FACADE PROJECT
SPARTANS THIRD
The city of Creston is exploring the possibility of a grant to restore the facades of buildings in the uptown area. For more on the project, see page 3A. >>
The Southwestern Community College men’s golf team placed third Thursday at the Graceland Invitational. For more on the Spartan golfers, see SPORTS, page 8A. >>
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Water’s Edge, pool CCSD sees improvement committee design in FAST scores concepts for potential upgrade CRESTON COMMUNITY SCHOOLS
By CARTER ECKL CNA staff reporter ceckl@crestonnews.com
CNA photo by SCOTT VICKER
Newly elected members of the Creston Community School District Board of Directors take the oath of office Monday night during the board’s regular meeting in the boardroom at the former Burton R. Jones complex. Pictured, from left, are Terry Freeman, Galen Zumbach and Sharon Snodgrass. Zumbach and Snodgrass were each re-elected to the board, while Freeman won a vacant seat based on write-in votes.
Board swears in new members ■
By SCOTT VICKER
CNA managing editor svicker@crestonnews.com
Formative assessment system for teachers (FAST) scores are trending upward for Creston Community Elementary School students. Callie Anderson, principal for junior kindergarten and kindergarten, and Scott Driskell, firstthrough fifth-grade principal, presented FAST scores to the Creston Community School District Board of Directors during the board’s regular meeting Monday. The FAST screenings test a student’s reading proficiency. The tests are given three times each year, during the fall, winter and spring, with each test during the year testing progressively tougher skills. “The difficulty of things change from fall to winter to spring?” asked Board Member Sharon Snodgrass. “So when you only go up 1
percent, it really is lots more than that?” “Right, because it’s changing those foundational skills,” Anderson said. “We’re excited to see that trend line continue to go up.” Anderson In the fall of 2015, only 49 percent of Creston Community School District’s junior kindergartners through fifth-graders were proficient. That number increased dramatically to 57 percent in the winter of 2015. From there, the number took a slight dip to 56 percent in the spring of 2016 before growing again to 57 percent in fall of 2016. Since then, the percentage of proficient students has continued to climb to 61 percent in the winter of 2017 and 63 percent in the spring of 2017. Students are currently being screened for the fall of 2017 period, and Anderson hopes to have
those results back within a couple of months. “I set a trend line on there (graph) to show we are making upward progress, which is encouraging,” Anderson said. “This is three times a year and it’s electronically scored by the teachers so we can receive immediate data once the students have been screened.” Driskell noted how the original FAST program was abandoned by the state after some issues arose with how teachers reported the scores. “When they rolled out the FAST piece, they were having a lot of technical issues with it and the state pulled back,” Driskell said. “That was part of our professional development this afternoon, getting our teachers acclimated with their (new) piece. The way they give the Driskell SCHOOLS | 2A
The next step toward improvements and funding for an aquatic center upgrade is underway following the pool committee’s twoday public hearing last week. A few members of the public met with Water’s Edge and the rest of the pool committee to give feedback on a handful of design optionsthe design firm had produced. The public feedback coupled with more pool committee ideas will lead to the next step in the
early stages of this project. “They were going to go back and put it into the drafting software and come up with a couple of more concrete designs so we can start coming up with costs,” said Samantha Baird, head of the pool committee. Five designs had been sketched out for the public to view last week. Every design option presented included the current pool and wading pool that currently make up the aquatic center. After the presentation, the public in attendance were given POOL | 14A
CNA photo by CARTER ECKL
Pictured is one of several designs presented to the public during last week’s public hearing regarding potential upgrades to Creston’s aquatics center. Water’s Edge is taking feedback from those meetings and is coming up with more designs for the pool committee to consider.
UNION COUNTY SUPERVISORS
Supervisors approve hog confinement expansion By ALEX FELKER
CNA staff reporter afelker@crestonnews.com
A Union County hog confinement facility will be expanding after the Union County Board of Supervisors approved the expansion by a 2-1 vote during Monday’s regular meeting. The facility, operated by Benjamin Waigand on behalf of BJW Pork LLC, scored a 445 out of 880 total possible points on the Iowa DNR’s master matrix. “The reason this is taking place,” said Waigand, “(is) I signed a new contract with JBS, and they wanted to expand it (the confinement facility) to 5,200 head. They wanted the extra pig space,
and so that’s the terms we agreed to.” JBS is an international meat processing company. The facility Waigand operates currently manages about 4,800 head. It will maintain its same square footage with the introduction of about 400 new head. According to the Iowa DNR, the master matrix is “a scoring system that can be used to evaluate the siting of permitted confinement feeding operations. Producers in counties that have adopted the matrix must meet higher standards than other permitted facilities. “Before they can be approved for construction, they must earn points on
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the master matrix for choosing sites and using practices that reduce adverse impacts on the environment and the community.” COUNTY | 2A
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“I SIGNED a new contract with JBS, and they wanted to expand it to 5,200 head. They wanted the extra pig space, and so that’s the terms we agreed to.”
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CNA photo by CARTER ECKL
Farmers Market: Connor Travis, 14, of Creston poses with some of his produce for his
business, Travis Produce, at Monday’s Creston Farmers Market in McKinley Park. Travis’ produce will be available to buy at Hometown Insurance with payment based on an honor system. Next week, Sept. 25, will be the last Creston Farmers Market of the year.
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