NV activities rolls out free student admission and cashless entry for all fans

The Nodaway Valley Community School District announced last week two measures aimed at maintaining or enhancing involvement and engagement in the community and student body alike.

Activities Director Sara Honnold said the district will go to cashless ticketing for all activities starting this school year. The district is also saying students will be admitted free of charge to activities this year.

Honnold said that the cashless ticketing will streamline and give greater protection to the money brought in for each game or event.

“When a person purchases a ticket it goes directly through the Bound website and into our account. There doesn’t have to be the handling of the cash from the person who is taking tickets to myself and another person who would count it,” she said. “Bound does things in a way that makes it super easy to track what you’ve got. They send you a spreadsheet that shows you what came in.”

Cashless ticket sales is becoming more and more common across Iowa. While some may be concerned or angry that it will be harder to buy tickets, Honnold said there will be people standing by at events to assist people in learning the new system. People will not be turned away at the gate. Card readers will be available for people to buy tickets with a card at the gate.

“Last year, we had our girls basketball postseason game here, and we used it then,” Honnold said. “I know there’s a lot of people who think elderly people won’t like it or people won’t be able to figure it out, but I think they’re not giving people enough credit. Our parents and grandparents have been using cards and understanding technology.”

Both the cashless ticketing and free entry for students play into a culture the activities department is trying to foster.

“We had a coaches meeting [last week] and our big focus is how do we build it up as ‘our kids.’ How do we make it so every single coach, every single sponsor, we’re making the best decisions for ‘our kids’ with every single decision we make? Even when we talk about cashless ticketing and free entry, those were decisions that were made for ‘our kids’ and those are things that will make it better for ‘our kids’ in our ability to track funds and get kids into games.”

There are also new ticket prices for the entire Pride of Iowa Conference this year as all costs surrounding activities continues to rise, including paying for officials, keeping up equipment and facilities, and so on. Adults will pay $7 and students $5. Junior high ticket prices will be $5.