Our Yearbook Club was selected to receive the Gold Level for the National Program of Excellence. Our yearbook will be featured in the "Look Book" that all schools receive nationally as an example of how to broadly represent the student body while helping students develop 21st-century skills. We were selected because we:
Created an inclusive yearbook
Generate school engagement
Successfully manage the yearbook creation process.
AP Literature seniors finished the year reading Hamlet and created a final project around the play's central question, "Who's there?"
This project, produced in a visual thinking/sketch-note style, was an opportunity for seniors to reflect on their childhood, adolescence and future prospects, as well as the literature of the year and what has mattered them in positive ways, as well as in less than desirable ways.
Thinking about their own humanity and the humanity in an array of characters from the works of John Steinbeck, Ian McEwan, Mary Shelley, Ralph Ellison, and back to Shakespeare, seniors set about composing a "To be" page, a "Not to be" page, a "Let be" page, and a concluding "Who's There" page for themselves.
These works (along with two proofs for all the ways The Lumineers' song Ophelia proves this band knows their Hamlet) are hung along the river behind The Bowl. If you'd like to check them out, they'll be up until Sunday, June 18th, weather permitting!
Please congratulate the following students who will be serving as student government leaders for 2023-24!! Elections will be held in the fall for rising 9th graders.
Class of 2024
Class President - Maggie Mello
Vice President - Sophia Nisimblat
Secretary - Skye Cully
Treasurer - Lila Beckwith
Class Advisors - Jennifer Stainton and Sherry Sousa
Student Council Members - Mac Abrams, Tess Belisle, Logan Knox, Leah Kuhnert, Ella Stainton and Farren Stainton
Class of 2025
Class President - Jane Stout
Vice President - Quinn Uva
Secretary - Bizzy Tindall
Treasurer - Jack Quicker
Class Advisors - Betsie O’Neill
Student Council Members - Izzy Cellini, Owen Courcey, Graham Fox, Aubrey Semen, and Joey Sluka
Class of 2026
Class President - Finn Costello
Vice President - Sadie Boulbol
Secretary - Aleks Cirovic
Treasurer - Kaitlyn Burres
Class Advisors - Janis Boulbol and Sarah Hagge
Student Council Members - Milo Farrington, Anna Fink, Schuyler Hagge, Maya Sluka, and Max van der Schoot
Martha Perkins is the recipient of the 2023 James T. McLaughlin Co-Curricular Award for her work as the Cross-Country coach and the organizer of the Poetry Out Loud competition at WUHS.
On her coaching, Assistant Cross-Country Coach Abbie Castriotta said, “Martha cultivates a love of the sport so that it can become a life-long endeavor. She brings her athletes together in a way I can say firsthand, I have never seen before.”
Regarding her work organizing the Poetry Out Loud competition, School Librarian Susan Piccoli said, “She not only coaches students on how to run cross-country, but how to run their lines of poetry. Martha Perkins's work as the cross-country coach and the organizer of the Poetry Out Loud competitions embodies the meaning of the James T. McLaughlin co-curricular award. She does all of these things outside of the classroom in addition to her work as a dedicated teacher in the classroom.”
And, Danny Smith ’23 added, “I could not have asked for a better English teacher and cross country coach.”
Student Council, advised by Marie Anderson and Peggy Boylan, voted to honor Ms. Perkins with this recognition and Jim McLaughlin attended the last Best Day to present the award to Martha Perkins.
The first official year for the CRAFT program is wrapping up! Current and rising CRAFT students gathered at Springbrook Farm in Reading to tour the cheese making operation and dairy barns. We also reflected on the first year of classes and experiences and set some good structures and excitement in place for the 23-24 school year. For a closing reflection, students completed this phrase: "CRAFT IS" with: hands-on, community, helps you get outside, fun, an adventure, a lot of trees, community building, creative, gardening, fun, cool, awesome, amazing, great, exciting, building resilient systems, not boring, creativity, our future, growing and eating a lot of good food, learning, an experience, outdoorsy, interesting, and crucial for our future. Couldn't say it better!
Students in Food and Forest Systems worked with the U.S. Forest Service and the Green Mountain Club to learn about and remove invasive species from the Appalachian Trail on Rte. 12. They also viewed a cabin that has been there since the 1930"s to make suggestions for what it might be used for on the trail.
The field trip finished their field experience by visiting the Kiss the Cow Farm in Barnard to learn about their agricultural practices, meet the cows and enjoy some of their incredible ice cream!
AP Environmental Science has had a few spring field trips to explore things that most people take for granted, wastewater treatment and electricity. First in April we visited the Woodstock Wastewater Treatment Plant that is located near East End Park. We learned that there is a lot of science to wastewater treatment including the use of microbes, chemical disinfection and water quality monitoring.
For our second spring field trip, we toured the McNeil Biomass power plant in Burlington and the Winooski One hydropower generating station on May 18th. Students learned about how electricity is generated and about how these two renewable stations try to minimize their environmental impact.
The Woodstock Unified Basketball Team played its first ever game against Hartford last Thursday, April 20th. The team earned a win with a score of 41-40. The stands were packed with smiling and cheering fans for both teams!
Students in our Stewardship Action Project class, Holden Larmie, Declan McCullough and Cyrus Hawkins are building bird nesting boxes in the innovation lab to sell in the spring sale. These boxes are wonderful nesting sites for bluebirds and swallows and provide a safe haven for returning birds to safely raise their young.
Students in Foundations of Agriculture are hand mowing down the cover crop in the garden beds and pressing it down and covering it to allow it to die back. The advantage of a cover crop is reducing erosion, building soil health and providing necessary nutrients to new plants that we will be growing in our garden. We have 3 student interns working with Ms. Castriotta this summer will help to manage our garden crops which will allow us to plant a wide variety of fresh, local food!
