Decatur County Community High School
605 E Commercial St, Oberlin, KS 67749
February 16, 2025 (Schedule at the bottom, Skip What You Want)
Follow us on Twitter at @DCHSREDDEVILS or
Facebook at https://www.facebook.com/Oberlin294/
Decatur community,
I was obviously wrong last week in my predictions. The only one that I think I was right about was that if the Eagles won there would be blame pointed at the refs. (Thank you, Deandre Hopkins) Unfortunately, I accidentally deleted a large portion of last week's message, so there really is no proof.
Another prediction that I had was that we would have a snow day last Wednesday, but those are never shared out loud, especially with students. Last week's notification went out at the end of the games on Tuesday evening, but I was told by several that they didn't get the notifications. If there is anyone that needs to be getting either texts, calls, or emails, please reach out, and we will figure out exactly what is happening, because I'm looking at the weather right now.
My prediction........
Shoutout to senior Davin Jensen. During last Thursday's senior night, Davin played the national anthem on his guitar. He did a great job, and I even had community members reaching out about the performance. That is one way to remember your last home game, although I sure hope that we will be getting at least one more home game in the post season.
Shoutout to junior basketball player Tyler Ostmeyer. Ostmeyer was the winner of an online public vote for the VYPE Athlete Spotlight this past week. Read the article here. Here's what I love about Tyler Ostmeyer. It doesn't matter if he is on the court, on the field, in the classrooms, or in the halls, Tyler gives everything 100%, is respectful to fellow students, athletes, refs, coaches, and staff members, and is a leader that everyone can be proud of.
Shoutout to Mrs. Springer and the JH cheerleaders. The cheerleaders practiced hard the past few weeks, and they put on a solid performance in between rounds at our home event this past Thursday. Their last match of the night was probably the loudest and most involved wrestling cheer that I have ever seen. Great work, ladies!
Shoutout to Transportation Director Rick Touslee. Rick has done a great job in his first year in the position. Rick maintains our vehicles, coordinates the large variety of transportation requests that we have for students and staff, and is generally available at all hours of the day. This past Saturday he was integral in helping to make the the tough decision to not send our teams on trips due to weather. He had seen cars in the ditch on the way and had even reached out to other schools' directors as well for their input. He's done a great job this year.
Shoutout to Decatur County Emergency Management Director Jeff Burmaster. It's nice to have another soul out there that is up super early, and he was able to provide more information on Saturday morning than any weather station ever could. Burmaster has done an outstanding job of communicating and working with the school this year and has been a crucial piece to the school and the community services working together on various things.
Shoutout to history teacher Trevor Williams. Mr. Williams class this past week was going over the Great Depression. They discussed some of the causes and ultimately its impact on the triggering of WWII. The students were given quotes by leaders such as Franklin D. Roosevelt (US) and Adolf Hitler (Germany) amongst others. I am a history teacher, and I loved being in the class and watching the students make the connections on the varying perspectives of each country and their reasons for their stances.
Shoutout to Mr. Wendelin and his students. I took a ton of science classes in high school, but my memories always come back to my 4th and 5th hour back to back Physiology and Zoology classes. I had the same teacher for both classes, and I remember back to back dissections of cats in physiology and sharks in zoology. Mr. Wendelin's biology classes dissected pig hearts this past week. The students were both nervous and excited at the same time. The great thing was that they were all genuinely interested in what was going on, and they probably will never forget.
Shoutout to math teacher Tessa Anderson. I spent a class period with her and her 7th grade students this past Thursday, and I was so impressed with the routines. One of the biggest challenges in teaching is what is called the transition. Transitions are often disruptive and time wasting, but Mrs. Anderson's class was seamless. She had bellwork waiting right away and students knew exactly what to do when they came in. She used technology and hands on learning as well. They used protractors to create pie graphs, which the info. came from self-created student surveys and student data from asking friends. There was a lot of learning taking place and a lot of strategies to capture the learning. One student's survey was about the greatest NBA player of all time. I can't believe that I was the only one that said Michael Jordan. I now understand when my friends' parents and uncles would bring up Wilt Chamberlain.
Shoutout to Mrs. Saul and her Public Speaking (College Speech) class. This past Monday I spent an hour with their class, and I enjoyed the conversations that the students were having over intrapersonal speeches. I was also lucky enough to be able to listen to the students' speeches. I enjoyed contributing feedback to each student, but, even more so, I enjoyed the students' feedback to each other. They did a great job of giving constructive criticism, which is so much more positive and respecful than just criticism, and they respected each other's opinions.
Shoutout to librarian Lisa Fortin. This year has been a true challenge with subs. The subs we have are great, but there are not enough of them to go around. There has been a ton of illness in our building from both students and staff, and I have had many occassions where I have had classes go to the library. Mrs. Fortin does a great job with them, and I appreciate her consistent effort to help.
Shoutout to the OES staff on their efforts with One School One Book. Most probably already know that the school is reading the book A Boy Called Bat. I love that they are posting guest readers reading the book online. It's a lot of fun, and I even heard board members discussing their own involvement with the book and reading it last Monday night.
Shoutout to the JV Wrestling Squad pictured below. On Friday, they traveled to Colby and each of the 5 wrestlers placed in their divisions. Her are the results:
Gus Bryan: 4th
Theo Butterfield: 2nd
Guss Emigh: 1st
Lucas Linner: 2nd
Christian Smith-Titus: 2nd
Next Tuesday, February 25th, junior students will be taking the ACT test. I will put more info. on this next week, but here is a brief overview of the test:
OVERVIEW OF ACT TEST SECTIONS
English
- 75 multiple–choice questions
- 45 minutes
- Tests grammar, punctuation, sentence structure and rhetorical skills
- Learn more about the ACT English Test
Math
- 60 multiple–choice questions
- 60 minutes
- Algebra I and II, geometry, and some trigonometry
- Learn more about the ACT Math Test
Reading
- 40 multiple–choice questions
- 35 minutes
- Four passages (prose fiction, social studies, humanities, and natural sciences) with 10 questions per passage
- Learn more about the ACT Reading Test
Science
- 40 multiple–choice questions
- 35 minutes
- Questions on science-based passages presented with graphs, charts, tables and research summaries
- Learn more about the ACT Science Test
Second Semester Conferences Coming up Next Week
Spring Conferences are next week. We will have no school on Friday, February 28. Here is some initial information on the times, but there will be more info. to come.
The timeframe is listed below:
Wednesday, February 26: 4:00-8:00 PM
Thursday, February 27: 4:00-7:30 PM
That's it for this week. There is a bit of deja vu floating around as Mother Nature is once again making herself felt to start another week, filling minds with hopes? (I guess it depends on who you're talking to) of yet another snow day.
Good luck to those of you rooting for another snow day.
Good luck to those of you that don't want another snow day.
Good luck to our wrestlers as they head off to Cimarron High School for Regionals. My hope is that
there will be much more to say about several of them next week.
My Prediction........
Until next week!
Jeremy Holloway
Go Big Red!
BOYS BASKETBALL Record 9-9
1-0 W 67-33 home vs Atwood
2-0 W 62-43 vs Hitchcock County (McCook Invitational First Round)
2-1 L 33-59 vs Danbury (McCook Invitational Semifinals)
3-1 W 55-42 vs Southwest (McCook Invitational 3rd Place Game)
4-1 W 50-48 home vs Hill City
4-2 L 48-54 home vs WaKeeney
4-3 L 40-25 @ Logan/Palco
4-4 L 46-53 @ Oakley
5-4 W vs Northern Valley
5-5 L 46-73 @ Hoxie
5-6 L 57-60 vs Wallace County (NWKL League Tournament)
6-6 W 56-36 vs St. Francis (NWKL League Tournament)
7-6 W 60-53 vs Ness City (NWKL League Tournament)
8-6 W 55-29 vs St. Francis
9-6 W 53-47vs Wallace County
9-7 L 33-66 @ Dighton
9-8 L 34-@ Greeley County
9-9 L 47-62 vs Norton
Girls Basketball Record 10-8
0-1 L 45-54 home vs Atwood
1-1 W VS Hitchcock County (McCook Invitational First Round)
2-1 W 35-25 vs Maywood (McCook Invitational Semifinals)
2-2 L 44-51 vs Southwest (McCook Invitational Championship game)
3-1 W 59-15 home vs Hill City
4-2 W 50-20 home vs WaKeeney
5-2 W 68-20 @ Logan/Palco
5-3 L 41-48 @ Oakley
6-3 W home vs Northern Valley
6-4 L 38-45 @ Hoxie
6-5 L 38-48vs Tribune (NWKL League Tournament)
7-5 W 51-33 vs St. Francis (NWKL League Tournament)
8-5 W 47-25 vs Dighton (NWKL League Tournament)
9-5 W 53-42 vs St. Francis
9-6 L 25-50 vs Wallace County
9-7 L 30-44 @ Dighton
10-7 W 40-35 @ Greeley County
10-8 L 26--28 vs Norton
Decatur County Community Junior/Senior High School
Email: jholloway@usd294.org
Website: https://www.usd294.org/vnews/display.v/SEC/DCHS
Location: 605 East Commercial Street, Oberlin, KS, USA
Phone: 785-475-2231
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/pages/Decatur-Community-JrSr-High/372347636275932
Twitter: @DCHSREDDEVILS