Australia is one of the first countries to cross the finish line to Jan. 1. Fireworks exploded over Sydney’s famed Opera House as usual, but few people saw them in person. 

A helicopter went down during a routine peacekeeping mission over Egypt’s Sinai Peninsula on Thursday. Six U.S. service members died, as well as a French peacekeeper and a Czech member of the force. The ninth member of the team, an American, suffered serious injuries.

Beijing on Thursday called a mass resignation of Hong Kong lawmakers an attempt to provoke foreign interference and a “blatant challenge to the power of the central government.” After China removed four lawmakers it deemed a threat to national security, the other 15 pro-democracy members of Hong Kong’s Legislative Council announced they were stepping down in protest.

Celebrations over the peace deal the United States and the Taliban signed on Saturday did not last long. Afghan President Ashraf Ghani said on Sunday he would not free 5,000 Taliban prisoners, a key component of the agreement, before power-sharing talks between the rival factions begin on March 10.

Almost everything in education news this year paled in comparison to the two mass-casualty shootings that claimed 27 lives. School safety dominated headlines from February until the November midterms. But with little agreement on school safety solutions, the news cycle ground on to other things. Here are this year’s top five stories in education.

Gregory Wills, a professor of church history at the Southern Baptist Theological Seminary, has spent years chronicling American religious history in general—and Southern Baptist history in particular. Last year, seminary President Albert Mohler, a WORLD News Group board member, asked Wills to head a research team investigating the school’s historic ties to slavery and racism.

Based on his previous research, Wills had an idea of what he would find.

Voters in Seattle approved a tax increase in November to fund education initiatives, including a program making two years of community college free for all high school graduates.