Nebraska Public School Advantage News

Nebraska Public School Advantage News

The Kids on Campus: Islander freshmen flock to the state’s flagship university for a day

The Kids on Campus: Islander freshmen flock to the state’s flagship university for a day

May 13, 2025
By Tyler Dahlgren The schoolbuses from Grand Island rolled down R Street and parked in front of the main entrance to the Nebraska Union. They kept coming, one after another, unloading hundreds of high school freshmen who were about to get a firsthand look at the state’s flagship university. On the Union’s iconic front steps, several UNL student tour guides clad in the school’s signature scarlet-...Read More

Mr Friend, Mr. Freeman: The 60-year story of an Omaha principal with a fascinating past

Mr Friend, Mr. Freeman: The 60-year story of an Omaha principal with a fascinating past

May 7, 2025
By Tyler Dahlgren I can close my eyes and make 30 years disappear. It's Field Day at Prairie Wind Elementary in northwest Omaha, late spring of '96. For us kindergarten kids, this was the Super Bowl. We dreamed of eternal glory at the potato sack race finish line and of the everlasting fame that would come with winning the baseball long toss. It was a hot day, by May's standards, and the hallway...Read More

Building Support, Changing Lives: Nebraska’s ASD Network and 23 years of impact

Building Support, Changing Lives: Nebraska’s ASD Network and 23 years of impact

April 15, 2025
By Tyler Dahlgren Numbers can not only help paint a picture, they can also tell a story. The story of the Nebraska Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD) Network begins back in 2002, when the Nebraska Department of Education (NDE) set out to further support local school districts, Educational Service Units (ESUs), and parents/caregivers of children, birth-21yrs, with autism or related characteristics...Read More

35 Years of Innovation: Sights and Sounds from the ESU 10 Regional Science Olympiad

35 Years of Innovation: Sights and Sounds from the ESU 10 Regional Science Olympiad

April 7, 2025
By Tyler Dahlgren More than 650 of Nebraska’s best and brightest student scientists put their innovation to the test at the ESU 10 Regional Science Olympiad, an event that has been growing since its inception in 1990. The olympiad, which turned UNK’s Cushing Fieldhouse into one giant science lab on March 18th, drew students from as far as Burwell, Ogallala and even Omaha. Throughout the day, they...Read More

Twenty-Five Packs, One Purpose: A Friday morning frenzy with the Whippet Families

Twenty-Five Packs, One Purpose: A Friday morning frenzy with the Whippet Families

April 3, 2025
By Tyler Dahlgren Assistant principal Ed Rowse stood near the baseline in Minden’s gymnasium Friday morning, holding a microphone in his left hand and gesturing towards six high school students with his right. While Rowse introduced the leadership from FBLA, FCCLA and FFA, his CL Jones Middle School students sat in the bleachers and did a commendable job at listening. But when Rowse handed the...Read More

On Seven Acres in Macy: Roots run deep on Umonhon Nation Public School’s III Sisters Farm

On Seven Acres in Macy: Roots run deep on Umonhon Nation Public School’s III Sisters Farm

March 21, 2025
By Tyler Dahlgren The sun beats down on the seven-acre farm beyond the south endzone of Wade Miller Stadium, the home and headquarters of Umonhon Nation Public School’s III Sisters Farm to School Program. It’s one of those sultry dog days of summer, the heat is inescapable, and, for a fleeting moment, Wakeen Teboe thinks about calling it quits. Air conditioning is alluring during these kinds of...Read More

Hang the Banner: Millard North Middle School celebrates second Unified Champion recognition with an epic showdown between staff and students

Hang the Banner: Millard North Middle School celebrates second Unified Champion recognition with an epic showdown between staff and students

March 14, 2025
By Tyler Dahlgren Ally O’Hara caught the ball near the free throw line, used two dribbles to find an opening in the defense, and hoisted a jump shot that floated both gracefully and promisingly towards the cylinder. The capacity crowd inside Millard North Middle School, which moments earlier had cheered so loud that NCSA Ambassador Kevin Wingard’s Apple Watch buzzed with a sound level of 95...Read More

Curating Curiosity: Award-winning Norris science teacher Katy Dornbos finds fascination in engaging with student imagination

Curating Curiosity: Award-winning Norris science teacher Katy Dornbos finds fascination in engaging with student imagination

February 28, 2025
By Tyler Dahlgren Given the luxury of hindsight, it was pretty obvious the path Katy Dornbos was destined to travel-though it may not have always seemed like it. Dornbos attended Lincoln Public Schools, where her fascination with science and all things unknown was ignited and then fostered under the tutelage of an array of esteemed educators. She loved to learn and welcomed a challenge, but what...Read More

Special Ops: High Ability Learners Granted Enrichment Opportunities Through ESU 2’s RESTORE Program

Special Ops: High Ability Learners Granted Enrichment Opportunities Through ESU 2’s RESTORE Program

February 21, 2025
By Tyler Dahlgren Two esteemed Nebraska artists and a whole bunch of bright young Nebraska students filled West Point’s Nielsen Center with cheerful movement last Tuesday, the latest “Special Op” offered to high ability learners by ESU 2’s RESTORE team. This is year two of ESU 2’s RESTORE (Rural Exceptional Student Talent Opportunities, Resources, & Experiences) grant, which gives gifted kids...Read More

The Pages of Yesteryear: Inside LPS’s Quest to Construct a Virtual Chronicle

The Pages of Yesteryear: Inside LPS’s Quest to Construct a Virtual Chronicle

February 13, 2025
By Tyler Dahlgren Lincoln Public Schools has built an impressive collection of archives over its 102 years in existence, and now the district is bringing its rich history to life. “There’s so many cool pieces of our history just kind of tucked away in all those file folders downstairs,” said LPS Director of Library of Services Dr. Chris Haeffner. “We’d been wrestling with how to make those...Read More

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