Edgar board tours new renovations

Members of the Edgar School Board toured a newly remodeled science room and stepped onto the recently refinished high school gym floor at their monthly meeting last Thursday.

Rob Rauen, director of buildings and grounds, led the impromptu tour during a facilities update at the start of the Sept. 25 meeting, which included an overview of recently completed projects and reports on ongoing projects, including the district’s new outdoor classroom. That structure was paid for in part by a $10,000 grant from #SocialSchool4EDU.

Rauen said the concrete foundation for the classroom has already been poured, and construction of the structure is scheduled to start this week. The district hopes to have it finished in time for a candlelight walk through the school forest in January.

Another upcoming project is the renovation of the high school’s Family and Consumer Education classroom, which is set to get two new stoves and other improvements. The FACE room project, which is slated for completion in the summer of 2026, will be the last to be done as part of the facilities referendum adopted in 2022 Board members decided to take a look at the newly remodeled chemistry room, which has all new stain-resistant vinyl flooring, cabinets and work stations for students to use.

Rauen said there were no technology upgrades as part of the chemistry classroom renovation, but those could always be in store for the not-to-distant future.

“Twenty years from now, what’s the need going to be?” he wondered. “We don’t have a crystal ball.”

Lastly, the board checked out the shiny new gym floor, which was recently sanded down to bare wood and refinished with a stained light green stripe replacing the solid dark-green lines at each end of the court.

Rauen noted that the Wildcat logo at center court is now a little bigger as well.

The gym floor project, which also includes possible scoreboard extensions, was 100 percent paid for by community donations.

A Walk In Their Shoes

Fifth-grade teacher Colin Hanson told the board about the next series of “A Walk In Their Shoes” speakers coming to the area, starting with Hmong author Kao Kalia Yang, who will speak at the UW-SP Wausau campus on Thursday, Oct. 9, at 6:30 p.m.

“She became an author after she went to the library and couldn’t find anything written by the Hmong or about the Hmong,” Hanson told the board.

As American allies during the Vietnam War and the Secret War against communists in Laos, Hanson said the Hmong “are beyond important in our history,” especially in this part of Wisconsin, where a lot of Hmong immigrants were resettled after the war.

Kalia Yang’s works include “The Latehomecomer: A Hmong Family Memoir,” which tells the story of her family’s escape from a refugee camp in Thailand and immigration to the United States, with special emphasis on her late grandmother.

“A Walk In Their Shoes” will also bring author Chia Y. Yang to speak about Cpt. Pao Yang, a pilot trained by the U.S. Navy who was shot down and taken to a POW camp in Laos. His story will be told during a Veterans Day ceremony on Tuesday, Nov. 11, at 6:30 p.m., at the UW-SP campus in Wausau. On April 23, 2026, musician Daryl Davis will visit the area to perform songs with local high school bands and share his stories of engaging with members of the Klu Klux Klan and convincing many of them to leave the group.

Other business

■ Superintendent Cari Guden told the board that the district was able to borrow less money and get a lower interest rate this year compared to last for meeting its short-term financial needs. The amount borrowed was $1.2 million, compared to $1.3 million last year, with a 2.64 percent interest rate (2.94 last year), resulting in a $6,000 decrease in interest payments. Guden said the reduction in short-term borrowing costs is the result of the district building up its fund balance and working with a consortium of other school districts to get better interest rates.

■ Middle/high school principal Mike Wilhelm said the school is working with the group Challenge Day to host a daylong, interactive workshop on Oct. 27 that is designed to break students out of their comfort zones and deal with emotional and social issues in small groups.

“It’s a big ask for our school, but it’s going to be awesome,” he said.

■ Special education director Mike Twomey said four high-need students recently moved into the district and enrolled just as the school year was starting, which has forced his staff to take on additional duties while the district looks to hire an additional teacher and paraprofessionals.

“I couldn’t be more proud of the staff we have here in Edgar,” he said.

Board member Rebecca Normington said she believes some families move into the Edgar School District specifically because of its high-quality special education services.

■ During a report by the board’s new student representative, Tucker Streit, board member Alison Reinders asked if he’s heard any complaints about the high school’s new rules for the ePASS system. The system allows teachers and administrators to track students who have requested to leave their classrooms for bathroom breaks or other approved reasons. A limit of two electronic hall passes per day for each student was implemented this year. Reinders said she’s heard some complaints about it, especially from female students who often encounter lines when they go to the bathroom in between classes.

“Some of the girls have been struggling with it,” she said.

Wilhelm said students are generally expected to use the four-minute breaks between classes and their 30-minute lunch period to visit the bathroom and take care of other personal issues, but exceptions are made, though it might spark a conversation if a student is continually asking to leave class more than two times a day.

“We’re not saying you can’t go the bathroom,” he said. “We’re not doing that.”

■ The board approved the hiring of Trevor Bunkelman as a nighttime custodian and signed off on the list of assistant coaches for the winter sports season.