Over the course of the last few weeks, I have worked with our Middle School science teacher, Peter Faletra, on a proposal to establish a center for STEM (science, technology, engineering, and mathematics) education on our campus. The goal of the center would be to offer greater opportunities for our students to immerse themselves in these fields while enhancing our curriculum. The center would be used by our students during the class day and would also be used for after-school programs. And it would be in operation during school vacations and summers for both student programs and teacher-training institutes. The new Director of Science & Technology Outreach at Dartmouth, Lauren Provost, is keenly interested in supporting the development of this center as a model for STEM collaboration between higher education and K-8 schools in the region. The New Hampshire Academy of Science will provide expertise in finding STEM professionals to help administer the center’s programs.
At last week’s Board meeting, the trustees expressed their support for continuing to pursue the development of this center. We are now speaking with interested individuals, foundations, and other potential donors to raise the necessary funding. Should these efforts be successful, we would undertake a two-phase renovation of the Barn, converting the lower level into a dining space for our Middle School students and the main level into a state-of-the-art STEM lab.
As with any project of this scale and potential impact on our school, there are many moving parts. But as we are beginning to speak with potential donors about this concept, I wanted to share this brief overview and encourage any families to stop by should they want additional information. I will also provide updates on this initiative throughout the spring.
Thank you for your interest and support as we continue to strengthen the program, facilities, and curriculum we offer our students.
—Yours truly, Brad
Follow me on Twitter @CrossroadsHead
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* Head’s Note: STEM Lab
* Virtue for this Month: Honesty
* Crossroads Annual Fund Match
* Admissions Office News
* Parent Association News
– Lunch Program
– Faculty and Staff Appreciation Luncheon
– April PA Meeting (4/7)
* School News
– Faculty and Staff Appreciation Luncheon thank you
– Lost and Found
– Passport to Winter Fun
– You Come Too, A Robert Frost Birthday Celebration (3/31)
– Echoes of Frost, Echoes of Silence, María Clara de Greiff
– Summer Programs 2016
– Classroom Clips
– Hats Off
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* Virtue for this Month
* March: Honesty
Honesty is truthfulness: loving the truth, telling the truth, and living truthfully in word and deed.
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* Crossroads Annual Fund Challenge Match
Congratulations and thank you to all eighth grade families for being the first class to reach 100 percent participation in the Crossroads Annual Fund Challenge Match!
Won’t you help your class be next? Just click here to make your gift. Thank you!
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* Admissions Office News
Greetings from the Admissions Office! On my desk sits a four-leaf clover encased in a clear, stone-like orb that someone gave me years ago on St. Patrick’s Day. Sometimes I hold it between my hands and think about the traditional meaning behind it…the four leaves are said to stand for trust, hope, love, and luck. Symbolism is a wonderful way to find inspiration, and I appreciate the focus this can bring to my work. I’ve been set to the task and given a special opportunity to help fill Crossroads with mission-appropriate students. I love our school and trust and hope that the students at Crossroads are gaining strength of mind and character for their happiness and well-being now and into their futures.
The depth and quality of our program and the commitment of our faculty is outstanding. Our students are outstanding. And we have not achieved this just by luck; it’s more about the hard work and dedication of the adults surrounding the young people in our midst—teachers and parents together. The strength of this collaboration has created an incredible school…one that is an inspiration to me and a pleasure to share with the community in my role as Director of Enrollment.
It is said that no clover plants naturally produce four leaves, and that is why four-leaf clovers are so rare. What we have achieved here at Crossroads is rare, too; it needs to be treasured and held between our hands with tenderness. Let’s remember to keep trust, hope, and love central to our mission at Crossroads…and, of course, a little luck never hurts!
Reminder…
Our next Crossroads Brown Bag Café will be held on April 19, the Tuesday morning following spring break. Please bring along a friend and join us for coffee and conversation between 8:00 and 9:00 am in the multipurpose room in the Klee Building. Maybe we can even take a nice spring walk around campus…wear your walking shoes! I hope you can join us.
Have a wonderful week! —Warmly, Marilyn
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* Parent Association News
* Lunch Program
This week follows the “Week B” menu. Please be sure you are following the correct week. In addition, please consider sending in a set of silverware for your child to keep in his/her cubby; we are trying to avoid the waste of disposable silverware.
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* Crossroads Faculty and Staff Appreciation Luncheon
A HUGE thank you to the eighth grade room parents, Claudia Adami, Maggie Hanson, and Joanne Salazar, for coordinating the fabulous Faculty and Staff Appreciation luncheon this year. And thank you also to all of the families who volunteered their time and culinary talents to make this event successful. This is definitely an “all hands on deck” affair; what better reason than to show our gratitude to the people who do so much, every day, for our children?
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* April PA Meeting (4/7)
This is an early reminder that our April PA meeting will be a week from this Thursday, April 7, at 8:15 am in the art room in Bancroft. This will be our second-to-last PA meeting of the year, and we’re going to start to turn our attention to planning for next year. With next year being our school’s 25th anniversary, there are a lot of exciting opportunities, and we’d like the PA efforts to reflect the desires of the community. So please come and lend your voice to the conversation. Feel free to contact Deb Hoffer with any questions.
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* School News
* Faculty and Staff Appreciation Luncheon
Thank You from the Faculty and Staff: What a delight it was for us to be treated to a delicious luncheon and heartfelt cards last week by our generous and thoughtful parents and their children, who also happen to be great cooks, hosts, and artists! We so appreciate all the effort and goodwill that went into such a relaxing and enjoyable respite from our busy day here at Crossroads. It will buoy us from now until the end of the school year. Thank you! — Faculty and Staff
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* Lost and Found
Come and get it! The Lost and Found box is full and overflowing! Please come to rescue your lost items before they are sent to the LISTEN Center on the Friday before Spring break, April 8. There are coats, fleeces, mittens, shirts, and more inside the bench at the entrance to the Klee Building. Thank you!
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* Passport to Winter Fun
Need more time to fill out your Passport to Winter Fun? You’re in luck! The Upper Valley Trails Alliance has extended the deadline to complete the passports until March 31. Mail your back flaps to UVTA, PO Box 1215, Norwich, VT 05055, to win a GoPro, ski passes, or even an iPOD!
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* You Come Too, A Robert Frost Birthday Celebration (3/31)
On Thursday, March 31, from 6:30-7:45 pm, the Crossroads Academy seventh grade will host You Come Too, a Robert Frost birthday celebration at the Howe Library. Students will recite poems that they have memorized, translated, and composed. All are welcome to join us for this special event. Please bring a poem to read, or simply come to enjoy an evening of Frost and a kickoff to National Poetry Month. Please click here for more information.
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* Echoes of Frost, Echoes of Silence, María Clara de Greiff
The echoes of Robert Frost have nested at Crossroads Academy. They have inhabited each one of us, touching and transforming our senses. Echoes like pulsing rivers resonate through the Barn, through the gym, through the halls, through the classrooms, through the woods and throughout each and every corner of the school.
At Crossroads Academy, we continually reinvent ourselves through our students’ poetry. Students here participate, hold hands, recite, write their poetry, and cross the frontiers and geographies of language to unveil the soul, the body, and the eyes. Gordon Clapp said in his recent performance that “poetry is our chance to be personal, to be intimate; poems are the extravagancies of the spirit.” Through the power of verse, quite unexpectedly we become electric, vibrant; we are a “Dust of Snow,” “Fireflies in the Garden,” “Fire and Ice,” passing through “The Road not Taken.”
In so many ways we are immigrants, nomads, citizens of our own inner worlds, traveling in the search to colonize unknown paths, territories, and lands. This search is precisely the pursuit of poetry, or in Clapp’s words, “A poem is a discovery.” Immersed in these currents, in these “Sounds of Silence,” effervescent moods and whispers of nostalgia, the Spanish class students prepared a special poetry project exploring “The Sounds of Silence.” Students started the process by reading quotes and poems from diverse authors. They then worked on a list of words, images, and landscapes related to the word “silencio.” The idea of the project was to empty whatever landed in their minds after listening to the word “silencio.” We worked with Spanish vocabulary, drawing forth synonyms, colors, and emotions. Students put all of these together to compose astounding poems, collages of instants, colors, rhythms, dancing words, whispers, quotes, pauses for imagination.
We became quiet and still to listen, to open each and every door to experience silence and to travel through it. So we embraced it and we started an intimate journey through silence and its resonances.
The poems were written in Spanish. Students used their very own personal vocabulary lists, following somehow what Gordon Clapp said in his This Verse Business performance: “The idea emerges in the writing of it.” But they also added something unique to the project, and that was freedom— freedom in the writing process. Because, once again, as Robert Frost would say, “A poet never takes notes. You never take notes in a love affair.”
Here are some student poems from my Spanish classes.
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* Classroom Clips
Classroom Clips is a weekly space for students and teachers to share their writing with the Crossroads community. The entries today are from two kindergarten students, Dylan Landgraf and Maddy Reder. All kindergarten students created stories about what makes them happy. Please click here to read Dylan’s story and click here to read Maddy’s story.
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* Summer is almost here…Please join us for a great summer at Crossroads!
We are delighted to share course descriptions and registration information for the 2016 Crossroads Summer Programs. Taught by Crossroads faculty, other local teachers, or in collaboration with educational organizations in the Upper Valley, all of our programs are designed to be both engaging and fun. Most programs run from 8:00 am to 3:00 pm daily with a free extended-day option from 3:00-5:00 pm, but please see the program descriptions for the exact times. All programs are open to both Crossroads students and others in the area. Please click here to sign up.
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* Hats Off…
Student Achievements
At Crossroads, we are fortunate to have many talented members of our community. For this reason, we continue to feature a Hats Off section of our Weekly News. But for this to be as inclusive as possible and a success, we need your help! Please share student achievements with us by emailing Darlene.
By celebrating a range of accomplishments of our students, we’re celebrating all of us at Crossroads. Thank you!
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Congratulations to Claire Uiterwyk
The third graders were given the opportunity to take part in a calendar contest that was sponsored by Casella Waste Systems. The theme of this contest was composting. A few students participated, and this year the Crossroads third grade had one winner: Claire Uiterwyk. Claire has won a TD Bank $25 gift card, a framed version of her winning picture, and calendars for her family. A representative from Casella will be here soon to do a small ten-minute presentation to the Lower School and will meet with Claire, her parents, Ms. Verheeck, and Mr. Choyt. Congratulations to Claire Uiterwyk and all of the third graders who participated.
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Congratulations to Crossroads UVAC Swimmers
Last weekend, the New Hampshire State Championship Meet concluded a tremendously successful season for the UVAC swimming team. Crossroads swimmers included Isabelle Benson (fifth grade), Laurel Benson (fourth grade), Adelaide Cesanek (second grade), Benton Cesanek (sixth grade), Claire Uiterwyk (third grade), Reilly Uiterwyk (seventh grade), and Natalie Wainwright (third grade). The team finished second at the Championship Meet, and throughout the season each swimmer achieved several personal best times.
Congratulations to all of these swimmers and their coaches, including Jen Haines for their hard work this season!
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Congratulations to Crossroads Skaters at the Challenge Cup
This weekend, four Crossroads skaters competed in the Challenge Cup in Burlington, VT, for the Skating Club at Dartmouth, and they all did an excellent job. Eden Anne Bauer (sixth grade) received a first and a second place medal, Lyla Eve Bauer (first grade) received a third place medal, Mackenzie Chin (second grade) received two first place medals, and Micki Loud (seventh grade) also received two first place medals.
Congratulations to all of these skaters for their great work and to their coaches, including Rose Grenier!
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KEY LINKS: http://www.crossroadsacademy.org/
