Those who know Susan Rueter say she never met a stranger. She loved people, and she was able to realize her calling when she moved to Batesville. As she and her husband were preparing to move from Fulton, Mo., a friend suggested she apply to Edward Jones Investments, which she did. Her office was on Main Street.
Members of the Lego Robotics Team at Central Magnet Math and Science were at the Batesville School Board meeting Monday afternoon to receive congratulations on winning their first trophy. The second-place trophy was earned by the team for the research and quality they put into their project at the 2008 Arkansas First Lego League Championship Tournament and Junior First Lego League Expo in Mountain Home recently. The First Lego League is a Junior Robotics Team, sponsored by Debra Smith. The challenge was “climate connection.”
HORSESHOE BEND - While a man was struggling to provide shelter for others during the ice storm last week, his home burned to the ground.
"We lost everything," Tony Baptistia said during a Guard interview Monday. "But we'll rebuild."
MELBOURNE - The bottled water coming into Izard County on pallets for those needing it is going to be rationed at this point. That's what Dennis Williams told the quorum court members Tuesday night.
HORSESHOE BEND - A soot-covered, partially melted fire engine was sitting in front of a water-soaked fire department this morning and officials are still unsure of what started the fire.
"The fire got so hot that the steel beams were weakened," Horseshoe Bend Fire Chief Mike Hilliker told the Guard this morning.
Chuck Jones, co-founder of the Literacy Council of Independence County, says that 25 percent of the residents in Arkansas over the age of 25 do not have a high school diploma.
Of that, more than 162,000 Arkansans have less than an eighth-grade education, he told the Batesville Rotary Club members at a recent meeting.
Batesville School District computers had been down due to a computer virus, but they are now running smoothly.
Debbie Miller, director of curriculum and instruction, said at the school board meeting Monday that representatives from the state Department of Education came to the school and "stayed with us the whole week and that's just about unheard of. We didn't realize we had the infection."
While 9-year-old Tera Culp worked to feed the material through the sewing machine, her instructor reminded her that going slow would give her more control.
Judith Dierkes, an artist-in-residence at West Magnet Visual & Performing Arts, has been introducing third- and fourth-grade students to the art of using buttons and bobbins to learn about the history of their school.
MELBOURNE - More than $500,000 has come into Izard County from the Federal Emergency Management Agency to pay for damage/services from 2008 tornados and floods.
Izard County Judge Rayburn Finley announced Tuesday night at the quorum court meeting that those figures came from receipts from FEMA, with just over $475,600 for floods and nearly $119,000 due to tornados.
2008 was a year for change in many of the area school districts - some of it welcome and some of it not.
The Batesville School District flourished in 2008, seeing enrollment soar with classes full and students on waiting lists for the magnet schools and students being introduced to new technology.
