Lisa Starr will become the next principal at Riley Elementary School for 2025-2026. Her appointment was approved by the Great Bend USD 428 Board of Education on Wednesday.
Starr fills a vacancy left by Principal Beth Rein, who will step down at the end of June to take a new role as a math teacher at Great Bend Middle School in the fall. Starr is a long-time Riley teacher who is an instructional coach in math.
Other personnel changes were also approved Wednesday. Randy Beck, physical education teacher at Great Bend High School, will retire at the end of the school year.
The board appointed two new teachers for the fall semester.
Isabelle Deckard will teach kindergarten at Park Elementary School and Garrett Cole will teach vocal music at Great Bend Middle School.
The board also accepted a $250 donation to the orchestra from the Central Kansas Association of Retired School Personnel.
GBMS hosts
Wednesday’s meeting took place over the noon hour at Great Bend Middle School. Principal Myron Ellegood was joined by other staff and GBMS STUCO representatives Tessa Doone, Gentry VanSkike and Emma Hammeke to report on school programs. Other students greeted board members at the door and escorted them to the library, where the meeting took place.
JAG-K Career Specialist Brenna Thompson reported this is the third year the program has been offered at GBMS. There are 54 students in grades 7-8. After an in-school competition, 10 students were chosen to compete in a JAG-K event on April 9 at the Kansas Cosmosphere.
JAG-K stands for Jobs for America’s Graduates - Kansas. It is an in-school, elective class taught by a trained JAG-K career specialist. Students learn employability skills, career and leadership development, and complete at least 10 hours of community service each year. Those who enter the program in middle school continue in it through high school.
Board President Jacquie Disque praised JAG-K. “This is probably one of my favorite programs that we do,” she said.
Principal Ellegood showed a video of other school activities, such as the investigative science class where students built model cars with compact disc wheels and powered by mousetraps, then tested to see whose car could travel the farthest. The winner, Alyvia Vinsonhaler, explained that she learned precise measuring and planning paid off. “You can’t just wing it.”
The video also showed an art class where students operated a printing press, and a math teacher who challenged students with a “Math Madness” bracket.
