 Are you ready for warm weather and a little sunshine? The Appalachian Wireless team has decided to have the ultimate spring break event. The spring break event is going on now through the end of April and all smartphones are on sale with Appalachian Advantage. We are you. We are Appalachian Wireless. U-Pike Professor of English Dr. James Riley will be retiring after 35 years on the job. I described the college when I first came. We had no elevators. Every student that went to class climbed the 99. It was not a symbol at that time. It was a literal path you took to get to your classes. The changes since then with the two professional schools and the three grad schools has been remarkable. We have at least four, possibly five times more students than we had when I first came. The faculty has at the very least doubled in size, so if you count then the buildings we've added for Kaiko and Kaikon, the changes have been fairly remarkable. After receiving his Ph.D. from Ohio University in 1987, Riley accepted the position as professor at the then known Pikeville College. During his time, Riley was the head of a literary magazine and a golf coach. During the announcement of his retirement, Riley says he hopes to continue his path in writing. Well, I've been writing a lot of poetry lately. I've published a book of poems a couple of years ago. I have a novel that has been accepted for publication and should be coming out soon. So I'm looking forward to that. There's still some polishing to do on the final draft to get it ready for publication and I'll be working on that. I have a good collection of stories. I wouldn't mind writing a few more stories to add to that collection and get it published. So I have a lot of things in the pipeline I think that I'm working on. I'm looking forward to making some progress with. From you Pike's humble beginnings as a teaching college, a change Riley adds is the quality of students stating that many seek advancement beyond a graduate degree. I've learned a lot from my students over the years. The better students always bring something to the table. Primarily I think I'm often surprised at how capable they are of going beyond my expectations. I begin a class, I expect you know writers, these students to be beginning writers. And I've always been amazed at how advanced they are at storytelling. This area is conducive to storytellers and I think that has had an effect on the quality of the writers that show up in my classes. Among Riley's achievements at U-Pike is serving as the undergraduate faculty chair and establishing long lasting relationships with students. I have no idea what retirement means. I know I won't be teaching every day, I know I won't be preparing classes anymore and I won't be going up on the hill every day. Beyond that I'm not really sure. I work during the summers, I write during the summers. I anticipate retirement being one long summer where I can focus on work exclusively. And I'm excited about that, I'm looking forward to it. For Mountain Top News, I'm Joel Porjol.