Recognitions:

Turners Falls High School/ Great Falls Middle School - Mary Poppins

Congratulations to the cast, crew, and advisors, as well as parent and community volunteers, for their outstanding production of Mary Poppins on March 27, 28, and 29. Each show was very well attended, including many students who came out for Friday evening’s performance to watch and support their friends in the musical. Thank you all for a wonderful show!

Friends of Sheffield Hillside Pizza Fundraiser

Friends of Sheffield will be holding a Hillside Pizza Fundraiser to help support upcoming fun events at Sheffield. The sale will start on April 13 and all money and forms will be due April 27. Orders will arrive in the 2nd week of May. This will give students a chance to sell items during April break. Be on the lookout for order forms and information in backpacks this week.

Hillcrest Kindergarten Volunteers

Special thanks go out to the Hillcrest family members who came to lend a hand at the recent Kindergarten Information Night. We really appreciate your participation!

Fun Fridays at Great Falls Middle School

Over the past several weeks, the Middle School Team has been providing opportunities for students to engage in a variety of fun activities at the end of each week. The students were required to meet school/academic goals in order to participate. Students were able to attend the dance, play basketball on the other side of the gym, or spend time in one of the quiet rooms. We appreciate all of the work that the MS team did to pull this off. Also, a huge thank you to Paul Wonsey for providing the sound equipment. Thank you!

COVID-19 Information:

Although case counts and 14-day percent positivity have decreased slightly in our towns, cases across the state and some area towns have been rising slightly. At this time, we will continue to monitor trends in COVID cases in our towns, schools and region.

Weekly COVID Public Health Report COVID Data- April 14, 2022

Town/City- Risk Status Cases Last 14 days % Positive Tests

Bernardston 8 5.13

Erving 6 6.54

Gill <5 2.97

Greenfield 64 3.78

Leverett <5 .79

Montague 17 2.73

Northfield 7 4.07

Orange 23 5.06

Sunderland 9 1.78

Warwick <5 6.45

Wendell 5 7.35

State 18,266 2.93

The CDC ranks the risk of transmission for counties across the country in one of 3 categories: Low, Medium, or High. Franklin County has been rated as LOW risk of transmission by the CDC as of Monday, April 11 .

School Committee Members Meet with High School Students:

The next scheduled date for School Committee members to meet with students will be on Friday, May 6, at 9:10 a.m.

Sheffield Principal Search Update:

I wanted to share the district’s appreciation for the hard work of Co-Interim Sheffield Principals, Joanne Giguere and Bob Clancy. We posted for the position and have been receiving applications. We have released a brief survey to families and staff, where we asked all respondents to identify the top 3 qualities, skills, experience and characteristics they seek in the new Principal. This will help us build interview questions and criteria for selection. We are in the process of assembling a Search Committee, comprised of parents, Sheffield faculty and staff, and administrators. We are planning to conduct semi-finalist interviews, by Zoom, the week of April 25. We hope to be interviewing finalists the following week and have a goal of completing the process to select a new Principal for Sheffield Elementary School by Friday, May 6.

• April 18-22 - April Recess (no school)

• Thursday, April 21 - COVID Vaccination Clinic, 4:30-6:30 p.m. at The Brick House

• April 25-April 29 - Gill Nature’s Classroom Field Trip

• Wednesday, April 27 – Friends of Hillcrest, 5-6 p.m.

• Saturday, April 30 - Friends of Hillcrest Spring Festival

• April 30-May 7 - Hillcrest Story Walk

• Wednesday, May 4 – Early Release Day

• Contact Information for Each School

• GMRSD COVID Information: Find all the district COVID information on this webpage, which includes details on upcoming vaccine clinics, COVID resources, testing, safety protocols, and COVID reporting.

• GMRSD Family Engagement Webpage: Information and resources for families, updated frequently by our Family Engagement Coordinator, Stacey Langknecht.

• School Lunch Menus

• 2021-2022 School Year Calendar

• 2022-2023 School Year Calendar