News Progress

Vanausdoll Goes to Tuscola
By Ariana Cherry,
for the News Progress

•July 1, 2020•

Superintendent Shannon Cheek and members of the Arthur Lovington Atwood Hammond school board discussed what the upcoming school year could possibly look like this fall.
“It is a whole new way of thinking and a whole new way of creating,” Supt. Creek began. The school district was still waiting for guidance from the state.
Creek stated that more teachers had been added to the committee for remote learning. The district might be looking at a hybrid model, but there are a couple of different plans that are being discussed.
Some of those ideas included some grades doing remote learning at home while others would be in the school buildings and “vise-versa.”
Each teacher will be doing about 35-40 hours of remote learning training, which they all will do voluntarily. Teachers also will receive credit for doing the training. The committee will continue to develop plans this summer for mask regulations and how bus transportation will be handled, etc. Read More

•July 1, 2020•
Mid-States Tank Co. in Sullivan started a two week quarantine this week after an employee from Coles County tested positive for COVID-19.
Emails and phone calls were made informing all employees on Friday, June 26. Read More

Photo by Mike Brothers
Bottle Caps to Benches
Supt. Ted Walk, SES Principal Leslie Guyot, Girl Scout Troop 3070 Leader Nikki Flexser, Girls Scout Cadettes Elise Fleming and Zoe Conlin attended the presentation of the bench in memory of kindergartener Tyson Mendoza at Sullivan Elementary School. A red and white bench was also placed at the entry to Wyman Park in Sullivan.

•July 1, 2020•
Zoe Conlin and Elise Fleming, Cadettes in Girl Scout Troop 3070, turned their recycling project into a memorial for the community.
The Girl Scout Silver Award is the highest achievement a Cadette can achieve. It requires identifying an issue we care about in our community, building our team, developing and completing a project related to the identified issue.
Conlin and Fleming wanted their community service project to be on recycling.
At first they tried to set up a recycling program at Mid-State Tank, where their fathers work. However, we had a hard time coming up with a good plan.
They focused on the Bottle Caps to Benches recycling project. This required collect enough plastic lids and caps from the community along with monetary donations to make two park benches. Read More

•July 1, 2020•
By Mike Brothers

In an effort to help local businesses Sullivan’s City Council is bringing back the revolving loan fund.
Approved unanimously at the June 22 meeting, loans will be available to businesses located within the city limits.
Amounts from $10,000 to $100,000 will be offered at between 2 to 6% interest over a seven year term. The council has $400,000 set aside for the Revolving Loan program. Read More