Choosing Pilot Knob Elementary – Interview with Principal Tom Benson
November 21, 2009
On Thursday November 19th I had a chance to spend an hour with Pilot Knob Elementary principal, Tom Benson, to discuss his school and why parents would want to choose them as a great place to educate their children. He had called me because a listing of mine (1632 Ashbury – Eagan) included a marketing line that suggested that even though the listing was in School District 197 that you could open enroll into District 196 and he wanted to get the chance to tell me about all of the great things going on at his school. It sounded like a wonderful learning opportunity for me.
Pilot Knob Elementary, located at 1436 Lone Oak Road in Eagan, is one of 5 elementary schools located in District 197 (West St. Paul, Mendota Heights, Eagan). The school has approximately 300 students in grades K-4 along with 20 teachers and support staff. Some of the interesting things about the school that parents should consider include -
- They have a great relationship with local employer, Lockheed Martin, who supplies engineers for math enrichment programs. In fact, the school has around 100 volunteers each week across different academic areas and highly encourages volunteer & parental involvement. Of the 300 students 70 of them were Academic All-stars last year participating in enrichment programs.
- The school has a number of remedial programs for kids at the other end of the achievement spectrum and has extra help and assistance programs for students that need to catch up.
- They view themselves as a place that needs to be open to the community after normal school hours and sponsors drama club, chess club, community education, book clubs and boy scouts.
- Pilot Knob and District 197 have worked hard to stay current on technology by providing laptops to all teachers, multiple mobile laptop carts for all students to use in classrooms and new interactive blackboards that tie into new media opportunities.
- Low class sizes are always a great thing for student learning and with class sizes as low as 12 in Kindergarten and 23 in 4th grade each child gets lots of individualized attention.
- One of the school’s teachers (Jennifer Parker) was among 11 finalists for Teacher of the Year in Minnesota in 2008
Test Scores
While certainly many schools offer similar programs one of the best ways to judge a school’s success is to look at test scores. The 2009 MCA (Minnesota Comprehensive Assessment) test results for 3rd & 4th grade math and reading have just been released and Pilot Knob took a pretty big step upward. These compare very well with other nearby schools in District 196 -
| State Avg | Pilot Knob | |
| 3rd Grade – Math | 82.1 | 85.9 |
| 3rd Grade – Reading | 74.8 | 85.7 |
| 4th Grade – Math | 78.4 | 82.7 |
| 4th Grade – Reading | 74.5 | 83.3 |
Additional Resources
There are a number of additional links and tools that a parent might want to use in helping them pick the best school for their children including -
- The Minnesota Department of Education website which has all kinds of data including school overviews of Pilot Knob Elementary and similar close schools like Deerwood Elementary in District 196
- The Great Schools website compares all K-12 schools in the state with test scores, comparisons and parent ratings
- School Matters does similar comparisons for parents to evaluate the different options available for their students
- Finally, go check out the Pilot Knob Elementary website for photo’s, e-news, community calendar and Principal Benson’s Web Page
My thanks to Tom Benson (along with all the enthusiastic students I met) for the information and tour of one of Dakota County’s fine educational institutions!
Dakota County Real Estate News – September 16, 2009
September 16, 2009
Today I decided to take a look at a few local and national headlines that are impacting Dakota County residents. These issues are making real estate news and those people that are buying and selling homes right now might gain some benefit from staying on top of what’s happening in the marketplace.
- There is a battle looming as the National Association of Realtors is trying to get Congress to extend the $8,000 first time homebuyers credit which is set to expire on November 30, 2009. The tax credit has already cost the federal government $15 billion (about twice what was expected). By extending it the credit would certainly help stimulate additional sales but at a price tag that could exceed $50 billion. There is a very good recap of the issue in today’s New York Times – Fight Looming On Tax Break
- In addition to looking at news I read a lot of other real estate blogs and the following article on the Top 10 Tips to Sell Your House was very good. The author, in Tallahassee, FL, discusses how 82% of homes in their market haven’t sold during their listing periods and what you can do to address it – 10 Tips To Make Sure Your Home Doesn’t Sell
- On the local front, last week I discussed how Dakota County and a few local cities were holding steady on taxes. The latest city to make a decision on taxes was Lakeville and they’ve decided to both raise taxes and raise utility fees – Lakeville Raising Taxes & Adding Utility Fees
- Finally, the Hastings school board is going to seek a bonding levy this fall from voters but has some good news as they qualify for no or low interest federal government bonds which could save them up to $11 million in financing costs – Voter Approval May Net Fed Funds
Dakota County Technical College – Septemberfest 9/12/09
September 4, 2009
The Dakota County Technical College is featuring an all-day community event on Saturday September 12th at the DCTC Rosemount Campus on County Road 42.
The event is billed as “Fun and free for the whole family, the festival will feature a slew of exciting activities to attract residents from the southern suburbs of the Twin Cities.” Some of the activities include -
- Arts & Craft Booths
- Live Entertainment
- Farmer’s Market
- Medallion Hunt
- Food & Beverages
- Children’s Activities
- Petting Zoo
- Puppet Wagon
- 5k Run/Walk
- Classic Car Show
- Volleyball Tourney
- They will have an outdoor movie (“Babe”) going from 7-9pm.
- For a full list of activities and detailed event schedule head over the official site – DCTC Septemberfest Site
Farmington’s New High School Opens Next Week
August 30, 2009
The Star Tribune has a story in today’s paper about 4 new high schools opening in the Twin Cities this year (Farmington, Woodbury, Chanhassen & St. Michael-Albertville). 4 New High Schools Will End Era. With our focus on Dakota County and the impact on real estate it make sense to give more attention to the new high school opening in Farmington.
The school has a controversial beginning as the Farmington school district 192 had numerous fights with the Farmington city council about the proposed location for the new school (on Flagstaff Avenue on the far western edge of the city). The school district purchased a nice open piece of land but it was located in an area the city hadn’t planned on developing for some time. The city preferred that any new building be located nearer existing developments. In the end, the school district prevailed.
The school district has had a very nice website tracking the development of the project -
New Farmington High School Site
Most Recent Pictures of School
Earlier in August the school hosted guided tours of the new building – all of which were full. As a part of that they did publish a brochure which gives a GREAT overview of the new building – Tour Guide Brochure
While the school doesn’t open until Tuesday September 8th, the first activity has taken place there as the Farmington Tigers girl’s soccer team opened up as the inaugural sporting event in their new stadium (FHS Debuts New Stadium). The Tigers beat Winona by a score of 6-1.
Edit – The Star Tribune ran an article today (9/2) about the new high school and preceding controversy so I thought I’d add a link for additional flavor – Farmington High Schools – Grand Opening
Lake Conference Changes Coming
August 29, 2009
The primary high school athletic conference serving Dakota County schools is about to go through some big changes for the 2010-2011 season. There are currently 12 teams in the Lake Conference but the Minnesota High School League is forcing the Lake to take 4 large high schools (Wayzata, Minnetonka, Hopkins & Edina) and integrate them into current Conference. While Chaska & Chanhassen were already leaving the Conference, forcing the Lake to have 14 teams and forcing the Dakota County schools to compete with the much larger west metro schools is probably going to get them to create their own conference and blow the whole thing up.
John Millea at the Star Tribune has been following this story closely – Four Teams Shift to Lake Conference
Lake Conference officials did not want all four Classic Lake schools placed in their league and there has been speculation that the Lake would splinter if that happened. After Tuesday’s decision, that became more of a possibility.
The most likely outcome will be that the 4 District 196 schools (Eagan, Rosemount, Eastview & Apple Valley), the 2 District 194 schools (Lakeville North & Lakeville South), District 191’s Burnsville High and possibly the 2 Bloomington schools will defect to create a new conference. This would basically have the effect of booting Eden Prairie out of the current configuration to go join the other 4 new schools. The schools have until October 1st to create a new conference so we’ll know something soon.
Many homeowners buy their homes with their children’s high school sports in mind so the changes happening in Minnesota’s premier high school athletic conference do matter.
District 196 – School District of Choice for Homebuyers
August 23, 2009
Minnesota School District #196 is the 4th largest district in Minnesota with over 150,000 residents and 27,000 students. The district covers Rosemount, Apple Valley, Eagan and parts of Inver Grove Heights, Lakeville and Burnsville. It has long been recognized as one of the premier school districts in Minnesota for student achievement along with excellent extra curricular programs. As a resident of #196 for the past 22 years I can personally attest to their quality.
As the district gears up for the 2009-10 school year they just published their Spotlight Newsletter for Fall 2009 (#196 Fall 2009 Spotlight) and as usual I turned to the Superintendent’s Message. This fall the district has a new Superintendent, Jane Berenz, so this was her first “Spotlight” message.
As a real estate agent I found it both interesting and insightful that she ended her 2nd to last paragraph this way -
I am confident we will remain a district of choice among people looking for a place to buy a home and raise a family
Let me know how I can help you find that perfect home in District #196!
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