Troyer Named New Principal Of Milford School
SYRACUSE — On the same night Cindy Kaiser was honored due to her retirement as Milford School principal, Dr. Stephen Troyer was named as her replacement and given approval by the Wawasee school board during its regular monthly meeting Tuesday, June 12, in Syracuse.
Troyer, chosen from among 10 candidates, was most recently the assistant principal at Northridge High School in Middlebury, a position he held for seven years. Prior to that, he taught for four years at Northridge and also taught three years at Carroll High School in Allen County.
Troyer grew up in Middlebury and is a 2000 graduate of Northridge. He earned undergraduate and master’s degrees from Ball State University and most recently a Ph.D. in educational administration from Indiana State University.
He is married to Brittany and they have two daughters Kaitlyn and Harlee. Troyer becomes the principal officially July 1.
Kaiser had 39 years of experience in education, the last 28 years as principal at Milford School. She noted she was at the school when the first computer was brought into the building and remembers office staff typing up tests for middle school students to take. “Times have really changed,” she commented.
Other staff members retiring include Wawasee High School teacher Julie Baird (26 years of experience) and teacher Colette Berg of Milford School (20 years). Support staff retirees include Mitzi Reber of Milford (26.5 years), Janet Fisher of North Webster Elementary (29.5 years), Donna Hollar of Milford (31 years), Dawn Randall of Wawasee Middle School (26 years), Glenna Fay Biddle of Milford (10 years) and Thomas Steiner of Wawasee High School (20 years).
Also included in the list of retirees are former teachers Cyndi Thornburg of WHS (41 years) and Stephen Jones of North Webster Elementary (24 years), who both passed away during the 2017-18 school year.
In other business, the school board approved awarding a bid to Project Design and Piping to replace the heating and air handlers in the auditorium, stage, old cafeteria, TV studio area, pool, locker room, auxiliary gym, media center, brickyard, pool lobby and pool locker rooms at the high school. Also replaced will be the old above-ceiling duct work and the ceiling and lay-in ceiling lights within the pool area.
Base bid is $1,238,000 and with the alternate bids the total cost comes to $1,558,000. The project will begin in September and will be done in phases to minimize disruptions in air flow as much as possible.
Other agenda items included:
• The new Warrior buses purchased by the school corporation last year were used 126 times during the school year and 65 of those trips were educational or field trips.
• Wawasee High School held a successful art show in the main gym in May and Lacey Helfers was named best of show.
• WHS student Tiffany Koble received a $2,500 scholarship from the AXA Foundation, $1,000 of which will be given to the school.
• WHS Drama Club received a $6,000 grant from the Dekko Foundation to be used for a fall trip to New York City.
• The Early Career Opportunities Challenge program at WHS received a $10,000 grant from Dekko.
• The marine mechanics program of Pathways received donations of two Yamaha waverunners, a Master Craft runabout boat and a Master Craft trailer.
• Effective July 1, the mileage reimbursement rate for school corporation employees will be 51 cents per mile.
• As required by the National School Lunch Program, lunch prices must be increased yearly and this year will be increased by 10 cents to bring the cost to $1.90 for grades K to five and $2.10 for grades six to 12.
• Several overnight or out of state trips were approved by the board including WHS girls and boys soccer to Sawyer, Mich., WHS boys basketball to Knightstown, WHS cross country to Angola, WHS boys track to Bloomington, WHS FFA to Quaker Haven, WHS ECO Challenge to Sawyer and Wawasee Middle School FCA to Taylor University.