Superintendent's Message for July 2021

The month of June flew by and the midpoint of summer vacation has arrived.  We have been busy cleaning, painting, and renovating at Southwest Valley schools.  Our plan is to have community reconnect events to allow everyone the opportunity to come to see the improvements.

The east campus has contracted with Estes Construction to complete a facility needs assessment.  The purpose of this assessment is to give the board and superintendent a road map of renovation upgrades over the course of the next ten years.  Our buildings are all aging and I want to be ahead of the needs so our students have the best facilities to learn and compete in southwest Iowa.

Our west campus has completed their major renovation project and the facilities are in very good shape.  We are addressing the aging playground at Enarson elementary and safety concerns with the equipment.  The community built the structure and I recently viewed some pictures of this event.  It was neat to see people coming together to build it.  However, it has served its purpose for numerous decades and now has issues that we need to address.  We are working on plans for new equipment and an ADA compliant playground.  We are currently assessing drainage issues near the playground.  I will continue to communicate with the public on the progress of the playground project.  The Corning elementary playground will be included in the Estes Construction assessment. 

We are renovating the Activity Center at Corning with updated restrooms and a new paint scheme in the gymnasium.  We are excited about the new designs in the gym and plan to have a public view later this summer.  All classrooms, the wrestling room, auditorium, and agriculture education building will be included in the assessment as well.

The future of Southwest Valley is bright and we have numerous positive things happening in our district.  As we move towards the next year, we will be focusing on improving academic performance and developing each student to be a productive member of our communities.  We would love to have you be an active member of our team by joining the numerous organizations we have in our district.  We have dedicated ourselves to being the “Destination District” and we will continue to strive for excellence.  Come be a part of the pack!