Cossatot River Primary School perfect attendance

Perfect attendance for the 3rd 9 weeks (2022-2023)

Kindergarten: Andrew Goethals, Leilani Gonzalez, Maeliegh Goodner, Emma Jenkins, Leah Munoz, Bayla Rodriguez, Jackson Speight

First Grade: Maggie Davis, Annabelle Hall, Xander Leach, Brayden Patton

Second Grade: Mason Davis, Yiana Decasez, Jesus Delgado, Kade Denton, Jaxson Knopp, Ely Loyd, Bentley Moss, Kaleigh Peek, Magaly Salgado, Dani Toon, Sophia Williams

Josey Webb among Mississippi State student winners

MISSISSIPPI STATE, MS (03/31/2023)-- Josey Webb, of Mena, AR, is among Mississippi State students whose work was recognized at the 2023 Spring Graduate Research Symposium.

Webb, a student in School of Human Sciences, won Second place in the Master’s-level Agriculture and Life Sciences category for the Oral Presentation titled “Is agriculture being implemented in private school classrooms? The impact of teacher willingness and availability of resources.”

The Graduate Research Symposium is an interdisciplinary forum featuring graduate students’ work. It serves as an opportunity for graduate students to gain experience giving presentations while receiving meaningful feedback from an evaluative panel of established MSU faculty members and researchers.

Mississippi State University is a national STEM-focused, doctoral degree-granting, land-grant university offering a wide range of educational experiences for learning and growth to a diverse student body of approximately 23,000 students. Among the National Science Foundation’s Top 100 research universities, MSU provides access and opportunity to students from all 50 states and 86 countries. MSU is committed to its comprehensive research university mission, addressing complex local and global issues with innovative ideas and solutions.

Duckett

continued from page 19 with applying for grants,” Maye said. Swall is a district conservationist for Polk and Montgomery counties.

The City of Mena also helped the school with building a road to the acreage. $till, the property is probably a quarter mile away, requiring the school to utilize a mode of transportation to get the students to and from instead of spending a halfhour roundtrip walking to the outdoor classroom. Maye is hoping they can get a minibus or van that the school has at the ready on a permanent basis.

There are plenty of things that will need to be done to get the outdoor classroom going and maintaining it.

“I don’t know how much that project is going to cost but it’s a substantial amount of money,” Maye said. “The Ronnie Duckett family, from what I understand, is contributing all the money towards that to get it built.

“We have already erected two wood duck nest boxes on the pond back over on the north side of the property. We have planted food plots for deer. We’ve had the state forestry service come out and do quite a bit of prescribed burning, which improves habitat for wildlife. We plan on doing a lot of thinning and forest stand improvement to facilitate better habitat for wildlife as well.

“We’ve just got a lot of projects and things we want to do. We’ve got some beehives that the local beekeepers association is helping us with. We’ll probably be planting some more wildlife blends this spring in our food plots, and maybe some pollinator blends out in an old field there by the shooting range.”*

The shooting range is used by the school’s trap team as part of the Arkansas Youth Shooting Sports Program (AYSSP).

Maye is also wanting to have the property posted and a fence put around it, as well as a lockable gate at the entrance to protect the resources.

“The classes would be primarily sophomores through seniors,” Maye said. “The purpose of that outdoor classroom is to provide a place on the lab to cultivate learning, to host events from time to time, and a place for our students to be outside and enjoy creation.”

The classroom can be utilized by the other teachers and grades outside of the high school, such as the middle school’s Project Lead the Way Program for STEM. Smith said, “I think the outdoor classroom is something that all of our STEM teachers can use, or any of our teachers could to some degree. Our fine arts should be able to take advantage of coming out here for inspiration, for example.”

Maye said, “If other classes want to get out there and use it, they can use it too. The Forest Service plowed out some firebreaks and made units within the timber. There would be some good walking trails.

A program such as the outdoor classroom could also help draw more students and families to the area based on what Mena Schools will have to offer.

“I think it would be very attractive because of the variety of the teaching approach it lends itself to,” Smith said, “One of the lines in the FFA model is Learning by Doing. Its programs like this, being in nature seeing the results of their work and the experience to use a skill to create a positive outcome. I think that’s what parents are looking for is so their kids gain skills that are applicable in the outdoor world and that’s what this outdoor classroom gives them.”

“It’ll be an on-going process from now on,” Maye said, “because land management is a continuation of what you’ve done in the past.”

“I think this is one more thing that will make Mena Public Schools an attractive option to anybody moving into the area,” Smith said.