Last week, we wrote about a few cultural and natural sites looking to make it onto UNESCO’s World Heritage list — “the designation for places on Earth that are of outstanding universal value to humanity.” Two of the places Nice News covered, Okefenokee National Wildlife Refuge in Georgia and Greece’s Mount Olympus, earned their designations at this year’s World Heritage Committee session, alongside 23 other sites. Check out the full list of new additions.
Must Reads
After 241 days in space, two Russian cosmonauts and a NASA astronaut touched down on Earth (and received a fitting welcome home gift)
Global Hunger Down for Third Consecutive Year, UN Annual Report Shows
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For the third year in a row, global hunger has fallen,according to the 2026 State of Food Security and Nutrition in the World. The annual report on hunger from the U.N.’s Food and Agriculture Organization found that 7.8% of the world’s people were undernourished last year, down from about 8.1% in 2024 and 8.5% in 2023. In other words, nearly 14 million fewer people were affected by hunger in 2025 compared to the year prior, with notable improvements seen in Asia, Latin America, and the Caribbean. And looking ahead, hunger is projected to continue to decline by 20% between 2026 and 2030. “Progress is possible, but we must move faster,” FAO Director-General QU Dongyu said in a press release, noting more work needs to be done to achieve the U.N.’s bigger goal of a world free of hunger. See the full report.
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Scientists Highlight 8 “Building Blocks” of Birdsong
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It sounds like many songbirds are getting their material from the same book of tunes, according to a study published last week. Researchers analyzed more than 116,000 songs from 3,160 species, looking at broader patterns rather than just pitch and frequency. They found that songbirds mix and match from eight “building blocks” when they sing: slow, fast, and ultrafast trills; flat, slow-modulated, and fast-modulated whistles; harmonic stacks; and chaotic notes, per Audubon magazine. Of those eight motifs, most songbird species typically use only about five and heavily rely on one, with beak size and location shaping their communication styles. For example, birds that sing to one another over longer distances opt for simpler songs that carry farther, while those at closer range generally use faster, more complex ones. The study highlights “a simplicity underlying the spectacular diversity of birdsongs,” its authors told the BBC. Lead researcher Quentin Bacquelé added: “I think this research has opened up a new way to see songs as something [intrinsically] linked with the environment.” Listen to four of the building block sounds.
Culture
To Teach Kids About the Past, a Museum Puts Them in Oliver Twist’s Shoes
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At a newly renovated museum in Ripon, England, kids are asked to do laundry by hand, eat gruel, and walk in the footsteps of those who once lived in workhouses, also known as poorhouses. The notoriously grim institutions (famously appearing in works like Oliver Twist) were the Victorian-era “solution” to poverty and homelessness, until they were largely phased out in the 1930s, when the country shifted to more humane welfare programs and public health systems. The museum building is itself a former 19th-century workhouse. “You are literally going to walk in the footsteps of people who have experienced this place,” Alexa Vernon, the director of the Ripon Museums Trust, told The Guardian. Visitors get to see firsthand what it was like to live in such conditions, touring where people once worked, slept, and went to school. When groups of children visit, a retired schoolteacher named Nick Baird takes on the role of a workhouse school teacher. “I tend to be quite fierce for the first few minutes, but I can’t keep it up,” he told the BBC. “I drop that act but it is important that they learn that’s how it would have been.” See pictures of the inside.
In Other News
An amateur astronomer found a 390 million-year-old impact crater in Quebec while perusing Google Maps (read more)
Cool as a cucumber: An adorable and “easygoing” Gentoo penguin chick was born at the Tennessee Aquarium (read more)
WNBA star Angel Reese now has a signature Barbie doll, featuring a pink legging as a nod to two of her idols (read more)
Lessons from Hurricane Helene: In North Carolina, communities are embracing solar as emergency backup power (read more)
Thrill seekers in Bosnia dove nearly 80 feet off a historic bridge for an annual diving contest(read more)
Something We Love
WMP Sunglasses I discovered WMP Eyewear about five years ago and it’s since become my go-to brand for sunglasses. The lenses are polarized and shatter-resistant, offer 100% UVA/UVB protection, and come in a variety of styles and colors for both men and women. The Tate and Nevada (pictured) are currently in my rotation, and I’m eyeing a pair of the blue light glasses as well. – Natalie Stone, Senior Managing Editor
This month, the Estey Organ Museum in Brattleboro, Vermont, announced it received a $35,000 donation that will completely pay off its mortgage. “It’s an amazing surprise,” said museum board president George Wiese. “I’ve spent my career in nonprofit leadership, and I’ve never seen this happen.” Fittingly, the museum opened after people began donating their old organs, many of which needed repairing — and now the latest donation will go toward both its debt and its mission to preserve musical instruments.
Photo of the Day
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Over the weekend, the World Water Ski Championships came to a close at Predator Bay Water Ski Club in Calgary, Canada. The championships welcomed hundreds of athletes from around the world for a mix of water competitions, including slalom (pictured above), jump, and trick.
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