Tuesday , 19 March 2024

FiredUp!

Fired Up! Editors' Blog

Final issue of Dakotafire published

Looking over the horizon. By Heidi Marttila-Losure

The final issue of Dakotafire magazine has been distributed. The topic looks to the future of rural places. Check it out here. Publisher and Editor Heidi Marttila-Losure shares some thoughts about what the view from the end of this rural road here. Note that Dakotafire Media is still doing a few things: We’re publishing the Dakotafire Go Local Directory this spring, ... Read More »

Local business owners: Watch for your town’s week to get a special discount in the Go Local Directory

We want to make this BIG, folks. We’re aiming to make the 2017 Dakotafire Go Local Directory as comprehensive a list of local businesses in the Dakotas as possible. And to help us reach that goal, we’re inviting locally-owned businesses in certain towns to sign up for their directory listing each week. If it’s your town’s week, you get a ... Read More »

Facing the past: A few lessons from Berlin

How should we deal with the painful chapters of our history? Bring them up and make people uncomfortable? Think about only the parts that make the people who are most like us look good? Skip them altogether? I was fortunate enough to go to Berlin in June—not only fortunate to go, but also fortunate to go at a time when those questions (which we asked ... Read More »

Dakotafire Media announces changes

Dakotafire Media is planning changes that include a new format and a new publication. The ones pictured are mockups only.

Note: This is an updated version of the editorial that appears in the July/August 2016 issue.  We at Dakotafire Media are making changes in how we distribute our content—changes that we think, overall, will make us a stronger company and better able to do our central work: in-depth, solution-focused journalism that helps rural places thrive. End of most newspaper partnerships First, starting with ... Read More »

Dakotafire staffers among recognized Press Women

Dakotafire staffers among recognized Press Women

Staff of Dakotafire Media were recognized for their work at the South Dakota Press Women convention in Deadwood last month. Publisher and Editor-in-Chief Heidi Marttila-Losure: Publications Regularly Edited by Entrant: 1st “Clean and appealing design, feels very professional without being too ‘slick,’” the judge wrote. Editorial Opinion: 1st Place, for her September/October editorial from the energy edition, entitled “Power people.” ... Read More »

Mothers can bring experience to classrooms through ‘encore careers’

Angie Baszler, 34, has been substitute teaching in DeSmet, S.D., while pursuing a teaching certificate online. Baszler, who has both bachelor's and master's degrees in business and held a prestigious position at Avera McKennan Hospital in Sioux Falls, S.D., before becoming a stay-at-home mom and working in economic development part-time in DeSmet, said she and other moms may be the answer to South Dakota's teacher shortage issue. (submitted photo)

by Anna Jauhola and Wendy Royston, Dakotafire Media Perhaps the answer to South Dakota’s teacher shortage doesn’t lie in recruiting this year’s high school seniors to the profession or retaining next year’s education grads within our borders. Maybe the answer is sitting in homes and in offices throughout our state, already engaging with youth. “Being a teacher was not an ... Read More »

Changing the way we educate educators could be one answer

By Tasi Livermont, for Dakotafire with additional reporting by Doug Card, The Britton Journal and Wendy Royston, Dakotafire Media Should future teachers have to spend as much time sitting in desks to earn the right to stand at the front of class? Some think the answer to South Dakota’s teacher shortage at least partly lies in reducing education expectations put ... Read More »

Some S.D. schools have given up on filling teacher vacancies

By Tasi Livermont, for Dakotafire with additional reporting by Doug Card, The Britton Journal; Jody Moritz, Faulk County Record; and Wendy Royston, Dakotafire Media With a hope and a prayer, school districts across South Dakota attempted to fill vacant teaching positions this year. “I must have prayed really hard,” said Monte Nipp, Langford (S.D.) Area School superintendent. “I was really ... Read More »

Consolidated celebrations bring new traditions

Editor’s Note: See related story here. by Wendy Royston, Dakotafire Media with additional reporting by Sheila Ring, Onida Watchman; Kim Ehlers, Standard Publishing; and Ken Schmierer, for the Dickey County Leader Consolidations of schools and sports teams are common across both Dakotas, and they often change the way homecoming unfolds in those schools and communities. Corsica and Stickney, S.D., will ... Read More »

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