Good evening,
AES Grandparents day was once again a tremendous success. Thank you to Mrs. Eacobacci and everyone who was involved. And most of all to all of our wonderful musicians.
Our Roundtable students at GRAIS felt it was necessary to say to ALL of the custodians and maintenance workers on both shifts at GRAIS that they are appreciated and cared for. The students raised money to provide a wonderful luncheon or dinner for each of our amazing workers. A beautiful bulletin board in the main hallway was created by Mrs. Boissonneau and her students, to say thank you. The team spoke of how touched they were to be thought of by our students. Thank you to all of GRAIS and Dr. Sullivan for this!
Congratulations to the Unified Track Team for their great performance at
Fairhaven HS. Everyone is invited to the next meet at HOME on April 25th- see you there.
Boys and Girls Lacrosse and Softball began their season with big wins
The Little Mermaid is coming to ARHS May 4-6! This is sure to be amazing!
As we are almost ready to begin our April vacation, beginning next Friday - 4/14-4/21, we will be focused on teaching and learning, we will be well represented on the playing fields, and our maintenance and custodial teams will be busy as always.
Each day there are a multitude of situations that every person, regardless of age or gender, race or religion, is having thrown upon them. Based upon how someone reacts to these situations, some appear to others as quite large and some do not seem as “big”, but what studies have shown is that how we approach any situation during a storm is a telltale sign to how we ultimately navigate the situation. And as hard as it is, it is vital that we work with our students to help them find inner peace during stormy moments. This does not mean we should ever ignore situations, not feel emotion, pretend to be tough or seemingly not care - as those behaviors are certainly not healthy for our own long term well being. Rather, we simply must learn to find some peace within the turmoil so that we do not fill ourselves with anger, rage, or any of the other toxic feelings that destroy the core of who we are, what our children see and how society treats each other.
This story is a wonderful perspective of this approach and one that has effectively served so many people. I hope it reminds you or someone you care about how powerful and important it is to find a “moment” of peace despite the storm around us.
“There once lived a king who announced he would award a grand luxurious prize to the artist who would create the best painting depicting peace. Many great painters sent the king several of their best art pieces. One of the pictures among the various master pieces was of a calm lake perfectly mirroring peacefully towering snow-capped mountains. Overhead was a blue clear sky with fluffy clouds. The picture was perfect. Most of the people who viewed the pictures of peace from various artists thought that it was the best among all.
But when the king announced the winner, everyone was shocked. The picture which won the prize had mountains, but they were rugged and bare. The sky looked very angry, there was lightning in the background. This did not on the surface look peaceful at all. It looked like the artist had mistakenly submitted his painting depicting a storm rather than peace. But anyone who looked closely at the painting could see a tiny bush growing in the cracks in the rock. In the bushes, a mother bird had built her nest. In the midst of the rush of angry weather, the bird sat on her nest within peace.
“Peace does not mean to be in a place where there is no noise or trouble. Peace means to be in the midst of all the chaos and still be calm in the heart. The real peace is the state of mind, not the state of the surroundings”. The mother bird within her calm, despite her chaotic surroundings indeed was the best representation for peace.”
I want to thank our counseling staff, nurses,Teachers, Assistant Principals, Principals, Paraprofessionals Secretaries, SRO, First Responders, Coaches, Advisors, IT staff, Library media staff, Custodial, Maintenance and Food service and every adult within FLRSD and within our community who help our students each day find peace amongst the daily storm of growing up. They do this tirelessly despite everything that might be going on in their own lives and for that alone, they are special people.
Just as we know that parenting is never about saying yes to every request or want, the role of an effective educator is to help our students learn lessons that reach far beyond a textbook or content and sometimes come with school based consequences. I watch our staff do this each day and, as always, applaud their work and the work of all our parents/guardians/grandparents and loved ones.
It is my hope that you all find moments of joy during the break and you have, even briefly, the opportunity to turn off the negativity and the distractions while simply being at peace, no matter what is going on around you. These moments, like the painting, are an amazing work of personal art that you deserve!
It is my deep hope that if you celebrate Easter that you find some time in all of the easter egg hunts, or the drives to church or relatives, or time spent cooking that you are able to reflect, find some center ground and embrace the meaning of this, the most treasured of days.
If you are in the midst of celebrating Passover it is my hope your seder was deeply reflective and returned you to a grounded place, a joyous space and that the celebration and prayer was what you needed.
And finally if you or your loved ones are in the midst of Ramadan I wish you Ramadan Kareem which means "Have a generous Ramadan".
Have a wonderful week and we will be back after vacation is completed.
Alan
Alan Strauss, Superintendent
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Lakeville Public Library
The Lakeville Public Library is offering Mini Golf at the Library on Sunday, April 23rd from 12-4 Pm. The event is free and open to the public.
Freetown Lakeville Regional School District School Links
Please click on the link(s) below for district information and easy access to your child’s school news
FLRSD: https://www.freelake.org/news
ARHS: https://www.freelake.org/o/arhs/news
FLMS: https://www.freelake.org/o/flms/news
GRAIS: https://www.freelake.org/o/grais/news
AES: https://www.freelake.org/o/aes/news
FES: https://www.freelake.org/o/fes/news
Below please find links to important forms and information. These are located on our website but hope this may assist you in locating them quickly (we will continue to add to this and if you have suggestions on what would be helpful to add please let us know) Thank you for the latest suggestions!