Grades K-12 Superintendent Joe Stutting Phone +1 563-285-4819 District mascot Lancer | Established () Colors Scarlet and Silver Color Scarlet and Silver Number of schools 7 | |
Athletic conference Mississippi Athletic Conference Website www.north-scott.k12.ia.us Address 251 E Iowa St, Eldridge, IA 52748, USA | ||
The North Scott School District is a public school district in Scott County, Iowa. Based in Eldridge, it spans 220 square miles (570 km2) in northern Scott County.
Contents
North Scott consists of seven schools: a high school; a junior high school; and five elementary schools, each located in the main communities of the district. The district is governed by a seven-member board of directors, which meets bi-monthly at the district's administration building in Eldridge.
The school district is accredited by the North Central Association of Colleges and Schools and the Iowa Department of Education.
History
The North Scott School District became a legal entity on July 1, 1956, and resulted from a special election in December 1955. Thirteen independent school districts - each serving individual townships or towns - merged to form the new district; another district joined in January 1958.
Because of its central location in the new district, Eldridge was selected as the site for a new junior-senior high school building. The southwest corner of LeClaire Road and South First Street, at the time the east edge of town. Construction began in 1957, and was completed in time for the 1958-1959 school year.
North Scott's first superintendent was Charles Hahn; the first high school principal was Melvin Heiler. Heiler would succeed Hahn in 1964 and guided the district through a period of great growth during the late 1960s and 1970s. He retired in 1980, a year after a successful push for the construction of a 900-seat fine arts auditorium at the high school.
Elementary students in kindergarten through sixth grades continued to attending either rural one-room schoolhouses in various parts of the county (or if they lived in town, an older school building). Students assigned to a particular building depending their grade level and where they lived in the district. By 1961, district leaders began the first of several attempts to pass a bond issue to replace these older school buildings with modern elementary schools. After several failed attempts, voters finally approved a measure in July 1965 to build four elementary buildings: one each in Eldridge, Donahue, Long Grove and Princeton. The elementary buildings were completed by 1967, with each of them named after astronauts (in paying homage to the space program). The older school buildings were either converted for private uses or abandoned.
North Scott's enrollment continued to surge in the early 1970s, with several district buildings receiving additions to accommodate this growth. A new junior high building was erected in Eldridge in 1975 (and opened in January 1976), while another elementary school building - in the fast-growing Park View - opened in the late summer of 1976. Several major additions have been completed to the high school through the years, most notably an auxiliary gymnasium in 1971, a fine arts auditorium in 1981, additional administrative offices in 1983, an expanded media center and computer labs in 1987 and a new science and fine arts wing in 1999. Each of the elementary schools and the junior high also received numerous additions in the late 1990s.
Dr. Tim Dose led the district as its superintendent from 2001 until his unexpected death on July 1, 2008. During his seven-year tenure as the district's top administrator, he was credited for leading the district through tough financial times, punctuated with the layoff of several teachers to offset declining revenue. He had most recently been a driving force in advocating the renewal of the district's physical plant and equipment levy and 1-cent local option sales tax, special funding mechanisms which provide school districts with extra revenue for building, technology and infrastructure projects. Dr. Dennis Rucker, who had served school districts in Illinois and Iowa during the past 30 years, was named interim superintendent a month later.
In March 2009, the school board named Jeff Schwiebert as its new superintendent. Schwiebert had served as superintendent of the Mount Vernon Community School District. During his time as superintendent, he oversaw the implementation of a facilities plan that included additions at the high school and several of the elementary schools, most notably a classroom and gymnasium addition at Ed White Elementary in Eldridge. That plan came into being after voters rejected an earlier proposal that included a second elementary school in Eldridge; there had been considerable community debate on the need for the second Eldridge elementary school and its possible impact on outlying schools. Schwiebert announced his retirement in January 2014, and two months later, Joe Stutting, who had been superintendent of the Sturgeon Bay (Wisconsin) School District, was named superintendent. Early in Stutting's tenure, a major expansion of Ed White Elementary School in Eldridge was completed.
Other superintendents during North Scott's history were Robert "Bear" Stevens (1980–1984), Douglas Otto (1984–1987) and Pascal V. "Pat" DeLuca (1987–2001).