Gov. Terry Branstad has ordered all flags in Iowa be flown at half-staff from sunrise to sunset Wednesday, Dec. 7th, 2016, in honor of Pearl Harbor Remembrance Day.

Flags will be at half-staff on the State Capitol Building and on flag displays in the Capitol Complex, and upon all public buildings, grounds, and facilities throughout the state.  Individuals, businesses, schools, municipalities, counties and other government subdivisions are encouraged to fly the flag at half-staff for the same length of time as a sign of respect.

CEDAR FALLS, Iowa (AP) — The Iowa Board of Regents has announced the hiring of an Iowa native and a current chancellor of Montana State University Billings as the new president for the University of Northern Iowa. The Des Moines Register reported Tuesday that Mark Nook will lead Iowa’s third-largest university, known for its education programs and persistent budget challenges.

Nook was selected over two other finalists, former Temple University president Neil Theobald and UNI Interim President Jim Wohlpart. Nook, who grew up in Holstein, Iowa, replaces former President Bill Ruud, who left the university this summer after three years of heading UNI to become president at a small college in Marietta, Ohio. Ruud was credited upon his departure for increasing enrollment, cutting student debt, raising millions of dollars and hiring key administrators.

OSCEOLA, Iowa (AP) — Authorities in southern Iowa say that three missing teens have been found dead in rural Clarke County. Osceola police tell Des Moines television station KCCI that the bodies of 16-year-old Elaina Critz, 16-year-old Lauren Barker and 19-year-old Jesse Robinson — all of Osceola — were found Tuesday at the wreckage of a car that had run off a rural road and into a creek.

Authorities say the teens were found in a culvert by a road maintenance worker who happened to stop in the area. Police say Critz, Barker and Robinson were reported missing from Osceola sometime after 7:30 p.m. Saturday.

The Montgomery County Sheriff’s Office reports a property damage accident occurred on Monday at US Highway 48 and 230th Street.  At approximately 3:50pm a black 2014 Kia owned and operated by 42-year-old Melissa Etter of Red Oak was traveling south on Highway 48 approaching 230th Street. A silver 2001 Dodge Dakota owned and operated by 92-year-old Granville Williams of Red Oak attempted to cross Highway 48 to travel west on 230th Street.  Williams did not see the Kia and struck it in the driver side doors.  Williams stated the sun was a factor.

No injuries were reported. Damage was estimated at $4,000 to the Kia and $1,500 to the Dodge. Williams was cited for violation of conditions of a restricted license.

A review of the new state program that pays experienced teachers more to be mentors for other teachers finds it’s too early to tell if system is actually helping students do better. But some school administrators who are using the plan say it has been a boost to morale of teachers. Iowa Department of Education director, Ryan Wise, says there are already signs the Teacher Leadership and Compensation System is making an impact.

“All of the evidence shows that the strengthening of the teaching profession that’s indicated in the report — the improved collaboration, the improved professional development — all of those things will lead to improvements in instructional practice. We see that come out as well, that teachers believe their instruction is improving.” Speaking on a conference call with reporters, Wise says he expects the improve teaching to eventually show up in student performance.

“Improvement in student achievement doesn’t happen overnight,” Wise says, “we believe that by putting these foundations in place , strengthening the profession and improving instruction will ultimately lead to an improvement in achievement over time.” Wise was asked about criticism that the program has created more mini-administrators in schools.

“For me, teacher leaders spread out great teaching. These teachers are in classrooms every day, working with more and more students. So, while they may not have their own classes of kids — they are reaching more students than they ever did before,” Wise says. Sioux City Schools Superintendent Paul Gausman, says he doesn’t agree with the criticism. “Frankly it has allowed us to use our strong leaders in education in new and better ways to reach even further than they were able to prior to the development of this system,” Gausman says. He says they are able to improve the way they teach using the best teachers.

“What this has allowed us to do is to take some of the strongest leaders we have in the instructional positions in our district and have them share that knowledge and that leadership across many classrooms and content areas,” Gausman says. “It is not necessarily content specific, because great teaching is great teaching, regardless of the content area.”

Benton Community School district instructional coach Andrea Townsley says the system is about teaching, not administration. “It can’t be that mini administrative role, that’s not what this was designed to do. It’s about supporting teachers, supporting students to best fit in their specific needs in their classrooms in order to improve student achievement,” Townsley says. Another criticism of the program is that teachers are not required to participate with the mentor teachers.

Education Department director Wise says the state gives each district a lot of room to develop their own plan and decide how they want to make it work. Sioux City superintendent Gausman says they did not require everyone to take part as they wanted to slowly change the culture of teachers being on their own in the classroom. “We really believed in what we felt the research was showing us from others who had move to this kind of leadership model — that over time the culture would change. And it appears to be doing just that,” Gausman says. He says the teacher leaders take part in professional development and it has become know they are available to help teachers who might be struggling and they can help those teachers without being forced on them.

“If we have a struggling teacher that’s been identified as an example, the teacher leader over time because this culture has changed, is able to get in there in a non-threatening way and work on instructional strategies, work on things that often would exceed instructional strategies, classroom management — which is often a challenge that a struggling educator would have,” Gausman explains. Kevin Ericson is a teacher in Nevada who says he seen the same cultural change in his district.

“In the past I have never seen a teacher basically go and ask for help. They’ve always had to have somebody come in and say ‘this is what we see’,” Ericson says. “Right now I am seeing everybody is more comfortable with the teacher leaders, so we are going to each other, so we can observe each other and help each other.” The system was rolled out in segments to the school districts, with 39 districts launching plans in the 2014-15 school year and 76 in 2015-16 school year. The report conducted by American Institutes of Research (AIR) focused only on the 39 districts in their second year of implementation during the 2015-16 school year.

(Radio Iowa)

DES MOINES, Iowa (AP) – Des Moines police say two officers suspected of planting evidence in a 2015 narcotics case have quit the force. Sgt. Paul Parizek said Tuesday that investigators will review all of the former officers’ work since the two joined the department in August 2013. Parizek says the two are suspected of planting the evidence on a suspect before turning over the case to investigators. He says a suspect in that case was arrested and the case adjudicated. He could not say what happened to the suspect.

The two are Joshua Judge and Tyson Teut. Parizek says the two former officers so far haven’t been charged with a crime.

A man from Audubon County was issued a warning for Failure to Yield upon left turn following an accident Monday afternoon, in Atlantic. According to the Atlantic Police Department, Jerry Jensen, of Hamlin, was traveling north on Hospital Drive at around 2-p.m., when he failed to yield for a southbound vehicle at the intersection with 7th Street/Highway 6. The other vehicle, driven by Carrol Trewet, of Atlantic, was in the process of making a right hand turn when the vehicles collided in the middle of the intersection.

No injuries were reported. Damage from the collision amounted to $5,000.

The Shelby County Emergency Management Agency reports a 5-ton vehicle weight restriction is now in-place for a bridge over Silver Creek on 660th Street. The bridge is located just west of the intersection of Ironwood Road and 660th, in Shelby Township Section, east of 931 and 933 on 660th.

The weight limit will be in effect until further notice. Emergency crews should plan an alternate route to residences in the affected area.

The C-E-O of the Iowa Restaurant Association says there’s one main issue the state’s hospitality industry hopes the 2017 legislature addresses. Jessica Dunker says her association wants a uniform minimum wage throughout the state. “We would really like to see the legislature step in and strengthen preemption laws,” Dunker says, “so there is one minimum wage and one tip wage across the entire state.”

County boards of supervisors in Johnson, Linn, Wapello and Polk Counties have voted to raise the minimum wage at the local level. The state’s minimum wage is 7-dollars-and-25 cents ($7.25) an hour, identical to the federal minimum wage. Dunker says the Iowa Restaurant Association isn’t opposed to raising the state’s minimum wage, but if that’s the legislature’s decision, her group would like to see the increase phased in over a period of years. Dunker met this week with bar and restaurant owners in the Sioux City area. She says hospitality businesses in border areas like Sioux City face unfair competition in neighboring states because of Iowa’s liability insurance laws.

“There are some things in Iowa law that make it more difficult to both obtain insurance and also make it easier for people to go back to restaurants and bars, even if the restaurants and bars aren’t responsible for unfortunate incidents,” Dunker says.

Iowa is among 30 states with laws that allow someone who has been injured by an intoxicated person to sue a bar or restaurant where that person may have been served alcohol. South Dakota law exempts bars and restaurants from that kind of liability and Nebraska has a more limited law regarding such lawsuits. Governor Terry Branstad has said he’s interested in passing “tort reform” in 2017, but he hasn’t specifically mentioned the part of state law that covers lawsuits filed against bars and restaurants.

(Radio Iowa)