Weekly Updates

Arkansas legislators approved a plan to add $300 a week to unemployment benefits, to extend the extra benefits available during the coronavirus pandemic.

Arkansas teachers and students are beginning the most challenging school year in living memory.

The Transportation Department is upgrading its web site to make it easier for Arkansas drivers to follow the progress of highway construction projects.

More than 28,000 Arkansas residents work in the forest products industry, cutting trees, producing paper and pulp, manufacturing furniture and shipping wood products across the world.

The state Education Department will spend $10 million to expand Internet access in every school district in Arkansas.

The average debt that a student incurs to earn a bachelor’s degree in Arkansas is almost $2,000 less than the national average. Over the course of a 30-year career, a person with a bachelor’s degree will earn an estimated $1.25 million, compared to $550,000 that a college dropout will earn over the same period.

Arkansas will hold its annual sales tax holiday on Saturday, August 1, and Sunday, August 2.

The number of Arkansas children in foster care continued to go down last year, after reaching an all-time high in 2016 and prompting dramatic measures from elected officials to improve the state’s child welfare system.

During the upcoming school year, local districts will have flexibility to adapt to changing circumstances created by the outbreak of the coronavirus, thanks to a set of waivers adopted by the state Board of Education during a special meeting.

The state will hire 350 more contact tracers to help control the spread of the coronavirus. After the funding is allocated to pay them, it will bring the state’s total to 900.