AP - An 8-year-old girl was in critical condition Wednesday after she was shot in the abdomen at her elementary school near Seattle, and one of her classmates was detained, authorities said Wednesday.

Reuters - A boy in the third grade at a Washington state elementary school shot a female classmate on Wednesday, critically wounding the girl, authorities said.

AP - A Connecticut woman who was homeless has pleaded guilty to fraudulently enrolling her son in the wrong school district.

AP - Violent crime at the nation's schools is declining, and students and schools are reporting less bullying and gang activity.

AP - The parents of an Alabama professor accused of shooting three of her colleagues to death in 2010 say she was a well-adjusted, "family-oriented" girl growing up and didn't deliberately kill her brother in Massachusetts in 1986, according to testimony during a closed-door inquest after the Alabama shootings.

Reuters - The heads of Pennsylvania's four largest universities pleaded with lawmakers on Wednesday to ignore Governor Tom Corbett's proposal to cut state subsidies on higher education by 30 percent.

Reuters - The U.S. Supreme Court said on Tuesday it would decide whether a state university may consider an applicant's race to achieve a more diverse student body, revisiting in an election year a divisive social issue it last addressed nine years ago.