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NU schools teaming up with St. James, Madelia on gymnastics

Thursday, the New Ulm School board approved an application for cooperative sponsorship that would join New Ulm’s gymnastics program with St. James and Madelia’s program. Superintendent Sean Koster explained that New Ulm Public Schools already partners with Minnesota Valley Lutheran and Cathedral High School on gymnastics; however participation levels are low. The three New Ulm schools have 13 participants. St. James and Madelia are in a similar situation with nine participants total. For this reason it makes logical sense to bring all five schools together. This way all schools will be able to participate in gymnastics. It’s great to see this many schools working together to benefit students.

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Plenty of Halloween fun this week

Halloween is less than a week away and there are plenty of activities going on. Saturday, downtown New Ulm will host the annual Halloween Hop and Early Childhood Family Education will hold its trunk or treat at Jefferson Elementary. The Brown County Museum will have a special Halloween scavenger hunt on Saturday as well. New Ulm Nightmares is once again operating two haunted houses at the Brown County Fairgrounds. In Sleepy Eye, Brent “Zoo Man” will be operating his Nightmare Underground and ghost tours through the season.

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Leaves still have color

Last week, the Journal had a story about the leaves changing colors for the fall. The Minnesota Department had forecasted the New Ulm area to reach peak leaf color over the Oct. 18 weekend, but only remain in the stage a short time. As it turns out, New Ulm’s window for peak fall colors was wider than initial thought. As of Friday, New Ulm is still in the peak color for leaves. Part of this has to do with weather conditions. Temperatures only started to drop this week. Without any major killing frosts, there are a lot of trees still holding their leaves. This is good news for anyone who missed a chance to enjoy the autumnal scenery last weekend.