CEDAR, Inc. - Future of Work in Appalachia

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CEDAR, Inc. - Future of Work in Appalachia

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Our mission? By nurturing leadership and problem-solving skills, we empower the next generation to take their communities forward. Want to get involved?

CEDAR (Community Economic Development And Revitalization) is a non-profit based in Pikeville, Kentucky that creates, develops, and delivers unique and authentic learning opportunities to K-12 students in order to reshape the Future of Work in Appalachia. 🌟 Hello Appalachian Kentucky! 🌟

We’re excited to introduce you to CEDAR (Community Economic Development and Revitalization) Inc., a 501(c)3 non-profit based right here in Pikeville, KY. To reshape the Future of Work in Appalachia by delivering creative, non-traditional education programs that inspire K-12 students to make a difference in their own communities. Through our unique programs, students gain hands-on learning experiences that push them to think critically, innovate, and discover how they can help drive change in our region. Last year, CEDAR reached 5,000 students and 100 teachers across 30 schools and 14 districts, giving them unforgettable learning opportunities that sparked curiosity, creativity, and a passion for their future.

✨ This year, we’re rolling out more exciting programs, including:

- CEDAR Teacher Study Unit Program (grades K-12)
- CEDAR Student Fairs (grades K-12):
- Future of Work in Appalachia (FWA) Fair
- Health Care Careers (HCC) Fair
- E-CIP (Entrepreneurial Community Improvement Program) (grades 9-12)
- ARTIMIS-MISSION ECHO: Exploring Community Healthcare Occupations (grades 6-8)
(in partnership with Pikeville Medical Center, ARH, and The Challenger Learning Center of KY)

We’re always looking to grow and create even more opportunities for our students, and we can’t do it without our amazing partners and community. Learn more about our programs and how you can make a difference: https://fwa.cedarinc.org

Let’s build the future of Appalachia together! 💡👩‍🏫👨‍💼

10/26/2026

Were you part of a CEDAR event last school year? Your picture may be in the paper this week.

A special CEDAR insert runs in seven Eastern Kentucky newspapers, starting Tuesday, October 27. Its articles and pictures cover CEDAR’s 2025–2026 school year and recognize students, teachers and schools for outstanding work.

Tuesday, October 27: Appalachian News-Express and Floyd County Chronicle & Times
Wednesday, October 28: Hazard Herald and The Paintsville Herald
Thursday, October 29: The Leslie County News, The Breathitt Advocate and The Troublesome Creek Times

Pick up a copy and look for your school, your students — maybe even yourself. The insert’s front page is the one with our QR codes.

10/24/2026

In the mountains, a century ago, silver kept the witches away.

Witches were blamed for spoiled milk and butter, so families guarded the churn. A dime was dropped into it, and money kept in it, to keep the witches off. Another guard: let a few drops of the cow’s milk fall on a piece of silver.

Every one of these is marked Mountains in Kentucky Superstitions, the 1920 collection’s tag for beliefs gathered in Kentucky’s mountain counties.

What did your family keep around for luck?

Source: Kentucky Superstitions, Princeton University Press, 1920.

10/22/2026

After an injury or a surgery, someone has to get you moving again.

Physical therapist assistants work under the direction of a physical therapist, carrying out the exercises and treatments in a patient’s plan of care. Hazard Community & Technical College - HCTC and Southeast Kentucky Community & Technical College share an accredited regional program — an associate degree in two years, full time.

Admission is selective, and every applicant has to attend a pre-admission conference first. Last year’s ran online from November through March. Before the program starts, you’ll need Anatomy and Physiology I with a C or better and a CPR course. Graduates are eligible for the national licensing exam.

Source: Southeast Kentucky Community and Technical College.

10/20/2026

The first written record of coal in Kentucky is one line in a doctor’s journal.

On April 13, 1750, Thomas Walker led a small party through a pass he called Cave Gap — Cumberland Gap now — and followed a creek down the other side. That night he wrote: “We camped on the Bank where we found very good Coal.”

The creek is Yellow Creek today. When Walker’s journal was first published in full, in 1898, its editor noted that Middlesborough now stood beside it, and that coal abounds there.

Walker kept finding coal for months. He described a layer about twelve inches thick with white clay beneath it; geologists now read clay like that as the soil the coal swamp grew in. His party wrote their names with coal under a rock shelter. By June, Walker had a name for the country he’d crossed. He called it the Coal Land.

Sources: Journal of Dr. Thomas Walker, 1750, as published by the Filson Club, 1898; A. C. McFarlan, Geology of Kentucky; Kentucky Geological Survey.

10/17/2026

When someone died at home in Kentucky, the house was set right.

Stop the clock in the room. Cover the mirror. Turn the portraits to the wall, or, as the belief went, a near relative of the one who died would soon follow.

In the mountains, a turtle-dove mattered: if one flew upward after a death, the soul had gone to heaven.

These come from Kentucky Superstitions, nearly 4,000 beliefs gathered across the state and published in 1920 by Daniel Lindsey Thomas, a Centre College English professor, and Lucy Blayney Thomas.

Source: Kentucky Superstitions, Princeton
University Press, 1920.

10/15/2026

Fifteen weeks to EMT. Twelve months more to paramedic.

Emergency medical training at the Kentucky Community & Technical College System comes in steps. The EMT course takes 15 weeks and runs every fall and spring. Finish it and you can sit the National Registry EMT exam.

Paramedic is the next step, and you need your EMT certification before you can start it. Big Sandy Community & Technical College and Southeast Kentucky Community & Technical College both run 12-month paramedic programs.

Admission is selective with limited seats, and Big Sandy asks applicants to attend a pre-admission conference first. Graduates sit the National Registry Paramedic exam.

Sources: KCTCS; Big Sandy Community and Technical College; Southeast Kentucky Community and Technical College.

10/13/2026

Some of Kentucky’s coal mines have trees in the ceiling.

About 300 million years ago, the swamp forests that became coal were sometimes buried in mud while their trunks were still standing. The wood rotted away, sediment filled the hollow, and what’s left is a stone cast of the tree, still upright. Mine out the coal beneath it and you are looking up at the base of a tree.

Miners call them kettlebottoms, for the rounded, kettle-like base a stump shows when it falls out. And they can fall without warning, which is why mines bolt and brace the roof around them.

You can see one without going underground. The Whitfield Stump came out of a Harlan County mine — the manager built a special car just to haul the several-ton stump out — and it is on display at the University of Kentucky. There are others at Morehead State and Pine Mountain State Park.

Sources: Kentucky Geological Survey; U.S. Bureau of Mines.

10/08/2026

The shortest road to a nursing license.

Practical nursing programs at Big Sandy, Hazard and Southeast Kentucky Community and Technical Colleges lead to a diploma in about a year of full-time study. Graduates sit the NCLEX-PN, the national licensing exam, to become licensed practical nurses.

LPNs check vital signs, start IV fluids, and help keep communication clear between patients and the rest of the healthcare team — in hospitals, long-term care facilities and clinics.

It can also be a first step. KCTCS gives licensed practical nurses credit toward an associate degree in nursing, and Hazard runs a bridge program from LPN to RN.

Admission is selective, and Big Sandy requires a pre-admission conference before you apply.

Sources: Big Sandy Community and Technical College; Hazard Community and Technical College; KCTCS; Kentucky Board of Nursing.

10/06/2026

Coal that comes out of the ground is not ready to sell. It comes up mixed with rock and minerals — shale, pyrite — and a preparation plant has to separate them first.

The trick is weight. Coal is light for a rock: its specific gravity runs about 1.2 to 1.5. Shale runs 2.4 to 2.8, and pyrite close to 5.

So plants make the water heavier. Stir in ultra-fine magnetite powder until the mix is denser than coal but lighter than rock, and the coal floats while the rock sinks. The magnetite gets pulled back out with magnets and used again.

Source: Kentucky Geological Survey.

10/02/2026

CEDAR was at The Bridge, Pikeville Medical Center's college and career fair at the Appalachian Wireless Arena.

Our booth covered the three ways the CEDAR Education Initiative engages K-12 students in shaping the future of work in Appalachia: innovation and entrepreneurship, coal, and health care careers.

Thank you to Pikeville Medical Center for hosting, and to everyone who stopped by.

Address

P. O. Box 2152
Pikeville, KY
41502

Telephone

+16064773456

Website

https://fwa.cedarinc.org/, https://linktr.ee/cedarincky

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