School Board honors three as valedictorians

By: Laura Giammattei

GLENWOOD CITY — The Glenwood City School Board recognized three students as valedictorians during Monday evening’s meeting on March 28. It is the first time in the school’s history to award this honor to three students.

This year’s valedictorian honors will be shared by Maya Petersen, Gabby Peterson and Macie Rasmussen, who all received 4.0 grade point averages. Morgan Kadinger stands as the class salutatorian.

In addition, the board recognized Noah Cline as the Class of 2016’s Technical Excellence Scholarship Recipient. This is just the second year Wisconsin has awarded the scholarship.

Assistant Principal Nicole Brite reported average to above average results for the Dunn-St. Croix conference Badger 3-8 scores. Glenwood City placed highest in the conference in English and Language Arts and scored higher than the state average and other local school districts in Math.

Superintendent Tim Johnson commended the staff and students for their extended effort in ensuring these numbers increase as well as their ability to sustain that success, and that he is “very proud” of these results.

Brite also reported on the tentative schedule for Forward Exam and ACT Aspire testing in April. Forward Exam testing will begin on Monday, April 11 for grades 3-8 and will conclude on Wednesday, April 27. ACT Aspire testing begins on Thursday, April 28 and will conclude Thursday, May 5 for ninth and tenth graders.

Middle and high school principal, Patrick Gretzlock reported very good participation for this year’s winter sports activities. He stated that a total of 84 high school and 47 middle school student athletes participated in winter sports this year.

High school numbers included 20 freshmen, 24 sophomores, 19 juniors and 21 seniors. A total of 27 girls were on the basketball team with zero turnover, while the boys’ team had 24 on the roster, also with no turnover.

Gretzlock also noted that the average GPA of its winter student athletes held strong at 3.085.

One aspect of the winter sports’ program Gretzlock would like to see improvement in is wrestling. The 2015-2016 high school wrestling team showed a lack of new talent, with just one freshman on the roster, while only eight total students went out for wrestling in the middle school.

Gretzlock has been in collaboration with head coach Strong to increase recruitment and numbers for the wrestling program.

Participation in spring sports is plentiful with 14 students going out for golf, 35 for track and field, 22 for baseball and 29 for softball.

Elementary principal Betsy Haltinner reported the Smiles for Life program is in full swing for eligible students at Glenwood Schools which provides free dental care and oral hygiene education to students who do not have access to dental care. Roughly forty high school students and twenty middle school students are participating in the program.

The board approved a two-year lease of a new 2017 bus through American Capital. The bid is $95,776 and also includes $2,000 in financing for each year of the lease. After two lump sum payments, Glenwood School would own the bus outright.

The board approved the purchase of the DOT owned land for the elementary school parking lot. Negotiations between Johnson and DOT brought the price down to $1,800 from $2,200. Johnson also noted additional costs for the excavation, site preparation, asphalt and striping would be $11,629.27.

Tim Johnson also gave an update on the construction in the elementary school, which began last week on Tuesday, March 22. Three elementary classrooms are in the process of having the ceiling tiles replaced and work will migrate next to the wrestling and art rooms.

Additional construction projects approved by the board included four additional exterior light fixtures outside the high school, converting three wooden staircases to concrete, providing a doorway for roof access from the mezzanine, and door repairs and/or replacement for the district office. The total funds approved by the board were in the amount of $108,192 with $113,571 remaining from referendum funds.

Johnson also added that $120,000 of additional budget funds are available if needed for potential construction of the roof structure over the high school, which had not been up to code when built in 1959.

In other business, the board approved Gordy Hierlmeier as the middle school track coach and Kristen Curvello as the new assistant softball coach.

The board also approved Diana Sanders as the summer painter for up to 20 hours per week for up to 10 weeks at regular pay rate. In addition, the board approved the posting for up to four student summer workers for up to 40 hours per week for up to 10 weeks at minimum wage.

The board took action on both items in executive session, which included the approval of Paula Gretzlock as the 20% school counselor beginning with the 2016-17 school year, and Jacqueline Briggs as a special education teacher beginning with the 2016-17 school year.

The next board meeting is scheduled to be held on Monday, April 11 at 6:30 p.m. following the committee meeting at 5:30 p.m.