Charlie Schlenker
Senior ReporterWGLT Senior Reporter Charlie Schlenker grew up in Rock Island, Illinois, and graduated from Augustana College. He has spent more than four decades in radio and has won numerous state and national awards for journalism. He lives in Normal with his family.
Contact Charlie at ceschle@ilstu.edu.
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Student support workers at Illinois State University have filed a petition to form a union. Academic advisors, financial aid counselors, and other support workers want to be a chapter of the University Professionals of Illinois. -
2025 was a good year for Normal, according to City Manager Pam Reece, noting town achievements include a range of infrastructure projects, opening a refurbished skate park at Fairview Park, and advancing the town's public arts plan. -
There are big warning signs in agriculture right now. And many experts are warning an aid package announced by the Trump administration is not likely to go very far or come soon enough -
A Bloomington-Normal historian says bicycles were once a top export from the state of Illinois. Manufacturing centers in the state, including Peoria and Chicago, made two-thirds of all bicycles sold in the country in 1898. -
A federal agency has given the Clinton nuclear power plant another 20 years of life. -
Winter weather complicates an already scarce parking situation in Downtown Bloomington. The Market Street parking deck has closed. And the Front and Center block has yet to finish demolition and become surface parking. That’s likely to become available sometime next spring. -
New Illinois Farm Bureau President Philip Nelson said one reason he unseated previous organization head Brian Duncan was a legal dispute with the American Farm Bureau Federation. -
McLean County Board Chair Elizabeth Johnston said there's significant movement on mental health program spending in the county. That comes from sales tax money shared with the county by Bloomington and Normal. -
Electric automaker Rivian has unveiled new technology it says will put it at the forefront of autonomous vehicles. -
Illinois State University is trying to revive a stalled dorm and dining center project. It also wants to put a solar farm on the land, roofs, and maybe parking structures at its College of Engineering campus on GE Road in Bloomington.
