(2-14-25) Tied at 38 with just :03 seconds to play, Madrid’s Samantha Springer rebounded an Orient-Macksburg shot, took two dribbles throwing a buzzer-beating shot up…SWISH… and beat the Bulldogs in Iowa’s girls regional basketball action, 41-38 last night.

For the Bulldogs, it was more then a tournament game, it signified the final time a O-M girl would ever wear the team colors.

The Bulldogs end the season 13-9.

WHY?

The Orient-Macksburg school district will close its doors after the current school year comes to a close. O-M opened in 1921, but the school district voted to dissolve in June 2024. 

June 11, 2024 Orient-Macksburg officials move forward with plan to close Iowa school district

The Reason

The district’s certified enrollment number was 163.9 students for the 2023-24 school year, but 86.9 students open enrolled out of the district and those state supplemental aid dollars follow the students to their new district. Thirty-three students have open enrolled into Orient-Macksburg and only two students from the district are enrolled in Iowa’s new private school tuition voucher program.

Board VP Alex Maeder 

 “It’s a tough decision because no one wants the school to close.

When it came down to reorganization or dissolution, at the end of the day, Orient-Macksburg would be no more, so it’s what’s best for the community. We want to do it on our own terms and we don’t anyone telling us, ‘Hey, you have to do it this way.’”

For all high school basketball fans…losing a small school like Orient-Macksburg is a sad day for all of us.

For All The Small Schools

RELATED:

March dissolution vote set in Orient-Macksburg School District