VOL. 102 NO. U
School board hears of special problems
at Irrigon & Boardman schools
Elementary schools in
Irrigon and Boardman are
having special problems ed
ucating the children of mi
grant workers in the area, the
Morrow County School Board
was told Monday night.
Teachers from the two
grade schools attending the
board meeting said a large
portion of students in the
lower grades do not speak
English well, have emotional
problems and do not attend
school regularly.
"This is producing an un
desirable situation for educa
tion," said Steve Brownfleld a
science teacher at Heppner
High School, and spokes
person for the Morrow County
Education Association.
Brownfleld said first and
second grade classes, where
most of the problems occur,
are crowded, adding to the
problem.
In or second grade class at
Sam Boardman elementary,
there are 28 students. Of the 28
one half have been held back a
grade ; for 30 percent Spanish
is their primary language; 60
percent of the class has turned
over during the year, and
there are emotional problems.
"Dealing with 28 students
who are average, it would be
O K." the second grade teach
er told the board "But with
this makeup it can be a
problem."
She said 62 percent of the
class is made up of Spanish
speaking students, many of
Burden begins as Public Works director
:y jwaut Uiifyr:''; ": 1
Otto L. Burden
Otto L. Burden began work
as Morrow County Public
Works Director Monday, April
9. He, his wife, Melody and
two sons Kevin, 3, and Dale, 5,
Farmers consider costs of
Representatives from the
Bureau of Reclamation, and
the Army Corps of Engineers
and the district water master
from Pendleton, met with
approximately 30 farmers
living along Willow Creek
below the dam Tuesday, April
10 at 8 p.m. at the Morrow
County Courthouse in Hep
pner. The purpose of the meeting
was for irrigators, to find out
how much it would cost them
if they decided to use water
stored behond the dam for
irrigation.
Dick Wilkinson, chairman of
DESSIE WET2ELL
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I.' E .V S P A P E It LIB
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Morrow
Thursday, april it. m
who speak English well and do
not have problems. "It's the
others that are difficult to
teach," she said. "They can
speak it (English) and under
stand it, but vocabulary is the
problem. As an example they
know what an airplane is, but
not a jet."
Mick Tolar, principal at
A C. Houghton in Irrigon, said
his school is experiencing the
same sort of problems. "The
makeup (of student) is similar
to Sam Boardman," he said.
Both schools have migrant
specialists to help the stu
dents. Sam Boardman has one
full time and one half time
migrant aid, and A C. Hough
ton has one half time migrant
aid, which, according to the
teachers, is not enough.
"The teachers are concern
ed about the quality of educa
tion; it's very frustrating for a
teacher," said Brownfield.
'This is something we have
to keep looking at." School
Board Chairman Jerry McEl
ligott told the teachers. "We
have to look at the makeup of
it (the school). We havetolook
at it as it comes; we can't
program for it."
The district does not know
how many migrant students it
will have from year to year,
and McElligott indicated this
makes it hard to plan.
"Of 27 students, in one year
13 came and went," said one
first grade teacher at Sam
Boardman. "One workbook I
had, had four persons names
on it."
are living at lone.
For the past year, Burden
has been working construction
and he and family have been
moving with the job.
Prior to that, he worked in
Vancouver, Washington, for
the Willow Creek District
Improvement Co. explains
that irrigation water drained
from the regular flow level of
the creek would be available
as before, without charge, but
if irrigators wanted to reserve
a certain number of acre-feet
of water behind the dam be
yond the average 2,000 acre
foot level for later irrigation
uses, that the estimated cha
rge would be $8 per acre-foot.
He explains that irrigators
are still considering all the
factors and no decision has
been made, but if they should
Th
County's Home -
PACES
In other business, the
board:
heard a report from board
member Pauline Winter who
said the district and classified
employees union had reached
agreement on a contract.
Winter said the major changes
were: 1) one year instead of
multi-year contract, 2) Three
precent cost of living increase
for all employees, 3) added
Presidents day to the list of
paid holidays. 4) gave the day
after Thanksgiving, and the
days after Christmas and New
Year as unpaid holidays, 5)
clarified the bereavment
leave policy. The board ap
proved the contract unan
imously. The union was to vole
on the contract Monday night.
gave formal approval to
hiring new Superintendent
Doyle McCaslin (see story
April 12 Gazette-Times) for a
salary of 143,000 per year with
medical plan and annuity
worth $200 per month. I think
he'll do a good job. I think he's
a good man," said board
member Jean Bennett. The
board was told McCaslin will
be on the job in July, after he
finishes up some business at
his present position as super
intendent of the Glide school
district.
voted to deny a grievance
filed by Heppner Jr. High
math teacher Mike Warren.
Warren had requested a hear
ing with the board, which was
held in closed-door executive
session.
- heard a report from Board-
tour years where he was the
assistant office engineer
working primarily in land
development for Clark County-
Burden has also worked out
of Ritzville in Adams County,
Washington, where he says
the terrain is very similar to
what we have here in Morrow
County.
He grew up in eastern Wash
ington near Moses Lake and
graduated from Washington
State University with a Bach
elor of Science degree in Agri
cultural Engineering.
"I received a warm wel
come moving in; all the ingre
dients are here in the public
works department," said
Burden who considers his new
position a "challenge." He
says that he is "still learn
ing," but is "looking forward
to working out the bugs on the
new computer system."
irrigation
decide that they want to make
use of the water reserve at the
dam, they would probably
need to form an irrigation
district which would make the
water charges to the indivi
dual users and assume the
costs involved with reserving
the water.
Another meeting is tenta
tively planned for next week
after the water master has
had time to investigate the
costs of the ditchheads which
would be placed in the creek
so the irrigators could pump
the water.
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Heppraeir
wi I 1
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Owned Weekly Newspaper
25 Heppner, Oregon
man attorney Ed Glenn, who
was part of a Morrow-Umatilla
vocational education
training council. Glenn said
the council had been compil
ing information from area
businesses about "getting a
job." Glenn told the board that
employers want students with
good work habits and good
attitudes who are well school
ed in the basics of reading,
writing and arithmatic. Glenn
said 15,000 of the reports were
being printed up and would be
distributed to every student
and parent in the county.
"Employers in a sense said
give us a student with good
work habits and the basics of
reading, writing and comput
ing and we'll take it from
there and teach them a par
ticular job." Glenn said of the
council's findings.
- gave superintendent Matt
Doherty the go-ahead to talk
with several lone Tridents
1 about possible joint icit
tank drain field construction.
Doherty said the Ione's scho
ols field is having problems,
as are about eight residents of
lone. agreed to participate
in a joint newsletter with the
city of Irrigon to disseminate
information in that city. The
newsletter would be published
monthly and coordinated
through the city of Irrigon. It
would cost the district $40 per
month.
- heard a report and saw
models of solar homes built as
a science project by lone
elementary students.
Lexington 'fly-in' helps pesticide spray performance
; r
1 III
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Gary Thomason (left) and Mel Boyer evaluate the computer
the spray pattern of one o Boyer's spray planes.
Aerial applicators of pest
icides were invited to a
"fly-in" at the Lexington air
port which was sponsored by
cooperative extension and
PBI Gordon Corporation.
Gary L. Thomuson, pest
icide education specialist with
Washington State University
has perfected a program to
help aerial applicators of
pesticides help themselves.
The idea of the program is to
provide equipment and the
technology necessary to
analyze what the aircraft's
spray performance is.
He emphasizes that there
are several factors which can
influence the spray pattern
from an aircraft even if the
chemical, the dilution and the
nozzel settings are identical.
The new computerized equip
ment can describe what the
.
At Extension workshop
Farmers learn computer basics
"Remember, the computer
doesn't do what you want it to
do; it does what you tell it to
do," Oregon State University
Extension Agent Gary Pro
thero told farmers at an ex
tension workshop last Friday,
April 13.
Vendors provided 14 dif
ferent types of computers for
the two-day workshop which
began Thursday, April 12 and
was attended by approximate
ly 15 farmers and ranchers
from the area.
Prothero stated that all of
the computers were running
the same program so that the
farmers could see how the
different computers differed
doing the same thing. The
purpose of the workshop was
to let farmers who did not
have computer experience try
the different brands and the
make a decision about wether
-4 computer could do them any
(good,
, The demonstrations and in
struction included general
programs: a spread sheet
program which is intended
partially for future analysis,
spray calibration and bud
gets; and a data base ma
nagement program which is
basically, a record keeping
system.
Rick Peterson, a Valby area
rancher, said that this was his
second workshop. He attended
a computer workshop in
Hermiston last December and
found it beneficial. He has
since purchased a computer,
' 1
aircraft did do at a particular
time under a given set of
conditions.
The process he uses to
analyze the performance of
the aircraft is accomplished
by putting a chemical tracer
in the spray tank. The aircraft
then flies across a test track
where a line of collection
dishes 100' wide have been
placed. The dishes are collect
ed and each dish is measured
for the amount of chemical
tracer. Knowing how much
should be in the dish, it is
possible to tell how much of
the chemical tracer has fallen.
The results of this analysis
read out from the computer in
a graph which shows the
pattern in which the tracer
has fallen. The applicators
can then re-position nozzles or
P- ,
Weather
by the City of Heppner
and he and his wife Anita
attended this workshop so that
she could also learn to use the
computer.
Peterson intends to use his
computer not only to keep fuel
records of diesel and gasoline
but also to help figure costs for
tillage including estimates of
the total hours expended, and
the amount of water and
chemical needed for the spec
ified rate of the chemical per
acre.
Marlene Currin, another
participant at the workshop
said that it has been an "eye
opener." She said that she and
her husband have been think
ing for some time about buy
ing a computer, but felt that
they needed some basic know-t
ledge about computers before
they made a decision to buy a
certain one.
She said that a real plus of
the workshop is that there
were so many different kinds
of computers and participants
could try any one they wanted.
She said that she had worked
on one computer on Thursday
and was doing the same sort of
thing on a different computer
on Friday.
Peterson commented that
he was surprised at the rela
tively small turnout at the
workshop because he thought
that more people could benefit
from learning about the use of
computer programs and not
necessarily have to own a
computer themselves.
I
printout of
make other necessary ad
justments to their aircraft to
achieve more evenness of pat
tern and the amount of deposi
tion which they wanted to
apply.
Thomason says that his
method using the computer is
an improvement over the
previous method used in
which chemical dye was put in
the spray tank of the aircraft
and released in a flight over a
100' strip of adding machine
tape. Spray patterns were
determined by the depth and
pattern of the colored dye.
This new computer analysis
method was designed as a
result of the damage to grape
harvest allegedly caused by
drifting of the chemical 2-4D.
Thomason describes aerail
applicators as conscientious
businessmen who Drovide a
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Alberta Johnston, associate director for the OSU Extension
joins area farmers in learning to use computers for farm
rebted situations at extension workshop lost Friday.
1 iMmnmrt ,
Gory Protheo, OSU extension
I f - .(.:
AAel Boyer, one of the pilots who attended the
airport last Thursday pictured with some of the
service at an acceptable cost
to farmers. He also commends
all chemical companies who
help sponsor programs which
provide this cost-free analysis
to help the aerial applicators
and ultimately the farmers.
Puppet show slated for story hour
Walter Cafton-Minkel, child
ren's consultant from the Ore
gon State Library, will be in
Heppner Thursday, April 26,
10:30 a.m., to perform a spec
ial puppet show during the
morning story hour at the
library.
"Silly Stories by the New
Rag Bag Theatre" is the title
of this puppet performance.
v
The weather report was not
available at presstime Tuesday.
agent instructs computer workshop.
1
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"fly-in" at the Lexington
aircraft he tested.
Thomason said that the
northwest is far in the lead of
the rest of the country and he
will be accompanying the
representatives of PBI Gor
don at "fly - ins" across Idaho,
Montana and the Dakotas.
Following the Heppner story
hour, Cafton-Minkel will
travel to Boardman where he
will present an afternoon
performance at the Boardman
City library. Ann Sipe, Board
man city librarian, says that
"he does a really neat show,"
and encourages everyone to
come and bring their pre
school children.
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