USDA stops funding for schools buying local food

The U.S. Department of Agriculture this month canceled two programs supporting the purchase and distribution of local food, including an initiative that provided funding for Vermont school districts to buy and serve food from area farms and food producers.

The Addison Central School District board will hold a special meeting on Monday, March 31, to discuss — and potentially decide on — the future of Ripton Elementary School. It’s a meeting that’ll be held in open session, beginning at 5:30 p.m. in the Middl … (read more)

Voter anger over property taxes has led to angst this winter in the Statehouse. A legislative leader recently urged fellow legislators and all Vermonters to discard “preconceived notions” about the issue.

For more than 200 years, Ripton schools have rated high marks among local citizens for the way they’ve nourished local children intellectually, emotionally and in intangible ways. But a simple case of math could be on the verge of forcing its undoing — ma … (read more)

When the U.S. Department of Education announced last week that it would fire more than 1,300 (nearly 50%) of its employees, it marked another step in line with President Donald Trump’s plans to ultimately dismantle the agency. 

Since the fall of 2024, UP for Learning, a Waterbury nonprofit education transformation organization, has been partnering with Mount Abraham Unified School District on a multi-phase journey to create a “Portrait of a Learner” that will ultimately guide an … (read more)

Crews are nearing the end of constructing a new residence hall at Middlebury College.

The Middlebury Board of Trustees last month increased the comprehensive fee for the undergraduate college by 4.5%, bringing the total undergraduate cost of attendance for the upcoming academic year to $90,756.

Is it inevitable that the Ripton Elementary School will close in the near future? Yes. Why? This is due to policy, maneuvering, and circumstance.

Elderly Services will be hosting a Community Education Series of five informative presentations this spring on topics of importance to both area elders and their families.

The journey to equity is important — are we clear about what equity means versus equality? AND, if we agree to provide a “robust” education to “all” students, how student needs are identified and addressed should be the drivers. If the focus is purely fin … (read more)

Dear Gov. Scott, after reading your letter in the Opinion section of VT Digger — where you refer to “… quality … equity … efficiency … savings…” as being the foundational characteristics of your new “bold” restructuring of public education in Vermont, I h … (read more)

An 11th-hour bid to preserve kindergarten and 1st-grade education at tiny Ripton Elementary School suffered a big setback when ACSD Superintendent Wendy Baker announced that not enough out-of-town families had accepted an invitation to join RES’s K/1 clas … (read more)

Addison Central School District voters on Tuesday decided a five-person race for three of Middlebury’s seven seats on the ACSD board, choosing Jess Venable-Novak, Ron Makleff and incumbent Steve Orzech to fill those three-year spots.

Buoyed by good news on projected education property tax rates, a majority of Addison County residents supported their local school budgets on Town Meeting Day.