CMS track to be named after local couple

Few people would argue there are individuals more influential when it comes to creating good Cheney cross country and track and field athletes and programs than Lawson and Ruth Van Kuren.

In fact, few would dispute that the long-time Cheney couple’s influence in the two sports extends beyond the school district boundaries to other cities and districts in the region.

The Cheney School Board decided at its Dec. 17 meeting to honor the couple by unanimously approving to name the new Cheney Middle School track complex in their honor. School district policy guidelines allow for naming public schools and other facilities after “a significant individual,” and in this case, they’re getting two.

CMS Principal Mike Stark said Lawson Van Kuren began coaching track in 1966 when he became a teacher at the district’s junior high school, located in the Fisher Building. In 1972, seeing a need for a program outside of the school district, Van Kuren started the Cheney Track Club, which had 50 kids its first year.

A year later, wife Ruth began helping to coach the team as the number of athletes reached 160. Over the next 30-plus years the club grew, not only accepting athletes from as far away as Wilbur, Almira, and the Tri-Cities in Washington and even Pocatello, Idaho, but kids who were deaf, hyperactive or missing limbs. Stark said that in the 1980s the club had a girl hurdler who only had one leg — and went on to compete in the Para-Olympics.

“They took all comers,” Stark said. “If you could walk, you were qualified.”

Stark said the club eventually spawned a couple national champions as well as many regional champions. Cheney Track Club not only hosted numerous meets, including several regional Junior Olympic Championships, but the Van Kurens also assisted other area clubs with putting on meets.

Cheney School District parent Kurt Holland told the board that the Van Kuren’s 35-plus years of volunteering for Cheney youth included over 20-plus years of such work after their own kids had grown up and graduated. One of those Cheney youth was Holland’s daughter Sanne, a “hyperactive kid” who he said “thrived” in track as a result of the Van Kuren’s work.

A perennial state competitor in her four years at Cheney High, Holland won back-to-back state titles in the 3,200-meter run in 2011 and 2012. As a cross country runner, she placed second, third twice and fourth in four 2A state appearances, helping lead the Blackhawks girls to a fourth-place finish in 2010, second in 2011 and their first ever state title in 2012.

“I can’t think of anybody higher who has put more effort and time into Cheney’s youth,” Kurt Holland said of the Van Kurens.

The track dedication will take place during the school board’s regular monthly meeting on Jan. 28, 2015, at the middle school.

In other business, Home Works Principal Ryan Fitzgerald reported there are 90 home-based instruction students enrolled in the district, an increase of 18 students over 2013 numbers, while the number of families intending to provide home-based instruction has increased by 14.

Fitzgerald said there are two groups of parents who are home schooling, those providing instruction at home and utilizing the district’s programs and those who school at home and do not. The number of students enrolled in Home Works and utilizing its programs is currently 82, an increase of 17 students from last year.

Fitzgerald said the program provides curriculum and guidance to parents who are home schooling, as well as access to standardized testing to measure students’ academic process. In response to a question from the board, Fitzgerald said they can require parents to give these tests, but can’t enforce it.

District Executive Director of Finance Kassidy Probert told the board that full time equivalent student enrollment through December was 4,164 students, 134 students above what was budgeted. That, along with other funding sources led to an increased revenue projection for the school year of $44.3 million, an increase of $1.5 million from 2013-2014.

John McCallum can be reached at jmac@cheneyfreepress.com.