CASCADE, Iowa — Cascade Elementary School recently was named Business of the Year by Cascade Area Chamber of Commerce, of which the school has been a member for many years.

“We’ve collaborated with them on different kinds of things in terms of sharing information on what we’ve been doing in the school, and they’ve been great,” said Principal Dan Wendler. “Last year, sometime in the late fall, they had a nomination form where you could submit your business to be voted on for Business of the Year. I wrote up a little piece about what we’re doing for things like trauma-informed care, happiness advantages and also the academic aspect of what we’re doing.”

All nominations were put to a community vote on social media this past spring, with Cascade Elementary emerging as the winner. Normally, the winner would be announced at a banquet, but pandemic cautions caused the event to be canceled and the release of the winner to be delayed.

Wendler indicated that school officials are happy to have received the award but consider it a greater honor that the award was given to them by the community.

“For us, as a school, to be seen as a business and to win this award means a lot because it’s a different twist on what we do,” he said. “I always say that we’re in the business of helping kids, helping families and developing relationships. It’s another way to have people in our community vote and share that their kids and the people they know are having a good experience at our school.”