Month: October 2017
‘Letters From Home’ to honor area veterans
Graveside conversations at historic Fort Hays
Join Historic Fort Hays for another free Sesquicentennial event! Scheduled tours will take you through the grounds to listen to the people from Fort Hays first hand. Plus, hear ghost stories that have taken place at the Fort.
We are still celebrating the 150th Anniversary of Fort Hays. So it will be another free event. We will schedule tours to walk through the grounds and you will learn about some of the people from Fort Hays. Mostly first person accounts from some of our volunteers who will be dressed in period clothing. You will also hear about some of the ghost stories that have taken place in the buildings over the years.
Saturday, Oct. 28, 7-9 p.m. at Fort Hays Historic Site, 1472 Highway 183 Alternate
Pumpkin carving at the Hays Public Library
Bring the whole family to this pumpkin carving extravaganza! we have 20 pumpkins to give away, so be sure to arrive early if you want a chance at a free pumpkin. You are more than welcome to bring your own pumpkin (BYOP!)
Hays Public Library
1205 Main St
October 28 | 2-5 PM
Trick or Treat On The Bricks
Grab your biggest bag and come to The Bricks in Downtown Hays for a fun and safe trick or treating environment! Over 60 participating businesses will open their doors to children of all ages.
Thank you to the Hays Daily News for organizing this event on The Bricks!
Participating Downtown Businesses will open their doors from 3-5 p.m. October 31st for your princesses, ninjas, ghouls, and super heroes!
LuVerna K. Schmeidler
LuVerna K. Schmeidler, 87, Hays, died Monday, October 23, 2017 at the Hays Medical Center.
She was born August 5, 1930 in Hays, Kansas the daughter of Joseph and Salomia (Wittman) Stroemel.
In 1948, she graduated from Victoria High School. She was united in marriage to Linus H. Schmeidler on September 14, 1957 at St. Ann’s Catholic Church in Walker. They celebrated 55 years of marriage before he preceded her in death on August 4, 2013. She was a member of St. Joseph Catholic Church, the Daughters of Isabella, worked at Travenol, and was a cook at St. Ann’s School in Walker and St. John’s New Horizons for many years.
Survivors include two brothers-in-law; Duane Klein and Edward Froelich, both of Hays and numerous nieces and nephews.
She was preceded in death by two brothers; Julius T. Stroemel and Marvin Stroemel and two sisters; Dolores Froelich and Edna Klein.
Mass of Christian burial will be at 10:00 am on Friday, October 27, 2017 at St. Joseph Catholic Church, 215 W. 13th Street. Burial will follow in the St. Joseph Cemetery. Visitation will be from 5:00 pm until 8:00 on Thursday and from 9:00 am until 9:45 on Friday, all at Hays Memorial Chapel Funeral Home, 1906 Pine Street. A Daughters of Isabella rosary will be at 6:00 pm followed by a parish vigil at 6:30 pm, both on Thursday at the funeral home. Memorials are suggested in LuVerna’s memory to St. Ann’s Cemetery in Walker, Kansas in care of the funeral home. Condolences may be left for the family at www.haysmemorial.com
Moritz, Chance named Hays USD 489 Best of the Best
By CRISTINA JANNEY
Hays Post
Brad Moritz, exploratory/industrial tech teacher at Hays Middle School, was honored with the district’s Best of the Best Award at the Hays school board meeting Monday night.
Moritz, who is also a department leader, was nominated by HMS Principal Craig Pallister.
On early release days, Moritz teaches digital citizenship to all HMS students over the school’s closed circuit television system. He talks to the students about how to use the school’s iPads and the rules of using the school’s technology.
“Brad takes on a lot of leadership roles and allows students and parents to be involved in activities and academics at Hays Middle School and cares and connects with every student, every period, every day,” Pallister said.
Moritz is the voice on channel 21 and is the announcer at the HMS assemblies. He plays games with the students over the PA system or shoots T-shirts into the crowd with the school’s T-shirt cannon.
“He came down to the gym the other day, and I said, ‘Ok, Brad, what are you doing?’ He said, ‘Well, I’m just going to get the kids going.’ I said, ‘Don’t get them too revved up,’ because this was at 8 o’clock in the morning.”
Pallister continued, “Brad is truly a master teacher in and out of the classroom that helps provide the total school experience whether it is shooting rockets they make in his exploratory tech classes or CO2 cars or doing the bridges.”
Pallister said Moritz affects almost every student in the school every year.
Moritz said it has been a pleasure working under Pallister at the middle school.
“It is has been nice to have the support we have had to make the changes in our technology program over the 20 years that I have been there,” he said. “I think the curriculum we teach — science, technology, engineering and math — speaks for itself.”
Moritz said he really enjoys his job.
“Sometimes I feel bad because getting to do the things we do — it is almost not like a real job,” he said. “If you happen to catch me at parent teacher conferences tonight, I will be building a robot for our robotics club we have in the afternoon. How cool is that to get to test bridges and play with robots?”
The student Best of Best Award was given to Logan Chance, seventh grader at HMS. He was nominated by Larissa Whitney, third-grade teacher at Lincoln Elementary School. Whitney was unable to attend the board meeting Monday, so Pallister discussed Chance’s nomination in her stead.
Chance is a part of the HMS peer tutoring program, and he travels to Lincoln to help students there.
“I appreciate his hard work already,” Whitney said in her nomination form. “For example, today he was finding ways to help me out instead of waiting for me to give him the next task. He decided he would organize a book cart, use proximity to monitor student reading and sort mailboxes.
“In addition to how helpful he is, I appreciate how proud he is to be on the Hays Middle School cross country team this year. Every time he comes into the room, he has the biggest smile and greets me with a, ‘Hi, Mrs. Whitney.’ ”
Logan is the son of Shawn and Shauna Chance.
Ellis Co. Historical Society presents ‘Dining with the Dead’
A Victorian style picnic will be held in Mount Allen Cemetery on Saturday, complete with music, activities and the opportunity to learn about the Victorian era’s “obsession” with death.
Ellis County Historical Society invites the public to bring lunch and a blanket to enjoy a sunny afternoon in the cemetery. The FHSU String Quartet will provide a variety of music and activities for children.
ECHS Director Lee Dobratz will lead a discussion of historical examples of dining with the dead, as well as the cemetery conditions that led to today’s memorial parks. Gather at Mount Allen Cemetery, 27th and Vine in Hays, by noon Saturday to join the festivities. Park along 26th street or in St. Joseph Cemetery. Costumes welcome.
Located at 100 W. Seventh, Ellis County Historical Society, founded in 1972, collects, preserves, and exhibits items and documents that illustrate the history of Ellis County.
— Submitted
1 arrested after alleged threat against school in Russell
RUSSELL COUNTY – Law enforcement and USD 407 school district officials are investigating an alleged threat against the schools and have a suspect in custody.
On Tuesday, administration and staff were made aware that an individual was allegedly making criminal threats, according to the school district web site.
Police took a suspect into custody and they are being held in Russell County Jail.
School officials are taking extra precautionary security measures as a result of the alleged threat. Local law enforcement agencies will remain vigilant in protecting students and staff.
Law enforcement authorities and the Russell County District Attorney are working to determine possible charges in the case.
SCHROCK: Accreditation, Chinese style
Last week was the visit from the inspection team from Beijing. I am at a national university, and that means that there will be national inspection teams. In the U.S., all universities are state-sponsored or independent and there are no equivalent national universities. In China there are roughly 40 nationally-funded universities as well as some Chinese Academies of Science that award degrees. The Ministry of Education inspection team was here all week.
There was the standard public relations banner welcoming them and the campus was kept very clean (but it normally is, anyway). Tarnished bronze signs indicating “Key Laboratory” (select, nationally funded) were replaced by new chrome signs. But classes met as normal.
The department chair led a portion of the team through the museum inspecting the actual condition of the collection. They already had all of the university data on classes, student numbers and facilities. You could say that they had been given the maps, but now they were here to confirm the ground truth. There were the standard meetings with groups of faculty. –And with groups of students.
But I asked a teaching/research colleague, “Do individual members of the team also chat with random members of the faculty?” –Yes!
“Do some sit down in the student commons and talk with random students?” –Yes!
“Do they check rigor of teaching by looking at sample tests at random?” –Yes!
With some of the team wandering around in an unscheduled way, they can actually detect most of what is really going on in the classroom. –Whether faculty meetings are honest discussions. –Whether rigor is being maintained in coursework, etc. Any idea of lying or misrepresenting anything to them is unthinkable.
Friday was the last day, with an exit ceremony. But there was no pronouncement whether the university passed inspection. There will be a detailed closed discussion back in Beijing. I have no doubt that this university will “pass” (it matches or excels any Kansas university). But I suspect that this inspection might have detected weaknesses in some program or staffing or some facilities, and that will be relayed via back channels.
It is therefore ironic that this is the very same week that in America, the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill got off free after a NCAA investigation of academic‑athletic fraud. For nearly two decades, Chapel Hill had athletes who got credit for classes they did not attend and work they did not do. To quote the Chronicle of Higher Education summary: “The association not only stopped short of levying the extreme penalties that some observers had expected, but refrained from applying virtually any penalties at all.” This decision was by an athletic body. But all of that time, UNC-Chapel Hill was also fully accredited.
If accreditation in the U.S. was similar to the Beijing inspection, some teacher or student at Chapel Hill would have likely squealed. But U.S. accreditation visits are a brief, highly choreographed dance, the team having already supposedly read through virtual reams of online paperwork written by university folks who scored high in “creative writing.” By having institutions only address some selected “measureable outcomes,” the system is easily gamed. A large faculty meeting with administrators in attendance ensures appropriate answers. And a selection of hand-picked naive students are no better.
The simple evidence for much of U.S. accreditation being a farce lies in the fully accredited status of schools that were closed due to providing no genuine and substantial education, and to “schools” that award credit for just taking tests, and to “schools” that graduate “nurses” that have never set foot in a hospital, etc.
But the UNC Chapel Hill incident also shows that nothing is changing to force U.S. accreditation to detect such problems tomorrow.
Nor is K—12 education in Kansas any better off, where annual U.S.D. paperwork reports (now submitted online of course) are also accepted on faith alone.
The solution is the very procedures that I saw here in China last week: actual checking the ground truth at the school. Unfortunately, neither the KBOR nor KSDE has a single person who has the authority and the responsibility to inspect on site and in person. So if you like reading fiction, Topeka has a lot of accreditation literature just for you.
John Richard Schrock is a professor at Emporia State University.
Win the ‘Best Seat in the House’ for Tiger football
Eagle Communications wants to give you the “Best Seat in the House” for this weekend’s Fort Hays State University football game.
Sign up to win the Eagle Best Seat in the House by filling out the form HERE.
One lucky winner will receive four tickets to the game and will be seated on a couch and chairs near the south endzone, complete with Eagle cups and an Eagle/FHSU blanket.
Those registering must be able to attend the game to be eligible to win.
Village Tours New Orleans Coach and Cruise with Theresa Trapp
Eagle Radio of Hays is offering a special promotion with Village Tours traveling with on air announcer Theresa Trapp.
Embark on a 7-night cruise vacation to the Caribbean with Theresa Trapp from KHAZ 99.5 FM! The miles will go by quickly as we travel south to festive New Orleans on a bonafide winter escape. From here, board the magnificent Carnival Dream and visit the ports of scenic Mahogany Bay, Grand Cayman & Cozumel! Includes deluxe motorcoach transportation, cruise fare, luggage handling, transfers and meals onboard the ship. In addition, hotel stays in Bossier City (pre-cruise) & near Dallas (post-cruise) are included in this package. Join us today and escape the cold this winter!
Cost starts at just $1479 per person double occupancy. Call Village Tours at 785-625-3255 or go online to VillageTours.net before November to guarantee space on this trip.
Entrepreneurial couples bring their stories to FHSU program
FHSU University Relations
A pair of special entrepreneurial teams will be the featured attraction at the fall 2017 edition of Fort Hays State University’s Entrepreneur Direct Lecture Series – two married couples who have built successful business entrepreneurial careers and lives.
Admission is free and the public is invited.
Rick and Gail Kuehl, Hays, and Gail and Cindy Boller, Norton, will present their stories from 10:30 to 11:45 a.m. Tuesday, Nov. 7, in the Eagle Communication Hall of the Robbins Center on the university’s campus.
The Kuehls opened their first McDonald’s restaurant in 1979 in Hays. They have continued to grow their organization, and currently own two restaurants in Hays, one restaurant in Russell and another in WaKeeney.
“Their philosophy is ‘people first’ as they work with a team of 210 employees,” said Dr. Mark Bannister, dean of Fort Hays State’s W.R. and Yvonne Robbins College of Business and Entrepreneurship. “They believe in giving back to the communities they serve, and are supporters of education at all levels.”
Early in their careers, the Kuehl’s also owned three radio stations and founded Media-Net, Hays’ first Internet provider.
Gail Boller founded Natoma Corp. in 1982 in Natoma. Two years later, he moved the company to Norton. The corporation is a world-class contract manufacturer. The company’s primary customers are aerospace, medical, and energy related. Natoma Corp.’s assets were sold to the Natoma Manufacturing Corp. in April 2017.
“The owners of Natoma Manufacturing are home grown Nortonites,” said Bannister. The company currently employs more than 80 people.
In 2009, working with a partner, Cindy Boller founded Destination Kitchen, a unique retail kitchen store in Norton.
“Destination Kitchen is a destination for delectable desserts, California Roasted Peets Coffee, a top line of teas and an exciting menu of baked goods, sandwiches and lunch items, and provides essential tools and gifts for the home cook,” said Bannister.
Entrepreneur Direct is a speaker series conducted by the university’s Robbins College, featuring successful entrepreneurs in an informal setting accessible to students, faculty and the public. The program is intended to connect students with successful entrepreneurs who have stories and advice to share. A panel asks questions about entrepreneurship and encourages questions from and interaction with the audience.