Daily Digest: snow falls, college enrollment rises for Mpls. high school grads

Your Daily Digest for Friday, Jan. 20th:

Snow hit the cities Friday. Minnesota roads saw 177 crashes between 5:00 and 10:00 a.m., the PiPress reported. They caused 22 injuries, though none was serious. "Ridiculous is an understatement," Ken Gilman, with the state Department of Transportation, told the Strib. "…People have forgotten how to drive." The cities could get a couple more inches today, and southern Minnesota could get up to 6 inches. Of course, the loppet organizer is pleased.

For a different kind of snow, check out these photos from China's Harbin International Ice and Snow Festival.

A city program has lifted the percentage of Minneapolis high schoolers that go to college, the Strib reported today. For years, Mayor R.T. Rybak has visited incoming ninth-graders, telling them to plan ahead. That's coupled with college and career planning rooms in each school and scholarship incentives from public schools. In 2005, 45 percent of grads from the seven schools went to college right after high school. Now that figure is 58 percent, and 71 percent for students who enter college within two years of graduating high school. "We need you to dream really big dreams, be we have really big problems right now," Rybak said at Edison High School last month.