Our guest this morning on the WRCO morning show is Congressman Derek Van Orden.
First time with us at WRCO.
Thanks for coming down.
Derek, what's new today?
been running around.
We
Okay, tell me what you mean by that.
What's new in Washington and made you compare that to a dairy barn?
Well, I mean, everybody knows that it stinks in DC, but it actually smells better in a dairy barn than most places you go in Washington DC.
But yeah, so we are going back on Tuesday.
Some of the things that are frustrating, I know, because my wife and I live in a little village with 192 people in it.
And so we are, we love small country living.
and you know the third congressional district is an ag district and we also do medium to small manufacturing really predominantly that's that's how we've been tourism obviously because it's so beautiful but we sent the farm bill over to the senate almost five months ago
okay
So if you guys get ahold of our senators, Tammy Baldwin and Ron Johnson, and say, hey, can you help move this forward?
I'd appreciate it tremendously.
But that's really frustrating being a member of the House sending over a good bill.
We got a lot of wins in the working families tax act that are going to be positive for our farms and our families here in the third.
But that would be great.
Another frustrating thing really on a national level.
I mean, obviously, the farm bill is national too.
We sent over the National Defense Authorization Act a few months ago, too.
What that does is it funds our military and makes sure that we can keep the country safe and all these things.
And in there, for me in particular, I'm the longest serving enlisted member of the United States military to ever get elected to Congress in the history of our country.
And one of the things that's near and dear to me that we sent over to the Senate was the largest pay increase for enlisted members of the military.
that we've seen in a very, very long time because those men and women are out there risking their lives for us and they shouldn't have to worry about, you know, wringing their hands and getting
groceries.
Derek, you were enlisted, I believe, 26 years.
And you retired, I think, Chief Petty Officer?
Petty Officer.
Senior Chief, I apologize for that.
That's right.
Navy
yeah.
Okay, so we every time I've met you and this is the fourth time every single time you talked about rural health care
what's new on that front there?
Well, let me tell you
In the Working Families Tax Cut, we got a $50 billion rural health care infrastructure revitalization fund.
And how does that translate to the state of Wisconsin?
The state of Wisconsin is getting $203 million a year for the next five years for rural health care infrastructure.
And what that does is it helps pay to educate our health care workers.
It helps get...
them caught up on the deferred maintenance they've been doing and we can use it from everything from ambulance services to communication networks and it's it's designed for rural hospitals and normally what happens is Washington DC sends money to Madison and Madison unfortunately sends money to Madison and Milwaukee well if they do that now they're not going to get any more money so there's very strict parameters and it's being watched very closely by CMS to make sure
that this is not abusing.
It doesn't wind up in downtown Milwaukee on Water Street, you know.
And then the other thing that we got down in the Working Families Tax Cut and Jobs Act was we leveled up our Medicaid reimbursement rate.
This was the number one thing I heard from every single one of our hospitals.
We simply are not getting enough money back from Medicaid and it's straining to the system to the point where it's going to break.
And so we got the ability to do so.
So we moved the reimbursement rate from
It's actually an assessment, but 1.8% to 6%.
So we brought the state of Wisconsin up to where the rest of these states have been for a long time.
And how does that translate?
I mean, in Black River Falls Memorial Hospital, for instance, this is the first time in a long time they don't have to worry about the future of the hospital.
Right.
And so that their health care providers can focus on their neighbors, you know, who happen to be their patients.
Exactly.
And they love them dearly.
I mean, that's what community hospitals are all about.
So that's tremendous.
Another thing is with the TrumpRx program, you're going to really start seeing these pharmaceutical companies paying or excuse me, charging the United States the same rates they've been charging other countries.
So we're able to negotiate most favored pricing status with these pharmaceutical companies.
Every American on average takes one to three adults, one to three prescription medications a day.
And so you want to talk about affordability and trying to figure out how to pay for those things.
Now they're going to start dropping precipitously because the United States was subsidizing the entire rest of the globe for prescription drugs.
And you know why they're doing it?
Because the pharmaceutical companies could get away with it.
President Trump, this, you wanna hear, it's a funny story.
His friend was using one of those GLP-1 drugs and he lived in New York and apparently he forgot them and he went over to London and he got the same drug and it was like, you know, one 25th of the price and he called the president, it's like, what the hell's going on here?
I buy this in New York and it costs 10 bucks or 100 bucks and I buy it over here in England and it costs, you know, 10 bucks.
Those numbers aren't the math, that's enlisted math.
But so,
What's going on here, and then you know President Trump started looking into it.
He got Bobby Kennedy looking into it got Mehmet Oz to look at it Dr.. Oz and they're like well We're just getting jammed and so Trump went to the pharmaceutical companies and said this is gonna stop And they're like well you have to negotiate this with the individual country So he did and this and there's a lot of controversy about tariffs, and I'd love to talk to you about those
Yeah, let's do that hold
Okay.
This is how this happened So Trump called Macron and everybody and they're like hey, we're gonna
You're going to have to agree that you're going to have to pay more for your pharmaceuticals because we're going to start paying what you're paying.
And everyone said no.
And he said, OK, you're going to have a 75% tariff on everything you try to export into the United States.
And they said, we'd love to do that, sir.
That's how that went down.
And that's why our pharmaceuticals are going to start going across or down across the board was because of the ability to leverage tariffs against these other countries.
Thank you for that information.
I am aware.
that a lot of other countries had much cheaper prices on all these drugs for a long, long time.
Well, I'm glad to hear that, and I know the people at our hospital here will be glad to hear that, too.
Yeah.
For sure.
Tariffs a little bit more, just specific to the dairy industry, because that scared some people here.
Of course.
What should we expect on that front with what's happened with Canada?
Should we be scared in Richland Center or should we not be so worried?
What do you think there?
So Canada signed the USMCA, the United States-Mexico-Canada Agreement.
There was a trade agreement.
trying to get rid of the disastrous NAFTA, which really shipped everything out of the country under NAFTA and went to Mexico, mostly all of our factories and everything just left the country.
It's to the detriment of Americans and American workers, you know.
So Canada signed on to NAFTA and they're not adhering to the agreements that they made.
So in other words, they're not allowing
Wisconsin dairy products and American dairy products to go into the Canadian market on purpose because they've established this quota system with their cows.
It's like by the cow, not by the 100 weight, you know.
And so they have not been, they haven't been adhering to that.
And they've also been flooding our markets here with dairy solids, which is not good for our market because then what do we do with our dairy solids?
So that's an issue.
And then what they recently started doing, what started this new round of
this kind of contentious period of time with Canada, is Canada started buying component parts from the Chinese Communist Party, importing them into Canada, sticking them into goods and other products, and then selling them into the United States, subverting the entire system.
So Canada is essentially funding the Chinese Communist Party off the backs of American workers.
And as soon as President Trump found out about that,
No, no, no, no, you don't get to do that and the negotiation So I just booked a hard luck like yesterday because it was September 11th and his brother was killed in the Twin Towers 25 years ago And so I just sent him condolences, you know, it doesn't matter how long it's been everybody knows this you lose a family remember it can be 25 years or 2,500 years It's that pains always there.
So I sent him a note and we talked a little bit And the the deal that they had to negotiate with Canada was really the best trade deal of any deal in the history of deals between countries
And they walked away with it walked away from it because their prime minister named Carney despises President Trump and what he's trying to do because he's wildly unpopular in Canada is Carney the Prime Minister of Canada is using this trade dispute for internal Canadian political purposes That's what's really taking place because they were offered the best deal they could ever get and they walked away with it for internal Canadian political purposes, which is shameful
Thank you for your candor.
I'm going to switch gears a little bit.
been candid?
You're not shy.
This is why I know from every time I've ever sat with you, I know you're going to tell me what you meant to tell me.
Let's talk about that t-shirt you're wearing right now.
It says defending the driftless and Wisconsin families.
It refers to the power lines that have been proposed.
What do you have to say there, Darren?
Well, let me tell you what.
And we lived in the driftless region.
on purpose.
And so this is the Driflus region and it's a unique geological area and geographic.
There's only one area like the Driflus region in the entire continental United States.
There's one in Alaska and there's like four or five around the world, right?
So this is a unique area and it needs to be treated as such.
we are simply not getting the answers we need.
There's the Becky line, not the Becca, not to be confused with the Becca line, which is actually just as disastrous as the long run.
So there's a Becky, excuse me, yeah, Becky and the Maribel line.
So there's 765 kilovolt.
And what these companies are trying to do is put these massive, they're like 250 foot towers, massive towers through the driftless region.
And I'm just not having any part of it.
And the primary reason is I don't think they did their homework.
I don't think they crossed the T's and dotted the I's.
Like how is this going to affect our groundwater when you start pounding in these huge pilings to support these towers?
What happens if a tower falls over because you didn't do it properly?
You're destroying farmland.
You're destroying an ecologically unique area.
And so this is very interesting because this issue has united everybody across the entire political spectrum because
In the driftless, we want to protect this land because it is unique.
And so I just got done speaking to some, I mean, real left Democrats at the fair today and we didn't care.
I mean, what's interesting is I've never cared what anybody's politics are.
They, you know, the way they portray me on social media and everything is just bananas.
I'll sit and talk to anybody, you know?
But I was talking to these ladies.
As a matter of fact, that's where I got this T-shirt from.
So this unites us because these companies are not going to just walk over us.
And there's so many different ways to do this.
Here's the unique problem that we've been working on.
There is no real federal nexus at this point, meaning this is a state regulatory issue.
And Governor Evers right now could flip a switch and turn off these projects right now.
He could just say, we're not going to do this.
You don't need to pass any legislation for this.
Governor Evers could stop this now because this is a state issue and he is in charge of the executive branch of the state and the executive branch of the state of Wisconsin and the people that run all the regulations.
Let's stop right there because I'm gonna go back.
They're the first person I've ever heard say that and I've talked to a lot of state officials and none of them have said that.
You know why?
ahead.
So you're saying Governor Tony Evers has the authority to stop these power lines?
Okay.
I'm part of the legislative branch.
And in Washington, DC So three branches of government we mirror each other.
You've got the executive branch.
That's the Trump administration right now You've got the legislative branch.
That's John Thune in the Senate by the way John Thune needs to get his people together and get the Save America Act done and then you've got Mike Johnson in the House of Representatives, right?
And then you've got John Roberts who's running the judiciary and then it mirrors that here in the state of Wisconsin You got a executive legislative and judicial branch.
Well, guess what the executive branch
can say no.
And then someone would have to go to the legislative branch and say the governor doesn't have the ability to say no using his executive powers through the DNR.
Like they'd have to do that and they'd have to sue him.
And that would still, that means that that would still stop this project until you could do more homework.
So the Evers administration has zero excuses for this stuff going through, zero.
Okay,
I'm
the reason I reacted the way I did Wasn't doubting what you're saying the question that just exploded in my head is why you're the first one I've heard say that because I have talked to a lot of elected officials on this at the state level
nobody has said that they've said well, we're trying to figure out what we can do
I mean how many things is it yours administration said no to right?
I mean, okay, how many people in the status constant raise your hand would agree with Tony Evers doing a line item veto and giving a 400 year property tax increase?
You can increase property tax for 400, he actually literally wrote that into the budget.
So if he can do something that wacky, which no one agrees with, he can certainly do something that makes sense to everybody, which is stop this stupid project until we figure out what the hell's going on.
Thank you.
Sure.
I'm going to transition a little bit because I have to ask you this one.
We've got an election coming.
We do.
Now, we hear it.
We see the ads are all over and the social media stuff, as you said, goes crazy.
I've been there as an elected person.
I've been there.
Okay.
In your words, Derek, the differences between the two candidates.
This is Rebecca's, I think, third attempt to win this seat and your attempt to win it for the third time.
I think that's right.
I think that's right.
No, fourth, because I lost the first time.
That's true.
You did the first time.
OK, so compare and contrast.
Take all the media away.
Take all of the whatever away.
The key differences between the two candidates.
Sure.
I
Like you know exactly who I'm I'm a retired Navy SEAL senior chief with multiple combat tours I'm a father that unfortunately lost one of our kids so I know the pain of that I've supported my family on a single Enlisted paycheck for an extended period of time I was a small business owner and You know now I'm a member of Congress and I say things exactly as as I believe they are to be true and you may not like some of the things that I say
But I'm going to tell you the truth as I know it.
And I'm also going to tell you exactly who I am.
Like you know my background.
Rebecca Cook is pretending to be this small, you know, hard scrabble, waitress lady.
And she's actually a professional political consultant who earns orders of magnitude more from George Soros funded organizations than she does as a waitress.
and she's been lying about this for the last six years.
So let me give you the most clear example of why Rebecca Cook does not want you to know who she is.
She put in an extension so she wouldn't have to release her personal financials after two days after the primary.
And the reason she did that is because it shows exactly what I said.
So Rebecca Cook has been getting paid directly to her personal bank account from George Soros for like six years.
That ain't me.
and she earns by orders of magnitude five and six times more as a political consultant than she does as a waitress, but she wants you to think that she's a waitress.
Rebecca Cook owns two waterfront properties.
Who listening to this right now even owns one waterfront property, let alone two, and then you pretend like you can't afford a washing machine.
So she's completely disingenuous.
She wants to ban your M4s, that's on video.
She endorsed Zorin Mondami for mayor.
in the city of New York.
She's endorsed by Bernie Sanders, who is an avowed radical socialist.
He is, okay?
She wants to open the borders again.
She wants to give everybody, including illegal aliens, free medical care.
How many people listening to this right now get free medical care?
And do you think we should be funding illegal aliens, giving them free medical care?
She wants sanctuary cities.
Let me give you an example why sanctuary cities are so dangerous.
The guy was a member of the Trenda Eragua that is a Venezuelan vicious gang and they have these very specific tattoos.
And unlike, you know, someone that goes to a music festival and gets a tattoo, if you have these tattoos, you are a member of that gang or they will kill you.
This guy was arrested in Minneapolis for a property crime and released.
He made his way down to Madison.
arrested again for some violent crimes, including strangulation and false imprisonment.
He was released because Madison is a sanctuary city.
He made his way to Prairie de Chine, where he trapped a mother and a daughter for a period of days, brutally raped the mom during this whole period of days.
And then he was finally, thank God, arrested by our police officers.
That was about four blocks away from where my grandchildren live.
Rebecca Cook wants those sanctuary cities.
And that's what happens with sanctuary cities.
And this is shocking to me.
Like 156 or so Democrats in the United States House of Representatives voted to not deport criminal illegal aliens that have been convicted of raping and murdering American citizens.
They voted to not deport them.
And I don't know how you negotiate with that.
And that is who Rebecca Cook is.
So she if it walks like a duck and quacks like a duck swims like a duck.
It's a duck Rebecca Cook is a socialist Every single one of those policies.
She's on record with all of them and so The difference between Francesca Hong and Rebecca Cook is Francesca Hong lost her primary and Cook because she was a political consultant for a decade and a half or so She understands if she says out loud what she really believes she won't get elected.
That's what happened to Francesca Hong
She said she really said or she said a lot of what she really believes
Okay, I gave you free reign.
I asked the question you answered it.
Thank you Derek I just say if if
you can't find a bigger contrast than that I don't I don't know how you can and this listen this is no longer Republican versus Democrat or or You know right versus left or even right versus wrong.
This is right versus crazy These people are crazy third
If you read the platform of the Democrat Socialists of America, they want to abolish the Constitution.
They want to abolish the executive branch.
They want to stuff the Supreme Court.
They don't want any borders at all.
They don't want any prisons.
That's who Rebecca Cook is siting with.
And we don't want that.
Those are not Wisconsin values.
I'm going to ask you one more.
I know you're short on time.
And I'm going to give you just wide open shot here.
You have you in a lateral authority Derek you can get one thing done that hasn't happened yet while you're in Congress What's one thing that you think we just got to have that we don't have now voter ID
I Mean voter ID the House of Representatives has passed excuse me has passed the Save America Act four times
We have passed it four times.
This is an 85% issue.
Republicans, Democrats, independents, libertarians, all socioeconomic groups and all racial dynamics all want to have voter ID.
So I am a firm believer along with 85% of Americans that only Americans should be voting in our elections.
And to me, it's just, it's not that difficult.
And people say, well, we have voter ID in Wisconsin.
I go, yeah, but we're one of 50 states.
So when you're dealing with federal elections, you know, you need to have, we need to know exactly who is casting that ballot.
And again, I want every single person that can legally cast a ballot to cast that ballot.
And that includes mail-in voting.
But I also don't want anyone, not even one person who's not legally allowed to vote to vote.
This has been Congressman Derek Van Orden on the morning show with us this morning.
Derek, thanks for coming in and joining us today.
I know you got to run.
Appreciate it.
The open conversation.
We'll have you back any time.
bet.
Safe travels, sir.
Thank you.
you
Welcome to our morning show today as we put the spotlight on the Richland School District, Director of Marketing and Communications.
Carrie Stoltz is here, Tiffany Boyarsky is here, District Instructional Coach, and Breanne Dre, Early Literacy Coaches in.
We'll find out what they do on their job roles this year with the Richland District.
But first of all, Carrie, you're on.
We'll start with you.
Hi Phil.
Just saw you not too
long ago.
I seem to frequent the school this time of year.
So every night seems like there's something going on.
Unfortunately, we had a lot of awake stuff this week.
So, but we did some winning when we were on the road.
So that's a good thing.
Volleyball got the win last night and soccer couldn't quite get it done at home, but we're happy to see those guys out there and cross countries having a great season.
I can't say enough about them.
They had their night meet last night.
So always kind of fun to get to do that under the lights.
Soccer lost River Valley, but good effort last night.
Yeah, it was good to see the guys out there and always nice to be home.
They were one of the only home events this week.
So it was great to see the crowd out there and always nice to have a home game.
Sounds like some rain on the way for the football team at Lancaster tonight.
Yes, we're hoping for the best.
But I do know that Coach Troxell has told the boys to be ready for a late evening if it is necessary.
But we're hoping we can get the game in there and get everybody home safe without too much trouble.
They don't know that Phil needs his rest before the Ithaca fair tomorrow, so.
We will try and get Phil to bed on
time.
I doubt that'll happen.
Well, you know, the last time we're here, we kind of touched a little bit on homecoming coming up, and that's still like about a month away.
Yeah,
less than a month now.
So we're ready.
It's late this year, which is kind of unusual for us.
it'll be the last kind of home, home stand.
And so hopefully we've got some teams in competition for, you know, conference titles and that kind of stuff.
So it should be a really great week.
Lots of energy homecoming always has just this kind of great energy around it on campus and dress up days and the parade and the game and the everybody just kind of has this great energy about them.
And so being later in the year, I'm hoping that'll be a nice little break for us.
We kind of have that joy.
and the excitement of the first day of school.
And then we've got to kind of get settled in there and then we get homecoming and then it won't be that long and we'll be at Christmas break already, which seems impossible, but it happens so quickly.
It does.
Who's the
grand marshal?
Yeah,
we just, we put it on our socials this morning.
So Billy Jones is going to be the grand marshal this year.
There's a nice little write up on the district website on our homecoming page about him.
So if anybody wants to take a gander at that,
And I'll also put in a plug for the website as we're talking about events and things like that going on at our district calendar is on the website.
And if you've ever got questions about, you know, what's going on, sporting events, musical music events, those kind of things that are on the district website and you can check it out.
It's right on the on the banner image.
There's a little image that looks like a calendar.
So click on that and you will be directed there.
And the construction, the referendum project, did everything get done pretty well by the start of school?
We are.
Everything is pretty well done.
There's, I think he calls it a punch list.
Brian Jones has kind of been helping us out even after he retired last year, just with kind of...
getting these things finished and completed and kind of checked off.
We do have our Hive students and our off-campus programming who moved into Melville Hall this last week.
So happened to run into Robin Dickman this morning and she said she was maybe doing a little too much moving of desks and things over there getting it ready and everything set up for those students.
So they are taking advantage of Melville Hall and utilizing that space and really are doing a great job of
making it a space that our students can have a place to learn and kind of private spaces and group work spaces.
And that is really going to be a benefit for them over there.
So that's construction-ish.
There's a lot more cleaning and furniture and that kind of thing.
And then we've got kind of punchless items, those last little.
you know, this trim is wrong, this needs repainted, that kind of thing going on at the other schools.
I'm trying to picture Melville Hall because there's a lot of space there.
And can you kind of picture, I mean, for us, what they're going to be doing?
So we're not 100% moved in.
And then I've.
I Thrive Program, which is currently at Rockbridge, will be moving over there.
So a lot of those larger spaces are going to be utilized for that program.
They have kind of large motor skills sort of elements that they were going to need for their programming.
So they're not in there yet.
And so it's a lot more of the study spaces and offices and that kind of thing that Hive and the off campus all ed program is able to utilize right now.
So I had never been to Melville until we took a walk through
Gosh, it's probably six months ago now, but a lot of offices, a lot of space, you're right.
So it will be great to get all those programs over there.
It's kind of a slow rollout as we've had programs get there.
We couldn't quite get it done this summer to have all the programs move in right at the beginning of the year.
But as we're getting more spaces open, it is seeming like a great time to make those moves.
You brought along some friends
today.
I
have.
So Tiffany and Brie are
have been with the district in different capacities over the years and now are working as instructional coaches or instructional coach and literacy coach and that has become something that is popular in districts and has kind of become a standard I would even say among districts is having coaches and I talked to Sherri Johnson this morning and her words were really great and she said you know you're helping every student by
helping every teacher.
So it's kind of what their roles are and why we're really excited to have them in our district.
So let's start with Rianne.
Is this your first time to the Morning Show Studios?
It's been a while.
It's been a while.
Well, good to have you in here.
Nice to be here.
It's been too long then.
Tell us about what you do as early literacy coach.
So the early literacy coach is actually a DPI grant that we've received over the next two years that allows me to mentor teachers in early literacy skills and instructional practices.
So mainly kindergarten through second grade.
And so my goal is to support them with professional development and help them within the classroom with certain systematic
literacy skills that we need to hit directly with the science of reading.
Is this something that's new not only to the district but something new in the state?
It is new in the state.
I go to training once a week with about 65 other early literacy coaches and it's a grant that they're giving schools to help support teachers in their literacy goals.
Do you spend a lot of time in the classroom?
Not yet.
Slowly, but surely, but that's been the biggest adjustment in this role is it's more on the outside rather than the inside.
Yeah.
Do you miss it a little bit?
I do.
I do.
It's just a different ball game.
It's not the classroom, everyday classroom that, you know, the chaos that you get to deal with, but it's nice to be able to support our teachers because it's a lot
of work.
It is a lot of work.
And I don't think we realize that.
And how receptive are the teachers too?
the work that you're
doing they're loving it i mean we have excellent educators and they want to be better so it's nice to be able to provide support and some resources so that they really can hit
all of those learners.
I mean our kids are very diversified in so many different ways.
It's nice to be able to support them and the teachers too.
Definitely.
So there's some like some online things that they can do and resources that way?
It's not.
I mean it's just kind of a big melting pot.
You can find resources anywhere but what's nice about programs
with instructional coach or early literacy is that we get the opportunity to model it form or co-teach with them and have those opportunities to talk about it afterwards so they can reflect and be like, okay, yeah, that didn't really work.
Let's try something different.
So again, it comes back to just being a support for the teachers so they can really hit all their learners.
Do you do something different like with each part of the school year then as the school year goes on, you have other plans then?
If I'm going to be honest, I'm figuring out as I go.
This is a new position and I think DPI
two is figuring it out.
How can we support, you know, from areas like ours to Milwaukee?
I mean, it's a very diversified profile.
So we're just finding ways to help everybody.
Teachers in the district, as you mentioned, you have students at all different levels of reading at this point and abilities.
You have Hispanic students as well.
So there are a lot of resources that you can help with.
I mean, once we figure out how this like,
the actual system itself.
I think once we figure out how we can really utilize this program on both parts, I mean, we're gonna be so successful with our kids and our teachers and our community.
It'll be great.
So you talked about there's being a grant.
Is this just for this school year then?
Or how does it work?
For the
next two years.
We're hoping, I think they're kind of crossing their fingers that this is something the state will extend because it's something that's really helpful in our reading area, our test scores.
We kind of could always use that extra bump.
Tiffy Boyarsky is here as well District Instructional Coach.
Tiffany, good morning again.
Good morning.
Good to see you.
Good to see you too.
So tell us about what your role is.
So I'm Instructional Coach for the teachers across all of the entire district, all buildings.
So I'm in the primary, intermediate, high school, I thrive.
Maybe I'll head over to the hive, we'll see.
But yeah, I'm everywhere.
It must not be boring.
I mean you've got something different all the time.
Oh, no, it's a lot of fun I enjoy the different buildings and principles and teachers and it's been amazing to You know before I was housed at the high school as an English teacher so Before that I was a ESL teacher across the district and so it's kind of fun to get back into those buildings and it's amazing I it's just Confirmed that we have some really awesome teachers like they're doing some really great things and it's it's fun to watch them
When this role came up, was it something you had to think about for a long time?
No, not at all.
Actually, I was really happy this role came up up at the high school for the last three years.
We've had a group of us that have been doing instructional coaching up at the high school within our departments.
And when we started doing that, we had some training for that in Dane County.
And I was like, this is kind of cool.
I really like this.
So then I went and got my masters in curriculum and instruction.
um, hoping to pursue something like this.
So when it came up, I was like, that's what I want to do.
Um, brand talked about teachers being receptive to it, but I mean, I think we all can get stuck in our ways, you know, especially if we've been doing something for a long time, how receptive do you find them to
be?
Um, really receptive.
Actually same, same here.
Um, like I said, the high school has been kind of already used that for the last three years.
So, um, already,
I've had multiple teachers ask me to come up and we sit in my classroom and see what's happening or I'm struggling with this.
It's only week three, but it's how it's going, it's real life there.
Same thing with the other elementary buildings, talking with teachers and jumping into their classrooms.
Even some of those teachers, like you said, that maybe feel like I know what I'm doing, they know.
They'll be like, you probably saw that.
So what do you think about that?
And we'll talk about it and brainstorm and problem-solve together and come up with some different instructional strategies or ideas of what might work better.
Because the goal is to get every learner involved and engaged.
And with a classroom of 15 or 20 and get up to the high school, you're getting up close to 30 kids in a classroom.
We're talking about all learners, so there's always probably one or two that you're like, oh, we can do a little bit more to get that kid involved, or what strategy can we do?
Like you said, you mentioned some of our diverse population, and that's something else too that I really am passionate about, being a former ESL teacher, working with some of those students.
Also, before Richland Center, I was Alt-Ed in Kenosha, so working with some of those strategies that work with some of our diverse learners.
Things have really changed in education during the time that you've had a career though, right?
Oh, yeah.
I started way back in little Belmont, Wisconsin, K-12 school back in 1999.
You
moved around a little bit.
But you've seen the small schools, you've seen the bigger schools.
Yeah, and it's changed.
I think for the better because we are you know back in the 90s it was you know no child left behind and we tried but I think we're doing a way better job well even with having the coaches come alongside but doing a lot better job of looking at each individual child and trying to figure out what can we do to help that student learn you know.
So.
Brian talked about reading too.
You know, reading is so important.
I mean, that's like the number one thing that should be focused on, especially at the lower grade levels.
Yeah, I think it's interesting, you know, the big push with Wisconsin DPI has been the science of reading, which gets back to the phonics.
And I'm sure Marie can talk way more about that than me.
But it's been fun kind of seeing that, which again,
works across all of our diverse learners, um, getting back to that science of reading and, um, we're hoping to really see a big, um, increase in those, those reading levels and seeing that each year, um, as it eventually gets up to the higher grade levels and up in the high school.
So.
Brie, are you hooked on phonics then?
Are you?
And reading rainbow.
Going back, especially a little bit to the speaking of the nineties, right?
So, but again, reading is so important.
That's like number one goal, isn't it?
I mean, it's a challenge because we were taught in college a certain way to teach and now we have to kind of throw out the old way of teaching reading.
And now we're really finding studies that our brain has made a certain way to learn a certain way.
So when we use science of reading techniques, it allows us to hit
every single learner, whether you are ELL or special ed or even dyslexic.
I mean, we're finding studies that that really supports the whole learner.
So it's really cool.
And catching those kind of things early is...
Yeah, it's huge.
It's huge.
Yeah.
Good deal.
So what excites you to go to work every morning, Brie?
the
people I work with.
Yeah, I mean, Richland Center School District, I've been here before and it's just nice to be able to walk in the building and feel like I'm part of something.
A
bigger picture.
Three weeks in.
And this is the important day I know for for taking role too, because it's the third Friday of the month.
So it's an important day in all the districts.
And we wanted to talk about some other things, Tiffany, that you're involved in.
Tell me about the Cozy Cafe.
Oh, yeah.
So our theater arts students, we're currently getting ready for our Mamma Mia production.
And one of our big fund raisers that we do throughout the year, the fall usually, is our Cozy
Cup Cafe.
We set up in different areas around town on weekends and we have these old mugs that are donated and they're, you know, some are cute with hearts or sometimes they're like, you know, could be graduation or Christmas mugs and people get to choose their mug and then they can get coffee, tea or hot chocolate for a free will donation.
And our community has always been really supportive of the theater arts and they are very generous.
Those mugs
go for $20 or $40 sometimes when they're donating.
And so we do really appreciate the community supporting us that way.
And so tomorrow we'll be at the 80 German warehouse.
They have an antique sale happening.
And Jane Kintz always reaches out to us and asks us if we want to set up a table and sell our coffee and tea.
So we'll be there tomorrow from 8 to 2.
getting to meet the people and the community and talk and promote our upcoming musical coming up and I'm hoping to raise some funds to help pay for that set.
Yeah.
And you can get a coffee mug for life.
I mean, I invested last year and I got a poop emoji cup.
Yes, you did.
That's right.
I
forgot about
that.
You talk about making an investment for the theater and then, you know, getting something for yourself.
so thank you very much and my wife is happy too but yeah anyway how is the musical mama Mia going Tiffany?
It's going amazing we have I have a great production team and crew team and awesome cast members we've been working really hard.
LizD Meyer is doing the music vocal part and then I have Cole Muth who's helping with putting my set
design ideas into reality and doing some CAD schematics and helping our building construction kids at school with Riley Blair and Alan Morwick have already started finally building some of our set.
We just finally got on stage Thursday to talk about those renovations and then the punch list.
We were waiting for this punch list to get done so we could get on stage and Thursday
Last night was the first night, so we're excited to finally get on stage, but I have some amazing choreographers.
I have Makayla Boyarsky, my own daughter, and Trent Kleis, who's from the Fenimore area.
Both of them from Dance Elite have been teachers there, teacher assistants and competition dancers, and it's been amazing.
I mean, we have a lot of athletes on our team, and so we start
about six or six, 30.
And some nights not getting out of there till like nine last night.
Some of us were there to hold 10, 30.
And so we'll go for the next month and a half or so.
I'm really excited to see it though.
How was the music coming together?
The early workouts
really, really well.
It's awesome.
I mean, Lizzie Meyer is amazing.
Um, great choir, choir and vocal person.
She, um, uh, the stuff she has the kids do and work on, like it's,
way past the basics.
She has them doing some really amazing professional things and has so much experience even with musical theater herself.
And yeah, like I said, and the dancing's coming right along.
So really, I just need to pick up my slack and get the acting where it needs to be.
And the stage is going to be spectacular then?
Well, I hope so.
I mean, Cole Muth made the comment to me the other day.
He goes,
He was a typical director.
He's like, he's been directing for 30 years.
Because I have like, we should do this.
We need to change that.
We need to do this.
And he's awesome.
He's been really good at.
making those dreams come to life and I think it's going to be amazing.
I'm pretty excited.
The kids last night seeing it kind of start to come alive and see some of the pictures and stuff that we had of it in the drawings were like, whoa, that's what it's going to look like.
I'm like, well, I hope so.
And what about you working on some polyester and some things like that?
Oh, yeah.
OK.
For sure, yeah, our finale is all disco.
Our finale will be Mamma Mia, Dancing Queen in Waterloo.
And we're hoping, I mean, I'm hoping even stage crew will come out in their disco costumes and that the audience will...
You know, join along and sing because everyone knows at least Dancing Queen and Mamma Mia and Waterloo.
So it'll be a great ending and they're looking forward to it.
So
much fun.
So yeah, things like the Cozy Cafe will help benefit that because it is expensive to put these things on.
Yes, it is.
Yeah, good.
Well, thanks for coming along.
Thanks for the update.
We'll have more on the morning show after the time out as we focus on the Richland district today.
Thanks to Tiffany Boyarsky, Andrea Andre, and it's great to learn about what they do and the special instruction they have this year for the teachers and the students of the Richland District.
One other thing I forgot to mention when Tiffany was here, but the musical Mamma Mia put on by Richland Center High School will be November 6th through the 8th.
I'm looking forward to that.
I'm going to see if I can find a special outfit to wear that night.
Date night.
And she would probably want to go with me.
If I'm dressed up like that.
Yeah, it'll be kind of one of the first opportunities for the community to get into the new auditor.
I shouldn't say new auditorium.
We didn't construct things, but
how about
new and improved?
Yeah, exactly.
New ish.
So definitely some improvements have happened in there.
A lot of them kind of behind the scenes.
So maybe you wouldn't necessarily notice right away.
There was kind of old technology up in the booth and there's the curtains.
Those actually I think went to the city auditorium if I'm not
mistaken.
They did, yes.
So they'll be new curtains and then there was, you know, kind of the curtains require new rigging at the top or, you know.
curtain rods if you would have in your house.
So that's new, carpet's new.
There's just some improvements made there so that mom and me will kind of be one of those first opportunities for the community to get in there and see it in a large scale.
We do have our choir concert before that, so that will be in there as well.
But yeah, hopefully the community loves the improvements and really gets a great chance to see what's going on and has been going on over the summer behind the scenes.
Musical years are always fun and there's nothing I think that that goes out of the district that that doesn't include more students in terms of the athletes and people that are maybe in band and choir and it just kind of melds everybody together.
So many things and I know I mean.
Tiffany has been having to deal with scheduling around a lot of different things and you know, you always think of football and Friday nights, but JV is during the week.
And so if you have JV athletes on there, you know, you could be dealing with Monday night football games and then you have Tuesday night volleyball and Thursday night soccer.
And it just doesn't, it never stops for people who are trying to work around all of our kids schedules, which to our kids credit.
We have amazing kids and they're super involved and they really do keep the school running.
Things happening, you know, it's a small school and so we really need our kids to be involved in doing lots of things and they rise to the occasion again and again.
And I will say, if you have a kid in the district who is still looking for something to do, we have
over 20 clubs and things that they can be involved in, tons of sports, things like the musical band, choir, all those things.
If your kid is looking for a way to meet people, get involved, be interested in something, there is an opportunity for them at Richland Center and we would love to welcome them to any of those things.
Any other changes in terms of the website and social medias and things like that for this year?
Well, we're pretty status quo.
There's always website updates that have to happen.
There's always new announcements and things that you have to have on there kind of as requirements by law.
And then I will give a plug or hive mind.
data is on the website and that will be kind of updating as we keep working through that improvement plan.
I know that the board members and the administrators met for quite a while on Wednesday night just kind of talking through what are going to be our priority pillars and how are we going to work towards those and how are we going to set those goals.
And so we will have more information coming out in the near future for the community and also just usually give a little sneak peek to the people who participated with us that night.
just so they kind of get a little highlight and to really know that their voices were heard and we're listening.
What's the schedule like in terms of going to school?
We have some days off coming up here in the near future.
Not really,
we're in.
You're kind of off and rolling.
Yeah, so we'll have grade check coming up here.
Homecoming is always kind of a neat week.
We do get out early for the parade.
And I think the goal is to get all of our students over the parade this year too.
A lot of them are already involved in on floats and walking and all of that already.
But for any of our students that aren't, we would really love to get them to the parade and get them the opportunity to be a part of it.
It's always just such a great event.
And we'll, you know, we'll cross our fingers for good weather.
We do not.
catch mother nature's wrath, but even so, it'll be a great day.
There's lots of stuff that goes on.
It is, we say over and over again, but it's such a high energy time.
And if you're an alumni or you know an alumni who would think of coming back, please encourage them to do so.
We'd love to see it at the school.
It looks a lot the same, but a lot different.
And we always love to welcome back.
people who've been a part of our community and our school.
And I know there's a lot of reunions happening and that kind of thing too.
So get your classmates together, grab a float if you want, go be in the parade, go have a meeting before the football game, come to the football game, enjoy the time with Richland Center at Homecoming.
And what is the date again?
Homecoming is October 16th, or I'm sorry, I, yeah, that's right.
Yeah, it is that week.
So I think we have things starting on that Monday is October 12th.
If I'm not mistaken, I have a calendar in front of me.
So yeah, and then we'll have events that whole week at the high school parade is the 16th and then dance on the 17th.
somebody might think that, oh, I missed it this year.
And all of a sudden, wait a minute, I, I didn't miss
it.
It's still going on.
Cause some people will assume it's the same weekend as the, the Canyon lights parade.
Yes.
So we, um, I have a band student and we lucked out this year that we don't have two parades on the same weekend.
And so we get to a little bit of a break in there.
Cause I think that's six than seventh or somewhere in there.
Second and third,
second and third.
Again, don't have that calendar in front.
Yeah,
things are coming up here.
Well, we appreciate you coming in.
Thanks for bringing some friends along today and we'll see you again next month.
Thanks so much, Phil.
You bet.
Kerry souls joining us.
Richland district director of marketing and communications on the morning show.
you
Welcome to our morning show today as we put the spotlight on the Richland School District, Director of Marketing and Communications.
Carrie Stoltz is here, Tiffany Boyarsky is here, District Instructional Coach, and Breanne Dre, Early Literacy Coaches in.
We'll find out what they do on their job roles this year with the Richland District.
But first of all, Carrie, you're on.
We'll start with you.
Hi Phil.
Just saw you not too
long ago.
I seem to frequent the school this time of year.
So every night seems like there's something going on.
Unfortunately, we had a lot of awake stuff this week.
So, but we did some winning when we were on the road.
So that's a good thing.
Volleyball got the win last night and soccer couldn't quite get it done at home, but we're happy to see those guys out there and cross countries having a great season.
I can't say enough about them.
They had their night meet last night.
So always kind of fun to get to do that under the lights.
Soccer lost River Valley, but good effort last night.
Yeah, it was good to see the guys out there and always nice to be home.
They were one of the only home events this week.
So it was great to see the crowd out there and always nice to have a home game.
Sounds like some rain on the way for the football team at Lancaster tonight.
Yes, we're hoping for the best.
But I do know that Coach Troxell has told the boys to be ready for a late evening if it is necessary.
But we're hoping we can get the game in there and get everybody home safe without too much trouble.
They don't know that Phil needs his rest before the Ithaca fair tomorrow, so.
We will try and get Phil to bed on
time.
I doubt that'll happen.
Well, you know, the last time we're here, we kind of touched a little bit on homecoming coming up, and that's still like about a month away.
Yeah,
less than a month now.
So we're ready.
It's late this year, which is kind of unusual for us.
it'll be the last kind of home, home stand.
And so hopefully we've got some teams in competition for, you know, conference titles and that kind of stuff.
So it should be a really great week.
Lots of energy homecoming always has just this kind of great energy around it on campus and dress up days and the parade and the game and the everybody just kind of has this great energy about them.
And so being later in the year, I'm hoping that'll be a nice little break for us.
We kind of have that joy.
and the excitement of the first day of school.
And then we've got to kind of get settled in there and then we get homecoming and then it won't be that long and we'll be at Christmas break already, which seems impossible, but it happens so quickly.
It does.
Who's the
grand marshal?
Yeah,
we just, we put it on our socials this morning.
So Billy Jones is going to be the grand marshal this year.
There's a nice little write up on the district website on our homecoming page about him.
So if anybody wants to take a gander at that,
And I'll also put in a plug for the website as we're talking about events and things like that going on at our district calendar is on the website.
And if you've ever got questions about, you know, what's going on, sporting events, musical music events, those kind of things that are on the district website and you can check it out.
It's right on the on the banner image.
There's a little image that looks like a calendar.
So click on that and you will be directed there.
And the construction, the referendum project, did everything get done pretty well by the start of school?
We are.
Everything is pretty well done.
There's, I think he calls it a punch list.
Brian Jones has kind of been helping us out even after he retired last year, just with kind of...
getting these things finished and completed and kind of checked off.
We do have our Hive students and our off-campus programming who moved into Melville Hall this last week.
So happened to run into Robin Dickman this morning and she said she was maybe doing a little too much moving of desks and things over there getting it ready and everything set up for those students.
So they are taking advantage of Melville Hall and utilizing that space and really are doing a great job of
making it a space that our students can have a place to learn and kind of private spaces and group work spaces.
And that is really going to be a benefit for them over there.
So that's construction-ish.
There's a lot more cleaning and furniture and that kind of thing.
And then we've got kind of punchless items, those last little.
you know, this trim is wrong, this needs repainted, that kind of thing going on at the other schools.
I'm trying to picture Melville Hall because there's a lot of space there.
And can you kind of picture, I mean, for us, what they're going to be doing?
So we're not 100% moved in.
And then I've.
I Thrive Program, which is currently at Rockbridge, will be moving over there.
So a lot of those larger spaces are going to be utilized for that program.
They have kind of large motor skills sort of elements that they were going to need for their programming.
So they're not in there yet.
And so it's a lot more of the study spaces and offices and that kind of thing that Hive and the off campus all ed program is able to utilize right now.
So I had never been to Melville until we took a walk through
Gosh, it's probably six months ago now, but a lot of offices, a lot of space, you're right.
So it will be great to get all those programs over there.
It's kind of a slow rollout as we've had programs get there.
We couldn't quite get it done this summer to have all the programs move in right at the beginning of the year.
But as we're getting more spaces open, it is seeming like a great time to make those moves.
You brought along some friends
today.
I
have.
So Tiffany and Brie are
have been with the district in different capacities over the years and now are working as instructional coaches or instructional coach and literacy coach and that has become something that is popular in districts and has kind of become a standard I would even say among districts is having coaches and I talked to Sherri Johnson this morning and her words were really great and she said you know you're helping every student by
helping every teacher.
So it's kind of what their roles are and why we're really excited to have them in our district.
So let's start with Rianne.
Is this your first time to the Morning Show Studios?
It's been a while.
It's been a while.
Well, good to have you in here.
Nice to be here.
It's been too long then.
Tell us about what you do as early literacy coach.
So the early literacy coach is actually a DPI grant that we've received over the next two years that allows me to mentor teachers in early literacy skills and instructional practices.
So mainly kindergarten through second grade.
And so my goal is to support them with professional development and help them within the classroom with certain systematic
literacy skills that we need to hit directly with the science of reading.
Is this something that's new not only to the district but something new in the state?
It is new in the state.
I go to training once a week with about 65 other early literacy coaches and it's a grant that they're giving schools to help support teachers in their literacy goals.
Do you spend a lot of time in the classroom?
Not yet.
Slowly, but surely, but that's been the biggest adjustment in this role is it's more on the outside rather than the inside.
Yeah.
Do you miss it a little bit?
I do.
I do.
It's just a different ball game.
It's not the classroom, everyday classroom that, you know, the chaos that you get to deal with, but it's nice to be able to support our teachers because it's a lot
of work.
It is a lot of work.
And I don't think we realize that.
And how receptive are the teachers too?
the work that you're
doing they're loving it i mean we have excellent educators and they want to be better so it's nice to be able to provide support and some resources so that they really can hit
all of those learners.
I mean our kids are very diversified in so many different ways.
It's nice to be able to support them and the teachers too.
Definitely.
So there's some like some online things that they can do and resources that way?
It's not.
I mean it's just kind of a big melting pot.
You can find resources anywhere but what's nice about programs
with instructional coach or early literacy is that we get the opportunity to model it form or co-teach with them and have those opportunities to talk about it afterwards so they can reflect and be like, okay, yeah, that didn't really work.
Let's try something different.
So again, it comes back to just being a support for the teachers so they can really hit all their learners.
Do you do something different like with each part of the school year then as the school year goes on, you have other plans then?
If I'm going to be honest, I'm figuring out as I go.
This is a new position and I think DPI
two is figuring it out.
How can we support, you know, from areas like ours to Milwaukee?
I mean, it's a very diversified profile.
So we're just finding ways to help everybody.
Teachers in the district, as you mentioned, you have students at all different levels of reading at this point and abilities.
You have Hispanic students as well.
So there are a lot of resources that you can help with.
I mean, once we figure out how this like,
the actual system itself.
I think once we figure out how we can really utilize this program on both parts, I mean, we're gonna be so successful with our kids and our teachers and our community.
It'll be great.
So you talked about there's being a grant.
Is this just for this school year then?
Or how does it work?
For the
next two years.
We're hoping, I think they're kind of crossing their fingers that this is something the state will extend because it's something that's really helpful in our reading area, our test scores.
We kind of could always use that extra bump.
Tiffy Boyarsky is here as well District Instructional Coach.
Tiffany, good morning again.
Good morning.
Good to see you.
Good to see you too.
So tell us about what your role is.
So I'm Instructional Coach for the teachers across all of the entire district, all buildings.
So I'm in the primary, intermediate, high school, I thrive.
Maybe I'll head over to the hive, we'll see.
But yeah, I'm everywhere.
It must not be boring.
I mean you've got something different all the time.
Oh, no, it's a lot of fun I enjoy the different buildings and principles and teachers and it's been amazing to You know before I was housed at the high school as an English teacher so Before that I was a ESL teacher across the district and so it's kind of fun to get back into those buildings and it's amazing I it's just Confirmed that we have some really awesome teachers like they're doing some really great things and it's it's fun to watch them
When this role came up, was it something you had to think about for a long time?
No, not at all.
Actually, I was really happy this role came up up at the high school for the last three years.
We've had a group of us that have been doing instructional coaching up at the high school within our departments.
And when we started doing that, we had some training for that in Dane County.
And I was like, this is kind of cool.
I really like this.
So then I went and got my masters in curriculum and instruction.
um, hoping to pursue something like this.
So when it came up, I was like, that's what I want to do.
Um, brand talked about teachers being receptive to it, but I mean, I think we all can get stuck in our ways, you know, especially if we've been doing something for a long time, how receptive do you find them to
be?
Um, really receptive.
Actually same, same here.
Um, like I said, the high school has been kind of already used that for the last three years.
So, um, already,
I've had multiple teachers ask me to come up and we sit in my classroom and see what's happening or I'm struggling with this.
It's only week three, but it's how it's going, it's real life there.
Same thing with the other elementary buildings, talking with teachers and jumping into their classrooms.
Even some of those teachers, like you said, that maybe feel like I know what I'm doing, they know.
They'll be like, you probably saw that.
So what do you think about that?
And we'll talk about it and brainstorm and problem-solve together and come up with some different instructional strategies or ideas of what might work better.
Because the goal is to get every learner involved and engaged.
And with a classroom of 15 or 20 and get up to the high school, you're getting up close to 30 kids in a classroom.
We're talking about all learners, so there's always probably one or two that you're like, oh, we can do a little bit more to get that kid involved, or what strategy can we do?
Like you said, you mentioned some of our diverse population, and that's something else too that I really am passionate about, being a former ESL teacher, working with some of those students.
Also, before Richland Center, I was Alt-Ed in Kenosha, so working with some of those strategies that work with some of our diverse learners.
Things have really changed in education during the time that you've had a career though, right?
Oh, yeah.
I started way back in little Belmont, Wisconsin, K-12 school back in 1999.
You
moved around a little bit.
But you've seen the small schools, you've seen the bigger schools.
Yeah, and it's changed.
I think for the better because we are you know back in the 90s it was you know no child left behind and we tried but I think we're doing a way better job well even with having the coaches come alongside but doing a lot better job of looking at each individual child and trying to figure out what can we do to help that student learn you know.
So.
Brian talked about reading too.
You know, reading is so important.
I mean, that's like the number one thing that should be focused on, especially at the lower grade levels.
Yeah, I think it's interesting, you know, the big push with Wisconsin DPI has been the science of reading, which gets back to the phonics.
And I'm sure Marie can talk way more about that than me.
But it's been fun kind of seeing that, which again,
works across all of our diverse learners, um, getting back to that science of reading and, um, we're hoping to really see a big, um, increase in those, those reading levels and seeing that each year, um, as it eventually gets up to the higher grade levels and up in the high school.
So.
Brie, are you hooked on phonics then?
Are you?
And reading rainbow.
Going back, especially a little bit to the speaking of the nineties, right?
So, but again, reading is so important.
That's like number one goal, isn't it?
I mean, it's a challenge because we were taught in college a certain way to teach and now we have to kind of throw out the old way of teaching reading.
And now we're really finding studies that our brain has made a certain way to learn a certain way.
So when we use science of reading techniques, it allows us to hit
every single learner, whether you are ELL or special ed or even dyslexic.
I mean, we're finding studies that that really supports the whole learner.
So it's really cool.
And catching those kind of things early is...
Yeah, it's huge.
It's huge.
Yeah.
Good deal.
So what excites you to go to work every morning, Brie?
the
people I work with.
Yeah, I mean, Richland Center School District, I've been here before and it's just nice to be able to walk in the building and feel like I'm part of something.
A
bigger picture.
Three weeks in.
And this is the important day I know for for taking role too, because it's the third Friday of the month.
So it's an important day in all the districts.
And we wanted to talk about some other things, Tiffany, that you're involved in.
Tell me about the Cozy Cafe.
Oh, yeah.
So our theater arts students, we're currently getting ready for our Mamma Mia production.
And one of our big fund raisers that we do throughout the year, the fall usually, is our Cozy
Cup Cafe.
We set up in different areas around town on weekends and we have these old mugs that are donated and they're, you know, some are cute with hearts or sometimes they're like, you know, could be graduation or Christmas mugs and people get to choose their mug and then they can get coffee, tea or hot chocolate for a free will donation.
And our community has always been really supportive of the theater arts and they are very generous.
Those mugs
go for $20 or $40 sometimes when they're donating.
And so we do really appreciate the community supporting us that way.
And so tomorrow we'll be at the 80 German warehouse.
They have an antique sale happening.
And Jane Kintz always reaches out to us and asks us if we want to set up a table and sell our coffee and tea.
So we'll be there tomorrow from 8 to 2.
getting to meet the people and the community and talk and promote our upcoming musical coming up and I'm hoping to raise some funds to help pay for that set.
Yeah.
And you can get a coffee mug for life.
I mean, I invested last year and I got a poop emoji cup.
Yes, you did.
That's right.
I
forgot about
that.
You talk about making an investment for the theater and then, you know, getting something for yourself.
so thank you very much and my wife is happy too but yeah anyway how is the musical mama Mia going Tiffany?
It's going amazing we have I have a great production team and crew team and awesome cast members we've been working really hard.
LizD Meyer is doing the music vocal part and then I have Cole Muth who's helping with putting my set
design ideas into reality and doing some CAD schematics and helping our building construction kids at school with Riley Blair and Alan Morwick have already started finally building some of our set.
We just finally got on stage Thursday to talk about those renovations and then the punch list.
We were waiting for this punch list to get done so we could get on stage and Thursday
Last night was the first night, so we're excited to finally get on stage, but I have some amazing choreographers.
I have Makayla Boyarsky, my own daughter, and Trent Kleis, who's from the Fenimore area.
Both of them from Dance Elite have been teachers there, teacher assistants and competition dancers, and it's been amazing.
I mean, we have a lot of athletes on our team, and so we start
about six or six, 30.
And some nights not getting out of there till like nine last night.
Some of us were there to hold 10, 30.
And so we'll go for the next month and a half or so.
I'm really excited to see it though.
How was the music coming together?
The early workouts
really, really well.
It's awesome.
I mean, Lizzie Meyer is amazing.
Um, great choir, choir and vocal person.
She, um, uh, the stuff she has the kids do and work on, like it's,
way past the basics.
She has them doing some really amazing professional things and has so much experience even with musical theater herself.
And yeah, like I said, and the dancing's coming right along.
So really, I just need to pick up my slack and get the acting where it needs to be.
And the stage is going to be spectacular then?
Well, I hope so.
I mean, Cole Muth made the comment to me the other day.
He goes,
He was a typical director.
He's like, he's been directing for 30 years.
Because I have like, we should do this.
We need to change that.
We need to do this.
And he's awesome.
He's been really good at.
making those dreams come to life and I think it's going to be amazing.
I'm pretty excited.
The kids last night seeing it kind of start to come alive and see some of the pictures and stuff that we had of it in the drawings were like, whoa, that's what it's going to look like.
I'm like, well, I hope so.
And what about you working on some polyester and some things like that?
Oh, yeah.
OK.
For sure, yeah, our finale is all disco.
Our finale will be Mamma Mia, Dancing Queen in Waterloo.
And we're hoping, I mean, I'm hoping even stage crew will come out in their disco costumes and that the audience will...
You know, join along and sing because everyone knows at least Dancing Queen and Mamma Mia and Waterloo.
So it'll be a great ending and they're looking forward to it.
So
much fun.
So yeah, things like the Cozy Cafe will help benefit that because it is expensive to put these things on.
Yes, it is.
Yeah, good.
Well, thanks for coming along.
Thanks for the update.
We'll have more on the morning show after the time out as we focus on the Richland district today.
Thanks to Tiffany Boyarsky, Andrea Andre, and it's great to learn about what they do and the special instruction they have this year for the teachers and the students of the Richland District.
One other thing I forgot to mention when Tiffany was here, but the musical Mamma Mia put on by Richland Center High School will be November 6th through the 8th.
I'm looking forward to that.
I'm going to see if I can find a special outfit to wear that night.
Date night.
And she would probably want to go with me.
If I'm dressed up like that.
Yeah, it'll be kind of one of the first opportunities for the community to get into the new auditor.
I shouldn't say new auditorium.
We didn't construct things, but
how about
new and improved?
Yeah, exactly.
New ish.
So definitely some improvements have happened in there.
A lot of them kind of behind the scenes.
So maybe you wouldn't necessarily notice right away.
There was kind of old technology up in the booth and there's the curtains.
Those actually I think went to the city auditorium if I'm not
mistaken.
They did, yes.
So they'll be new curtains and then there was, you know, kind of the curtains require new rigging at the top or, you know.
curtain rods if you would have in your house.
So that's new, carpet's new.
There's just some improvements made there so that mom and me will kind of be one of those first opportunities for the community to get in there and see it in a large scale.
We do have our choir concert before that, so that will be in there as well.
But yeah, hopefully the community loves the improvements and really gets a great chance to see what's going on and has been going on over the summer behind the scenes.
Musical years are always fun and there's nothing I think that that goes out of the district that that doesn't include more students in terms of the athletes and people that are maybe in band and choir and it just kind of melds everybody together.
So many things and I know I mean.
Tiffany has been having to deal with scheduling around a lot of different things and you know, you always think of football and Friday nights, but JV is during the week.
And so if you have JV athletes on there, you know, you could be dealing with Monday night football games and then you have Tuesday night volleyball and Thursday night soccer.
And it just doesn't, it never stops for people who are trying to work around all of our kids schedules, which to our kids credit.
We have amazing kids and they're super involved and they really do keep the school running.
Things happening, you know, it's a small school and so we really need our kids to be involved in doing lots of things and they rise to the occasion again and again.
And I will say, if you have a kid in the district who is still looking for something to do, we have
over 20 clubs and things that they can be involved in, tons of sports, things like the musical band, choir, all those things.
If your kid is looking for a way to meet people, get involved, be interested in something, there is an opportunity for them at Richland Center and we would love to welcome them to any of those things.
Any other changes in terms of the website and social medias and things like that for this year?
Well, we're pretty status quo.
There's always website updates that have to happen.
There's always new announcements and things that you have to have on there kind of as requirements by law.
And then I will give a plug or hive mind.
data is on the website and that will be kind of updating as we keep working through that improvement plan.
I know that the board members and the administrators met for quite a while on Wednesday night just kind of talking through what are going to be our priority pillars and how are we going to work towards those and how are we going to set those goals.
And so we will have more information coming out in the near future for the community and also just usually give a little sneak peek to the people who participated with us that night.
just so they kind of get a little highlight and to really know that their voices were heard and we're listening.
What's the schedule like in terms of going to school?
We have some days off coming up here in the near future.
Not really,
we're in.
You're kind of off and rolling.
Yeah, so we'll have grade check coming up here.
Homecoming is always kind of a neat week.
We do get out early for the parade.
And I think the goal is to get all of our students over the parade this year too.
A lot of them are already involved in on floats and walking and all of that already.
But for any of our students that aren't, we would really love to get them to the parade and get them the opportunity to be a part of it.
It's always just such a great event.
And we'll, you know, we'll cross our fingers for good weather.
We do not.
catch mother nature's wrath, but even so, it'll be a great day.
There's lots of stuff that goes on.
It is, we say over and over again, but it's such a high energy time.
And if you're an alumni or you know an alumni who would think of coming back, please encourage them to do so.
We'd love to see it at the school.
It looks a lot the same, but a lot different.
And we always love to welcome back.
people who've been a part of our community and our school.
And I know there's a lot of reunions happening and that kind of thing too.
So get your classmates together, grab a float if you want, go be in the parade, go have a meeting before the football game, come to the football game, enjoy the time with Richland Center at Homecoming.
And what is the date again?
Homecoming is October 16th, or I'm sorry, I, yeah, that's right.
Yeah, it is that week.
So I think we have things starting on that Monday is October 12th.
If I'm not mistaken, I have a calendar in front of me.
So yeah, and then we'll have events that whole week at the high school parade is the 16th and then dance on the 17th.
somebody might think that, oh, I missed it this year.
And all of a sudden, wait a minute, I, I didn't miss
it.
It's still going on.
Cause some people will assume it's the same weekend as the, the Canyon lights parade.
Yes.
So we, um, I have a band student and we lucked out this year that we don't have two parades on the same weekend.
And so we get to a little bit of a break in there.
Cause I think that's six than seventh or somewhere in there.
Second and third,
second and third.
Again, don't have that calendar in front.
Yeah,
things are coming up here.
Well, we appreciate you coming in.
Thanks for bringing some friends along today and we'll see you again next month.
Thanks so much, Phil.
You bet.
Kerry souls joining us.
Richland district director of marketing and communications on the morning show.