The school year is off to a great start, and everyone has settled into their routines quite nicely. I would like to recognize and thank all of the custodians throughout the district for doing such a wonderful job of getting our facilities cleaned and ready to go over the summer!
Here are a few quick hitting topics that you might be interested in:
Facilities Study. Over the summer a number of community focus groups were held to help us determine, not only the future of the vacant Jefferson Elementary School, but to help us make the best use of all of our best buildings. Out of that work came some recommendations that we now need community input on. In October, a survey will be sent to all residents of the district to gather input on facilities plans, operations referendums, etc. Please watch for this survey and take some time to complete it as your input is very important to our school district.
PFAS at Pine River. Most of you have likely heard, but there have been PFAS levels discovered in the well at Pine River that exceed the Health Department’s acceptable levels. We have been working closely with both the DNR and the DHS to explore long-term solutions to this issue. In the meantime, we have taken a number of proactive measures to ensure that our students and staff have safe drinking water out there. At this time, this issue is more of an inconvenience than anything, but we hope that feasible long-term solutions can be found.
The MHS Building Construction House. Every year people ask me why MHS no longer builds a house as part of the building construction class. The answer is that our students do still build a house every year. However, through an ongoing partnership with the Merrill Housing Authority, our students now build the house on-site (as opposed to building it on the footings behind MHS and moving it to a site). The current MHS house is being built on Francis St. The previous builds can be found at the NE corner of Mill and 4th Streets and on the far end of W. Grand Ave.
Have a great autumn, everyone, and please join us for the MHS Homecoming festivities on October 7th!
– Shannon Murray
Superintendent