STELLA - Fifth and sixth grade students in Susan Wissman’s class at Southeast Consolidated School took the opportunity to enjoy the unseasonably warm weather on a recent afternoon.

Taking to the outdoor basketball court after lunch, the group engaged  in a fierce game of dodgeball with those timeless red rubber balls used for everything from soccer to four square.

They ducked and dodged and argued about who was out or not out.

Far from their minds was the fact that this  will be the last year they will spend together at Southeast Consolidated.

“It’s really sad,” fifth grader Taylor O’Brien said. “I’ve been in this building since kindergarten. It’s been my home.”

That sentiment has become increasingly prevalent this semester after a merger between Southeast and neighboring Humboldt Table Rock-Steinauer was approved. The Stella school will officially close at the end of the current school year.

With the closing, most students will travel the extra 15 miles to Humboldt every day next year. O’Brien and a handful of others will attend Auburn and other students throughout the school have chosen to enroll at Falls City or Johnson-Brock.

Wherever they go, it won’t be Stella.

Early last month, the board of education for District 70 reached an agreement to sell the school to Kevin Gardner for $125,000.

Despite repeated calls from the Beatrice Daily Sun, Gardner was unavailable for comment.

HTRS Board of Education President Neal Kanel said it wasn’t possible to maintain an attendance center in Stella. The cost of keeping the building running was the main reason to sell the building, he said.

“[Southeast Consolidated’s board] had put the building on the market with a real estate firm before the merger,” Kanel said. “After the merge date, Mr. Gardner came to us with his initial proposal.”

Kanel said the initial proposal needed some “fine tuning” before the district accepted. The counter proposal offered by the HTRS board maintained some items in the school like student records, memorabilia, music instruments and any equipment deemed necessary by the district.

The Southeast building will be officially turned over to Gardner on Aug. 1, 2009.

Absorbing the Southeast district helped to strengthen the HTRS district, Kanel said.

“It no doubt makes us a stronger district,” said Kanel. “With a larger land base and more students it makes us have a pretty good position.”

Kanel said that with districts like Falls City and Auburn landlocked to the east and north, respectively, HTRS has also cemented its position in southeast Nebraska.

The joining of the districts will eventually play a role in state aid received by the school district.  HTRS Superintendent Clint Kimbrough said that as much as 60 percent of the Southeast district now belongs to HTRS.

“State aid will not be affected this first year,” Kimbrough said. “Obviously next year we will have more valuations that will show up in any kind of state aid formula.”

Kanel said that the 60-80 students that will enroll at HTRS next year will only split “one or two classes” and that bus routes will operate accordingly.

The Southeast district stretches from Stella in the west to Shubert on the east and Nemaha to the north. After the merger, HTRS will stretch more than 40 miles end to end, making it one of the largest consolidated school districts in the state.

Kanel, who now leads the special nine member board consisting of board members from both HTRS and Southeast, said the merger had been in the making for several years while the Southeast district lost enrollment.

The school currently has an enrollment of 110 students.

“That got to a point where they knew they were going to have to do something,” Kanel said, stating that Southeast and HTRS started serious talks last fall about merging.

The merger took effect in January although school is being continued at the Stella site until the end of the school year.

The absorption of the 22 teachers and 10 staff members at Southeast would be too much for the HTRS district to maintain.

Eleven of the certified teachers from Southeast accepted buyouts and plan to either retire or look for another job after the school year ends. Eight more teachers are going to continue to work for the consolidated district.

Michael Montgomery, Southeast’s current superintendent, will resign as Stella site superintendent and principal effective June 30.

Montgomery said he has already begun looking at other positions within the state, but would like to stay close to the area.

“My wife and I are season ticket holders for Nebraska volleyball,” Montgomery said. “It will be tough to get back if we are too far out west.”

Southeast math teacher Philip Hall said the experience of joining a new district will shorten his drive to work everyday.

“I’ve driven through Humboldt every day for 24 years and now I’ll stop I guess,” he said.

Some Southeast students have already transferred to HTRS.

“Some of our past students are over there already,” Hall said. “Some of our students will be going over there with us, but there will be a lot of new faces.”