Mid-Prairie second grade teacher Kerri Bell received the Iowa Excellence in Teaching about Agriculture award in December. Bell was awarded the Iowa Agriculture Literacy Foundation. She is an educator who has been shaping the lives of students for 30 years. She has accomplished many things in her career. Bell has a Bachelor of Arts in Elementary Education from Iowa and Master of Arts in Language Arts from the University of MaryCrest in Davenport, Iowa.

Bell has been teaching at Mid-Prairie since 1997 after teaching for three years at St. James School in Washington. Bell tries to incorporate the National Agricultural Literacy Outcomes (NALOS) into many of her programs in the class, including teaching her students as much as possible about agriculture and works with the program Adopt-a-Farmer, where students can understand how farming works and where they get their food source.

For her excellent work in teaching agriculture, she will receive a stipend of $500. Bell plans to attend the National Agriculture in the Classroom conference in June of 2025.