Archive - Feb 13, 2012
ADDISON COUNTY — When winter rolls into the Green Mountains, many Vermonters gear up for a season of fun. But while some look forward to the colder months, others, like Starksboro’s April Parent, see only struggle on the horizon.
“Before winter even comes, in August or September, we start worrying about making it,” said Parent. “What are the heating bills going to run? What are the electric bills going to run? It’s really a struggle every year.”
VERGENNES — After 38 years in public education and 25 years as a school principal — the past 13 at Vergennes Union Elementary School — VUES Principal Sanford “Sandy” Bassett will step down from his post at the end of this academic year.
Bassett, a Greenwich, N.Y., native who will turn 60 in June, insisted that he is not retiring, but that it is time for new challenges after nearly four decades on the job.
ORWELL — Frances Stone always knew she had a story to tell. It just took 40 years, a little literary guidance and the support from her family to put it on paper.
LEICESTER — Forget about teaching writing for standardized tests.
These days at Leicester Central School, it’s all about the craft of creating essays, fiction and poetry.
In classes from pre-kindergarten through fifth grade at Leicester, and in some classes at Brandon’s Neshobe School, students are focusing on reading and writing in a different way: seeking out inspiration, getting into the flow of writing and, afterward, revising their efforts in workshops.
VERGENNES — Vergennes police cited two Northlands Job Corps students with aggravated assault after an attack that left a 17-year-old fellow student with a suspected broken neck last week.
Vergennes Police Chief George Merkel also questioned the 20-hour delay before his department was notified by Northlands of the Feb. 7 assault.
MONTPELIER (AP) — With Vermont still working to recover from Tropical Storm Irene’s torrential rains and flooding, environmental activist and writer Bill McKibben went before a panel of state lawmakers on Tuesday to say the storm was at least partly the product of climate change and a likely harbinger of a troubled future.
VERGENNES — The visiting Mount Abraham Union High School boys’ basketball team played what its coach said was probably its strongest effort of the winter on Thursday, but it wasn’t quite enough to derail the No. 1 team in Division II and the Eagles’ No. 1 rival, Vergennes.
The Eagles led by seven late in the third quarter, but saw the Commodores go on a 16-4 run on the way to a 59-47 victory.
A few of us from the Addison Independent had fun in Boston Saturday night.
We were there for a conference, which incorporates two full-days of 90-minute training sessions (getting three hours of instruction both morning and afternoon) along with staff camaraderie and the annual awards banquet for the New England Newspaper-Press Association.
