March 28, 2024

Driskell takes over as CCHS activities director

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Monday night the Creston Community Schools Board met to approve the hire of Scott Driskell as the athletic director, taking over for Jeff Bevins who is moving into a new position with the school’s I-JAG program.

Driskell will move over from his elementary school principal position to become activities director as well as assistant principal at the high school.

A 1990 Creston High School graduate, Driskell moved back to his hometown in 2011 after teaching and coaching at Earlham High School.

While at Earlham, Driskell served as the head football coach for a decade, giving him plenty of experience as a coach to go along with his more recent role as an administrator.

Bevins was named the Southwest Iowa Athletic Director of the Year in October and steps away after 15 years of service as the AD in Creston.

In taking over, Driskell mentioned Bevins and his predecessor Curt Olson as the driving forces behind wanting the activities director position.

“Curt Olson, who was a long time activities director and assistant principal here, was my activities director and football coach for me and he kind of guided me in this direction,” said Driskell.

“He (Bevins) trusted a lot of us administrators to manage the events, especially if we happen to be there watching our kids. So we got some first-hand experience working with officials and doing what we could during games to make sure it ran as smoothly as possible during those times,” Driskell said. “(He) has done a great job as the activities director and assistant principal here.”

Driskell added that in the back of his mind, the job always piqued his interest. Though he didn’t always anticipate he was going to end up back in Creston.

While a student at Creston, Driskell was an all-state caliber athlete in both football and basketball. He also served as the starting pitcher for the Panthers in the 1990 state championship baseball game.

Combining the experience from his previous administrative role and his time coaching athletics is what Driskell is using as a building block into his new position.

In the coming weeks, Driskell is hoping to learn as much as he can as quickly as possible to help the students and coaches around the school to continue to be successful.

As a longer term goal, the new activities director wants to continue to keep all of Creston’s programs at the highest level possible throughout the state.

“My goal is that every program we have, whether its in athletics or fine arts, that we compete at the highest level throughout the state and at the state level,” Driskell said. “The school districts that have student success in those different spectrums are always the ones that everyone looks to. I want to continue to have the success that we’ve had here and then build on that as well.”

“He knows the people. He knows the community. I think he will do a great job because he’s got a base knowledge of what he’s going to be getting into,” said Bevins.

Continuing to build relationships is something Driskell says he will carry directly over from his days as the elementary school principal.

He will have already built a rapport with many students currently involved in activities he will now oversee and looking out for the students’ best interest is his next goal in helping find their trust.

“It’s all about getting kids to trust and understand that you’re in it for them and it’s really about putting the kids first,” said Driskell.

Along with being activities director, Driskell will also take over the high school assistant principal position, which will also leave him in charge of student discipline.

“It’ll be good,” Driskell said. “It’ll be the challenging part of it, but if you can build that relationship with those kids that struggle in school or aren’t a big fan of school sometimes you can make a difference that way too.”

Bevins steps away

After 15 years as activities director, Bevins says he will still be around Creston Community High School athletics even with the change in title.

For the longtime AD of CCHS he felt it was the best time to move on to a new challenge and be able to spend more time with family.

“It was an opportunity to still be in education and retire from this position. I’m still doing what I want to do as far as working with kids and being in the school environment,” said Bevins. “... Another reason why this is a good time for me to get a new challenge is I’ve got two grand kids. ... My two boys, one is the head football coach at Clarinda. ... My oldest son is also coaching at Centerville and if I want to take off and go see what they’re doing I don’t have to think about whether there is a home game or its snowing or makeup dates.”

Overall, Bevins felt that in his time as AD he couldn’t have been surrounded by better people.

“This has been a very special experience for me, being activities director at Creston High School,” said Bevins. “I haven’t worked with a better total group of men and women in the 38 or so years that I’ve been coaching or teaching.

“It’s the next phase in my life and I’m still going to be very active,” said Bevins. “I want to thank Mr. Hood for taking the chance on bringing me here from Chariton and also Mr. McDermott with the years that I have spent with him. As far as superintendents are concerned they were two good ones to work for.”