Fairbury FFA Attends 90th National FFA Convention

On October 24th at midnight, the Fairbury FFA Chapter set out from Lincoln on their way to the 90th National FFA Convention in Indianapolis, Indiana. In attendance from the Fairbury Chapter were Sarah McCown, Brock Barton, Olivia Koop, Kane Hasselbring, Delaney Miller, Kaylee Sipek, Michaela Buchli, Bryn Livingston, and Trevin Arnold. While they were there, the group of nine, plus advisor Thomas Dux, attended various workshops and fairs.

There is a large career fair held in the convention center each year, where various businesses and colleges have booths to give the FFA kids a chance to learn more about agricultural opportunities.  They also had the chance to take a tour of the Dallara Indycar factory where students were able ride in an Indycar.  Unique to the state of Nebraska, the Nebraska chapters sponsor a dance on two nights of convention that are only for Nebraska FFA students. The Fairbury FFA chapter attended both of these dances, and enjoyed meeting and visiting with students from other chapters closer to home.

Fairbury graduate Cody Huss also received the American FFA Degree.  The American FFA Degree is a sign of great accomplishment and only a small percent of FFA members ever earn this degree.  There are numerous requirements for FFA members as one of them is members have to have earned at least $10,000 or productively invested $7,500 into their Supervised Agricultural Experience Program.  Congratulations to Cody on this huge accomplishment.  

It was a full week, but they all enjoyed venturing outside the comfort of home and into the sea of blue.

 

Central and Jefferson Celebrate Red Ribbon Week

Last week, Central and Jefferson students celebrated Red Ribbon Week.  Red Ribbon Week is a national celebration that promotes and encourages students to choose to be drug free.  This year’s theme was, “Your Future is Key, So Stay Drug Free!” Students participated in many fun activities such as creating drug free chalk messages, dressing up, designing drug free posters and pledging to live a drug free life. Thanks to everyone who participated and joined in on the fun!  You showed everyone that you are taking care of your mind and body in a healthful way, and that you are citizens of good character today and everyday.

FPS Celebrates Digital Citizenship Week

In support of Digital Citizenship week, the following activities took place during the weeks of October 9-18. The students and staff of Fairbury Jr. Sr. High School and Jefferson Elementary were encouraged to participate. The goal was that together we can model and promote positive digital citizenship in our school and community!

Monday October 9 – Wednesday October 18th –  Decorate Your Door Contest. Faculty and students were invited to decorate their doors with the theme “Be Internet Awesome!”.  Judging took place on the 18th.  Winners were announced at the end of the day.  There was a popcorn party for the winning door from Fairbury Jr. Sr. High and Jefferson. 
Mrs. Scott’s Classroom ~ Jefferson Winner
Mrs. Winter’s Classroom ~ Jr. Sr. High Winner
On Monday, October 16th, the Fairbury Jr. Sr. High School also had a convocation with Hunter Rodenslaben.

Hunter’s Story

​Heading into his freshman year of high school, Hunter faced tragedy with the loss of his mother to cancer. While coping with the situation, Hunter developed a vision of making a positive impact on people’s lives.

As a 12-year-old, Hunter created the Twitter account @AthleteNation where he shared inspirational and uplifting messages. Today, Athlete Nation is a sports media company with a platform of over 70,000 followers.

As a recognized professional speaker before graduating high school in 2017, Hunter shares his story of overcoming adversity to help empower others to make a difference. Hunter works in guiding today’s generations to leverage the power of social media to change the world for the better.

Teachers Take on Community Service Challenge

During their weekly professional development, teachers of Fairbury Public Schools were challenged to take part in community service.  Many ideas were shared.  Several teachers helped with carpeting the FYI Center in Fairbury and others took on additional projects.  Julie Petersen, a high school math instructor, challenged the high school teachers to donate to the Blue Valley Community Action Food Pantry.  The teachers gladly took on the challenge and donated 121 items.

Soaring Jeffs Quiz Bowl Off to a Terrific Start

The Soaring Jeffs Quiz Bowl Club is off to a terrific start!  We currently have 34 members of our Club!  The students meet weekly after school to answer questions, play games, and even participate in Quiz Offs!  Two competition teams recently traveled to Thayer Central to compete in a Quiz Bowl Competition against 7 other schools, Bruning Davenport, David City, Diller Odell, Meridian, Osceola, Sutton and Thayer Central.  Our 5th grade team, consisting of Adeline Blatny, Brody Schmidt, Izzy Ausk, Heidi Ramos, and Landon McBride took 2nd place in the 5th grade division with a 5 – 2 record.  The 6th grade team made up of Blake Starr, Brook Tatro, Lily Ausk, Jakolbe Atkins, and Toby Julin-McCleary took 1st place going undefeated in competition!  The Club is coached by Nicole Comer and Angie Judd.  Competing in competitions like this couldn’t happen without the support of our entire Quiz Bowl Club!  Congratulations to all of the members of the Soaring Jeffs Quiz Bowl Club!

Students Attend Endicott Clay’s Manufacturing Day

Twenty-six students attended Endicott Clay’s Manufacturing Day.   The purpose of Endicott Clay manufacturing day is to expose students to manufacturing in our community and to promote the different jobs available at the plant.   Students from many local schools got the opportunity to see first hand how the manufacturing of bricks takes place.   Endicott Clay manufactures over 100,000,000 bricks per year. If you do the math and each brick is worth 40 cents, that equates to 40 million in sales.  Endicott bricks are shipped all over the United States and Canada.  Endicott bricks are used in many huge structures such as Yankee Stadium.   The plant never shuts down with three shifts running all the time.

Endicott Clay employs around 350 workers.  The students got to see many different jobs at the plant.  Starting wages for first shift are $11.00 per hour, second shift $12.00 per hour, and third shift $13.00 per hour with overtime at time and a half after 40 hours.  Endicott Clay has workers in office positions, sales, engineering, plant management, heavy equipment operators, machinists, welders, artists, carpenters,  and maintenance to name a few.

Students got to explore the manufacturing lines where they saw many different processes.   Robotics is used extensively at the plant.  Robots lift heavy bricks and place them on carriages where they will go into a kiln for firing.  It takes over two days for the bricks to be fully fired.  They also have an art mural department where artists carve green bricks.  It is there that the bricks are numbered and the mural is disassembled and shipped to the customer.  Fairbury students also got to see one of the original “bee hive” kilns that were used in the making of the bricks back when the company was first in business.
It was a great day and a positive experience for our students.   At the end of the tour, there was a question and answer session with the President and CEO of the company, Ryan Parker. He answered many questions.   He also told students that a 2 year degree is very helpful in getting a job at the factory.  A group photo was even taken in front of two huge Caterpillar scrapers that they use in the mine.  Thank you to all that went.  Fairbury was well represented!

3rd Graders Learning to Code

Third graders at Jefferson Intermediate School are learning to Code in their Enrichment class with Mrs. Shinn.  Maybe you are wondering why students should learn to code. Well, coding, also called programming, is a skill set that students could use for a future career in a world that has a shortage of skilled coders and programmers. However, coding can also help students in their other subjects, too—coding can improve skills like perseverance and problem solving.  Coding is can also be beneficial to students who are struggling with reading and math. In addition, students often feel empowered when they can create using digital media and share it with others.

The earlier we introduce children to coding, the more comfortable they will be when presented with it in middle and high school. Also, early exposure to coding helps teach children how important it is to understand computers as the valuable tools they are rather than merely fun playthings.

When students learn the fundamentals of coding it will help provide students with skills that will benefit them in any career they choose. Plus, there a lot of excitement in a room full of students learning to coding in a 3rd grade class.

These third graders want to learn how to code. They are motivated to learn how to make tablets and computers do useful things and they want to learn how to build programs and websites. To them it is actually a very cool thing to learn how to do.

However,  while “cool” is nice, what really matters are the life long benefits of building these skills:

  • Logical thinking
  • Problem solving
  • Persistence
  • Collaboration
  • Communication

Music is in the Air at Jefferson Intermediate

Lately, students in the 6th grade have been working on basic ear training skills in music. Given a sung or played musical pattern, students use colored cards to transcribe what they hear. Possible rhythms are written on the cards, and the colors of the cards indicate the pitch (high or low, do/re/mi, etc.) The development of these skills is crucial to attaining independent musicianship, which allows students more opportunities to explore and understand the music they love.

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