THE SUPERIOR EXPRESS

As part of the annual meeting held by the Nuckolls County Historical Society in the museum church located in Superior's City Park, Charlotte Endorf, a Nebraska author, Humanities Council Speaker and the Nebraska Mother of the Year in 2011 presented a program based on her personal research and conversations with Orphan Train Riders. This video gives her introduction and one of the stories she told.

New school board members bring questions to monthly meeting

With three relatively new faces serving on the Superior Board of Education, regular monthly meetings, are filled with new questions, a change possibility also spurred by a push to update the school's goals and mission statement.
All members were present Monday evening at the Superior High School library for the May meeting. Members of the board are Darrrell Kile, Peggy Meyer, Jim Miller, Steve Renz, Matt Sullivan and Darren Willett. The only actions taken during the meeting besides approving the agendas and monthly claims ($511,497.59), were to approve a contract with Courtney Giger to be an elementary special education teacher and a minor policy changing the name of the personnel committee to the negotiations committee.
During reports, Doug Hoins, elementary principal, said, 38 students have registered for kindergarten. Bob Cook, secondary principal, indicated early projections indicate the junior-senior high enrollment will drop 10 students from 198 this year to 188 next. Current enrollment figures are for 26 seventh grade students, 32 eighth grade students, 37 ninth grade students, 34 tenth grade students, 30 eleventh grade students and 29 seniors.
Supt. Charles Isom handed out a summary sheet from the School Improvement Process (SIP) committees. The sheet outlined the mission and belief statement work from three committees: the best practice committee, the family and community committee and the data committee.
The mission statements were as follows
· Every student, every day, a superior success.
· Superior Public Schools will proved educational opportunities for all students to acquire the academic skills necessary to become productive citizens and lifelong learners.
· Superior Public Schools, in cooperations with students, families, communities, strives to promote skills necessary to achieve academic, physical and social wellness of all students to become productive citizens.
Belief statements were as follows:
Best practice committee -
· We believe every student has the ability to learn and succeed.
· We believe every student shares a responsibility for his or her learning.
· We believe the school should proved a safe and secure environment.
· We believe the educational process is a partnership between the students, the family, the school, the community and the world.
Family and community committee
· Lifelong learners continue to develop in their personal and professional life.
· Productive citizens live in harmony.
Data committee
· Students will be provided the opportunity to develop their potential academic, physical and social wellness.
· The district will provide high quality human resources to accomplish the mission of the district
· The school will proved a comprehensive educational experience to enable the students to develop skills in rational problem solving, independent thinking, and digital citizenship.
· The district will proved equal opportunities related to varying aptitudes
· Develop skills to promote lifelong physical wellness.
· Provide a safe environment.
Supt. Isom also reviewed legislation he expects to become law: the superintendent compensation bill, state aide - LB 407 and school retirement plan - LB553.
The superintendent compensation bill will require boards to publish a copy of the superintendent's entire contract at least three days before the meeting of the board at which the contract will be considered.
Legislation expected to become law related to state aid is complex. Supt. Isom has participated in several discussions with state legislators involved in the process of establishing state aid. Supt. Isom expects several of the legislative changes to affect Superior.
· He expects teacher education allowance to be reinstated. This means the district will receive state aid to assist in paying the wages for certified instructors with advanced degrees. Teachers with advanced degrees earn higher salaries than those with just a bachelors degree.
· Isom expects the new legislations will recognize extended calendars - those with more than 175 days. He hopes the Superior district will adopt a calendar with 180 days, do away with the no school Friday's used for teacher inservice which have been common in the spring semester, and move teacher inservice to another time.
· Basic allowable growth is 1.5 percent. With a 75 percent vote of the board of education it can be boosted to two percent in 2013-14.
· Voluntary early retirement must net a savings to the district and district benefits for five years. Practically speaking, instructors who take early retirement must be replaced by someone who will be paid less because of fewer years experience and or having less education.
Since the April meeting, members of the board of education have met twice to work on the district's goals. Identified priorities are related to student achievement and communication. Goals are primarily related to student achievement. Some facets include helping board members understand student achievement data , testing requirements, the testing procedure, the handling of testing data, follow up reports and become involved in the process of studying how to engage students in the importance of testing and success. Then communication and involving students, families and the community in becoming stakeholders in improving student achievement.
The board will be meeting for another workshop related to school goals.
The following is a summary of some of the ideas presented during a discussion focusing on schools testing and below age five education.
Two primary questions were raised by board members. Matt Sullivan said in the business world businesses that verify the need for a service and also provide the resulting services are looked upon with suspicion because their is a built-in incentive to grow the service. Sullivan was referring to ESU 9 providing the personnel to verify birth to age five instructional needs and also provide the personnel to meet those needs in the PALLS program. Sullivan has noted in more than one meeting the significant portion of the monthly expenditures which pay for birth through age five services. It totals more than one million per year and is approximately 50 percent reimbursable from the federal government.
Supt. Isom would like the school to oversee the entire birth to age 5 instruction program in Superior.
The second question was raised by Peggy Meyer. Meyer said, "in the world in which I work, goals are measurable. When I look at our goals, we have no way of knowing when we have achieved our goals because they are open ended."
Darrell Kile once again pointed out that if the district is to maintain a cash reserve fund, something must change. For several years, the cash reserve fund has been shrinking.
Darren Willett suggest board members should communicate with board members from outstanding schools (Blue Ribbon Schools) to find out what they are doing, just like business managers study other successful business.
Inside dispatch times generally will be earlier for many of the offices will be closed when the truck arrives.

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Compromise stops release of stored river water

It was announced Thursday the Nebraska Department of Natural Resources had reached a tentative agreement with the Kansas Bostwick Irrigation District with regard to the storage and release of water held in Republican River basin lakes.
As a part of this agreement, the Nebraska Department of Natural Resources discontinued the controversial release of water from Harlan County Reservoir. Before agreeing to stop the release the Kansas Bostwick Irrigation District had to agree their use of the water will not harm Nebraska's efforts to comply with the Republican River Compact.
The agreement between Nebraska and the Kansas Bostwick Irrigation District will be formalized in a contract being developing by the United States Bureau of Reclamation.
Releases of water from Harlan County Reservoir were started in early May at the request of the Nebraska Department of Natural Resources, after discussions with Kansas state officials failed to reach a conclusion acceptable to the two states.
Brian Dunninga, Nebraska Department of Natural Resources director said, "We are pleased Kansas Bostwick Irrigation District approached us willing to implement, what we have felt is a practical solution." The agreement reached will at least put off the required releases of water from Harlan County Reservoir until such time that the water will be used by Kansas Bostwick Irrigation District to supplement current irrigation water supplies or until after the 2013 irrigation season has ended. I hope this is the start of finding common ground on water management solutions in the Republican River Basin so all water users in the basin may benefit."
Dunninga has threatened to restart the releases if a final agreement was not reached by 5 p.m. Friday.
The gates remained closed Monday.
About 5,000 acre feet of water were released down the river before the closure order was issued. The initial announcement had indicated Nebraska planned to release 20,000 acre feet before May 15.
On Monday it was estimated 213 cubic feet of water was flowing into Harlan County Reservoir and zero was being released. The reservoir was considered to be 66.1 percent full. The elevation was 1,936.94 feet above sea level. The conservation pool is considered to be full when the elevation reaches 1,945.7.
Having adequate water in Harlan County Reservoir is of vital interest to farmers in the Kansas Bostwick Irrigation District with land above Lovewell Lake that are served by the Courtland Canal. They feared if the water was released before the start of the irrigation season, water might not be available during the irrigation season.
While Nebraska interests wanted to release the water earlier when it was more likely the water would reach the measuring station near Hardy and less likely to be lost to evaporation and invasive plans growing in and near the river.
It isn't unusual for approximately half of the water released from an upstream reservoir to be lost before the water reaches Hardy.
Because of the continuing drought, Nebraska has declared 2014 to be a compact call year and banned the holding of water in farm ponds and lakes located in the Republican Basin. That order is not expected to be rescinded until significant rainfall breaks the drought.
Irrigators served by the Bostwick Irrigation District in Nebraska expect to receive some irrigation water this year but are worried that unless storage is permitted none may be available in 2014

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Council delays curb painting until late summer

Painting of the lines which designate parking stalls in downtown Superior is underway. Tradionally the work is done in advance of the Victorian Festival but Monday evening the Superior City Council directed the curb portion of the painting be delayed until later in the year.
In the downtown area it is expected a storm sewer construction project will result in much of the curb being taken out and replaced. And this construction season the council expects the city street crew will replace many sections of damaged curb.
Major steet improvement construction projects scheduled for this year by the state and city include installing handicapped sidewalk ramps on Idaho Street between Ninth and Fifteenth streets, replace of the Eighth Street over Lost Creek and a downtown storm sewer project.
In other action Monday the council designated a property at 184 South Kansas to be a public nuisance. The property owner may either bring the property into compliance or request a show-cause public hearing and attempt to explain the reasons for the property's current condition.
Bev Czirr met with the council and discussed plans for the swimming pool.
Approximately $500 remains to be raised for the handicapped lift that hopefully will be installed at the pool this year. Crack and joint filling is now underway. If the work continues on schedule, she anticipated the pool will be filled by about May 20. Council members are hopeful the pool will be open by Memorial Day.
The council approved the renewal of funding at the same level as last year both SASA Crisis Center and the Midland Area on Aging programs.
Jamie Manzer, SASA director, reported Karla Devaney was the agency's local advocate. The service is a popular one with Nuckolls County residents. The agency served 55 Superior residents in the past year and 10 from other parts of Nuckolls County. The number of requests for assistance continues to increase and SASA is looking for office space in Superior.
It was noted Superior residents are allowing grass clippings to blow into the streets which is violation of a city ordinance. The city clerk was directed to place an advertisement in this issue of The Express reminding residents such action is prohibited by city ordinance.
The council is afraid the grass clippings may accumulate and plug a storm sewer.

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Readers asked to sign petition
News from the United States Postal Service is worse with each passing day. For many offices not only has the mail dispatch time been advanced, often to before noon, but the mail arrival time is being pushed back as the rush to close processing centers continues.
We have recently learned of two websites collecting signatures to show our opposition to the actions which are taking mail service away from rural America.
Readers of this newspaper are encouraged to go to www.apwu.org before May 24 and select the "sign the petition" and the "contact congress today" links.
Personal contact with our U.S. Representatives and Senators is also encouraged. It is time for Congress to intervene and set the Postal Service on a proper course of serving the needs of American citizens.

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