TeamMates program at CCS looking for new coordinator

    After a year and a half of inactivity due to COVID, board members for the TeamMates program at Chase County Schools have the program up and running again.
    However, there are some personnel issues to deal with.
    At the Sept. 14 school board meeting, member Carrie Terryberry, also on the TeamMates board, said current co-coordinators Trent Herbert and Cathy Hanna would like to forego those responsibilities.
    Herbert has been a co-coordinator since the CCS TeamMates chapter organized eight years ago. Hanna is starting her seventh year.
    Both fulltime guidance counselors at CCS, Herbert and Hanna don’t feel they are able to give the time needed to be coordinators, Terryberry said, and also perform their guidance counselor duties.
    Terryberry told board members she wanted it on the meeting agenda for some conversation.
    Questions posed included: How can the coordinator position be taken off the counselors’ plates, and what will CCS provide to help with that?
    Herbert said it’s been discussed whether CCS would fund a potentially paid coordinator, or if it could be paid with fundraisers—ideas that came from other schools.
    Some schools with TeamMates provide a paid, parttime position as coordinator.
    The school board was also asked if they want to continue with TeamMates or consider a different mentoring program.
    Terryberry said she feels the TeamMates program is a benefit to the school and its students, and said the board supports staying with the program started by former Husker Football Coach Tom Osborne.
    “I think it’s the right fit for our school,” she said.
    While TeamMates has some “hoops to jump through” to participate which means paperwork and more, it also provides benefits back to the local chapter, including training, data collection, liability insurance, backup and support, said Sheila Stromberger, a past TeamMates board president and mentor.
    She said TeamMates’ expenses amount to an average of $500 to $600 per year.
    When COVID peaked early last year, there were 60 TeamMates matches in the CCS program. There had been no meetings since early in 2020, but those have resumed this school year, Terryberry said.
    Stromberger noted that TeamMates has a 30-year record as a successful mentoring program.
    K-6 Principal Becky Odens said at the meeting she would hate to see a mentoring program leave CCS.
    Besides Terryberry, other TeamMates board members are president Chris Lee, Jo Leyland, Jill Mays and Tanna Hanna. There are two seats open on the seven-member board.