schools in the Commonwealth are clustered around Northern Kentucky, Owensboro and Louisville, in that order.

E. Ky. is beautiful, but boy does it sure have problems!

[Jamie40829]

lol......I dont push the county schools. while I did complement the districts over priced state of the art high school. I push the independent district whos test scores continually rank in the top 10% of the state year after year after year. I do realize there are problems. But you can find problems in any part of the state. Find me an area that you cant. It doesnt exist. Things arent as bad as the media wants you to believe. Do you think for one minute that the areas they shown on that program is representative of the majority of the area? My family, my friends and my neighbors are all middle class hard working people. Why accentuate the negative? Im not saying there isnt bad things in the area. But there are good things going on why not talk about those some? a little encouragement goes a long way. Regardless of what people may think. The Kentucky state line is not at Richmond.

[dixiegirl7]

Originally Posted by jcm1986

Pretty much sums it up!

There are a few neighborhoods around Ashland, Greenup, Pikeville, Hazard, Corbin, and London with any significant amount of wealth. And, even at that, the largest town in the bunch is Ashland at only 21,000, a town rapidly in decline since the 1970s. This wealth accounts for such a miniscule segment of their local populations that it's almost insignificant.

I know Jamie40829 strongly pushes Harlan Co. Public Schools, but top scores in one category and a nice, new, state-of-the-art high school do not alone comprise a decent system. The ONLY systems in E. Ky. that even have anything halfway decent to offer overall are Russell (the best of the list,) Ashland, Raceland-Worthington, Pikeville, and Corbin. This is the entire eastern half of Kentucky here! Not even Lexington has an impressively good school system (but, ooooh, aaaaah, it's Lexington, home of UK, "big city," horse farm wealth, high taxes, blah blah blah...) The BEST schools in the Commonwealth are clustered around Northern Kentucky, Owensboro and Louisville, in that order.

E. Ky. is beautiful, but boy does it sure have problems!

We have some excellent schools in Bowling Green and Warren County, thank you. I can see you are being your usual ambassador of negativity toward Kentucky today...lol.

[dixiegirl7]

Originally Posted by Jamie40829

lol......I dont push the county schools. while I did complement the districts over priced state of the art high school. I push the independent district whos test scores continually rank in the top 10% of the state year after year after year. I do realize there are problems. But you can find problems in any part of the state. Find me an area that you cant. It doesnt exist. Things arent as bad as the media wants you to believe. Do you think for one minute that the areas they shown on that program is representative of the majority of the area? My family, my friends and my neighbors are all middle class hard working people. Why accentuate the negative? Im not saying there isnt bad things in the area. But there are good things going on why not talk about those some? a little encouragement goes a long way. Regardless of what people may think. The Kentucky state line is not at Richmond.

Well said, Jaime.

[abcde-fam]

My family and I are relocating from Detroit area and we seem pleased with the Ashland area. I looked up schools and infact Russell has ranked very good overall in the state as well as some Ashland area schools. I think south Ashland. I do not know alot about the areas but I also read GA. and WV ranked #1 for best/most technology in there classrooms. As everyone is entitled to there oponion I just hope I am not making a bad decision. I seem to like alot that I have read about E.KY. But whenever I tell someone here in MI we're moving to E.KY they automatically assume it's what Diane Sawyer did on 20/20.