From Tri-Cities to Lake in the Hills

Hi All,
We have now moved to the Lake in the Hills District where we started with a tour around the local police station (fascinating!).The police here gave us great tour - with a recent detainee viewing included! Went through 911 control room, detectives station, cell block, in a car - which have laptops as standard issue now so that they can do reports on the run and have information fed through to them. The new Dodge Charger is the mufti car used for highway patrol - tops out at about 180 miles per hour!! The Dukes of Hazzard used to use one of these toget away from the law, now the law is fighting back! The systems of State, County and Local policing is mind boggling, with each district having it's own police, fire and schools funded from property tax (rates) which are amazingly expensive! About $6000 dollars a year (depending on the value of your property), of which 70% goes to schools - Yay!
This afternoon we went to a local elementary school (primary) and were guests in a number of classrooms giving the students a taste of life in New Zealand. Security is amazing here - you have to be 'buzzed' into the school, announcing your arrival via intercom so that the door can be unlocked for you. The access to classrooms is via corridors and lunch (either your own or provided) is eaten in the cafeteria. Outside the playground is fenced, again so no-one from the public can access the school or it's students.
The schools is dependent on ISATS (Illinois State Attainment Tests) to determine student progress and how the teachers are performing! Very scary and therefore quite an interesting curriculum!


Golf went well yesterday (Wednesday)- they have a trolley that goes around the course selling candy, snacks and BEER! It's cold too - better than carrying your own around and letting it get warm! That night we went to a steak fry (Bbq) and did our first presentation - really well received, and they said it was the best GSE presentaion they had seen! Sad to leave that district this morning, but excited about our days ahead!!