Canton’s Students Give Generously to their Community

by Lynn K. McMullin

     Last year at this time, two high school seniors, Chris Robataille and Ryan Abraham, made the news when their Senior Project raised over $20,000 for the Lance Armstrong Cancer Foundation and the two young men were selected to receive a Red Cross Good Samaritan award
     However, well before that, and since then, Canton’s students have regularly been acting as ‘samaritans’ by giving back to their community – often creating service projects of their own design, as Chris and Ryan did. From learning about and understanding the world around them, our students realize the ideal that together we can take action to change the lives of others less fortunate.
     Certain philosophies hold to the concept that acts of charity fall into a tiered structure. At the lowest level of giving are the actions that have little impact on us, such as throwing our change into the bucket under the McDonald’s drive-through window or buying a poppy from a Veteran. These acts, while nice, require little thought and little of our resources or time. At the higher levels of giving, we sacrifice more of our time, as well as the resources that are important to us, and we give to people without their knowledge and without any thought of personal reward beyond the act of giving itself.  As you look at what our students are accomplishing, you’ll proudly see that they do engage in these higher levels of giving. Their actions are thoughtful and varied.
      This week at the high school, CATA (Canton Adolescents Taking Action) made 15 plates of homemade cookies for the Canton Food Bank.  At the same time, their math classes are competing in an annual food drive for non-perishables which will be delivered by the carload to the food bank.  With the support of two teachers, Ms. Gabrielle Laux and Ms. Loreen Forastiere, the students have undertaken this project annually for 12 years, always making their delivery in plenty of time for the community’s holiday needs.
     At Cherry Brook Primary School, during their annual Book Fair, students and their families donated $300 to “Bucks for Books” to provide books for impoverished schools. Students also collected four boxes of non-perishables at Thanksgiving for the Jack Bannan Food Drive, and are currently bringing in mittens, hats, and unwrapped toys for Canton “Gifts of Love.” The teachers regularly donate $5.00 a month on “wear jeans day" which also goes to “Gifts of Love.”
     Several CHS students have been teaching computer skills to our senior citizens through the "Surfing for All Ages" program which was just completed at the high school.  This volunteer program bridges the generations through the mutual gifts of interest and time. Twenty sophomores pitched in and completed an extensive fall clean up for the Lowells. In return, the Lowells donated $400 to the Canton Food Bank in their honor. Fifteen students also volunteer regularly as mentors and tutors at Canton Intermediate and Cherry Brook.
     On November 11th, as part of their Veterans' Day activities, the Canton Middle School students in each advisory group went to the website http://www.anysoldier.com/, where they selected soldiers to whom they would write letters and mail care packages. The 19 advisory groups wound up with over 70 boxes loaded with letters from students and the kinds of things the soldiers had asked requested, items we often take for granted such as personal hygiene items, granola bars, soup, Band-Aids, and Chapstick. In return, the response from the soldiers has been equally amazing, with a couple of the soldiers writing a note to each and every child in an advisory group. One serviceman, Major Anthony Beatman, mentioned the thrill a young Iraqi girl got from receiving a backpack because the Iraqi children, particularly the girls, attend schools with no supplies. This week, the middle school is sending Maj. Beatman an additional 20 boxes of school supplies.
     During the first two weeks of November, Canton Intermediate School students also participated in Jack Bannan’s Farmington Valley Food Drive. Students and staff together collected over 2,057 pounds of non-perishable food items. That’s over 1 ton of food that students moved into the school and out again on its way to people who need it in these hard times. Currently, CIS students are engaged in a toy, book, and gift certificate drive for the Canton Chamber of Commerce.
     CIS has also started a new club called “Kids Care.” As their first project, they are collecting gently used books, toys, art supplies, puzzles, and blocks for children ages birth to age 5 for the Therapeutic Child Center.
     At Canton High School, two freshmen Autumn Magro and Shayla Durbois, pledged to go 30 hours without food to raise money to ease hunger in Africa. They began their fast at 8:00 a.m. on December 11th and ended it at 2:00 p.m. on the 12th.  Through pledges, at the end of their 30-hour fast they were able to donate over $400 to the World Vision Organization.  During the two days, the young women also spent time with the Salvation Army in Hartford wrapping presents for those in need and ringing bells at store fronts.
     Also at the high school, students and staff raised over $500 for Greg Mortensen’s “Pennies for Peace” program, supporting his Central Asia Institute which builds schools in Afghanistan and Pakistan.  The National Honor Society collected school supplies for Hartford elementary schools and made holiday cards to send to senior citizens. The Student Council collected new, unwrapped toys as admission to their recent dance.  This group also adopted two local families through Avon Social Services’ "Adopt-A-Family" program.  For the holidays, the Student Council presented the families, via social services, with nearly 40 gifts!  The Student Council is also in the process of organizing a "team" for the Komen "Race for the Cure" in June of 2010.
     A relatively new student group at the high school is called “Be the Change,” and these students made 12 fleece blankets that were delivered to "My Sister's Place," a shelter for battered women and children in Hartford.
     For the past two years, Canton Intermediate School has had an ongoing vested interest in the Kilimanjaro Education Foundation through which they are helping to build a school. To raise the necessary $12,000, they have produced a CD, hosted volleyball competitions with Cherry Brook, held a 6th grade Talent Show, and participated in a basketball shoot-out, all to build a CIS classroom in their sister school in Oltoroto, Tanzania. The walls are up, the roof is on, and what remains is finish work, painting, and furniture. The students have raised $9,458 so far, and will have completed their goal in the next few months. Once the classroom is done, CIS will receive pictures of their sister school classroom.
      The Middle School’s SFS (Substance Free Students) and Team Hybrid (a group of students from 7th and 8th grades) ran a canned food drive and sent 30 cartons of food Canton Food Bank.  In addition, the 8th grade team made sandwiches for "House of Bread" in Hartford, and about a dozen students (one or two students from each advisory group) traveled to Hartford with the teachers to make their delivery in time for lunch.

          All this generosity in the first four months of school! 
  Happy Holidays -- watch for the Blog to resume on January 8th!

School Closings and Delayed Openings: When? Who? and How?

by Lynn K. McMullin

To delay? Or, not to delay? To close? Not to close? When the weather is foul, parents, teachers, and the community at large often wonder how, when, and by whom the decision to close schools or to remain open is made. While one single factor is at the heart of each decision – student safety! – there still remains the question, how does a district determine when the roads are safe?

How are the weather-related decisions made?

First of all, I do set-up the AlertNow early notification system to teachers’ and students’ homes, and it is my voice you hear… but, I don’t make the decision.   In fact, no single individual makes the decision to cancel school or delay school’s opening.

The final call is a collaborative one usually made around 4:30 a.m. by Superintendent Kevin Case, Dean Martel owner of Martel Transportation who bears direct responsibility for student bus safety, Walter LeGeyt, the Director of Public Works, and the on-duty police dispatcher who is in constant contact with the police officers on the road. These individuals are paying close attention to the road conditions, particularly in North Canton where many times, due to a difference in elevation, the roads are more treacherous.  Ideally, at 4:30 a.m., they try to predict what the driving conditions will be like two hours later when the buses will actually hit the roads.  However, sometimes the conditions either worsen or don’t improve as anticipated and a decision to delay or cancel comes at 5:30 a.m. or later.

Yes, there are times when Avon or Simsbury have school and Canton doesn’t; but every town’s bus routes and road conditions are different.  Yes, there are times when your route, or my route, to work might be safely passable, but our older high school students and our buses must navigate some very difficult roads in the hilly North Canton neighborhoods.

In every case, only one question factors into the decision – will our students be safe today?


How to get weather-related updates!

First, the AlertNow Early Notification System is set-up to make phone calls to teachers and students’ homes on the morning of a delay or cancellation. Once the decision is made, the phone call to teachers is arranged immediately, usually around 5:15 a.m.  Hartford students also receive their calls at this time, too, since some of these students catch the bus around 6:00 a.m.  A second of round of calls to Canton students’ families is scheduled for 6:20 a.m.

Second, most schools have set-up the AlertNow student records to include email. If that is the case for your family, you can turn down the phone and use your email instead.   In a few days, you will be able to send a note to your school and arrange for a second email address if you need one.  You can also arrange to receive an email notice by registering for e-notifications at http://www.ctweather.com.   Just follow the on-line directions.

Third, check our www.cantonschools.org webpage.  I use the scrolling bar at the top of the page to post delays, cancellations, and early closings.  It is updated as soon as I have set-up the AlertNow calls.

Finally, you can still listen for school delays and cancellations on the radio and television as follows: WTIC – 1080 or 98.6, WDRC – 102.9, Fox 61, WVIT 30, WTNH 8, and WFSB 3.

More about AlertNow!

Sometimes I get requests regarding the AlertNow Early Notification System from families wanting special arrangements – Can we receive our call at 6:00 a.m., instead of 6:20?  Can we receive a call for delayed openings, but not for cancellations?  Can we receive a call on Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays only?  I would love to accommodate, but AlertNow is not set up that way.  It operates from a database using our district’s student information system, so I can isolate ‘logical groups’ already existing within the system.  I could isolate gender or birthdates, for example, but those fields wouldn't make sense for announcements.  However, I can select “all students” and “all teachers” as sub-groups. AND, I can also isolate students by their specific bus routes.  The bus route sub-group, for example, is what allows me to place a special call to Hartford students.  There is a down-side to this special call, however; because when I later make the 6:20 a.m. call to “all students,” these families get a second call from me. The same is true for teachers who are also parents of a Canton student – two calls, one at 5:15 and one at 6:20.

Even with a computer-based system like AlertNow, mistakes happen!  If you are not receiving your AlertNow call, please contact the school with the correct phone numbers.  This past Wednesday, I disconnected a cell phone belonging to an elderly woman in South Carolina who called back to say she “has no kids and was enjoying her weather down south very much!”  Our records had her cell phone number listed as belonging to one of our teachers, but it was an easy fix.  After Wednesday’s call, I was also able to provide information to our schools about four invalid phone numbers and 22 disconnected phones, thus enabling us to correct our contact information.  I also know based on our “delivery report” that 78% of the calls went to answering machines, 14% were answered live (including the woman in South Carolina), 6% were ‘live partials’ (meaning the person hung up on us), and the remaining 2% were busy, disconnected, or invalid numbers.