Berg’s Stewart awarded 2020 Adviser of the Year

Tyler Stewart had all his “shoutouts” ready for an on-line video meeting to recognize National Student Leadership Week, April 19-25. Surprise — the shoutout was really for Stewart, Newton Berg Middle School’s student council adviser on Wednesday.

Stewart is the 2020 Warren E. Shull Award recipient for middle level student council advisers given by National Student Council Association. Stewart was one of five national finalists.

Stewart is the first Iowan to win the middle school level award. Iowa has had two win the high school level award in 2006 and 2012.

“Yes, I was surprised. This award just validates what we do in the our community as a student council and the support we receive from the community,” Stewart said. “I enjoy working with our students at Berg.”

Berg Middle School Principal Lisa Sharp joined NSC Associate Director Jeff Sherrill and the President Ann Postlewaite in the announcement conference video call. Sherrill told Stewart he lied to him and then announced Stewart as the national winner.

“Tyler, congratulations. What an honor and a well deserved honor,” Sharp said. “You are such a dedicated educator. We’re so honored to have you in our building. Our families and kids are absolutely the luckiest to have you part of their world. I appreciate everything you do.”

Then the next day — Thursday — the National Student Council Association announced its 2020 National Councils of Excellence Award winners and for the second year in a row, the Berg Middle School student council National Gold Council of Excellence. Berg is the only Iowa middle school to receive the honor and one of seven overall Iowa student councils receiving the distinction.

“I have to thank Lisa and our administration in general because we get to do so much fun stuff at our school. It’s unbelievable and it’s crazy — the stuff we do, which started with the Lip Sync Battle five years ago,” Stewart said.

Stewart, who has been teaching at Berg for six years, became the student council adviser five years ago. The eighth-grade history teacher began drawing ideas from students and from his past to have the student council become very active at the school and in the Newton community.

The kickoff event, the Lip Sync Battle, came from Stewart’s time as a middle school student in Hampton. It has become a show-of-shows and the BMS student council’s biggest annual fundraiser. The 2020 show raised more than $8,000 to be donated to Kids with Cancer research.

“It ballooned when one our administrators, Steph Langstraat, decided to one-up everybody by repelling from the ceiling during her performance. It became ‘what can we do next’ and it’s gotten better each year,” Stewart said.

Stewart said Sharp has allowed him to grow into the job and learn on the fly with her support.

“I always joke that she’s never told me no on an idea. Our administrators have been spectacular and always accepting of new ideas,” Stewart said.

Sharp responded in saying, “your ideas are always well though out, Tyler.”

Stewart also thanked Vicki Carstens, who is the executive director of the Iowa Association of Student Councils. He said Carstens helped him discover the state organization and the national conference “opening my eyes to a whole new world.”

Stewart was named the Iowa Association of Student Council’s Middle School Award winner then the National Student Council Region 5 award winner.

He said he wanted to thank all the teachers, local businesses and community leaders who support the Berg students along with the parents of Berg students.

“I want to thank our student council officers we’ve worked with the past five years. Those who have moved on to high school or college are still invested and dedicated to what we are doing at the middle school. Some come back to our leadership conference before school starts,” Stewart said.

Under the direction of Stewart the past five years, the Berg Middle School Student Council grew from 40 students to 140 students on board this year. The student council has become very active at the school and in the community. Stewart also has a co-adviser in Mindi Bartell, a family and consumer science teacher at Berg.

“The greatest gift you can give kids is an experience that leads them down the path of wanting to improve the lives of others. I think those experiences come from the things you do at school, things you do in the community and the things they love the most like going to the national and state conferences,” Stewart said. “It gets the kids out of their comfort zone and they learn so many amazing things and bring it all back home.”

Stewart, who graduated from Central College, offered some advice:

“Do what others aren’t doing. I feel like you do something with the kids to set them apart from others. Do something unique so they can wear it as a badge of honor, saying they did this. We’ve changed things up and doing things to brand ourselves differently.

“I tell the kids the more we do to support our school and community the more support we have from businesses and community leaders the more things we can o to change our school and community for the better.

“Using your resources is important from reaching out to presidential candidates during the Iowa caucuses to the great ideas found on line from the National Student Council website and the state association.”

Contact Jocelyn Sheets at 641-792-3121 ext. 6535 or jsheets@newtondailynews.com