Letter to the editor: Middlebury’s education community deserves thanks

This weekend, our fourth child will graduate from MUHS, and we are filled with pride, relief, and above all, deep gratitude. This milestone was not achieved alone, and is the result of the unwavering dedication from a learning community that has supported our children through their combined 52 years of ACSD education.

As a parent of a child at Weybridge Elementary School, I strongly oppose the school board’s May 12 decision to allow a privately funded flag pole designated to fly only an American flag at Middlebury Union High School.

Engineering a five-year capital improvement plan for nine school buildings that have collectively accrued millions in repair and upgrade needs would be difficult enough. Try doing it at a time when taxpayers’ patience is stretched thin, construction costs … (read more)

Many of the roughly two-dozen Ripton children who’ll be attending Salisbury Community School this fall will see a familiar face in the principal’s office.

Bridport’s and Shoreham’s elementary schools will both remain open for the next school year serving their own local children with multi-age classrooms.

Addison Central School District officials continue to prepare the next school year that will see Ripton’s K-5 students attend classes at Salisbury Community School, which is currently recruiting a new principal.

Longtime Addison Central School District educator Bjarki Sears later this spring will see his career as an educator come full circle. On June 1, he’ll officially step down as principal of Salisbury Community School and reprise his prior vocation as a seco … (read more)

The Addison Central School District board on Monday voted unanimously to shutter tiny Ripton Elementary School for the 2025-26 academic year while it sizes up the future of an RES that’s been decimated by declining enrollment.

For the first time, elementary schools in both Bridport and Shoreham are slated to offer all multi-grade classrooms beginning this fall. It’s a product of declining enrollment and an Addison Central School District policy stipulating a minimum of 10 stude … (read more)

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)

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)

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

Thank you to all who voted for me for the ACSD Board.

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.