CRAFT connects with Germany through Food and Forest Systems

On Tuesday, November 14, 2023 we hosted visitors from the Bavarian region of Germany to set up an exchange between our CRAFT students and their English language students.

The exchange will take place next March with a focus on sharing our cultural and historical context of food and forest systems in each others' regions. Our newly formed partnership with the FOSBOS school in Ingolstadt, Germany will continue to expand our international learning experiences.

Colleen O'Connell has been pivotal in this work and has helped to cultivate this partnership. Mr. Smail thought CRAFT students were the perfect fit for this type of exchange. The teachers from Germany participated in our CRAFT professional learning at the national park and got to enjoy many delicious pizzas hand crafted by our teachers.

Students in our CRAFT classes helped prepare a local lunch for them at school and they enjoyed sitting in on a wide range of classes. CRAFT students spent their lunch and are time sharing their experiences and learning about what they might get to do when they go to Germany!

Thanks to all who hosted our German friends and made them feel at home here in our school. We look forward to visiting their region of the world and having them stay here with us.

Senior Cassandra Naife Shares Stories From Mozambique

Senior Cassandra Naife delivered a fascinating presentation about her native country of Mozambique to about 18 students in Government & Politics class on November 15. Naife is an exchange student at Woodstock through the U.S. Department of State’s Kennedy-Lugar Youth Exchange and Study (YES) program.

In 13-slides, and through a student question period, Naife shared information about Mozambique’s history, government, economy, language, culture, and cuisine. Naife emphasized that her country is ethnically diverse, and heavily influenced by Portugal, which first colonized Mozambique in the early 1500s. Link to the presentation.

Naife also shared her first impressions of the United States, including her amazement at the size of food portions at restaurants. -Steve Smith

CRAFT Students visit Sterling College

Sophomores and Juniors in CRAFT spent Friday, November 17, 2023 at Sterling College learning about this small, unique school in Craftsbury, Vt. They took a campus tour, ate in the dining hall and got to sit in on college level forest ecology and animal husbandry classes.

Students also learned about the fiber arts classes by naturally dyeing yarn that was made from their sheep and colored with locally grown and harvested plants. Students explored the outdoor education component by scaling great heights on the campus climbing wall even after the sun went down.

They then traveled to the Northwoods Stewardship Center in Island Pond for an overnight. In the morning they shared breakfast together, reviewed their newly created CRAFT portfolio and hiked an interpretative forest trail.

Safe School Ambassadors

The Safe School Ambassador Program is in its 9th year at WUHSMS. With 45 members in grades 8-12, this nationally recognized program uses socially influential leaders of the school’s diverse friend groups to shape positive social norms and behavior. The students in SSA had the opportunity to participate in a 2 day retreat, where they did some powerful self reflection, and learned and practiced the skills needed to resolve conflict, defuse negative incidents, and support their peers .

Thank you to the returning students, most of whom have been participating since 8th grade, for their many years of commitment to our school, and thank you for the warm welcome you gave to the ten new 8th grade members; Oliver Bennett, Elisabetta Cirovic, Lexi Gebardi, Lucas Geller, Alaythia Lockhart, Sam Molalley, Joey Palazzo, Declan Roylance, and Lindsey St. Cyr.

These students were selected based on an anonymous survey that their peers filled out, and have been identified as people their friends turn to, listen to, and trust. With that respect comes responsibility. We look forward to watching you grow and develop as leaders.

French students serve as interpreters

In an annual tradition that began more than twelve years ago, students taking Advanced French at Woodstock High School served as French interpreters at the Marsh-Billings-Rockefeller National Historical Park this past Wednesday, October 25.

The students, seniors Leah Kuhnert, Chloe Masillo, Amelie Fabre, Phoebe Anderson, Clara Shortle, Griffin Picconi, Delia Morgan, Andrea Journet, Tess Belisle and junior Levi Halley, gave the tour to four French speakers, two of whom are Quebecoise.

The tour lasted for over an hour, with each student leading their part of the tour in tandem with the others. The presentations were knitted together by clearly thought out transitions designed to make the audience feel that the tour was a whole, and not separate presentations. The students moved seamlessly from outside of the mansion where the first three students talked about the park as a starting point in the land and conservation movement to a history of the trails and how these trails are enjoyed today by locals and tourists alike. From there, the group entered the mansion and learned about how the entryway changed over time, to how the Rockefellers, who enjoyed entertaining, were hosts to many luminaries, including Lady Bird Johnson.

Moving from the living room to the library, the audience was introduced to the importance of books to each of the proprietors of the mansion, including Frederick Billings. The student presenter talked about the books her grandfather had in common with Billings, revealing the many links local inhabitants have to the park. From the library, the group entered the kitchen to learn about the employment of servants, what their lives were like and from where they originated (many were young Irish immigrants). The tour ended where it began, outside of the house where three students shared the passion of the Billings family for the natural world in general and this property in particular. Once again, for the twelfth year, the students excelled at a task that at first seemed indomitable to them, receiving rave reviews from their audience.