The Harwood Unified Union School District board last week heard a request to move ahead with a long-discussed overhaul of the kitchen at Waitsfield Elementary School that would rely on using more than $500,000 of the district’s Maintenance Reserve Fund. 

A Waterbury seat on the HUUSD School Board has a new member as of last week when the board appointed Jacob Pitman to serve until Town Meeting Day in March. The appointment passed muster with a waiver from the Vermont Secretary of Education given Pitman’s role as a coach in the district.

To end the week on multiple high notes, the Harwood Union Music Department presents Battle of the Bands, a new event where high school rock bands compete for prize money and fame. It happens Friday, Oct. 28, at 7 p.m. on the Harwood stage.

There was some morning excitement at Brookside Primary School on Tuesday. 

The gymnasium floor at Harwood Union High School will be completely replaced after it sustained significant water damage from a fire sprinkler break several weeks ago. 

The gym at Harwood Union Middle/High School will remain out of use for at least this coming week as efforts continue to dry out the floor from water damage from a major sprinkler system leak.

One of Waterbury’s four seats on the Harwood Unified Union School Board has come open and applicants are needed to fill the spot through Town Meeting Day in March.

With the 2022-23 school year about to commence, Harwood’s new superintendent along with school board leaders have announced an end to the use of restraint and seclusion of students for the district to review its practices for handling behavior issues. 

Summer break comes to a close for thousands of Vermont’s K-12 school students this week. In the Harwood Unified Union School District, buses roll bright and early Monday morning for most of the students in the district’s six towns.

Northern Vermont University this summer announced that Professor Gina Mireault, Ph.D., has been awarded a $547,000 research grant from the National Institutes of Health and was named a Vermont State Colleges Systems Faculty Fellow for the upcoming academic year.

As she prepared to step down this week, Harwood Superintendent Brigid Nease recently talked with The Valley Reporter in a candid interview reflecting on her 13 years with the school district. We share excerpts and links to the full pieces.

At its final meeting of the 2021-22 school year, the Harwood Unified Union School Board filled its last remaining vacancy, scheduled dates for meet-and-greets with the school district’s new leader, and thanked the outgoing superintendent and finance director for their more than a decade of service each. 

After two years of modified graduation ceremonies, Harwood Union High School returned to its traditional celebration on the school’s front lawn on Saturday to send off the class of 2022.