Conestoga School Board

My motivation for being on the board is simple. I want to help our school and community to thrive with the changing times in education. In addition, I want to make sure that we provide an education that our students, staff, families, and communities can be proud of. I grew up in a smaller community similar to ours where it is a responsibility of the parents and community members to get involved and help make sure that our schools continue to grow. I feel that this is an opportunity for me to do just that at Conestoga.

I have been involved in our school in many ways in the past. I have been a coach of several youth sports over the years including flag football, soccer, and basketball. I have been on the building committee at Conestoga to help find the best solution for the growing needs of education and current facilities. I have been a speaker at the Conestoga career days. I am a member of the Nebraska Education Technology Association (NETA) focused on advancing technology in education.  Last year I implemented and coached the CyberPatriot program at Conestoga to help get students interested in the growing career of cyber security. The CyberPatriot team had a goal of getting to state in our first year and the amazing team ended up going to the national semi-finals and placing 7th. You can read more about this program at www.uscyberpatriot.org

I have been very involved in our community as well supporting our youth. I implemented and coach the CyberPatriot program at the high school. I have been a community member on the Conestoga building committee to help balance the needs of our school and the community while being fiscally responsible. I have been a youth coach in the past of flag football, soccer, and currently coaching Basketball. I am a leader of our local Boy Scout troop 471, I am a member of the Lake and Habitat Committee at Beaver Lake and am also a director on the Corporal Daegan Page foundation.

Education has become a rapidly changing environment that we have to make sure we continue to adapt to. I would like to see us implement more programs around Science, Technology, Engineering and Math. There are many programs that we can take advantage of as well as funding for in the future. There are a number of programs at the elementary level that are funded by state and federal grants. There are also many programs for our Jr High and High School students such as Ag Tech programs for one of the most in demand careers in our area. We also have many external funding sources such as e-rate that we need to make sure we are taking full advantage of to help take some of the cost burden off of our school for our requirements around the way we learn.