Now settled in to his job as the new superintendent at Burlington Public School, Brent Rousey said he has two goals. One is “to continue the gold standard Burlington is known for.” Hired in June, his other goal is to “complete the ($10.5 M) bond project.”

“We'll start with the greenhouse,” Rousey said. They await the architect drawings and plan to open for bids August 25. “We have money in the bank for the greenhouse,” he said and anticipates it going up “fairly quickly.”

“We'll receive the remainder of money mid-October,” the superintendent said. The architect drawings for the gym, cafeteria transformed into The Little Gym, and relocated elementary classrooms into existing locker rooms should be ready by early November. The bidding process can begin in later November.

Rousey reminded he's had lots of experience taking bond issues through completion. One of those was when he was at Timberlake 12 years and superintendent there 10 years. The other building project was at Drummond.

He accepted the superintendency at Burlington in part because of the bond issue, but also “because of the people I've known up here since I started in 1980 at Ringwood. I brought teams up here to play basketball.”

Rousey said the new gym will “hopefully” be built by the 2023-24 basketball season.

Burlington students started classes last Wednesday. Rousey provided the following enrollment figures: grades K-6, 64 students; grades 7-12, 55 students; Pre-K, 13 students; six children in the three-year-old program.

There are 30 students in the daycare. Kassandra Kuns was the assistant director and served as interim. The school board hired her as the new director. So Burlington's Daycare has four full time and three part time employees.

Rousey confirmed that Burlington still does not receive state funding and will not for the 2022-23 school year.

The Miss Burlington Pageant is Sept. 13 at 7 p.m. Four of five junior girls are trying out for the title in which they would represent Burlington High School in the Miss Cinderella Talent Show and Pageant in Alva during Northwestern Oklahoma State University's homecoming Nov. 3-5.