Category: Luther College and Decorah Schools

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Seventh graders at Decorah Middle School are sponsoring their annual Water to Thrive fundraiser with a goal to reach $5,000 to support the building of a well in rural Africa. From May 8-12, all students at DMS can bring monetary donations of any amount to school. These donations can be made during students’ lunch shifts.

Orange donation buckets will be placed at businesses around town with QR codes explaining the reasons for the fundraiser. People can also donate by directly visiting https://www.watertothrive.org/campaigns/one-well-one-drop-5.

In class, DMS students learn how water can impact health, hunger, education, and poverty–creating inequalities. As a way to ‘be the change’ and address those inequalities, the students partner with Water to Thrive through which one well can be built for $5,000. That well can bring clean, safe water to over 500 people. DMS has funded four wells since 2018 and hopes by the end of this fundraiser will be able to fund a fifth well.

In language arts class, students read the book A Long Walk to Water. In this book, one of the characters has to walk for water twice a day to provide for her family. Although the character is fictional, the scenario is real. 

On May 17^th, students will leave from the middle school and walk indirectly to the Upper Iowa River to gather and carry water. 7^th grade Global Studies teacher Carrie Reed remarked, “We do the water walk to gain a sense of empathy for those who face that reality every day. In the past, the community has offered smiles and words of encouragement as they see us walking through town. We’ve even had people stop us and hand us money to add to our fundraiser total!”

Reed added, “I always tell my students that this is truly the most meaningful teaching and learning that I have ever been a part of. In a world where negative stories are easy to find, it’s good to share the amazing things that our young people are making happen!”

On April 28th in Arlington, Virginia, Decorah High School junior Simon Kutz competed with 100 other students from across the country in the United States Geography Championships and finished in 7th place. During the competition Kutz had to take a written exam covering the following categories: geomorphology, geography and current events, historical geography, cultural geography, economic geography, urban geography, biogeography, and climate geography. Then he took a test meant to assess the types of practical map skills and cartographic reasoning reflective of exam questions as well as field work examinations.

In addition, he was a finalist (8th place) in the National Varsity round of the International Geography Bee.

Kutz participated in both competitions last year, finishing 12th in the United States Geography Championships and 16th in the National Varsity round of the International Geography Bee. 

More information about these contests can be found at https://geographychampionships.com/nationals/.

The Decorah Family, Educator, and Community Organization (FEC) recently held a Spell-A-Thon Fundraiser. Through generous donations from families and community members, they raised over $36,000 for the Decorah Elementary Schools (John Cline and Carrie Lee).  This money will be used for field trips, extra classroom supplies, guest visitors, family events, teacher appreciation activities, and the like to support the elementary students, staff, and schools.  

The FEC would like to thank the community for supporting this fundraiser and our schools.

To learn more or to volunteer with the FEC, follow them on Facebook or contact FEC President Shanna Putnam Dibble at shanna.putnamdibble@decorah.k12.ia.us.

Justin Berlage of Decorah High School has been named a semifinalist for the 2023 U.S. Presidential Scholars program, one of the highest honors bestowed upon graduating high school seniors in the country.  He is the son of Jodi Enos-Berlage and John Berlage of Ridgeway.

Out of nearly 3.7 million graduating high school seniors from across the country, over 5,000 students were identified as candidates for the program, which originated in 1964 by executive order of the president. Application to the program is by invitation only. This April, 628 semifinalists were selected, including eight students from Iowa. Scholars are selected on the basis of superior academic and artistic achievements, leadership qualities, strong character, and involvement in community and school activities.

Berlage plans to attend MIT in Cambridge, Massachusetts, in the fall to study mechanical engineering, with special interests in computer science and robotics. 

Berlage is a National Merit Finalist and has played a key role in leading the Decorah Robotics team and a Decorah Envirothon team to regionals and back-to-back competitive appearances at state competitions. He attended summer programs at NYU-Tandon School of Engineering and Carleton College Summer Program in Computer Science/Robotics. He has also been involved in High School Mathematical Competition in Modeling (HiMCM), soccer, National Honor Society, and chorus. He is a graduate of St. Benedict’s K-8 Catholic School in Decorah. He is also a member of the Madison 4Hers 4H club.

For his application to the U.S. Presidential Scholars program, Berlage was required to submit a photograph of something of great significance. He chose a picture of a K’Nex roller coaster that he designed and built when he was eight years old. In his related essay, he explained how the many hours and years he spent building various items using K’Nex materials instilled creativity, testing of ideas, risk-taking, confidence, and joy—attributes that he later applied to robotics, engineering, and computer science. Other major influences described by Berlage included growing up in a household and community where education was highly valued, reading hundreds of books a year from the Decorah Public Library–further supplemented by Dragonfly Books–and growing up on a farm, which developed problem-solving skills, a strong work ethic, and an appreciation for the fragility of the natural world.

In his response to the essay prompt “If you could improve one thing in the world, what would it be, and how would you change it?”, Berlage focused on elevating environmental education at the K-12 level, intentionally integrating it as a required core subject in elementary, middle school, and high school, equal in importance to reading and math and taught in a similarly successive fashion. He emphasized that these changes to the educational system would give his generation their best chance of living in a sustainable future.

The Commission on Presidential Scholars, a group of up to 32 eminent citizens appointed by the President, will select approximately 160 U.S. Presidential Scholars program finalists. The U.S. Department of Education will announce the Scholars in May.

Margaret Aitken Haggerty, a Chair of the Commission on Presidential Scholars, remarked, “Regardless of the final outcome of the competition, it is a great honor and an exceptional accomplishment to have reached the semifinalist phase in this highly selective and prestigious program.”

Two Decorah Middle School students recently qualified for the National History Day competition which will be held June 11-15 at the University of Maryland.

Jayden Lundtvedt qualified with her exhibit titled Valentina Tereshkova: Frontier in Female Cosmonautics

Naomi Kutz qualified with her website titled Jane Bolin: Leading the Frontier for Equality in Law

This year’s theme was Frontiers in History: People, Places, and Ideas.

Decorah Home School Assistance Program (HSAP) student Eva Kriemelmeyer received first place in the junior (grades 6-8) individual performance category at the state National History Day competition in Des Moines on April 24. Her performance is titled “Marie Curie: Frontiers in Radioactivity.”

Kriemelmeyer will advance to the 2023 National History Day contest at the University of Maryland June 11-15, where she will compete alongside nearly 3000 other students from all 50 states, American Samoa, Northern Mariana Islands, Department of Defense Schools in Europe, and international schools, including several from Asia.

National History Day is a year-long academic enrichment program that challenges students to research, develop, and present projects about historical issues, ideas, people, and events related to an annual theme. This year’s theme is Frontiers in History: People, Places, and Ideas.

Lucas Arendt, Connor Evelsizer, Gabriel Hiner, Anders Lovstuen, and Aidan Nalean-Carlson, members of the “DNR” Envirothon team representing Decorah High School, took first place at the Envirothon state contest held April 24that the Jester Park Nature Center near Granger, Iowa. They will represent Iowa at the international contest to be held July 23-29, 2023, at Mount Allison University located in Tantramar, New Brunswick, Canada. Decorah’s “Team Skabush”–Justin Berlage, Peter Essa, Nathaniel Myers, Nathan Swarbrick and Henry Weis–finished in fourth place. Both teams tied for first place in the Current Environmental Issue category.

The Envirothon is a team competition for high school students, testing their knowledge of the natural world around them. In the field and classroom, teams of five students are challenged to use their knowledge and critical thinking skills to conduct hands-on investigations, solve real-life scenarios, and answer questions covering five categories: Aquatics, Forestry, Soils, Wildlife, and a current topic. This year’s current environmental issue, “Adapting to the Agricultural Changes Needed in a Changing Climate,” required each team to prepare and present a speech outlining a designed plan with recommendations and possible solutions to meet the current topic challenges.

Adviser Larry Berland remarked, “Have you ever been asked to determine the amount of sand, silt and clay in a soil sample by using only your hands?  Do you have the desire to figure out the basal area of trees growing in a woodlot with a 10 factor prism?  How about sighting in on the clarity of a water sample using only a Secchi tube or identifying turtles by the markings on their carapace?  High school students in Decorah who have been participating in the school’s Envirothon program are ready for these challenges and more.”

“I am very proud to say that 70 awesome Decorah High School students participated in the Envirothon program this year–a new record,” Berland continued. “They offer hope for the Earth’s environment. I want to especially thank Adam Riley along with the entire Decorah system for their support, including the super help of John Kraus and Maggie Schwarz along with a very generous contribution made to our program from Barb Schroeder and the Winneshiek County Conservation Board.”