Last chance to see the community theater production of Murder at the Orient Express

The last performance is Sunday at 2:00 p.m. The Senior Center will be selling pie and ice cream at the intermission.

Quality School Construction Bonds

Bancroft-Rosalie School received an allocation of $330,000 in Qualified School Construction Bonds (QSCB). The plan is to use the money to build a two classroom addition to the north end of the existing secondary school building. Using modular construction will reduce the cost of the project by roughly 50%. The new addition will be for a K-12 music room and a social studies classroom. The exsting music room would be renovated into two elementary classrooms.

QSCB's (also known as Q-Scabs) are authorized by the federal government through the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (ARRA) of 2009. The bonds provide federal tax credits for bond holders in lieu of interest in order to significantly reduce an issuer’s cost of borrowing for public school construction projects. The bond's will be provided at nearly 0% interest.

What are the uses and restrictions?

* Use of Proceeds. 100% of available project proceeds must be used for the construction, rehabilitation, or repair of a public school facility, or for the acquisition of land on which such a facility is to be constructed with part of the proceeds of such issue.
* Tax Credit. Credit to investor of 100% of Tax Credit Rate.
* Maturity Limit. Maximum maturity and Tax Credit Rate are set by the IRS as of the date that there is a binding, written contract for the sale of the bonds (as of May 2009, the maximum maturity was set at 15 years).
* Arbitrage Rules. The entity issuing the bonds must enter into contract to spend at least 10% of the proceed within six months of issuance, and must spend 100% of proceeds within 3 years or redeem the bonds.
* Projects funded with the bonds must comply with all ARRA provisions including the Davis-Bacon Fair Labor Act governing federal prevailing wage requirements, whistle-blower protection.

School lunch prices going up

Changes in the National School Lunch Program will result in price increases for lunches this Fall. The Federal government reimburses schools for breakfasts, lunches and after school snacks served to students. This year the reimbursement will be:
Free lunch $2.77
Reduced Lunch $2.37
Paid Lunch $0.26
Free Breakfast $1.51
Reduced Breakfast $1.21
Paid Breakfast $0.27
No reimbursement is received for adult meals.
We do not participate in the after-school snack program.
Schools are expected to charge paid lunches and breakfasts at least as much as the federal government is reimbursing for free meals minus what they reimburse for paid meals. If not, then the reimbursements for free and reduced meals from the federal government is considered to be subsidizing the students that are paid meals. In this case the feds want lunches at $2.51 and breakfasts at $1.24.

This year Bancroft-Rosalie will be raising lunch prices 25 cents, charging:
Lunch Grades 7-12 $2.25
Lunch Grades Pre-6 $2.00
Breakfast Pre-12 $1.25
Lunch Adults $3.00
Breakfast Adults $2.00
The adult minimum price is set by the federal government and that is what we charge.

The federal government is giving schools time to gradually raise their prices to the expected amount. As you can see, lunch prices will have to go up again next year to get to this price.

The price increase comes at a good time for B-R because our School Lunch account has been losing money due to the decreasing number of students, the decrease in the number of free meal qualifiers, and the increased price of food.

THE SCHOOL STRONGLY ENCOURAGES THOSE THAT QUALIFY FOR FREE OR REDUCED MEALS TO COMPLETE THE APPLICATION. The school is required to verify 3% of the applications we receive each year.

Some other changes made this year:
1. Schools are required to offer two choices of milk- skim or 1%. Whole milk and 2% cannot be served.
2. Drinking water must be made available to students in the area where lunch meals are served.

Bancroft Community Theater this Friday, Saturday and Sunday

Take a break from the summer heat and join the cast of the Bancroft Theater in the AIR CONDITIONED B-R school gymnasium for the production "Murder at the Orient Express". There will be three performances this weekend. The Friday night and Saturday night shows are at 7:00 p.m. The Sunday matinee is at 2:00 p.m. Sunday the Senior Center will be selling pie during intermission.

New to the community theater are B-R music teacher Jason Smith (Dudley Sharpe, private eye) and Cuming County Economic developer Garry Clark (Lester Peapicker). Also performing with the group for the first time are B-R students Amanda Brummond and Jerrica Tietz (the McGregor sisters), second grade teacher Jo Brummond (Scarlett Dawn) and Deb Bonsall (Hildegaard).

Regulars in the Community Theater Danny Bridges (Willy Wonkers), Jon Cerny (Seymour Twitt), Kent Steinmeyer (Barney Barrelfoot), Nicole Sachs (Carlotta), Janet Smith (Millie Fern), Jennifer Carlson (Olivia), and Sandy Ahlers (Frau Beethoven).

Help Dudley Sharpe as he tries to solve the Murder at the Orient Express.

High School students in summer school courses

The elementary students are not the only ones involved in summer school this year. Currently 16 high school students are taking on-line courses through a software program called Odysseyware. Courses taken include English, Algebra and Computer Applications.

The are three reasons why high school students are taking summer classes. Either they are re-taking a class they failed once, taking a class that won't fit into their schedule this fall, or taking a class that is required to get into a class they want to take this coming year.

Completing a semester class over the summer is a lot of work. Some of the students taking the computer applications course are trying to do an entire year over the summer. Of course the students taking a summer course are allowed to keep their Mac computer over the summer.

This is the first year we have had so many high school students involved in summer school. In the past it has been one or two students, generally for "credit recovery" of classes that were failed. At the end of the summer we will evaluate whether it accomplishes the goals we expect.

Farewell roast of Vicar Dom Guido

For those members of Grace Lutheran Church that missed Sunday's roast and toast farewell to Vicar Dom Guido, here are the stories that I shared, none of which are actually based on fact.

Coffee Hour Roast and Toast for Vicar Dom

We are here this morning to say farewell to vicar Dom and thank him for his service to Grace this past year. This morning’s program will include some singing, some presentations, some short skits and some good-hearted roasting. There will also be an opportunity for sharing some Dom stories.

As chairman of the Intern Committee I am responsible for completing a final evaluation of Dom for the Seminary. The intern committee and I have listened and observed throughout Dom’s time here to gather information to include in the report. The report has been completed and sent to the seminary office and of course the evaluation was very positive. This morning I would like to share a few stories that did not make the evaluation, some of which I cannot guarantee actually took place.

Dom came to Nebraska last August full of confidence and enthusiasm. Upon his arrival he met with Pastor Chris and the Bishop and they decided to take him fishing. The rowed into the lake a short distance when the Bishop realized that he had forgotten the water. So he proceeded to get out of the boat and walk across the water to the shore to get it. Once he had gotten back into the boat the Pastor Chris remembered that he had forgotten the bait." So he exited the boat and walked across the water to get the bait. When Pastor climbed back into the boat Vicar Dom said," Well if you guys can do it so can I!!! He climbed out of the boat, and fell into the water. At this point Pastor says," Do you think we should have told him where the rocks are?"

The Intern committee felt that Dom had a real gift for writing and delivering sermons. In fact one day as I was leaving church I overheard a member of the congregation tell Dom, “Vicar, today your sermon reminded me of the peace and love of God!" Dom was thrilled. "No-one has ever said anything like that about my preaching before. Tell me why." "Well - it reminded me of the Peace of God because it passed all understanding and the Love of God because it endured forever!"

Dom brought some new ideas with him to Grace. The training program he put together for ushers and worship assistants was very successful. But there were a couple of ideas that didn’t catch on. Ike serving prune juice at Holy Communion, if the Holy Spirit didn’t move you, the prune juice would. Or the week that he put the sanitary hot air hand dryer in the men’s restroom, and took it out after his sermon. When asked why he confessed that they worked fine but when he went in there he saw a sign that read, "For a sample of this week's sermon, push the button."

Dom was very creative during his time here. In fact he solved a very big problem we had at the church. It seems that we had bats living up in the bell tower. At a council meeting it was suggested to shoot them, but although some would be killed by the shot, it could leave holes in the roof and then we would have leaks as well as bats. Then it was suggested to try netting them, driving them out into the country and releasing them. But the bats would just find their way back. Vicar Dom came up with a solution. He baptized and confirmed them and we haven't seen them since.

Vicar was very active in area cluster meetings where pastors meet to discuss common issues. One night Pastor and Dom were driving down the road when they missed a turn and went into the ditch. A somewhat intoxicated man pulled up and asked if they were all right.
Dom said "Oh, yes, Jesus is with us,"
The man thought that over for a minute. "Well, you'd better tell him get in with me, you're going to kill him!"

Dom had the opportunity to fill in at a few churches around the area when their Pastors went on vacation. One morning he was at a church outside of Pender and only three people showed up to hear him preach. He asked the secretary "Did you give notice that I would be here today?".
"No" she said, "but word seems to have got round anyway".

Dom has had a lot of experience working with youth, and he is good at it. At Day Camp he set out a table of oranges and cookies. On the one side of the table, by the oranges, he placed a sign, "Take only one, God is watching!"
He saw one of the boys walk up to the cookies and started taking a handful. Dom asked him "Son, what are you doing?"
"It's Okay," the boy said, "God's watching the cookies!"


I know you are probably very anxious to be on your way. So In conclusion we want to thank you once again for your time here at Grace. We hope that we have been able to provide a very rewarding educational experience for you. Have a safe trip home. A year from now some congregation will be very lucky to have you.

Summer school starts this Monday

Jump-start summer school will begin Monday July 22. It will be held Monday through Thursday for the next three weeks from 8:30 am to 11:30 am. A bus will take students to/from Rosalie each day, leaving Rosalie at 8:10 a.m. and leaving Bancroft at 11:35 a.m.

Teachers will be Mrs. Slaughter, Mrs. Vogt, Mrs. Zwygart and Mrs. James. Para-parofessionals will be Shonna Briggs, Steph Larsen and Kayla Johnson- a junior at Wayne State College majoring in Early Childhood education.

Summer school provides students the opportunity to review skills that were mastered at the end of the last school year so they are ready when the school year officially begins. Students were selected based on the reading and math groups they were in last year. These groups are being selected in order to accelerate their lesson progress to catch them up with their peers.

The last day of summer school, August 11, will be a pizza party to celebrate their accomplishments.