Sheldon, Iowa — The Christmas festivities continue in Sheldon throughout the Christmas season.
Sheldon Chamber Coordinator Allison Cooke says this Saturday, December 19th, will be a chance for your child to have cookies and milk with Santa and a ride in a sleigh.
Again those sleigh rides are only from 10:30 to noon, so don’t miss them. Cooke says it doesn’t matter if there isn’t any snow.
She also says don’t forget to shop local by patronizing Sheldon businesses. Plus she says don’t forget Merry Money has to be spent by December 24th and businesses must have it deposited by December 31st.
Your last chance to visit with Santa in Sheldon is coming up on Monday evening. The Sheldon High School Carolers will sing downtown Monday night too.
Northwest, Iowa — If you’d like to see how your child’s public school rates in several important categories, the Iowa Department of Education now has an easy way for you to do that. The Department has introduced a new on-line system to evaluate and rate each public school in the state.
Department of Education director, Ryan Wise, talks about the Iowa School Report Card in an introduction on the website.
The report card is based on the performance of each school for a set of measures.
Wise says the report card should be helpful across education.
While the Iowa School Report Card provides a measurement of schools, Wise says it is not the only thing that should be used to judge the schools.
The scores and ratings are based on data reported by school districts for the 2013-14 and 2014-15 school years. There are no consequences or rewards tied to the school ratings.
The ratings are based on each school’s performance over a two-year span on the following educational measures:
·Proficiency: The percentage of students scoring proficient or better on state reading and mathematics assessments.
·College and Career-Ready Growth: The percentage of students who are making the year-to-year growth necessary to be ready for college and career training by the end of high school.
·Annual Expected Growth: The percentage of students making a year of academic growth in a year’s time on state reading and mathematics assessments.
·Closing Achievement Gap: A measure that reflects a statewide goal of narrowing the gap in achievement for students with disabilities, students who are eligible for free and reduced-price meals, and English Language Learners.
·College and Career Readiness: The percentage of students who score at or above a level of performance on reading and mathematics assessments that predicts a higher probability of postsecondary success. (Middle/high schools only.)
·Graduation Rate: The percentage of ninth-grade students who finished high school within five years. (High schools only.)
·Attendance: The average daily attendance of students, which is the total number of days students were enrolled and present divided by the total number of possible attendance days.
·Staff Retention: The percentage of teachers, school administrators and other licensed staff members who remained employed in a school over consecutive school years.
Schools in the KIWA listening area, for the most part, fell into the top half of the rating categories, being listed as “Exceptional”, “High-Performing”, or “Commendable”. Only four of the area school districts that we checked had schools that were rated “Acceptable”, or “Needs Improvement”, with no area schools receiving a “Priority” rating from the Iowa DOE.
Northwest Iowa — America’s students are graduating from high school at a higher rate than ever before, according to United States Department of Education statistics.
For the graduating classes of 2014, 82.3% of high school seniors successfully graduated from high school. Iowa seniors, on the other hand, graduated at a rate of 90.5%, or 8.2% above the national average for the same time period.
Here in northwest Iowa, most schools are beating the statewide average, and all that we looked at are above the national average. According to the Iowa Department of Education’s Bureau of Information and Analysis, Sheldon and MOC-Floyd Valley districts led the region in 2014, graduating 97% of their seniors. Central Lyon, West Lyon, Sibley-Ocheyedan, and George-Little Rock all graduated slightly more than 96% of their senior class, while South O’Brien had an 89.66% graduation rate, and Hartley-Melvin-Sanborn had an 88.89% graduation rate.
The numbers released by the Iowa Department of Education are for public schools in Iowa, and were for students who were seniors in the 2013-2014 school year.
Northwest Iowa — Christmas is a week away, and for many northwest Iowans, it just wouldn’t be Christmas without a blanket of white covering everything outside. Meteorologist Matthew Dux, at the National Weather Service, says if you’re dreaming of a white Christmas, you might be disappointed. He says the snow we already have most likely will be gone by Christmas.
And he says, the prospects for more snow before Christmas don’t look good either.
We asked Dux to give us a probability for a white Christmas in northwest Iowa. He defined a “white Christmas” as having at least an inch of snow on the ground; and he gave only a 25% chance of there being that much snow on the ground on Christmas.
Many northwest Iowans have travel plans for next week’s holidays and Dux says the good news is the lack of precipitation should at least mean good road conditions.
But Dux says you’ll want to keep an eye on the weather and road conditions after Christmas, as there is a possibility of some winter weather after the holiday.
A huge THANK YOU to everyone who participated and sent in photos of your tree! Each of the three winners will receive 2 passes for Risefest 2016, as well as a meet & greet pass for Chris Tomlin and Newsboys.
Winners were notified via email yesterday afternoon and can pick up a voucher for their prize any time here at KIWA.
The contest was such a big success we hope to do it again next year. We had well over 60 submissions, and it was difficult to narrow it down. We discussed it, and thought it would be fun to have different categories if we do it next year.
Now, here are the winners of the contest:
Most Unique – Richard Ludeke
Best Themed – Kody Hansen
Most Colorful – Rae Lynn Schnider
Most Unique – Richard Ludeke
Richard says of his unusual tree “This is a saguaro cactus skeleton from our property in Yuma Arizona. A saguaro must be 200 years old to grow an arm. So this Christmas tree is probably as old as the United States. This has 3 arms, died, then took many, many years in the sun to dry to see the saguaro skeleton. Amazing that it has survived intact! Each year we decorate it with chili pepper lights and a western theme. This Christmas saguaro brings back many happy memories to our family.”
Kody Hansen – Best Theme
Kody told KIWA that his Jeff Gordon tree is an evolution of ornaments that he either collected or was gifted over the years. He felt he finally had enough to warrant a tree dedicated solely to the Nascar driver and entered this tree on a whim. He says that he’s very glad that he did!
Most Colorful – Rae Lynn Schnider
When we spoke to Rae Lynn she told us that her tree contained ornaments that she has received from friends and relatives over the years.
Contest sponsored by Vogel Paint & Glass, wishing you the blessings of Christmas.
Sheldon, Iowa — Sheldon’s Planning and Zoning Commission has been working for about a year to update the City’s Comprehensive Land Use Plan. They were led through the process by the Northwest Iowa Planning and Development Commission. The Plan which is 154 pages long was approved by the Sheldon City Council at their meeting Wednesday.
City Manager Scott Wynja told the Council that the plan is a tool for Planning and Zoning as well as other elements of City Government when they need to make decisions regarding development. One chapter of the plan includes results of input from the public. Another chapter shows community trends for such areas of population and housing. The document also addresses Public Services in the City, Occupational and Employment trends, Transportation Diversity, Zoning and Parks and Recreation.
In other business the City Council approved the sale of a lot in the Sunshine Addition to Jeff and Sara Van Meeteren for one dollar. The buyers must comply with the stipulations placed by the City on all remaining lots in the Sunshine Addition, which is located on the South side of the City. The lot being sold to the Van Meeterens is located on the north end of South 9th Avenue in the Sunshine Addition.
The Council set January 6th, 2016 as the date for a public hearing on the final plat for the Nest Haven subdivision which is located by the old Smit Pits along Nest Avenue North of Sheldon.
The Council also heard a report by Public Works Director Todd Uhl that the abundance of rainfall this year has re-charged the City’s shallow wells enough to make it practical to begin using them again. He said it will be a slow process to get them back on line, however. He says the result of the changeover will be a reduction in the hardness of the city’s water.
Uhl also reported that Mid-American Energy is in the process of installing new L.E.D. lights on 56 of the poles in the city.
