School news
9th graders winter wellness field trip
As part of our efforts to support students’ social development and well-being, our ninth grade students recently enjoyed two afternoon field trips this winter. Students went bowling at Maple Lanes in Claremont and snow tubing in Killington. Experiences like these give students opportunities to connect outside the classroom, practice cooperation, and stay active during the winter months. A fun time was had by all!
Championships for two winter sport teams
The Girls Nordic Ski Team claimed the Vermont Division II Nordic Ski Championship, a hard-earned title that reflects the dedication and teamwork the squad has brought all season long.
The Girls Snowboarding Team also took home the team state championship at Jay Peak — with Bonnie Kranz and Lia Gugliotta earning the title of overall top female snowboarder, a proud accomplishment for the whole team.
Congratulations to all of our athletes, coaches, and supporters. The whole community is proud of you!
Spirit team celebrates fellow students
Members of the Spirit Team made poster for upcoming Sports and YOH theater.
It has been a wonderful winter season of spirit, celebrating and supporting all the activitiies in our school!
WE ARE WOODSTOCK!
Coffee sleeves with a message!
Co-president Aleks Cirovic of VTLSP (Vermont Teen Leadership Safety Program) designed this coffee sleeve that addresses suicide prevention and promoting the 988 number. We bought a case of these printed coffee sleeves and local establishments welcomed a box for their customers. Local managers expressed their support for such a mission and thought it was a job well done. Stores welcoming these coffee sleeves were: The Barnard General Store, Maplefields, Cumberland Farms, Mon Vert Cafe, The Village Butcher, Teago General Store, Swiss Farm Market in Pittsfield, Abracadabra Coffee Company and The Woodstock Farmers' Market. These sleeves are also biodegradable. Members of VTLSP would like to thank these stores for their ongoing support for the students of WUHSMS and VTLSP.
9th graders cultivate empathy and understanding through food insecurity project
Written by 9th graders Aven Westbrook, Kasia Sluka, Sawyer Brown, and Charlie Bordeauxl
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Over the past few weeks, Woodstock Union High School freshmen have been researching and learning about food insecurity in Vermont. Along the way, we have been given many opportunities to listen to guest speakers, partake in discussions, do hands-on activities, and go on field trips. This unit was designed to inform and help us act upon the problem of food insecurity, not only in our close community, but in the whole state of Vermont.
Starting in Modern World History class, we learned about root causes of food insecurity globally. After a few classes, we started to dive deeper into the cost of living in Vermont and how that may affect food security. First, teachers wanted to bring awareness to the subject on a global scale. In the class called ‘Modern World History’, we followed a walk around activity with posters full of data from 10 different countries. We were asked to record the total food cost and how many people were in each family. This helped us get a larger scale idea of everything before zooming in to Vermont. In our Wellness class, we started our discussion by investigating daily nutrition needs, which led to the effects of poor nutrition. From here, we discussed solutions.
Molly Fielder ‘29 and Charlie Davis ‘29 work together to prepare soup
Two representatives from Hunger Free Vermont joined us to present about programs like SNAP and more local branches of it, like Hunger Free Vermont and 3 Squares VT. This presentation provided statistics about the amount of hunger being faced in our small state. They were open to clarifying questions as well as deeper discussion questions, which gave my peers and us a new understanding of this growing problem.
The next step of this unit was action. Our goal was to help support people who are food insecure in their community. In our Wellness class, we learned about the different food groups and how people don’t always have access to them, which is also a way of being food insecure. Afterwards, we were prompted to create a shopping list with a required number of items in each food group and a budget of $75 (the same amount as weekly SNAP benefits for a qualifying family of 2). We made and printed out lists and were ready for the next step. To help us better understand the topic, our teachers organized field trips so students could directly help the situation instead of watching from afar.
One portion of our field work took place at the Upper Valley CO-OP food store, where we were buying food and checking prices, how nutritious it was and if it was enough for the amount of people we were shopping for. All the groups did lots of math in this process and most groups stayed on budget; if you were over $75 you would work as a team to figure out what to put back. After buying our food, we got back on the bus and drove to the Upper Valley Haven where we donated a total of 247 pounds of food and got a tour of the operations and food market.
Meanwhile, at the Billings Farm and Museum, we learned about the history of farming and agriculture businesses, before competing in a light-hearted, 3 team quiz about making food like butter. Most pom-poms to win! We then broke off into cooking groups. In these groups we made butter, applesauce, and soup. We donated our hand-churned butter and carefully crafted applesauce to the Woodstock Community Food Shelf and our soup to the local Meals on Wheels program through the Thomson Senior Center.
Food insecurity is a huge problem in the United States and around the world. It can seem so out of reach to make a real impact, but even a small donation to the Haven or standing up for SNAP benefits can go a long way. This project made learning about a serious topic fun and engaging while still focusing on the big picture. We think it’s cool that every 9th grader gets to do this project. The 9th grade class was so glad that they could have such a positive impact on food insecurity and hopes that others feel inspired to engage in the topic and help people live longer, healthier lives.