Katie Doman, an English instructor at Tusculum College and a recognized authority on Appalachian culture, recently visited 6th grade students at Rogersville City School. Doman shared songs, stories and crafts with the students as a way to teach them the importance of Appalachian culture. "When you see something every day, you don’t think it’s special," Doman told students, "but people in other parts of the world actually study us and are very interested in how we live."

RCS sixth grade teacher Alice Brooks said Doman’s visit was "a great boost to my reading program. The students are studying world history now, and next year as seventh graders they’ll study Tennessee history. This is such an interesting way to present the information and to bring it all together."

Brooks and Doman planned the visit at a teaching workshop earlier this year. Doman, along with storyteller Linda Poland, is the creator of "Hidden Heroines," a play based on oral histories of the lives of Northeast Tennessee women.