Like many teachers and families, we were encouraged to hear Governor Raimondo and Commissioner Infante-Green’s shared goal to return our children and teachers safely to school in the fall and their pledge to work together with schools to accomplish this.
Although many unknowns remain at this time, based on current data and guidance we feel Meadowbrook is uniquely positioned to meet this goal for our enrolled families. Our educational values, campus, even our architecture, work in our favor. Here is where we see our advantages:
- We are returning to our 28-acre woodland campus in Richmond. Paired with our habit of outdoor and experiential learning, faculty and staff are excited to be working together to imagine even more opportunities for our students to learn and play in the fresh air.
- We have a brand-new school building with lots of windows that open, a modern HVAC system, and an exterior door in each classroom. We can easily envision children entering and exiting school through their own classroom doors to increase social spacing at arrival and dismissal.
- Each classroom has its own sink. With clear guidance on the importance of hand washing, this will be accomplished efficiently without children leaving their classrooms.
- Our students have always brought lunch and snack from home and eaten at their desks or outside. This will not be an adjustment for our students.
- We have relatively small class sizes. Although we would love our school to be larger, and we do have room to grow, we see this as an advantage for this fall.
- In our school, the bell signals a time for classes to change topics, rather than rooms. This reduces hallway usage.
- Each of our Early Childhood rooms has its own single-stall bathroom located within the classroom.
- Grade students use a single occupancy bathroom located directly outside of their classrooms. At most, only two classes share a bathroom which both reduces distance traveled and improves occupancy.
As a relatively small, tight knit community, we have a culture of communication and support at our school. This is supported by a weekly newsletter, class meetings, a strong parent association and many other opportunities to learn and share.
- In preparation for the fall, we have convened committees to address various aspects of our Covid response including: Cleaning, Health and Safety, Human Resources, Outdoor Spaces, Building Space and Flow, Distance Learning and others.
Finally, we have a track record of successfully meeting unexpected, complex challenges by working together with grace, collaboration, and good humor. We look forward to seeing you in the fall.
After my recent parent meeting, I grabbed a cup of tea and sat down, hoping to reflect on this time of Meadowbrook at Home and how it has been for the parents and students. I started to think about all the lessons we’ve learned, and how proud I am of the student’s resilience and goodwill toward me and each other throughout this time. My group of seventh graders quickly became more tech savvy than I am, and only had kind responses to my many glitches along the way- “Well, Mrs. Boving, you could try this to get your whiteboard to work better…hope this helps…”. I remain so impressed with their maturity in the face of such obstacles to overcome.
Upon graduating from UVM, I spent some time working for Brown University’s Superfund Research Program in partnership with the Narraganset Tribe. We organized and analyzed data concerning fish, water, and sediment contamination from two main ponds on the Narraganset reservation and worked towards understanding how tribal individuals interact with fish and/or water from these two ponds. As part of this project, we crafted workshop materials and created lesson plans that will serve to help educate tribal members about contamination found in those specific ponds. Though my working full time for this program has come to an end, I now volunteer a few hours a week, contributing toward the final report for this project.
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