Laurel: To quiet support. When the world is turned upside down, it seems sometimes like the only way to be heard is to shout at the top of your longs, to bang a gong and light a fire. But there is another way to stand up for what one believes, and many area communities have seen that happen lately.

Quiet protests may speak as loudly to the importance of an issue as a boisterous brouhaha. In areas like Vandergrift, Jeannette, Irwin, Point State Park and more, the opposition to the kind of police brutality that ended George Floyd’s life in Minneapolis has been plentiful but also peaceful.

A quiet voice can sometimes say the most if it makes people listen harder to hear it.

Lance: To ruining the moment. Graduates have faced a hard enough time this year with lockdowns and quarantines changing how senior years have wrapped up. But Apollo-Ridge’s Class of 2020 had one final blow when they finally had a shot at graduation, only to have a social media threat cut it short before the diplomas were handed out.

This wasn’t a sickness no one can blame or a governmental decision people can rail against. This was someone making a deliberate decision that stole the pot of gold at the end of the graduates’ rainbow. It was likely thoughtless and toothless, but the result was savagely cruel, snatching the special moment away at the last minute.

Likewise, it is sad that Pittsburgh Public Schools graduates will miss the drive-in ceremony planned for their commencement on Saturday. The district pulled the plug on that Thursday amid concerns about protests planned for Downtown. The decision was made at the request of law enforcement.

The district is making the safe call. It’s just unfortunate that the call is necessary.

Laurel: To a nice uptick. While the airline and travel industries as a whole are in trouble amid the coronavirus pandemic, Arnold Palmer Regional Airport is reporting a bounce as things start taking off again.

Passengers in the airport went from 20,000 in March to just 423 in April. But in May, the numbers show them going back up to about 2,000. June is on track for another good month with 1,823 bookings after the first week and another 1,449 passengers planning to land in Latrobe.

That’s good news for an airport with improvements planned for the runway, and things really should get off the ground when direct flights between Latrobe and Orlando resume this week.

On the watch list: To demanding the best for kids. Black Women for Better Education wants Pittsburgh Public Schools to deny Anthony Hamlet a new term as superintendent when his contract ends in mid-2021.

Calling Hamlet’s tenure “an abject failure,” the group sent a letter with more than 50 signatures to the school board asking that his contract be allowed to lapse and a new superintendent be found to lead the district.

Hamlet’s time at the helm has not shown the promised gains in test scores, while the Pittsburgh Gender Equity Commission shows problems with performance by black female AP students versus those in other cities, as well as higher rates of discipline and police interaction with black students compared to white students.

Maybe this is Hamlet’s problem. He’s definitely faced others, including questionable spending and travel decisions. Maybe it’s a bigger issue. Let’s see what the board does now.

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