The 12th Street Community Center will host the 2018 Honor Student Lock-In on Friday, February 16th.

This event will be students in grades one through five, and is for students who maintained A’s and B’s for the last semester with no demerits.

There will be games, food, music and prizes.

You can drop students off at 8 p.m. and pick up will be at 7 a.m. the next day.

Students can be registered by calling the 12th Street Community Center at ( 785 ) 238-7529 or you can stop by the Center.

The United Way of Junction City / Geary County is seeking volunteers to assist with their funding allocation process.

If you are interested call the United Way office at 785-238-2117.

Responsibilities for a member of the Allocations Panel will include attendance at an orientation meeting where you will receive a panel member notebook, reviewing that notebook that contains allocation applications from the agencies you will be visiting and the information presented by United Way.

You will participate in site visits to assigned agencies, participate in discussions with the agency representatives about their programs and financial information, and you will participate in panel review and recommendations to formulate funding preliminary recommendations for each of the visited agencies.

MANHATTAN —Its Daddy Daughter Date this Saturday, great event and it is for charity!

Bellus Academy is located at 1130 Westloop Place in Manhattan.

For more information on the fun call 785-539-1837

Geary County 4-H Club Day will be held this Saturday at the First Presbyterian Church in Junction City. Events will begin at 8 a.m. and are scheduled to be completed around 11:30 a.m.

4-H members will be presenting speeches, music numbers, drama programs and parliamentary procedure demonstrations. Members will also be able to participate in photography and family and consumer sciences judging contests throughout the morning.

This is open to the public.

SALINA — Four Kansas State University Polytechnic Campus students have received a significant boost to their dream of being professional pilots with the help of $10,000 scholarships from the Conor Burton Aviation fund.

The newest Burton scholars, all in Kansas State Polytechnic’s professional pilot program, are Mychal Akers, Junction City; Nahuel Bugosen and Chad Frerichs, both from Salina; and Michael Edwards, Dallas, Texas. Their scholarships are split between their junior and senior years and help pay for flying time or books and tuition, enabling the students to earn their flight certificates more quickly.

All four scholars have wanted to become pilots since childhood.

For Akers, a childhood of frequent cross-country trips inspired him to seek a career as a pilot.

“When I was a little kid, I got to fly across the country all by myself. It was a big sense of freedom,” Akers said. “One of the captains put me in the captain’s seat, put his hat on my head and gave me a pilot badge. He told me I was the captain. It was the coolest thing for me as a kid.”

Akers’ favorite toy as a child was a flight simulator, and he would spend hours playing and practicing in preparation for his dream career. For a birthday, Akers’ parents surprised him with a helicopter ride in San Francisco. That sealed the deal — he was going to be a pilot.

Akers wanted to turn that childhood fascination into a career, but feared one thing stood in his way: he is partially color blind.

He put his dream on hold and joined the military. He was injured near the completion of his time in the military and spent four months bedridden. He used that time to evaluate his next step and decide if he could really become a pilot.

“I started researching and it turned out that I could be a pilot and be color blind,” Akers said. “I just had to prove it to the Federal Aviation Administration that I could see the appropriate colors.”

He began his journey to a professional pilot degree at Kansas State Polytechnic in January 2015. Akers has worked his way up to a position as a certified flight instructor, helping other Kansas State Polytechnic students learning to fly.

“This scholarship from the Burton Aviation Foundation is helping me take care of my family, provide better lessons for my students as a certified flight instructor, and complete my degree at Kansas State Polytechnic,” he said.

K-State News and Communications Services
Division of Communications and Marketing

WABAUNSEE COUNTY-One person was injured in an accident just before 6p.m. Saturday in Wabaunsee County.

The Kansas Highway Patrol reported a 2000 Ford Explorer driven by James James, 54, Knoxville, TN., was eastbound on Interstate 70 just west of Snokomo Road.

The vehicle left the roadway to the right, entered the south ditch and overturned.

James was transported to the hospital in Topeka. He was properly restrained at the time of the accident, according to the KHP.

The new Kansas Governor Jeff Colyer wants to see a stable long range funding plan for the Kansas Department of Transportation, wants to rebuild the mental health treatment system, and is supportive of the effort to seek another brigade of troops for Fort Riley.

Those were topics for Colyer during a stop at Bob’s Coffee in Junction City, one of several for him in east central and northeast Kansas communities on Saturday.

On the additional troop issue Colyer told a news conference, “One of the things that would be very helpful is to see more soldiers here.” He feels that would be an important opportunity. ” We have discussed this with the federal legislators and we stand ready to be very helpful on that. I think that’s something that we’re going to work very had on over the next couple of years.”

Colyer noted Kansas highways are among the top five best or top ten highway systems in the United States but there are a lot of challenges, particularly in rural parts of the state. “What I would like to see is more stable financing of this over the next few years. What we’ve proposed is that we have a study that we build on a new sort of T-Works type of program that would look at where we’re going over the next five to ten years and help us prioritize what our spending is and where those are going to be built.”

During the Governor’s session with the public, the Geary County Sheriff Tony Wolf, noted that the mental health system in Kansas is broken with people who need assistance ending up on the streets and eventually in his jail. Wolf said he has had to hire people to help handle those folks but after they’re out of jail there is no support system. The infrastructure exists but no funding to operate those things.   Colyer responded by noting a lot of money is now being spent on facilities in Osawatomie and Larned, and officials are looking at opportunities on how this treatment can also be done better in local facilities. “I want to rebuild the system.” He made it clear he wants to go to the root causes of the problems and not just throw money at them.

Colyer stated during his visit with the media that a legislative task force has recommended a number of changes and opportunities. “And we’re going to follow those. We’re going to start immediately on that. Within our own departments we’re looking at a number of options for us where we can really help individual communities that have substance abuse issues and a lot of mental health issues.”

In addition to Junction City, Colyer also visited Manhattan, Leavenworth and Atchison on Saturday.

Two hiring events are scheduled at Fort Riley on Monday at Riley’s Conference Center. The first from 9-11 a.m. is for Outdoor Recreation jobs. The second from 10 a.m. until 2 p.m. is for Aquatics jobs, particularly lifeguards.

For the outdoor recreation positions recreation laborers, aids and assistants will be paid $8.99 to $11 per hour and must be at least 18 years old. Those interested should arrive ready for interviews and job offers.  Applicants must bring a resume, social security card and valid driver’s license or government-issued ID. Before attending the hiring fair, people are encouraged to apply online at USDAJobs.gov.

The aquatics / lifeguard positions pay $10.15 per hour and jobs are available for ages 15 and up. Human resource professionals will be on hand to answer questions and help with applications. Interested applicants must bring a resume, social security card, birth certificate and government-issued ID. Additionally, lifeguard and first aid certifications are required, or a receipt showing enrollment for a lifeguard certification course. Completion of a pre-test is required prior to enrollment in the Lifeguard and Shallow Water Attendant Certification Course. Applications needing the pre-test must bring swim wear to the hiring event. The pre-test will be offered at Eyster Pool at 10 a.m. and 11 a.m.