EMMIE BOESE
Hutch Post
NICKERSON, Kan. — The USD 309 Board of Education filled a vacant seat at their meeting on Monday night. Jeremy Schmidt, who has served on the South Hutchinson city council, was approved as the new BOE member.
Vice President of the board Jay Mitzner motioned to approve the appointment of Schmidt and board member Stacy Watson seconded the motion. The vote for approval was a unanimous decision.
There was a vacancy on the board because a member retired recently.
Also on the agenda at the meeting was a report from Nickerson High School's FBLA president Cody Spurlock and Haley McGill who is also a member of the team.
Spurlock and McGill qualified for the National Leadership Conference in Orlando, Florida on June 28-July 2.
Spurlock said this is the first time since 2012, that Nickerson's FBLA team qualified for the national conference.
"In the past year we've seen a lot of accomplishments throughout the team beyond just qualifying for nationals," Spurlock said. "We had significantly more people place at districts than ever before. Beyond just competition, we've implemented some things to where to go out and compete, you need to reach those community service requirements which was something that me and some of my other officers implemented this year."
The Nickerson BOE also recognized the high school's FBLA team for having the third highest membership increase in the state of Kansas. McGill not only qualified for nationals but is also in her first year with the team.
"I have seen a significant change in the students from our school going from high schoolers you see walking about doing silly things in the hallway to genuine Future Business Leaders of America at these conferences," McGill said. "At state, at districts where we have to get all dressed up but its more than that. We become professional. We start to peek into our futures. We start to examine entrepreneurship, opening our own businesses, all of these new avenues that we didn't really know were available to us before."
Mitzner asked Spurlock how far away he and McGill are from reaching their fundraising goal to attend nationals and why he feels Nickerson's FBLA membership numbers have increased.
"It's an appetizing program to join. It's something to where you can join and be successful and have fun. We had a massive increase because getting people to join in FBLA is easy. You get them to go in and say, hey, come to this. We practice this many times a year and then at those practices we have fun and we practice and then we are competitive and win so its like, why wouldn't you want to join in type of thing."
Spurlock said the trip will cost around $10,000 for him, McGill and an advisor. He told the board that there is about $4,000 in the FBLA budget right now, meaning they need to raise $6,000 to attend the conference.
FBLA is a non-for-profit corporation that helps students prepare for careers in business.
The next Nickerson BOE meeting is Monday, May 13.
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