Stories from Lincoln Public Schools

This week we hear an interview Jason Keese did with Brent Toalson, who is retiring next month after serving as the principal at Southeast High School for the past eight years. As you’ll hear, Brent has a passion for education and Southeast that will be greatly missed but always remembered. 

This week we’ll hear an interview with Azcia Fleming, who recently graduated from Lincoln High. Jason got to know Azcia through her work on a communications diversity advisory committee and the annual MLK Youth Rally. She’s an incredibly thoughtful young woman and is destined for big things – as you’ll hear.

This week we’ll hear an interview with Oscar Rios Pohirieth, the Cultural Specialist and Coordinator for the Bilingual Liaison Program at LPS . Oscar has a fascinating life story and he also talks about some of the many challenges faced by so many of our refugee families here in Lincoln, especially over the last few […]

This week we hear inspiring words from the recent virtual graduation ceremonies for Yankee Hill Education Center and Bryan Community Focus Program. Their ceremonies included speeches from their principals, our superintendent, board of education members and of course, graduating students.

This week we’ll hear an interview with Chris Haeffner, our director of Library Media Services. Chris and her team did an amazing job of pulling together online resources for families during remote learning at the end of the school year. She talks about what they did, how they did it, and what they’re still doing […]

This week we’ll hear an interview with Lincoln High Principal Mark Larson. Jason had a chance to talk to Mark about what the last two months have been like as principal of the largest high school in Lincoln. They talked about those first days when COVID-19 reached Lincoln, the challenges of remote learning, potential silver […]

This week we’ll hear an interview that our communications colleague BriAna Campbell did with Carrie Foster. Carrie is one of our special education supervisors at LPS and one of the groups she oversees is school psychologists, who play a critical role in the education of so many of our students. Just like all of our […]

This week we’ll hear members of the Board of Education offer words of deep thanks to our teachers as part of National Teacher Appreciation Week, which was last week.

This week we hear about Matt Rinne, a computer science teacher at Pyrtle Elementary. Matt is creating these amazing 10-minute videos that teach elementary students the basics about computer science and coding. If you’ve ever watched any of Bill Nye’s videos, you can definitely see the influence. We are blown away by Matt’s videos. He […]

Episode 59 — April 27, 2020 This week we’ll hear about how LPS music teachers and students are spreading the joy of music by recording performances of themselves in their homes, which are then shared with local nursing homes whose residents are unable to experience live performances right now because of COVID-19. Inside the New […]

Episode 58 — April 20, 2020 After a long break as we adjusted to pandemic-life, we are back! Please accept our apologies for the sound quality — we still have some learning to do on that front, but we’re all lifelong learners right?! Today we get to hear about how our educators are stepping up […]

Episode 57 — March 9, 2020 We have a number of schools celebrating anniversary milestones this year and the latest was Roper Elementary. It’s been 25 years for the school in west Lincoln and to mark the occasion they held an open house event on March 1st. We were there and we’ll listen to some […]

Episode 56 — March 2, 2020 Thursday is Nebraska Teacher Appreciation Day, so on this episode we’ll listen to the latest Superintendent Spotlight. Steve Joel talks about the powerful impact that teachers can have on students, families and communities. ‘Really cool science’ at Park Middle School Southeast hosts 9/11 survivor, honors theater’s namesake High School […]

In this episode we listen to the latest episode of Superintendent Spotlight, where Steve Joel and Director of Operations Scott Wieskamp discuss next steps now that the bond issue has passed. 2020 Bond Issue Learning Lunch — We the People Jaime Bodecker, Nuernberger Education Center interview Coming Up This Week Monday  2/24 7pm – LSE […]

Jason Keese interviews Jaime Boedeker, the principal at Nuernberger Education Center. Jaime talks about his journey to LPS, what they do at Nuernberger, misconceptions about their students and how he deals with the stress of such a demanding job. 2020 Bond Issue U.S. education official lauds LPS special education, early childhood programs Moore sixth-grader wins […]

In this episode we listen to a couple performances from this year’s African-American Read-In event held at LPS District Office. You’ll hear a North Star High School student perform the song “Lift Every Voice and Sing” and a group of students from Belmont Elementary School read parts of the poem “The Undefeated,” by Kwame Alexander. […]

Today, we’ll listen to the latest episode of Superintendent Spotlight, our biweekly online interview show with Superintendent Steve Joel. He talks about the power of public education as we celebrated I Love Public Schools Day this week, and he answers a series of questions from students. LPS, LES partnership powers valuable physics lesson Three world […]

Today, you’re in for a real treat. Our fellow communications team member Caitlin Lukin rang in the new year by visiting lunchrooms in schools across the city. She asked students from kindergarten all the way to 12th grade about their hopes and goals for the new year and the new decade. Topics included martial arts, […]

Today, we’ll listen to the latest episode of Spotlight Superintendent, in which Steve Joel shares some important information about the upcoming bond election on February 11th. Scott Middle School honors community leader Nate Woods at annual MLK event Irving students step up for service learning project 2020 Freedom Breakfast honors Martin Luther King Jr. Coming […]