A Dexter native has graduated from the 93rd Missouri State Highway Patrol Recruit Class and has been assigned to Troop E in Southeast Missouri.

Captain George E. Ridens, commanding officer of Troop E, Poplar Bluff, announced this week that Christopher B. Christian of Dexter graduated from the Patrol Academy on June 24 and will report for duty in Troop E on July 11.

Christian is a 2005 graduate of Dexter High School and received a bachelor’s of science degree in management from Missouri State University in Springfield.

Christian has been assigned to Zone 8 in Troop E, which serves the citizens of New Madrid and Pemiscot counties. His field-training officer will be Trooper Brooks Pratt.

Two other Southeast Missouri residents were also members of the Academy class that graduated this month. Devin W. Foust and David P. Rinehart, both of Sikeston, were a part of the class. Both have been assigned to Zone 6, which serves Scott, Mississippi and New Madrid counties.

Others troopers new to Troop E include:

• Trooper Conrad Purnell of Kansas City; assigned to Zone 8 (New Madrid and Pemiscot counties)
• Trooper Eric M. Reynolds, a native of Mt. Zion, Illinois; assigned to Zone 3 (Wayne County)

By Annabeth Miiler,
ShowMe Times Editor

Students in the Dexter Public School District will pay an extra dime for lunch next year thanks to a federally mandated increase in school lunch rates.

The Dexter Board of Education met in a noontime meeting this week, and reluctantly approved a dime increase per lunch in both the elementary schools and high school for the 2011-2012 school year.

“We are basically under new federal mandates to raise our lunch prices,” Superintendent Dr. Thomas Sharp told the board. Even though board members voted earlier this year not to raise lunch prices for the upcoming year, Sharp said the district is mandated by the federal government to raise the cost to students to remain in compliance with the school food program.

The change will affect the lunch program only; the cost for breakfast will remain as previously established. The cost of lunch will be raised 10 cents across the board – to $1.50 in the elementary schools and $1.60 at the high school.

Sharp presented to the board new job descriptions for each employed position in the district for the upcoming academic year.

“Dr. (Kim) Flowers and I ‘hit the ground running’ a year ago, wanting something better,” Sharp said. He told board members that the previous job descriptions were so old they were stored on a “floppy disc on an Apple 2E.”

“Dr. Flowers and I think it’s real important to have a good job description with the contracts,” he said. “She’s been going through (the current job descriptions) and we’ve been getting samples.”

Flowers said that changes were minimal, except for an “essential functions” section that has been added to most of the existing descriptions.

“We have done some tweaking, because there are some jobs that are no longer existing in the district, there are some jobs we’ve added,” Flowers said. She said her research showed that employees now had to be informed of every sensory issue that might be in a school setting. “Apparently you can’t assume too much anymore.”

The board approved the changes and the new descriptions will be given to each employee as a part of the contract process.

Sharp presented to the board a bid for repairs to the gymnasium floor at the high school. The floor has some dangerous places where the boards have warped due to a moisture problem. The source of the moisture is unknown, and steps have been taken to try to find the source of the problem. However, Sharp said in the meantime the floor needs work to make it safe.

“He will get it fixed so that it is safe and then he will monitor it,” Sharp said. “This may be the last time we can do something with it until the source of the problem is found."

Sharp said that the gym is not being air-conditioned this summer, and the warping has apparently subsided.

“Until we get a source determined we are not going to turn the air conditioning on,” he said. The hypothesis is that the air conditioning could be the source of some of the problems. “The floor is not safe; it’s hazardous. We just have to do whatever we can to make it safe.”

The contract for the repairs to the high school gym floor was awarded to Jarrett Enterprises, Inc. from Cabool, Mo.

In end-of-fiscal year business, the board:

• Approved the transfer of enough funds from the General Fund to the Special Revenue Fund to bring the Special Revenue Fund balance to zero;
• Approved the transfer of $388,000 from the General Fund to the Capitol Projects Fund;
• Approved the tentative budged from Fiscal Year 2012 (2011-2012 school year). A revised budged will be presented to the board in December or January.

In other business on Tuesday, the board,

• Agreed to revise the limit for capitol outlay purchases to $250 from the current $1,000. Sharp said this minimum allows for flexibility in the coding of purchased equipment;

In executive session, the board:

• Accepted resignations from Jennie Dachs as a Title I aide and Tila Hubrecht as nurse;
• Approved the transfer of Jim Hutchcraft to become the district’s head custodian;
• Employed bus driver Shane Mallard for additional employment as maintenance personnel.

By Annabeth Miiler,
ShowMe Times Editor

There were plenty of big handshakes, pats on the back, and broad smiles as the men who were part of this spring’s Honor Tour came back together Thursday for the Honor Tour Reunion Luncheon.

The luncheon was held at Wesley Hall on the campus of the First United Methodist Church in Dexter. The men were all a part of the Honor Tour group that left for a “tour of duty” – a specially designed tour of Washington, D.C. – on April 29 from Dexter’s Bearcat Event Center.

The luncheon was a special time for the veterans and their families to come back together, see a specially made video of their journey, and to receive special mementoes of the tour.

Guest speaker for the event was Tom Akers of Eminence, a former NASA astronaut with four Space Shuttle missions under his belt.

Akers is a graduate of Eminence High School and received both bachelors and masters degrees in applied mathematics from the University of Missouri at Rolla (now Missouri University of Science and Technology).

“I’m humbled to be in the presence of so many of you World War II vets,” Akers said. Akers spent 20 years in the Air Force. He was selected for the astronaut program in 1987 and is a veteran of four space flights, accumulated over 800 hours of space flight including over 29 hours of space walking experience.

“Many times when I speak someone will introduce me as ‘one of our local heroes.’ I have a problem with that,” he said. He explained he feels people today overuse the word ‘hero’ – that baseball players, movie stars and others are all considered today by many to be heroes.

“I think a real hero is somebody who sacrifices for others when they would really rather be somewhere else,” Akers said. “I doubt very many of you really wanted to be were you were back in the 1940s. But you did the right thing and went and served your country. Every time I went up in the Space Shuttle there wasn’t anywhere else I want to be.”

Akers talked to the veterans and their family about being in space and about his four missions on the Shuttle.

During his career with NASA he was on the responsible for the primary payload in 1990 – the Ulysses spacecraft the went on a four-year journey to Jupiter and investigated the Sun’s polar regions; a member of the crew on the maiden flight of the Space Shuttle Endeavour, was a part of the crew that captured the Hubble Space Telescope and restored it to full capacity through a record five space walks by four astronauts. He also visited the Russian Space Station Mir.

“I felt very fortunate and blessed,” he said to be a part of the Space Shuttle program.

Akers showed the group a number of photos from his travels in space.

“Launch is, I think, probably the most exciting part of going to space. It’s a lot like riding a ride at Six Flag – a lot like a roller coaster. There’s a lot of shaking and rattling. There’s nothing violent; it’s really not that scary. When you take off it’s about like somebody running into the back of your car in a parking lot,” he said.

Akers has three separate space walks, including a time with two other astronauts to repair the Space Shuttle Hubble. Akers said “walking” is space is a truly unique experience.

“When you’re out there in space you’re totally oblivious to what’s going on except what’s right in front of your face,” he said. Therefore, oftentimes the crew in the shuttle would tell those outside to take a break and take in the view around them.

The shuttle would orbit the earth over 90 minutes, so there 16 sunsets and 16 sunrises ever 24-hour period. Akers photos were remarkable, showing scenes of earth that are unbelievable.

One of the photos showed Akers in the shuttle, complete with an Eminence High t-shirt and a University of Missouri – Rolla banner in the background.

Master of Ceremonies for the luncheon was Rob Callahan of First Midwest Bank. Callahan is the founder of Honor Tour, and has planned each of the Honor Tour journeys.

Photos Above: Top Photo - Tim Akers of Eminence was the guest speaker at the Honor Tour Reunion Luncheon held Thursday at Wesley Hall on the campus of the Dexter First United Methodist Church. Akers is a veteran of four NASA Space Shuttle flightes. Bottom Photo - Veteran Chet Medler of Dexter (seated) with former U.S. Senator Bob Dole and his wife, former U.S. Senator Elizabeth Dole, on this spring's Honor Tour in Washington, D.C.

A candlelight vigil will be held Friday evening to remember a Bernie teenager who died this week in a one-vehicle crash.

Friends and family of Dalton Tyler Wasson will gather at 9 p.m., Friday, June 24, in the Bernie Park to remember him and mourn their loss. The public is invited to the vigil.

Wasson died Wednesday morning in a single-vehicle accident 3 miles east of Bernie on Route Z. He was the son of Jesse E. Wasson of Bernie and Monica J. Wasson of East Prairie. Dalton was a student at Bernie High School.

A complete obituary is published in the Obituary section of the ShowMe Times.

A ShowMe Times News Report

The blaring sound heard Friday morning in Dexter will be the sound of the community’s emergency sirens being tested.

Dexter Fire Chief Al Banken reports the city’s emergency sirens will tested at 9 a.m. Friday, June 24, weather permitting.

This testing is necessary to ensure that the siren system is working properly. No critical weather is forecast at this time, so please note that the sounding of the sirens in Dexter is a step in the testing procedure.