Superintendent’s Corner

The CEO of Boston Apparel Group, Chas Hepler along with employees of the company visited the MacDonald School on Wednesday, December 17^th to personally thank grade 3 students and award the prizes to the winners of their annual Holiday Greeting Card Contest.

Boston Apparel Group (formerly REDCATS USA) parent company of Chadwick of Boston, located on United Drive in West Bridgewater, invited the grade 3 students to use their artistic skills to design a holiday/winter greeting card. The winning card will be sent to all of their employees at the West Bridgewater facility along with other locations and some will be sent to customers oversees.

The judges at Boston Apparel had a difficult time picking the winners, as all the children did a wonderful job.  First place winner is Victoria Wright.  Additional winners are Matthew Shaughnessy, Joshua Smith and Emma Sheedy.  Victoria’s drawing will be on the front cover of the card and the additional winners’ drawings will be placed on the back along with their photograph. In addition, eachwinner was given a gift certificate and various treats were given to the entire 3^rd grade class. Congratulations to all of the winners and participants, and thank you to the Boston Apparel Group for supporting the West Bridgewater                                                      

Under the direction of Music Teacher Toni Beaver, West Bridgewater High School recently added a TRI-M chapter to their music department and they held their first induction ceremony on December 5^th. TRI-M, the nationally recognized honor society for music, stands for “Modern Music Masters.” Students in grades 9-12 are selected based on academic achievement as well as musical excellence. These students are the moving force of the West Bridgewater Music Department with their primary goal being to set the example of a role model music student. 2008 inductees include; Renee Boudreau, Tyler Cafelle, Gianna Crowley (President), Sue Ellen Duffy (President), Kelleen Heavey, Kayla Junkins (Treasurer), Nancy Kwan, Chris Perkins, Maryann Serilla, Andrew Smith, Rebecca Smith ( Secretary), and Carly Walter (Historian).Each member has selected an individual music project such as music tutoring, extra music performances, rehearsing with the middle school music ensembles, learning more/new instruments, and/or composition projects. In addition to this, the chapter will be running a Battle of the Bands and a Chamber Concert in May, and a Gillette Stadium Fundraiser in December. Congratulations to all of you!

In November, under the direction of lead teacher Anita Labrecque the Integrated Preschool learned about Native Americans, Pilgrims and the first Thanksgiving. As a culminating event, they had a Thanksgiving Feast. For the Feast, the children shake heavy cream to make butter, make corn muffins in class, and bring in a fruit or vegetable to share with the class. The children also make both a Native American and a Pilgrim costume, and then choose which one they want to wear for the Feast.

This year, Dr. Oakley joined the afternoon class when they shook cream to make butter. Each person took a turn shaking the container until the buttermilk separated out and the fat turned into butter. Dr. Oakley explained to the children that the small parts in the butter, called fat molecules, bang together as we shake the container. As they bang together more and more, they begin to stick together, which makes the butter. The children learned that a liquid can become a solid.

8^th Grade students at the MSHS, under the direction of Science teacher Laura Black, were busy working on Science Fair projects throughout the fall. Students studied the principles of the Scientific Method and what makes a fair, scientific test. In the second week of September, each student picked a Science Fair topic that they wanted to further investigate. Projects ranged in the content areas of Earth Science, Physical Science, and Life Science.  The skills of scientific inquiry were practiced by each student throughout their experiment. Students formulated a testable hypothesis, designed and conducted an experiment while carefully controlling the variables, and drew conclusions from their collected data.

Communication is an important step in the Scientific Method, and students shared their results with each other and the judges on the day of the Science Fair Monday, November 24th. Projects were set up in the MSHS cafeteria for the entire school community to view. Each year the Science Fair culminates during parent-teacher conferences so that all parents can view the hard work of each and every grade 8 student. The top ten finalists were announced on Tuesday November 25th. Each finalist then went through a second round of judging. The top three were announced on Wednesday November 26^th. Listed below are the finalists and winners of the 2008 Grade 8 Science Fair:

1) Cameron Hay – Warm All Over

2) Brittany Churchill – Weight for the Music

3) Jacob Thomas – Totally Turbine

Frank Cambria – Which Substance Will Melt Ice the Fastest?

Kristin Harper – There’s Bacteria Where?

Maria Alfieri - Bubblerama

Elizabeth Keeling – How Music Affects Males and Females

Helen Jones – Hover Wonders

Chelsey Pringle – Don’t Drink This!

Christian Cardinal - Bounce

As part of the “Savings Makes Cents” program, Angela Hucles, 2 time olympic gold medalist in soccer, spoke to 5th graders at the Howard School on Friday.  Angela discussed the importance of saving money and ways in which students can start to save money.

On Friday, November 21 a group of students from the Howard School sang at the Galleria Mall in Taunton. Under the direction of Music Teacher Jo Enke and with assistance from Donna DePaola and Eric LeMarier,  the students performed a number of holiday songs. What a great opportunity to spread the joy of the holidays to the community and to showcase the musical talents of our students.

During the month of November, the Hunakai Studio of Fine Arts sponsors “The Art of The Educator”, a display of art from local art teachers. The show runs from November 3^rd through the 29^th and features work from educators in Foxboro, Franklin, King Phillip, Medfield, Middleboro, Walpole, and our own high school art teacher Justin Finley from West Bridgewater.

During the course of the show various pieces are chosen to be displayed at a gallery in Boston during the month of December. The West Bridgewater School System is proud to announce that Justin’s pieces were chosen for the Boston display. Mr. Finley’s pieces are wheel thrown ceramics inspired by the Japanese Haniwa ceremonial soldiers.

To see Mr. Finley’s pieces and other fine works of art by local educators, you can visit 106A Mechanic Street, Foxboro Massachusetts through the end of the month, or head to the Boston Gallery at 300 Summer Street.

The students at the MSHS spent their Sunday morning along with several faculty members helping those community members who are in need this holiday season.  Student Council and National Honor Society members went door to door to gather food for the West Bridgewater Food Pantry.  Every student who returned to the school with their car full of goods felt a real sense of pride about what they had accomplished. 

In addition to the food products, over $100 in cash donations was collected. Along the way some of the students talked with people who will actually be benefiting from the drive as they will be using the food pantry themselves.  The drive was a success in the fact that bags and bags of food were collected, but more importantly it opened the eyes of our high school students to the importance of giving back to the community and helping those less fortunate.