This morning the Georgia Department of Education announced that Decatur High School ranked as both an “AP Merit School” and an “AP Challenge School” in 2009.

• To qualify as an “AP Merit School” a school must have “at least 20% of students taking AP exams and at least half of the AP exams scoring a 3 or higher.”
• To qualify as an “AP Challenge School” a school must have “fewer than 900 students” and offer “AP classes in the four core areas of English, Mathematics, Social Studies and Science.”

Decatur Commissioner and Bicycle South’s Fred Boykin writes in…

Agnes Scott has just started a Bike Agnes Scott program with Bicycle South and Fuji Bicycles. Their program is modeled on the Bike Emory program that Emory, Bicycle South and Fuji started as a pilot project in 2007.

Agnes Scott deserves some credit for setting this program up. The web page just went live today.

To learn more about Agnes Scott’s new bike lending program, “purple bikes”, and check out discounts on Fuji bikes for ASC folks, click HERE.

Photo courtesy of the Agnes Scott “Purple Bikes” website.

Two Decatur chefs are listed among the semi-finalists for this year’s James Beard Foundation awards.

• Scott Peacock of Watershed fame is one of 20 semi-finalists in the Outstanding Chefs category.
• Cakes & Ale’s Billy Allin is one of 20 semi-finalists in the “Best Chef: Southeast” category.

Peacock was an “Outstanding Chef” semi-finalist last year as well. This is Allin’s first nomination.

Congrats to both Decatur semi-finalists!

Jump over to CL’s Omnivore (who also gets the hat-tip!) for a wrap-up of all nominated chef’s with kitchens around Atlanta.  And for the full list of semi-finalists across the nation, click here (PDF).

Photos ripped from the restaurants’ respective websites.

From Creative Loafing’s Omnivore…

To celebrate the [10 year] anniversary, the owners plan to open a different TDS for a few hours each Sunday in April. Diners will get a chance to order some more complicated dishes. “We hate that we can’t do certain dishes now,” Trusler said, “but they take too long with the high-speed pace of the taquerias.”

Get on the TDS mailing list to be sure you’re notified about the anniversary celebration.