How does a public high school go from opening with 17 students in 2004 to being ranked as the 60th best in the nation by 2017?
I say it's because Dr. Martin Schopp-meyer built, nurtured and fed it lots of academic protein blended with caring. As a result, parents seeking the best for their children came in droves.
They arrived as Haas Hall Academy grew from a rural charter school in what looked like a barn in Farmington to its handsome new Fayetteville campus with waiting lists stretching for years.
Haas Hall is much more than a meteoric phenomenon. It's truly the result of Schoppmeyer and staff's dedication to excellence and expectations of meaningful achievement, as evidenced by a 100 percent graduation rate for some 350 students.
No faculty, staff or student gets away with plodding through the motions in this high-octane public academy.
So it was no surprise to me that in 2014, Newsweek cited it as the 19th best high school in America. And last week U.S. News and World Report, after naming Haas Hall Arkansas' finest high school for six consecutive years, sent it soaring up its 2017 national best list from 116th last year to 60th.
After having written over the years of this school and Schoppmeyer's influence, such results have become more expected than surprising. Nor is it unexpected that Haas Hall has extended its standards by establishing campuses in Bentonville, Springdale and Rogers. The public's demand for what this unique school offers became too great not to expand the opportunity to parents who've been waiting with hope to land their children in its classrooms.
Teresa talks science
Teresa Turk, a marine biologist and researcher dedicated to protecting the Buffalo National River, spoke at the Harrison library last week where she outlined the latest scientific findings about water-quality studies along the river and a major tributary, Big Creek, that flows alongside the controversial C&H Hog Farms at Mount Judea.
Here's the essence of what I gleaned from her session: Tourists on the river increased by 300,000 between 2015 and 2016. Resulting revenue climbed from $72 to $77 million. Related jobs increased from 969 to 1,200. "While many will say the hog factory isn't affecting tourism," she said, "one could say the pollution, such as thick algae blooms spanning 17 miles, has not yet become obvious enough to get the word out that our national river's in trouble."
Dr. John Van Brahana's groundwater dye-tracing studies found a very complex, widely connected hydrology system with positive dye results: Ten miles distant at Mitch Hill Spring upstream of Carver on the Buffalo; eastward to Cave Creek; and, most startling, even above the Big Creek Research and Extension Team's upstream water-quality testing site on Big Creek.
"Having found positive dye results above [the team's] upstream site is very significant because [it] uses that spot as a 'control' to determine if the hog factory is impacting water quality downstream," she said. "So by having a positive dye finding above even that location after being injected below, it makes the idea of this being a research control site is naturally invalidated."
The U.S. Geological Survey found low dissolved oxygen 20.5 percent of the time in its study of Big Creek. That exceeds the state standard of 10 percent. Low dissolved oxygen affects the stream's health and, even the lives of various stream fauna, and is caused by algal growth.
Turk said Big Creek, with waste-spreading fields along its banks, had the highest algal growth of five streams the USGS examined. "By having low dissolved oxygen well in excess of our 10 percent state limit, Big Creek should have been placed on the EPA's 303 (d) list of impaired streams in 2015. E.coli studies from 2014 indicate Big Creek also met criteria as an impaired stream while the 2015 data has yet to be analyzed." Preliminary results from the Big Creek team and another study show E.coli levels do not consistently exceed state standards, and similar information from the National Park Service has yet to be examined.
Turk said research shows nitrates are consistently higher downstream of the factory compared with upstream. "Although the nitrates aren't close to violating the approved drinking water limit, they are much higher than they should be."
A simple plan
Justin Eichmann's peace plan sounds simple enough.
The former city attorney for the embattled town of Cave Springs returned to that job this month after leaving it last August. But this time around, he's hoping to use his three-point plan to hopefully restore civility to the council and administration: First, restore public confidence in the city's frayed leadership. Second, he wants every council member to understand their roles and responsibilities. Finally, ensure they always follow the Freedom of Information Act.
Eichmann's noble plan might be more difficult to implement than he's planned, especially since the administration is now under audit and a state police investigation. If he can pull this off, I may nominate him for the Nobel Peace Prize for which lesser efforts rooted in politricks have been so honored.
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Mike Masterson's column appears regularly in the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette. Email him at mmasterson@arkansasonline.com.
Editorial on 04/30/2017