FERRISBURGH — Our schools are open for the fall and there are great preparations going on to ensure a successful 2016-2017 school year! Ferrisburgh Central School opened for the year on Aug. 31 and already the building is bustling with academic, sports and extra curricular activities as led by the new principal, Dr. Beth Brodie. Students are fundraising for a variety of events and travels (such as the annual sixth grade Canada trip!) so as they appear at your door with wares to sell, please support them as you are able.
The FCS PTO Meetings will be on Monday, Sept. 12 at 6:15 p.m. Please feel welcome to attend this meeting and learn how you can volunteer to support the PTO and their wonderful activities. The FCS open house for parents and families will be held on the evening of Thursday Sept. 22. For more information visit http://www.anwsu.org/fcs or call 877-3463.
There are many activities involving Ferrisburgh students at the Vergennes Union High School that we can support as families and as a community. Back to School Night for students and families grades 7-12 will be on Wednesday, Sept. 21. This is an evening to meet the principals, teachers and staff of the middle and high schools and visit classrooms. Displays will be set up on the many programs, resources and clubs the school offers students and families.
Other news and information can be found at the school’s website: www.vuhs.org. The site contains important information on a variety of topics, such as the college visitation schedule, how to sign up for PSAT/SATs, school sports schedules, the school nutrition program and lunch menus and the school music performances. In addition, there are great links from the VUHS library section for reading suggestions and student research.
The Lake Champlain Maritime Museum’s activities and exhibits continue into the fall season. Of particular interest is the “Alnobak: Wearing Our Heritage.”This special exhibit features examples of clothing and accessories worn by Vermont Abenaki people from the late eighteenth/early nineteenth century to the early twentieth century.
In addition, the Maritime Museum offers a variety of key support services to teachers, students and school administrators designed to celebrate a “maritime theme” for Personalized Learning Plans — especially targeting the proficiency-based graduation credit requirements of transferrable skills, physical education and global citizenship.
These programs that get our students out of the classroom and onto the water to discover history through nautical archaeology, and explore our region’s beautiful freshwater ecology, can lead to increased academic achievement as well as personal growth.
LCMM staff have organized the curriculum offerings by topic and by type, as listed on the website.  Also note that there are professionally developed free lesson plans to help educators prepare students for each field trip, and toolkits to rent for classroom use. For more information, visit www.lcmm.org.
The Ferrisburgh Grange’s “King Pede” card parties are scheduled for Saturday, Sept. 3 and Saturday, Sept. 17. These get-togethers are held at the Ferrisburgh Town Hall and Community Center and begin at 6:30 p.m. with a sandwich supper and then on to an evening of fun and card games. This is a great way to socialize with your neighbors and support our Grange, so please consider joining this event.
On Sept. 2, the Friday Night Movies at the Bixby Library will feature “Inside Out” (2015.) The Bixby website describes this movie as being a “thrilling return to form” for Pixar, an “unmissable film triumph” and a story for the whole family that takes us inside the mind and heart of Riley, an energetic 11-year-old girl, newly transplanted to San Francisco with her parents. Check out the trailer at: http://bit.ly/InsideOutTrailerBixby. The showing will be held in the Bixby’s community room and starts at 7 p.m. (and includes free popcorn!) For more information, contact Bixby Librarian, Muir Haman at [email protected] or at 877-2211.
Rokeby’s fall season includes many exciting and unique events for the public. On Saturday, Sept. 10, from 10 a.m.–4 p.m., there is the collaboration with the Shelburne Craft School of the “Branch to Spoon: Carving Workshop.” Join instructor Robert Palmer for a day of spoon carving at Rokeby Museum using hand tools and traditional Swedish methods.
Search for a branch with just right bend to create the spoon you want to make. Then split the branch in half, draw the desired shape, and coax the spoon from the wood one slice at a time. You will learn to safely and effectively use a variety of tools such as carving knives, crooked knives, gouges, coping saws, and hatchets. Carving a spoon from a branch is a meditation on form and function, and you will leave with a beautiful object that you will cherish for years to come. Register via the Shelburne Craft School at 985-3648.
On Sunday, Sunday, Sept. 11, at 3 p.m., The Rokeby presents “Friends and their Meetinghouses: Deciphering Paradoxical Attitudes.”Visiting lecturerCatherine Lavoie examines Quakers’ paradoxical attitudes toward their meetinghouses, using the 154 structures in the Philadelphia Yearly Meeting as a case study.
Friends lovingly maintain their meetinghouses but at the same time they deny their historic importance. Lavoie will explore how the “testimony of simplicity” leads Friends to preserve the old buildings rather than build new ones. Lavoie directs the Historic American Building Survey at the National Park Service and is a recognized national expert on vernacular architecture and its documentation. The fee will be $2 for program only or free with museum admission.
“Singularities of Dress: Quakers and their Clothing in the 19th Century” will be the feature on Sunday, Sept. 25 at 3 p.m. For many of us, the word “Quaker” conjures up the man with the hat on the oatmeal box. Erin Eisenbarth will explore how Quakers really looked in the 19th century, using the clothing worn by one Delaware Valley family.
To what degree did their “plain” clothing separate Friends from their “worldly” neighbors? She adds a new dimension to the idea of the Quaker plain aesthetic. Ms. Eisenbarth is a PhD student at the Bard Graduate Center. The fee will be $2 for program only or free with museum admission.
Note: We are always interested in including a variety of Ferrisburgh-related news in this column; so if you have news that would be of interest, contact Sally Kerschner at [email protected]. You are able to access these columns and other information about Ferrisburgh news and events on the Ferrisburgh Town website at www.ferrisburghvt.org.