With turnout of 35% across the school district, voters have approved a $47,892,873 million budget to run the schools in the Harwood Unified Union School District for the 2024-25 school year.  Supporters cast 2,429 ballots in favor for 61%.

The announcement carries an attention-grabbing message: “Harwood We Are Going Back to 1995” as teachers and administrators at Harwood Union HS look for community input Wednesday night, May 29, on a plan to go cellphone-free starting next school year.

In its last meeting before the third school budget vote on May 30, the Harwood Unified Union School Board heard requests to find different budget cuts in order to keep the elementary World Language program, but it refrained from asking the administration for alternatives.

The statewide nonprofit poetry organization Sundog Poetry recently announced that a Harwood Union High School freshman was the winner of a contest to name Vermont’s first Youth Poet Laureate. 

Early voting is open and the public informational meeting ahead of the third vote for Harwood’s 2024-25 school budget will be held Monday, May 20. Meanwhile the school board’s new finance committee has started to meet. 

The Harwood Unified Union School Board has chosen a new, lower 2024-25 budget proposal under $48 million that relies on staff layoffs and cutting elementary foreign language instruction, and it has set May 30 for the next special election. 

Leaders in the Harwood school district hope the third time is the charm for voters to back a budget for the 2024-25 school year. The school board meets tonight to discuss the third budget proposal it will put to voters. It also will review its conflict of interest policy in light of a claim focusing on a school board member.

By a vote of 1,731 to 1,565, voters on Tuesday told Harwood Unified Union School District leaders to go back to the drawing board to draft yet another budget proposal to run schools for the 2024-25 school year.

On Tuesday, voters in the six communities of the Harwood Unified Union School District will head to the polls to consider a new budget of $48.8 million to run schools for the 2024-25 school year.  The second vote is needed after voters on Town Meeting Day overwhelmingly rejected the first budget of $50.8 million.

With the second vote on a revised 2024-25 budget proposal less than two weeks away, the Harwood school board last week rolled out messages to the community and held a two-hour informational meeting to answer questions from local residents. The vote on a $48.8 million budget happens April 30. There is one more chance to hear a presentation and ask questions this Thursday, April 25.

Last Tuesday morning, Brookside Primary School first grader Liam Lande, skipped hopping on the school bus for an extra-special lift to school.

The Harwood Unified Union School Board appointed three new members last week to fill vacancies representing Waterbury as the board prepares for a second vote on a proposed budget for the 2024-25 school year.