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Centre district has new personnel

By ROWENA PLETT

Staff writer

Two new teachers are employed at Centre High School this year, and a teacher's aide is assisting Kenna Krause with the kindergarten class.

Seth Bishop teaches upper level math classes — Algebra II, pre-calculus, and calculus. He also is an assistant football coach.

He and his wife, Tammie, live in Manhattan and have three teenage children. Jeni, 19, is married and lives in Kansas City. Mike is a senior and Kara a junior at Manhattan High School.

Cathy Whitaker of Marion is Bishop's sister.

He was the youngest of 10 children. He grew up at Axtell and feels comfortable with the small class sizes at Centre High School.

He spent his first two years of college at Emporia State University, then transferred to Kansas State University. However, he didn't graduate until December 2002 with a degree in math education.

During the intervening years, he and his wife operated an accounting business in Kansas City. After graduating from K-State he did some graduate work and was a teaching assistant there.

Bishop enjoys playing video games with his children, likes reading science fiction, and is a movie buff.

"I love to cook and eat," he said. "My wife's not unhappy with that."

Cindy Riedel is the new science teacher at Centre High School. She grew up at Kismet, a small town near Liberal, and graduated from Southwest Heights High School.

"It won't be too different here," she said. "I'm looking forward to it. I feel fortunate to be here."

She received an ag journalism degree in 1978 from Kansas State University and a secondary teacher education degree in 1993 from Kansas Newman.

She taught for eight years at Council Grove High School, followed by two years of teaching at the Council Grove branch of Butler County Community College.

At Centre, she teaches biology, anatomy, and physiology, and team teaches chemistry. She also will supervise junior high science projects.

Riedel is a single mother with two sons. Nick, 20, lives at Emporia, and Zach, 16, attends Council Grove High School. Riedel plans to commute from Council Grove.

She occasionally writes feature stories for the Council Grove Republican and also enjoys reading and walking.

Sharon Matz was hired as a full-time teacher's aide for the kindergarten class at Centre Elementary School in lieu of a second full-time teacher. The 22 kindergartners attend school all day.

Matz is married to Brad Matz of rural Lincolnville. She grew up in Shawnee and has a degree in graphic design from Kansas State University. She has an art nook in her home and does signs and murals for people in the community.

Before marrying in 1996, she worked in Kansas City at an advertising specialty company.

More recently, she was employed as a special education paraprofessional at Marion Elementary and Centre High schools. She also has done some substitute teaching.

Although she grew up in a metropolitan area, Matz loves country living.

"I like the smaller school because you get to do everything," she said.

She is secretary of Centre PTO.

The Matzes have two children: six-year-old Jacob, a first grader, and Maggie, two.

Steve Smith is the new transportation director. He lives at Marion, where he formerly was employed by Marion-Florence USD 408 as custodian/bus driver.

"This job is a lot tougher than I thought it would be," he said.

Although he is familiar with planning bus routes and doing maintenance, he is learning how to manage the administrative end of the transportation department.

He thought he might miss out on getting to know students, as he did with his custodial job at Marion, but that void is being filled as he fills in for other bus drivers.

"It's a pleasure to work with the kids," he said.

Smith enjoys working on vehicles and being out in the country. He is discovering the vastness of the territory the Centre school district covers.

Smith has two grown sons, Trevor, who is employed at Marion, and Tyler, a freshman at Butler Community College, El Dorado.

He also has three stepchildren: Megan, a sophomore at Kansas State University, Cory, an MHS junior, and Zach, an MHS freshman.

His wife Stacie is employed at St. Luke Hospital. Both serve on the Marion ambulance crew and recently received certification as EMTIs.

Mark Meyer

attends conference

Mark Meyer, agricultural science instructor from Marion High School, attended the Kansas Career and Technical Education Conference Aug. 1-4 at Overland Park.

Meyer represented the Kansas Association of Agriculture Educators (KAAE).

Teachers from across the state attended workshops that included topics on integrating academics for No Child Left Behind, career clusters, experience-based learning, leadership in the classroom, trade and industry standards, Perkins reauthorization, and legislation.

Meyer attended inservice sessions on global positioning systems (GPS) and meats evaluation, and toured the newest agricultural education program in landscape maintenance at Olathe North High School.

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