The Healing Kids Hearts Retreat is still taking applications.
Organizers are urging loved one to get their children’s names in for the retreat as soon as possible.
Children experience the loss of loved ones just as adults do but youngsters grieve differently than adults.
The Center for Life Experience (CFLE) in Hays is offering a special retreat March 30 for children dealing with death.
Healing Kids Hearts is in its fourth year.
The daylong retreat is for children ages 7-12 who’ve lost someone significant in their lives, whether a relative or a friend.
“They don’t talk the same way as adults,” says Ann Leiker, CFLE executive director and a licensed social worker. “They may want to grieve creatively, doing things like making a memory box with pictures and drawings.” Music and story writing is often part of the process.
Children attending past retreats have made bird houses and memory stones to place in a garden to honor loved ones. This year’s activities will include a balloon launch.
The young participants learn about grief, how to embrace it and how to cope with it so they can move forward in their journey of healing.
Each child is paired with a trained adult volunteer as a matched “buddy” for guidance and support throughout the day.
“They become friends and they just share. The kids come in pretty quiet and by the end of the day, they’re smiling and they have hope,” Leiker said. “They have memories of their loved one that they can share.”
“Healing Kids Hearts” will be held 9:45 a.m. to 4 p.m., Saturday, March 30 at the Sternberg Museum of Natural History, 3000 Sternberg Drive. The deadline for applications for participants and volunteers has been extended, but organizers would like to have applications by March 8 if possible. Applications are available on the CFLE website.
Cost is $10 per child which includes a T-shirt, tote, lunch and snacks. The cost for families with two or more children attending is $5 per child. Financial scholarships are available.
A separate session for adults will be held during the morning.
More information is available by calling or texting Leiker at 785-259-6859, or by email at [email protected].
Ron Wilson is director of the Huck Boyd National Institute for Rural Development at Kansas State University.
By RON WILSON Huck Boyd National Institute for Rural Development
A major road construction project is underway in North Africa. An industrial sweeper is being used to prepare the road surface for the application of asphalt. Where do you suppose that sweeper was built? Would you believe, halfway around the globe in Kansas? Today we’ll learn about a remarkable ruralpreneur and his company who is building these sweeper machines for markets across the nation and beyond.
Alan Vance is CEO of Broce Broom, the company which produces these industrial sweepers. Mark Chalfant is chief operating officer.
The history of this company goes back to Alan’s grandfather, Ray Broce, who was born in 1902 in the rural community of Attica, population 626 people. Now, that’s rural.
Mr. Broce worked for the Kansas Highway Department and then went into business for himself in Dodge City. “He mortgaged his home and bought his first piece of construction equipment in 1937,” Alan Vance said.
Alan Vance
Ray Broce grew the Broce Construction Company into one of the leading road construction businesses of its era. Broce became the largest road construction company in Kansas and Oklahoma. “Someone estimated that half the roads in Oklahoma were built by Broce Construction,” Alan said.
From 1973 to 1975, the National Asphalt Paving Association presented its highest award for construction projects to Broce Construction – the only company in history to win the award three years in a row. Gee, they should retire the trophy…
In the road construction process, a roadbed base is built and then swept clean immediately before adhesive and asphalt is applied. It’s important that the road surface be just right.
Of course, the process of building roads and applying asphalt is typically done in the summertime. Winter is downtime. During the winter of 1961, Ray Broce and his mechanics had time in the shop to think about how to improve their road construction process. At that time, a road sweeper was usually towed behind a truck or tractor. That made it difficult to simultaneously steer and adjust the equipment.
The question arose: “Wouldn’t the broom work better if we put it in the middle of the machine where the operator could see it and make adjustments?” The guys went to a salvage yard, got an automobile frame and engine, and mounted the industrial sweeper broom in the center of the machine.
That was the beginning of the self-propelled mid-mount sweeper which would revolutionize that part of the industry. Broce Construction crews used it that summer. It worked so well that other contractors saw it and wanted one also. In 1963, Ray Broce formed a new company, Broce Manufacturing, to build and sell “Broce Brooms.” Eventually the family closed the construction business to focus on manufacturing.
Ray Broce’s daughter went to K-State and later met and married Bud Vance. Bud was an Air Force pilot. When he eventually retired from the Air Force, he joined his father-in-law’s company. They had a son named Alan who served as an overseas missionary before taking the position as company CEO.
Broce Broom now manufactures a heavy duty model for road construction and a lighter weight model for rental companies, while continuing to innovate with its partners. “People are now using our sweepers in the artificial turf industry as the final step in leveling the crumb rubber which has been poured on the artificial turf,” Alan said.
In 2018, the company partnered with another business to offer a new dust control additive to go in the sweeper water tank. “We want our operators to have the safest experience possible,” Alan said.
Broce Broom in Dodge City now has 60 employees. “We have shipped our products coast to coast and exported to 40 different countries,” Alan said. “We continue to sell more sweepers than all our competitors combined.”
It’s time to leave North Africa, where a sweeper from a company in rural Kansas is being used to prepare the roadbed. We commend Alan Vance, Mark Chalfant, and all those involved with Broce Broom for making a difference with engineering innovation. When a Kansas company can have global impact, that is a clean sweep.
Alicia BoorGardeners are eager to get out and do something in the landscape this time of year. One chore that can be taken care of now is pruning certain shrubs.
Often, gardeners approach pruning with trepidation, but it is not as difficult as it may seem. Remember, not all shrubs need to be pruned (i.e., witch hazel), and certain shrubs, which will be identified later, should not be pruned this time of year. Shrubs are pruned to maintain or reduce size, rejuvenate growth, or to remove diseased, dead or damaged branches. Deciduous shrubs are those that lose their leaves each winter. Evergreen shrubs maintain foliage all year and include yews and junipers.
Deciduous shrubs are placed into three groups:
• Those that flower in the spring on wood produced last year
• Those that flower later in the year on current seasons’ growth
• Those that may produce flowers, but those flowers are of little ornamental value.
Shrubs that flower in the spring should not be pruned until immediately after flowering. Though pruning earlier will not harm the health of the plant, the flowering display will be reduced. Examples of these types of plants include forsythia, lilac and mock orange. Shrubs that bloom on current seasons’ growth or that do not produce ornamental flowers are best pruned in late winter to early spring. Examples include Rose-of-Sharon, pyracantha, Bumald spirea and Japanese spirea.
Pruning during the spring allows wounds to heal quickly without threat from insects or disease. There is no need to treat pruning cuts with paints or sealers. In fact, some of these products may retard healing. There are three basic methods used in pruning shrubs: thinning, heading back and rejuvenating. Thinning is used to thin out branches from a shrub that is too dense. It is accomplished by removing most of the inward growing twigs by cutting them back to a larger branch. On multi-stemmed shrubs, the oldest canes may be completely removed.
Heading back is done by removing the end of a branch by cutting it back to a bud and is used for either reducing height or keeping a shrub compact. Branches are not cut back to a uniform height because this results in a “witches-broom” effect.
Rejuvenation is the most severe type of pruning and may be used on multi-stem shrubs that have become too large, with too many old branches to justify saving the younger canes. All stems are cut back to 3- to 5-inch stubs. This is not recommended for all shrubs but does work well for spirea, forsythia, pyracantha, ninebark, Russian almond, little leaf mock orange, shrub roses and flowering quince.
Alicia Boor is an Agriculture and Natural Resources agent in the Cottonwood District (which includes Barton and Ellis counties) for K-State Research and Extension. You can contact her by e-mail at [email protected] or calling 620-793-1910
LIBERAL — Hefty college debt won’t saddle Bryan Medina.
He’s on a fast track to an energy career that he hopes will pave the road to family dreams: Buying his own cattle and going in on the purchase of 300 acres of land with his dad.
Students take a U.S. history class that also counts toward college credit at Liberal High School. CELIA LLOPIS-JEPSEN / KCUR/KANSAS NEWS SERVICE
“We could grow and eventually own our own feedyard,” said Medina, who finished high school last May in the small southwest Kansas town of Sublette. “If things go great, if we put all the work into it, we’ll definitely get there.”
Medina had just one semester left of his natural gas studies at Seward County Community College in Liberal. Kansas footed much of the bill for him, meaning Medina can start banking paychecks faster toward those livestock purchases instead of pouring them into college loans.
“I left Wyoming Tech owing $17,000,” said David Ratzlaff, one of Medina’s instructors. “It took me about 10 years to pay that off.”
Savvy teens eyeing tech careers can get a leg up in life under a Kansas program that made college free for them while still in high school. Stories like Medina’s have generated buzz, and now some education officials and lawmakers are mulling how to help students shooting for non-technical careers, too.
Cost and logistics could prove hurdles. The potential expenses of such a program remain unclear, as does legislative support amid the state’s gradual recovery from years of fiscal trouble.
New research on the dual credit boom in Texas also raises questions about how much money it really saves families. And it suggests dual credit mostly helps white students and those with more money, instead of the low-income and minority students policymakers want to put on a level playing field.
But if Kansas can smooth out the wrinkles, high school students see a way to build competitive college applications and get ahead, all while easing into more rigorous coursework. Many already enroll in dual credit at their own expense.
“It’s not as intimidating” starting college this way, said Nevaeh Bess, a Liberal High senior earning such credits at her own, familiar school. Her teachers explain class assignments and expectations clearly.
“That helps out a lot — knowing what your teacher is grading,” the aspiring anesthesiologist said. “I spoke to someone that is in college now, and she was like, ‘Well, sometimes I just don’t know what they’re looking for.’”
High stakes
For students plotting a direct course from high school to four-year colleges, taking dual credit may seem like an easy choice.
Students in Liberal pay around $300 per class. That’s less than a third of the price they’d pay as freshmen at the University of Kansas and many times cheaper than out-of-state tuition.
Liberal High senior Mica Watson-Huskey has her sights trained on a major in civil or aerospace engineering at the University of Texas at Austin because of the school’s research opportunities.
Last year, she took college algebra and trigonometry, but she lost some of the credits when she couldn’t pay in full. High school students don’t qualify for financial aid that can take some of the sting out of tuition bills.
If the state paid for even a few dual credit courses, Watson-Huskey said, that would lift ambitions at a school where many families struggle to make ends meet.
“They would have the motivation to do a college class,” she said. “They wouldn’t be limited because of the amount of money.”
One thousand of the 1,300 students at Liberal High come from low-income families.
The school lies in a corner of the state where meat drives the economy. The thousands of slaughterhouse jobs in the region pay $14 an hour on average, an annual salary of just under $30,000 a year.
Many of the students here would be the first in their family to attend college. Most learn English as a second language and four out of five are Hispanic.
Nationally, Hispanics and people whose first language isn’t English are less likely to go to college than other Americans.
The vast majority of students at Liberal High graduate. But of those only a third quickly head to college or work on an industry certificate. Across Kansas more than half of high school graduates do.
Yet missing out on higher education shuts doors. Decent jobs still exist for people with no more than a high school diploma, but not to the extent they once did.
Economist Nicole Smith says those jobs continue to dwindle. Today, just three in 10 teens who stop their educations at high school can hope to find jobs that will pay at least $35,000 from their mid-20s through their early 40s and at least $45,000 after middle age.
What of the other seven?
“They’re going to be experiencing significant amounts of hardship,” Smith said. “Even to get a job, and far less to keep that job and to earn a living wage with it.”
Smith — chief economist at Georgetown University’s Center on Education and the Workforce — co-authored studies on the changing job landscape. Those spurred Kansas and other states to ratchet up efforts to get more students to college.
Chart: The Kansas News Service Source: US Census Bureau Created with Datawrapper
Survival mode
That urgency has Kansas education officials hunting for ways to bridge the college gap — not just for go-getting teens planning careers in anesthesiology and engineering.
They hope free dual credit would plant the idea of higher education in more students’ minds, making it seem less scary, distant or unattainable.
“There are a lot of students that are college ready and college material,” said Jean Redeker, vice president for academic affairs at the Kansas Board of Regents. “But they don’t know it.”
Free tech classes have already built one bridge, college administrators say. They attract high school students whose families otherwise might not feel comfortable setting foot on a college campus — even just to ask questions.
Janeth Vazquez advises families at Seward County Community College. CREDIT BETHANY WOOD / FOR THE KANSAS NEWS SERVICE
In Liberal, many may not know about federal financial aid and generous local tuition grants. That leaves families feeling Seward County Community College “is only for people with money,” said Janeth Vazquez, who advises students there. “A goal that’s just too out of their hand.”
Vazquez gets it. Many are in survival mode. When she was a teen, her father was deported and she worked long hours after school helping to pay the mortgage, utility bills and other family needs.
“That was my story,” she said. “That was my life.”
Last year, the Kansas Senate passed a bill that would have kicked off free general education dual credit in a test program — paying for English composition for high schoolers.
It’s Kansas’ most popular non-tech dual credit class. Free access to algebra, psychology, public speaking and U.S. history would possibly have come in the following years.
The idea never got a vote in the House. It fell to the wayside amid the broader school finance battle in the Legislature — yearslong wrangling over court rulings that demand Kansas increase funding to local schools.
Recommendations for the dual credit legislation came from the Regents and Kansas State Department of Education. To qualify, they suggested students would generally need:
A 3.0 GPA and a college-ready ACT score in math or English to take algebra or composition. Nationally, most ACT-takers hit the mark in English but not math.
A 3.0 GPA and a 20 or higher composite ACT score to take any of the other three free classes. That’s a little below the national average composite score.
Logistical hurdles
Pinning down the potential cost to taxpayers has proved complicated.
Just how many of the state’s 70,000 high school upperclassmen would jump at an offer for free college English, algebra and more remains unclear. After the state rolled out free tech college classes in 2012, student enrollment in those more than doubled.
About 15,000 Kansas high school students took college dual credit at their high schools last school year. They took, on average, two classes each.
Then there’s the matter of calculating cost per student. The Board of Regents finished a study in December, but the state’s two dozen two-year colleges reported huge variations in cost per credit hour. English composition ranged from more than $900 per credit hour to $1.
Some variation is inevitable. In addition to regional cost differences, colleges deliver dual credit through a variety of models. Some high school students travel to campus for class, or connect through remote video links and online tools. In other cases, colleges send professors to high schools or rely on high school teachers to run courses themselves.
Colleges and high schools would have to figure out how to ramp up capacity if English and other classes became free. The pilot proposal aims for a soft start that would buy time to identify and deal with hurdles.
Having high school teachers teach college classes only works when those instructors hold advanced degrees with significant relevant coursework. On the other hand, placing students in on-campus classes comes with potential transportation costs and difficulty aligning schedules, among other issues.
Administrators talk eagerly about the possibilities — enthusiasm tempered by the knowledge that logistics take time to solve. They worry, too, that they might build dual credit programs only to see the money disappear in a few years amid funding battles in the Legislature.
Even funding for the state’s free tech college program — popular with lawmakers across party lines — fell millions of dollars behind in recent years. That unsettles Seward County Community College president Ken Trzaska. A quarter of the students at his school now attend through that initiative.
“That program is a great program,” he said. At the same time, it’s a vulnerability. “If, suddenly, the funding goes away or that population of students go away, then that’s a huge hit.”
Good and bad news
Uneasy faculty at the University of Texas took the following question about dual credit to university brass: Might it inadvertently hurt freshmen? Some professors reported that students arriving with college basics out of the way struggled in next-level classes.
UT’s study and a separate one conducted by the American Institutes for Research both came out last summer, among the most ambitious dual credit studies to date.
They offer good and bad news from a state ripe for analysis. Texas has vigorously promoted early college credit for years. From 2000 to 2016, the number of high school students in dual-credit classes rose more than tenfold, topping 200,000 per year.
The bad news first:
Dual credit didn’t save students much money. UT students saw a negligible impact on debt unless they showed up at college with a full two years of credit. Savings may elude many people because their credits don’t align with their degrees or they opt against graduating early.
Past research oversold dual credit. Dual credit appeared to help students likely to succeed in college anyway. After factoring for that, college enrollment only ticked up by about 2 percentage points and graduation rates by an “insignificant” 1 percentage point. Many past studies touting robust benefits from dual credit fell short of standards for rigorous research.
Dual credit doesn’t solve achievement gaps — it mostly helps white, more affluent students. Poor students who took it became less likely to go to or finish college. Black students became more likely to attend two-year colleges, but not to graduate. Hispanic students became more likely to finish a two-year, but not a four-year, degree.
Now, the good:
Even if the benefits were less than previously touted, they were still statistically meaningful. Grade analyses and course comparisons also didn’t bear out faculty concerns that high school teachers might be watering down dual credit classes for their students.
Even with evidence of less significant benefit, the cost of dual credit paid off many times over. Better college outcomes mean higher eventual incomes for dual credit students, who earn more money and consequently pay more tax revenue to the state.
Dual credit does improve college prospects for some people. Though dual credit didn’t help poorer students as a whole, it did help the academic high-flyers among them to make it to college and graduate.
Kansas state Sen. Molly Baumgardner says some of the Texas findings point to problems unrelated to dual credit. Minorities enrolling but not graduating in larger numbers suggests colleges need to recognize that students need better support.
“They have a changing role,” she said.
Baumgardner, chair of the Senate’s education committee, spearheaded work on last year’s bill. In her combined 16 years of teaching high school and community college, she saw students grow when opportunity allows.
“Kids don’t really know their limits,” she said. “But they become limited if they’re told they can’t do something.”
This is Part Four in our series on college and careers. Don’t miss Part Oneon the advent of the “college economy,” Part Two on planning life after high school and Part Three on Kansas’ tech college boom.
Department of Communication Sciences and Disorders at Fort Hays State University
FHSU University Relations
Three undergraduate students in the Department of Communication Sciences and Disorders at Fort Hays State University recently attended Legislative Day at the Capitol building in Topeka.
Madisson Jesse, Burlington senior, Ashley Luna, Victoria junior, and Alexis Schaben, Hays senior, attended. Jacque Jacobs, Herndon Clinic coordinator and professor in the CSD Department, Tara Marshall, clinical educator, and Stephanie Tiernan, clinical educator in the department also attended.
“It’s easy to get consumed with your day-to-day activities and providing services to your clients,” said Marshall. “Legislative day is an opportunity to connect with politicians about issues that affect our profession and, therefore, our clients.”
This was Marshall’s second Legislative Day.
“Advocacy is part of our scope of practice, a part that we need to invest time in as well,” she said. “By involving CSD students in Legislative Day, we’re instilling in them the value of advocacy at an early stage in their careers in hopes that they will continue to get involved when they are practicing clinicians.”
KSHA members have been active at the Capitol since the inception of the organization in 1959. Through activities such as participating in bills, serving on task forces and regulatory boards, and voting in local and state elections, members have made a lasting impact on the professions and those with communication disorders.
“Legislative Day plays an important role in the life of a professional association and in the lives of our members,” said Susie Ternes, executive director of KSHA. “When members of an organization come together at the Capitol, they show policymakers that they are paying attention and that they want to maintain an open line of communication with them.”
“Legislators are expected to be knowledgeable about many different topics and many know very little about the work of a speech-language pathologist or audiologist,” said Ternes. “Bringing awareness to our profession and to the clients we serve is a critical component to our Legislative Day activities.”
Legislative Day provides participants the opportunity to learn about current legislative priorities and learn about ways to become involved in the legislative process. It also provides an opportunity for members to meet with their legislators and begin to form relationships with those who represent the members at the State level.
“We are called to be advocates for our clients, and advocating for change at the state level has a tremendous impact on our mission. Through effective communication, all individuals will realize their potential,” said Ternes.
“Going to Topeka and hearing from legislators was a valuable experience,” said Jesse. “Our group discussed two important topics for the field of speech-language pathology, Medicaid expansion and more funding for education.”
Jesse and Schaben were able to meet with State Rep. Eric Smith, Burlington, to discuss CSD matters and learn more about advocacy.
“Having Madisson and Alexis here and listening to their ideas and observations helped me to take a big breath of relief because I know that there are young people out there who truly care about our country and our state,” said Smith.
“They showed a genuine compassion and interest for the direction our state is going and that kind of attitude is going to be key to future success of Kansas,” he said.
“This experience showed me that it’s important for any young adult to be educated on these and other topics, as they can enter the polls at any given time,” said Jesse.
Abrienne Pince, USD 489 Best of the Best Award winner, shakes hands with school board member Sophia Rose Young at the school board meeting Monday night.
By CRISTINA JANNEY Hays Post
Abrienne Pince, Lincoln Elementary third-grader, was honored with the student Best of the Best Award for February for her friendship to other students and her natural leadership abilities.
She was nominated by her teacher Larissa Whitney.
“Abrie is someone who has stood out since the beginning of the school year,” Whitney said, “especially for her selflessness and her ‘How can I help you, Miss Whitney?’ and her overall demeanor. I have a classroom full of students who need a friend and Abrie accepts that challenge every day.
“I see her walking to school every day with her shoulders held high. She has this confident smile, and it is almost if she is on a mission.”
Whitney said Abrie helps other students when she can, befriending them on the playground or walking with them at school.
During a beginning-of-the-year get-to-know-you exercise, almost every student listed Abrie as a good friend.
“I thought that was amazing,” Whitney said. “She is already a natural leader and it was only the first week of school.”
Whitney continued, “She loves others so well, so I hope that tonight, Abrie, you are soaking this all up like a sponge, and I want you to know how much we love you and I hope you feel so loved. Honestly, we need more Abries in this world. I could see her sitting on a panel of a board some day. I could see her being our first lady president if that is what you want to do.”
Whitney also praised Abrie’s parents. Abrie’s father, Bill, bought pizza for the class after they completed their reading workshop. Whitney used the pizza as an opportunity to teach a lesson on fractions and division.
Abrie’s mom brought in Halloween treats and lead the class in make-and-take craft projects for both Christmas and Valentine’s Day.
“Our classroom has been blessed by this family,” Whitney said. “I am sad I only have a couple more months with Abrie, but I hope she will come back and help with our classroom every year in some sort of capacity.”
Kathy Wagoner
Kathy Wagoner, USD 489 Best of the Best Award winner with members of the Hays school board and Superintendent John Thissen.
Kathy Wagoner, Hays High language arts teacher, was honored with the February’s Hays USD 489 staff Best of the Best Award for her work on the HHS job fair.
She was nominated by Sue Rouse, HHS office staff member.
Wagoner also co-sponsors student council.
“She is one of the people who actually brings the community in, so they have a knowledge about of what is going on at Hays High,” Rouse said.
Wagoner started a program with the help of Tammy Wellbrock, director of the Hays Area Chamber of Commerce, to bring professionals into the high school to help students develop resumes and interview skills. This was the second year for the program, and about 50 professionals participated this year.
“As the office person, I was so excited … to see so many strong and professional people coming in. They were quality people doing the interviewing,” Rouse said. “When they came back to the office to sign out, they were so excited because they had met some really awesome kids with some awesome goals. Three of [the students] even commented they were thinking of going to technical college and coming back and working in Hays.”
Vera Elwood, young adult librarian with the Hays Public Library, was one of the professionals who interviewed students. She also attended the school board meeting Monday to speak on Wagoner’s behalf.
“I have seen no one who has demonstrated a commitment to the Hays High mission statement of empowering all students for tomorrow’s challenges quite like Mrs. Wagoner does,” Elwood said. “Each year she puts in countless hours to create the mock job fair for seniors.”
Wagoner recruits local hiring professionals throughout the community as volunteers, works with the seniors in advance to prepare resumes, teaches them interview skills and talks to them about professional behavior and attire.
“Then she brings it all together for days of crazy scheduling to make it all work to have job skill panels and mock interviews for every senior in the high school,” Elwood said. “This allows the students to practice real-word skills and network with potential bosses in the community.”
Elwood interviewed dozens of seniors and sat on multiple panels during this year’s job fair.
“I have seen how serious the seniors take this exercise and how big of an impact it can have on their lives,” she said. “I interviewed a student who had just landed her first job. I interviewed a student who was in the process of applying for technical school and was very worried about the interview portion. I met a student who had already started her own business and met a student who already had eight years of working experience by his senior year because of working on his family farm, and we talked about how to translate that onto a resume.
“I even interviewed one student who I was so impressed by that when she emailed me a thank you note, I responded with an application to my library because I really wanted to keep her in the community.
“Every student I spoke to was so prepared to leave the halls of Hays High and represent their alma mater in the real world, and none of the that would have been possible without the work and dedication of Mrs. Wagoner.”
Wagoner acknowledged her fellow teachers Alicia Brungardt and Diane Mason who work as a team on the job fair.
RILEY COUNTY — Law enforcement authorities are investigating a shooting that sent two people to the hospital.
Google map
Just before 2:20 a.m. Saturday, the Riley County Police Department Dispatch Center received a report of shots fired in the 2300 block of Tuttle Creek Blvd in Manhattan.
Two individuals were life-flighted to Stormont-Vail Topeka Hospital for injuries. Investigators were still on the scene and authorities asked the public to avoid the area.
Anyone with information on this crime, is encouraged to contact the Riley County Police Department at (785) 537-2112 or Crime Stoppers at www.p3tips/353 or (785) 539-7777. Using the Crime Stoppers service allows you to remain anonymous and could qualify you for a cash reward of up to $1,000.00.
The new lab-on-a-chip’s key innovation is a 3D nanoengineering method that mixes and senses biological elements based on a herringbone pattern commonly found in nature, pushing exosomes into contact with the chip’s sensing surface much more efficiently in a process called “mass transfer.” (Credit: Yong Zeng)
KU NEWS SERVICE
LAWRENCE — A new ultrasensitive diagnostic device invented by researchers at the University of Kansas, The University of Kansas Cancer Center and KU Medical Center could allow doctors to detect cancer quickly from a droplet of blood or plasma, leading to timelier interventions and better outcomes for patients.
The “lab-on-a-chip” for “liquid biopsy” analysis, reported today in Nature Biomedical Engineering, detects exosomes — tiny parcels of biological information produced by tumor cells to stimulate tumor growth or metastasize.
“Historically, people thought exosomes were like ‘trash bags’ that cells could use to dump unwanted cellular contents,” said lead author Yong Zeng, Docking Family Scholar and associate professor of chemistry at KU. “But in the past decade, scientists realized they were quite useful for sending messages to recipient cells and communicating molecular information important in many biological functions. Basically, tumors send out exosomes packaging active molecules that mirror the biological features of the parental cells. While all cells produce exosomes, tumor cells are really active compared to normal cells.”
The new lab-on-a-chip’s key innovation is a 3D nanoengineering method that mixes and senses biological elements based on a herringbone pattern commonly found in nature, pushing exosomes into contact with the chip’s sensing surface much more efficiently in a process called “mass transfer.”
“People have developed smart ideas to improve mass transfer in microscale channels, but when particles are moving closer to the sensor surface, they’re separated by a small gap of liquid that creates increasing hydrodynamic resistance,” Zeng said. “Here, we developed a 3D nanoporous herringbone structure that can drain the liquid in that gap to bring the particles in hard contact with the surface where probes can recognize and capture them.”
Zeng compared the chip’s nanopores to a million little kitchen sinks: “If you have a sink filled with water and many balls floating on the surface, how do you get all the balls in contact with the bottom of the sink where sensors could analyze them? The easiest way is to drain the water.”
To develop and test the pioneering microfluidic device, Zeng teamed with a tumor-biomarker expert and KU Cancer Center Deputy Director Andrew Godwin at the KU Medical Center’s Department of Pathology & Laboratory Medicine, as well as graduate student Ashley Tetlow in Godwin’s Biomarker Discovery Lab. The collaborators tested the chip’s design using clinical samples from ovarian cancer patients, finding the chip could detect the presence of cancer in a minuscule amount of plasma.
“Our collaborative studies continue to bear fruit and advance an area crucial in cancer research and patient care — namely, innovative tools for early detection,” said Godwin, who serves as Chancellor’s Distinguished Chair and Endowed Professor in Biomedical Sciences and professor and director of molecular oncology, pathology and laboratory medicine at KU Medical Center. “This area of study is especially important for cancers such as ovarian, given the vast majority of women are diagnosed at an advanced stage when, sadly, the disease is for the most part incurable.”
What’s more, the new microfluidic chips developed at KU would be cheaper and easier to make than comparable designs, allowing for wider and less-costly testing for patients.
“What we created here is a 3D nanopatterning method without the need for any fancy nanofabrication equipment — an undergraduate or even a high school student can do it in my lab,” Zeng said. “This is so simple and low-cost it has great potential to translate into clinical settings. We’ve been collaborating with Dr. Godwin and other research labs at The KU Cancer Center and the molecular biosciences department to further explore the translational applications of the technology.”
According to Zeng, with the microfluidic chip’s design now proven using ovarian cancer as a model, the chip could be useful in detecting a host of other diseases.
“Now, we’re looking at cell-culture models, animal models, and also clinical patient samples, so we are truly doing some translational research to move the device from the lab setting to more clinical applications,” he said. “Almost all mammalian cells release exosomes, so the application is not just limited to ovarian cancer or any one type of cancer. We’re working with people to look at neurodegenerative diseases, breast and colorectal cancers, for example.”
On KU’s Lawrence campus, Zeng worked with a team including postdoctoral fellow Peng Zhang, graduate student Xin Zhou in the Department of Chemistry, as well as Mei He, KU assistant professor of chemistry and chemical engineering.
This research was supported by grants from National Institutes of Health, including a joint R21 (CA1806846) and a R33 (CA214333) grant between Zeng and Godwin and the KU Cancer Center’s Biospecimen Repository Core Facility, funded in part by a National Cancer Institute Cancer Center Support Grant (P30 CA168524).
HOISINGTON – Ryan Karlin scored a career-high 28 points and the Monarchs made a season-high eight three pointers as they earned a 66-54 win over Hoisington Friday to advance to Saturday’s sub-state championship game.
Hoisington took a three-point lead a couple of time in the first quarter before the Monarchs tied the game at eight at the end of the first quarter.
In the second Hoisington used a three-point lead to take an 11-10 lead with 5:37 to play in the first-half, but that would be the last time they would have a lead in the game.
Down one, Ryan Karlin connected on his second of six three’s in the game to put TMP up 13-11 and they would never trail again.
After another Karlin three the Monarchs led 21-16 in the final second of the first-half when Bryce Seib stole the ball at mid-court and banked in a three-pointers to beat the buzzer that game TMP a 24-16 lead.
In the second-half Hoisington closed the game to four with 5:30 to play in the quarter when Karlin drained another three to put an end to the Cardinals run and put TMP up 30-23.
The Karlin three sparked a 17- 7 run that put TMP up 14 at the end of the third quarter at 44-30.
Karlin added his sixth three-pointer of the game to open the fourth quarter giving TMP a 17-point lead at 47-30.
Hoisington closed the game within 10 two times in the final minutes of the game but the Monarchs were able to hold on for the 66-54 win.
Karlin finished with a career-high 28 points and fellow senior Jared Mayers added 10 points.
Hoisington’s Mason Haxton led two in double-figures with 16 points.
The Monarchs improve to 12-11 and will take on Smoky Valley in Saturday afternoon’s sub-state championship game in Hoisington.
Smoky Valley, the five-seed, defeated the top-seed Phillipsburg 49-43 Friday.
Saturday’s championship games have been moved to 2 p.m. for the girls game and 3:30 p.m. for the boys because of the chance for winter weather impacting the region.
Boys
1A sub-state semifinals
At Pratt
St. John-Hudson 66 Minneola 27
Attica 44 Hodgeman Co. 38
At Dodge City
South Gray 67 Little River 58
Macksville 68 South Central 53
At WaKeeney
Central Plains 73 Stockton 25
Wallace County 63 St. Francis 40
At Great Bend
Osborne 48 Quinter 66Northern Valley 63 Sylvan-Lucas 39
At Clay Center
Centralia 49 Burlingame 52
At Alma
St. John's/Tipton 50 Blue Valley 68
3A sub-state semifinals
At Hoisington
Phillipsburg 43 Smoky Valley 39
TMP 66 Hoisington 52
At Kismet-Southwestern Heights
Larned 62 Colby 37
Hugoton 70 Scott Community 60
Girls
2A sub-state semifinals
At Leoti
Trego Community 48 Oberlin 22
Hoxie 43 Plainville 50
At Meade
Meade 36 Sublette 51
5A Sub-State Finals
Sub-State #1 at Maize South
Salina-Central 44 Maize South 61
Sub-State #2 at Goddard
Hays 33 Goddard 38
Sub-State #3 at McPherson
Bishop Carroll 32 McPherson 53
Sub-State #4 at Wichita-Heights
Maize 44 Wichita-Heights 45
Hays High traveled to Goddard on Friday night for a sub-state championship game and berth to the 5A State Tournament.
Both teams played a tight first quarter and to a two all tie through the first six plus minutes of the game. Hays had four chances to break the tie and take the lead but was unable to do so. Goddard hit two shots in fifteen seconds to grab a 6-2 advantage. The Indians trailed 8-5 after the first quarter then cut the deficit down to 8-7 after an Isabel Robben coast to coast basket with 3:30 to go in the half.
Hays had one chance to take the lead without success and then Goddard received points from an unlikely source. A player that had made one three pointer on nine attempts on the season made back to back three pointers sandwiched around Jaycee Dale field goal for a 14-9 lead. Goddard hit a third straight three for a 17-11 advantage before Robben hit a put back shot for a halftime score of 17-13.
Highlights
Goddard scored the first points of the third quarter to take a seven point lead at 20-13. Back to back field goals from Brooke Denning and Taleia McCrae brought the Indians back within three at 20-17 and the lead remained around three points through the rest of the quarter and was at 24-21 heading to the fourth.
Goddard went on a 7-2 run for a game high eight point lead at 31-23 with 3:01 left. Then it was the Indians turn for their best run of the game. Six straight points by Hays closed the game down to a 31-29 score with 1:35 left. The final 1:16 came down to free throws. Goddard made 7 of 10 free throws while Hays made two of four attempts and made just one of their final five field goal attempts.
Coach Alex Hutchins
Goddard held on for a 38-33 win and punched a ticket to the 5A State Tournament in Emporia. The #3 Lions go to state at 20-2 while the Indians finish their year at 14-8.
Hays was led by Savannah Schneider scoring ten point.
Hays graduates four seniors that combined for 330 games played, 249 starts, 2010 points, 1147 rebounds, 490 assists and 480 steals. Mattie Hutchison played in a school record 86 games, Savannah Schneider 85 games, Kallie Leiker 84 games with 84 starts, and Jaycee Dale 75 games.
PITTSBURG, Kan. – Fort Hays State won a pair of non-conference games against Pittsburg State on Friday (Mar. 1), moving to 7-4 overall on the season. The Tigers won by scores of 5-4 and 6-0, led by a 5-for-7, two home run, five RBI day from Bailey Boxberger and a complete-game shutout from Hailey Chapman. Pittsburg State dropped to 7-8 overall.
Game 1: Fort Hays State 5, Pittsburg State 4
A solo home run by Bailey Boxberger in the seventh inning proved to be the game winner for Fort Hays State in the first contest of the afternoon. Boxberger finished the game 4-of-4 at the plate with 2 RBIs.
The Tigers took an early 1-0 lead on Boxberger’s first RBI of the game, a single up the middle that plated Grace Philop in the first inning. Pittsburg State countered with a pair of runs on a two-out, two-RBI single by Makenzie Goswick in the bottom half of the inning. That produced the only lead of the day by the Gorillas, a 2-1 advantage after an inning.
Philop instantly pushed the Tigers back in front in the second inning with a bases-clearing, two-out double to left center field. Jeni Mohr, Lily Sale, and Katie Adler all came in to score on the play.
Philop’s double in the second stood as the game’s decisive hit until the sixth when Pittsburg State rallied for a pair of runs to tie the game at 4-4. Michaelanne Nelson settled into the circle during the second through fifth innings, but ran into trouble in the sixth when the Gorillas opened the inning with a single, RBI double, and a walk. Hailey Chapman took over in the circle and hit the first batter she saw, which loaded the bases with no outs. Chapman got a strikeout before a grounder to second base tied the game. Chapman escaped further damage by getting another strikeout to end the threat.
Already 3-for-3 at the plate, Boxberger blasted her solo homer to left field in the seventh to push the Tigers back in front and then Chapman mowed through the heart of the Gorilla order in the bottom half of the inning with a strikeout, flyout, and another strikeout. Chapman picked up the win for FHSU in relief, moving to 3-2, with her only runner allowed being the batter she hit in the sixth. It was just the start of a dominating day for Chapman in the circle. Nelson went 5.0 innings in her start, allowing four runs on six hits and four walks, while striking out four.
Shelby Smith took the loss for PSU, moving to 3-3 on the season. She allowed 11 hits and three walks with three strikeouts in her complete game effort.
Game 2: Fort Hays State 6, Pittsburg State 0
Already warmed up from getting the final six outs of game one, Hailey Chapman continued to navigate through the Gorilla lineup by hurling a four-hit complete game shutout in game two. She struck out five and did not allow any walks.
Chapman locked in a pitcher’s duel with Sierra Thompson for the first three innings as the teams went into the fourth inning scoreless. The Tigers finally solved Thompson in the fourth when they strung together four consecutive singles by Megan Feiner, Jeni Mohr, Lily Sale, and then Terran Caldwell. Caldwell’s bases-loaded, two-RBI single up the middle with two outs broke the scoreless tie and put the Tigers up 2-0.
A Grace Philop single and Sara Breckbill walk to open the fifth inning put an end to Thompson’s day in the circle handing the ball to game-one starter Shelby Smith. Her first challenge in relief was the person she could not get out in game one, Bailey Boxberger. The trend continued as Boxberger launched a ball over the right field wall for a three-run home run, pushing the Tiger lead to 5-0. Boxberger finished the day 5-for-5 against Smith, reaching base all six times against her in the doubleheader with two home runs, three singles, and a walk.
Breckbill tacked on an insurance run in the sixth with an RBI double, but it was plenty for Chapman in her march toward a complete-game win. Chapman retired the side in order in three of the seven innings. Chapman moved to 4-2 on the season by picking up the win in both games.
Tiger Notes
-Bailey Boxberger went 5-for-7 at the plate with 2 home runs and 5 RBIs. She was 5-for-5 against Shelby Smith in the doubleheader and reached base in all six plate appearances against her.
-Hailey Chapman averaged a strikeout per inning, fanning nine over nine innings of work for the day with no runs allowed. She has 31 strikeouts through 28.2 innings of work this season. She had a WHIP of 0.56 for the day.
-Fort Hays State outhit Pittsburg State 23-10 in the doubleheader.
-Seven of Fort Hays State’s 11 runs on the day came with two outs. The two home runs on the day by Boxberger that produced the other four runs came with less than two outs.
Up Next
Fort Hays State travels to Springfield, Missouri on Saturday to take on Drury University in another doubleheader. Game time is set for 12 pm.
WICHITA, Kan. (AP) — The fraud case of former Kansas legislator and current Sedgwick County Commissioner Michael O’Donnell is now in the hands of jurors.
Michael O’Donnell-photo Sedgwick Co.
The judge gave jurors an hour to get organized and begin deliberations before he dismisses them for weekend. O’Donnell faces 23 counts of wire fraud and three counts of money laundering related to his state and county campaigns.
Prosecutors allege he put $10,500 in campaign funds into his personal checking account and gave some to friends.
O’Donnell testified the payments were legitimate campaign expenses.
The Wichita Republican was elected to the Kansas State Senate in 2012 for a term that ended in January 2017. He did not run for re-election and instead ran for and won a term on the Sedgwick County Commission that began in 2017 and is set to expire in 2020.
By BECKY KISER
