Please stay

Editor:

An open letter to Keith Lewis. Please stay as superintendent of Douglas County Schools and proceed our School District as No. 1 in Nevada. You were right and those who opposed you were incorrect. 

Bruce Hollander

Gardnerville

Work with board

Editor:

Whether one liked the outgoing school superintendent, or not, must be of no consequence nor should his personality be of any consequence as well.

In point of fact what did matter, was the unwillingness to serve the varsity board in accordance with their direction and instruction. Wanting to do things the best way it was done under the prior board after which wanting the newly elected board majority to only rubberstamp these actions. That’s just not how it really works sir, nor should it’s, in my humble opinion.

Saying that being pushed out without cause is disingenuous at best.  Conducting oneself because the boss and ignoring the duly elected school board showed contempt not just for the board, but for the people of Douglas County and, really, created a dangerous precedent.

There are some who would say that, for the past 12 months, the newly elected board majority has been hamstrung from implementing their vision for the DCSD under which students, teachers, and all stakeholders would have succeeded and prospered.  Now they are going to have the chance to rectify the issue.  I wish them well and thank them for his or her enviable efforts up to now. 

Robert M. Hellen, Sr.

Sunridge

Gilkerson stalling

Editor:

It actually looked like Trustee Gilkerson was attempting to drag things out on the Douglas County School Board meeting on Sept. 12. She apparently, with none advance notice to her fellow trustees or any effort to resolve her “concerns” upfront, pulled the attorney fees application from the consent calendar. If Trustee Gilkerson’s intent was to waste public and county time, she succeeded to the tune of 1 and a half hours nit- picking the attorney bill. Is she still indignant that the vast majority of the board [this is still a democracy] replaced an attorney, who was deemed ineffective, with one who’s at his peak and may represent the Board, appropriately? Yes the bill was higher than before. The brand new attorney has been inundated with lawsuits, document requests, and alleged technical violations by a bunch of sore losers, all this along with his regular duties. What would Trustee Gilkerson have him do? Not do the work? Work free of charge? In what world does Trustee Gilkerson live?

Terri Akola

Topaz Ranch Estates

A rhyme for the time

Editor:

On the ballot, selections led us astray,

For the incorrect candidate, we solid our say,

Now within the realm of legal battles, strange and bizarre,

A metaphor arises, like a distant star,

Hiring a lawyer, a private injury ace,

To represent the varsity district’s case,

Is akin to a proctologist, quite absurd,

Performing open heart surgery, undeterred.

For in matters of law, as in matters of health,

The specialist’s knowledge is essential to 1’s wealth,

A proctologist, expert in matters below,

May find the center’s intricacies hard to know.

Just as a surgeon, with a scalpel precise,

Knows the center’s chambers, its rhythm, its vice,

A lawyer must grasp the law’s vast terrain,

To navigate pitfalls, triumph or strain.

 

Within the realm of non-public injury, he’s found his space,

Navigating complexities of an insurance case,

Though we don’t diminish his legal shine,

In safeguarding our schools, he won’t be a lifeline.

 

For schools need protection, experience profound,

A legal representative who’s all the time around,

To fathom the statutes, the foundations, and the lore,

And guide them through perils, as LeGoy did before.

 

So, in matters of law, heed this sage decree,

Like a proctologist performing surgery, you’ll see,

Hiring the proper expert, is the prudent way,

To safeguard children’s interests, come what may.

 

Amidst this tempest of perspectives, let reason be your guide,

The college board can excel, with children’s needs in stride.

It’s not only politics alone; your mission is profound,

To nurture young hearts and minds, where our future will be found.

James Lawrence Esq. 

Gardnerville 

Hales’ partisan patter

Editor:

In line with an article on this paper last Sept. 30, Sharla Hales, speaking on the Business Council Forum on Sept twenty eighth attempted to elucidate away the poor scores of the DCSD student body on a nationwide test by saying scores were” between two different testing regimes” and called attempts at comparison as “inaccurate and inexcusable”. Conspicuously, Mrs. Hales offers no solutions. Only criticism. 

Interestingly enough, the test scores were out and on the screen behind Mrs. Hales, yet the Trustees had not received them after asking repeatedly for them to Mr. Lewis. The scores were available quickly enough to throw the conservative board members against the wall, but to not the School Board president when she had been asking for them. She finally received them almost two weeks after from an unnamed individual after that egregious meeting. The whole absence of knowledge flow from Mr. Lewis to the brand new trustees has been since they took office.

But what is basically “inaccurate and inexcusable” is her partisan diatribe, as quoted within the paper, that the varsity board is “in search of to remove his [Superintendent Lewis’] ability to send communication to families.” I feel that is patently false. From the varsity board published agenda, it seems that the board is just in search of to require the Superintendent to first get their approval as to form and content for normal communications with families. That’s proper and regular. The superintendent is the worker of the Board and as such he’s alleged to be under their supervision and control, not the opposite way around. Hales, then again, says that is “undermining the power of the superintendent to do his job.” False again. He’s merely being required to pass those communications through his bosses first. He’s, in any case, not a free agent. Hales acts as if she doesn’t understand who’s alleged to be running the show – our elected officials or their worker.

Simply stated, she shouldn’t have stated as a fact something which is merely, at best, her opinion. 

Hales is an attorney and may know higher than to try and pass of partisan propaganda as fact. Now that’s ‘inaccurate and inexcusable’.

Virginia Nisse

Gardnerville

Please support our district

Editor:

My name is Jennifer Tanner. I even have lived in Douglas County for 40 years – 20 on the lake – 20 within the valley. My very own children went k-12 on the Lake schools. Two of my grandchildren went k-12 within the valley. I taught for 20 years within the district on the elementary level. My daughter is in her twentieth 12 months teaching at Douglas High.

You’ve got been entrusted with the education of our community’s children. As trustees you have got been handed the present No. 1 school district in Nevada. EPIC Douglas County! What are your duties as trustees? Five answers got here up repeatedly in my research.

Number One: As trustees you’re to support excellence in student achievement and the creation of a positive and effective learning environment. Our district’s mission statement is a vision for excellence in academics and character that features all of our community’s children. As trustees your mission is on behalf of our students. Our community’s schools aren’t a venue for partisan political platforms or a pulpit for spiritual guidance from a specific sect or denomination. You might be to be advocates for all children of Douglas County.

Number Two: It’s your job as trustees to learn the parameters of your role. There are district, state and national codes and regulations that outline your job. To function a trustee you should be cognizant of those codes. Yet this board has proposed removing bylaws that require you to attend skilled development workshops or that you just be told on educational issues continuously brought before the board.

Number Three: The trustees shall work hand in hand with the chief executive officer to offer support, ensure accountability and advocate for all students. In class districts the chief executive officer is the Superintendent. In Douglas County that’s Keith Lewis.

Number 4: The trustees shall manage budget items before them in a fiscally responsible manner. 90 percent of most school district’s money is spent when the facilities are open, the lights and warmth on and all staff paid. There shouldn’t be an amazing deal of discretionary funding. Trustees must judge any expenditure against the district’s goals for our students.

Number Five: Trustees shall foster a curriculum that gives fields of study that create positive learning environments for all students: the students, musicians, artists ,student athletes, tradesmen, special needs students and yes, for individuals who just cruise through their school years and those that are dazed and confused by all of it. 

Five tasks of college board Trustees. You’ve got lost your way.

But the excellent news is: our community is here to assist you learn learn how to be stewards of our youngsters’s education, celebrants of our incredible employees and positive promoters of public education. 

Jennifer Tanner

Jacks Valley

Support the varsity board majority

Editor:

Cheers for our latest school board majority.  I an so thankful for his or her efforts, each of them – Katherine Dickerson, Doug Englekirk, Dave burns and Susan Jansen.  All Of Douglas County owes them an enormous debt of gratitude.  They and their newly appointed attorney Joey Gilbert have done a implausible job of returning our college district to considered one of traditional values. 

Unfortunately, and no credit to them, a vocal group of sore losers (whose ringleader appear to be the prior school board president who lost to President Susan Jansen) apparently don’t have anything higher to do except to scurry around and say mean things in regards to the above mentioned.  How crass can one get?  Sore losers all.  And the Oct. 7 meeting was even worse.

All they achieve is to run up expenses and create discord where none is need exist and otherwise making everyone’s job harder and more costly.  Indeed, even Commissioner Sharla Hales took some low cost and unwarranted shots because the Business Council meeting of Sept. 28.  No class, in my view.  Indeed, shame on all of them.

Please proceed to support our high quality school board majority.  From what I see, all are working very hard to make our college district and its pupils the very best they will be.

Ed Hayes

 Sunridge

What’s ‘woke’ actually mean

Editor:

In response to the complete page ad appearing within the Sept. 27, 2023, Record Courier funded by Nevada 1st Pac. The web site indicates it’s a PAC registered by the Federal Election Commission out of Alexandria, Va. Who’re they and why are they funding advertisements for a Nevada school district? Please look up the web site. If anyone in Douglas County is collaborating with this out of state group, I’d like them to discover themselves as a substitute of hiding behind the name 1st Nevada PAC. Let’s be transparent about who’s funding these advertisements?

First I need to explore the meaning of “woke” because it is widely utilized in the Nevada1st PAC advertisements to explain a gaggle of people that purportedly have an irrational and evil agenda, especially in the case of our local schools and students. As defined within the Merriam Webster dictionary “woke” means: “aware of and actively attentive to vital societal facts and issues (especially problems with racial and social justice)”. One other definition provided by the Oxford English Dictionary “alert to racial or social discrimination and injustice.

I would favor to be “woke” somewhat than “asleep”.

Moreover, while grateful to live in a rustic with the freedoms we enjoy, let’s not close our eyes to the realities of slavery, racial oppression, segregation, and disparities that exist to at the present time. These facts must be included in lesson plans to be taught in our local schools. 

The inference that the woke agenda is encouraging the sexualization of youngsters is fake. It does perplex me why gender differences are so frightening to many individuals. Gender differences don’t imply perversion, pedophilia or deviant behaviors. They aren’t a threat to our youngsters. I don’t care how anyone identifies their very own sexuality. I’m more concerned about someone’s character, principles and integrity, something that certain members of the varsity board and these Nevada PAC members clearly lack.  

In reference to the comparison of math and english scores from 2017/18 to 2021/22, perhaps the Nevada 1st PAC has forgotten the dire situation our local, state, and national schools faced through the COVID epidemic. No matter your beliefs in regards to the origin of this virus, or whether or not masks or vaccines were mandatory, or whether schools and businesses must have closed, this district under the leadership of Keith Lewis, survived the specter of teachers and students becoming infected by teaching online while keeping students and teachers and staff protected from an epidemic traveling through our area people. 

Online teaching was difficult at best. Lessons could have suffered. Kids and teachers suffered, and maybe math and English scores suffered. But I can assure you it wasn’t simply Douglas County schools whose scores dipped during that difficult time. The truth is referencing the web site that this political commercial advisable I discovered that the majority school districts within the State of Nevada had reduced scores during this time period. 

Stop sowing your seeds of fear and misinformation in a community whose school district has been so highly regarded. 

Susan Lippmann

Gardnerville Ranchos

Because of Kiwanis 

Editor:

Thanks Kiwanis in your donation to our READing Paws and Reading Furends programs.

Program concept- allow kids to read allow to animals in a protected environment with no judgement attached to reading speed or mistakes. This improves the literacy skills of youngsters with the assistance of pet reading teams.

Pet and handler reading teams are trained by the next organizations.

READing Paws is an Affiliate of R.E.A.D.® (Reading Education Assistance Dogs®), a program of Intermountain Therapy Animals® (ITA) of Salt Lake City, Utah

Alliance of Therapy Dogs- Reading Furends

How this system works.

Kids signup to order a 15 minute reading slot.

Kids can read anything they need during their reading time.

Very young children can take part and talk in regards to the pictures of a book.

The predominant idea is to get the children to do the reading. That is practice time!

When the kid is completed reading, they check in with their reading rating card.

The reading rating card builds up time and the children get rewards- stickers and small prizes.

The Kiwanis gave the Douglas County Public Library funds to support two latest reading pet teams.

How will we get a latest reading pet team for the library?

It starts with a pleasant person and a mild calm pet. They work as a team. Personality! (They need to like people and other pets)

The pet owner contacts the organization for certification.

They get an inventory of coaching requirements that they shall be tested on.

They join the READing Paws for Read Furends)

They get training suggestions and advice to practice.

They get tested and must pass to be certified. (The library will reimburse costs when a team passes training, thanks Kiwanis)

They undergo probation with other members and get graded

The library provides protected space and we keep track of readers

In case you would like to volunteer together with your pet and want more information please contact Douglas County Public Library. 775-782-5754

Timothy DeGhelder

Minden

October and the Pink Ribbon

Editor:

It will possibly be devastating. It will possibly be heart-wrenching. It will possibly be a complete surprise. It will possibly be cured or extend life with powerful treatments and radical cutting. It will possibly cause a slow and painful death or one inside just a few months. Cancer – the disease, malignancy, tumor, growth which may bring us to our knees.

October, Breast Cancer Month… Pink ribbons and pink flowers filling large pots along our well-traveled Foremost Street are reminders of this vicious attack on bodies….reminders of lost friends and relatives in addition to beloved pets, but additionally a reminder that there are survivors, too, and this affords hope – perhaps not this 12 months, perhaps not next 12 months but within the many years coming. 

Great strides have already been made and can proceed. Clinical trials are critical. This author is well-aware of this having had a double mastectomy in 2007 with 4 cancers in a single breast – three different kinds. Mammograms every 12 months. No family history. Researchers are devising reliable predictors of developing breast cancer and survival rates (medicalxpress.com/news/2023-08-year=breast-cancer.html). 

A large number of due to all areas of research – individuals who devote themselves to finding cures, inventors who spend many years in search of out latest cancer medicines, biomedical engineers designing latest equipment, DNA scientists who laboriously scan multitudes of information looking for tidbits of knowledge connecting the dots and medical personnel who constantly and gently support and encourage patients. Thanks greater than words can express.

Robin L. Sarantos

Minden

Haunted by a Disrespectful Society

Editor:

I’m haunted by a disrespectful society.

I admit that there are greater than one million things that disappoint me in regards to the state of our society, and by extension, our community. Life’s challenges affect all of us in alternative ways, and attitudes often reflect. For my millennial mind on the heels of a world pandemic and the toes of economic uncertainty, the rampant inflationary insanity paints a bleak future for lots of us. The prospect of owning an honest home within the region I grew up in seems an almost impossibility on any timeline. A tank of gas costs a reasonably penny from each paycheck, and a cart of groceries gets filled about half as high because it did 10 years ago. There’s lots to be in a nasty mood about.

With the aforementioned tribulations a reality for lots of us, it’s easy to get fed up with one another a bit of quicker than we’re used to. What’s not okay, nevertheless, is how we’re treating each other. As a baby, I used to be taught by the older generations that I used to be growing up right into a world of respect. Don’t like someone? That’s okay, but you’d higher treat them with respect. Be the voice of reason. Develop into the higher future.

Alas, the words of lots of those exact same teachers and mentors ring negativity to our fellow neighbors within the everlasting ink that stains these very pages. The identical voices that preached personal responsibility and the importance of motion have hypocritically shifted into petty disagreements, and all the best way all the way down to hateful criticism and private attacks. On a day by day basis in various types of media, I watch neighbors attack neighbors. I watch members of our community cut one another off in traffic and—in some cases—risk the lives of their fellow man to get quick revenge. I watch toxicity spew through keyboards.

We’re higher than this.

If we’re ever going to maneuver forward as a society and a community, we really want to start out treating one another with kindness, and on the very least, with respect.

Eric Cachinero

Sunridge

Let’s be a community

Editor:

I write this letter to you as an almost lifetime member of the community. We moved here from Oregon in 1994 after I was barely 10 years old. Once we moved here the community embraced us and helped to be sure that that my family became successful not only in business but additionally as members of the community, and we equally supported the community. Though we’re lucky enough to be entering our thirtieth 12 months here, things have sure modified.

Why is an element of our community against reasonably priced housing? Why do they assume that the individuals who maintain them on the food market, gas station, dry cleaner, etc. can afford to live here? Why don’t these people discuss with the people around them and discover who they’re and the way they will help them to proceed to live here, where most of us have grown up and where we wish to boost our families.

Let’s be essentially the most community oriented place to live. I do know for a indisputable fact that there are many places where people can volunteer or donate to and so they can use your money and time to grow. You never know when you could end up in need of considered one of our organizations. Some examples are, The Suicide Prevention Network, Family Support Council, Aktion Club, Backpack Buddies are only just a few. If these organizations don’t ring a bell then begin a conversation with considered one of our locals and I guarantee they are going to have some ideas. 

Show up at a county commission meeting and ask for reasonably priced housing. Let’s be a community that loves and supports one another.

Melissa Davis

Minden

Good art show

Editor:

I’m pleased that I used to be one in a big group of art lovers who attended the opening reception of the third Annual Sierra Nevada Invitational Art Show and Sale held on the Carson Valley Museum and Cultural Center on Sept. 30.  Nine of the West’s best artists got here together to showcase a curated body of high-quality creative works, seen for the primary time. The show was created by local Artists Teri Sweeney and Joe Millazo. Teri Sweeney has lived within the Carson Valley for over 17 years. Her work is an excellent representation of the sweetness that surrounds us here. Joe Milazzo re-located her from Arcadia, California and his work with the Pencil and Ink is a God-given talent. Sheri Greves-Neilson, is one other local Artist. Her wonderful paintings of animals she finds on the local ranches rest in lots of local homes.

This Show is representative of the evolving arts and culture scene here within the Carson Valley. It’s an ideal example of our local talented Artists Connecting – Collaborating  –  and Creating. As this continues, our Carson Valley Artists are working to make our Valley an ever-bigger Arts Destination. Many Because of Dennis Little, the Museum Director and his talented staff of volunteers who hosted the Show. 

The Sierra Nevada Invitational Art Show is the results of Teri and Joe’s vision of the High quality Arts as a unifying force in our Valley. It’s produced for the enrichment of our residents and to showcase the incredible talents of our Artists. What might be higher?

Joe Hooven

Minden