Hi Everyone,
Because running for President is now so incredibly expensive, candidates are turning to super fundraisers known as “bundlers” who are individuals who commit to collecting a certain amount of campaign contributions from other donors. I’ve decided this month to serve as a bundler, but instead of for a political campaign, I’m going to take on this role in service of two important year-end activities at Acton-Boxborough, the 8th grade End-of-Year celebration, and the High School’s annual Project Graduation event. And instead of trying to raise money, I am going to try and convince as many of you as possible to volunteer for one or both of those events. These are two events that serve an important role at the Junior High and High School, respectively, as we continue to celebrate certain milestones and transitions for our students. These two events also rely heavily, if not almost entirely, on the willingness of community members to contribute their time to planning, organizing, and supervising these events. We are fortunate that there already exists a core group of parents who serve as the event coordinators for both -- but as we near the actual date of both events, there is still an unfilled need for volunteers to help set up, decorate, chaperone, manage, or breakdown different activities or aspects of the event. To be sure, many of you already give a good deal of your time, expertise, and also money - to many important programs in the community. I’m hoping and asking you to also consider giving a bit more of your time to one or both of these important events as a way to continue the pay-it-forward model that has served our community so well for many years. For 7th grade families, chipping in for the 8th grade dance has a pretty quick “return on investment” with your own kids attending this event next year. And while our current Junior High students won’t be graduating from High School for another four to five years, the sheer size and scale of Project Graduation (think all-night festivities for 400+ kids) really relies on an all-hands-on-deck commitment from our families. It might be ambitious of me, but I am setting for myself a “bundling goal” of 20-25 volunteers for Project Graduation, and asking our RJ Grey families to please consider a role that you can comfortably serve for that event which offers graduating students an all-night substance free celebration with prizes, activities, and food. Consider helping out because you remember an event like this when you yourself graduated from high school (for me it was Andover High School’s Senior Safari on June 5, 1995), or because my above plea about paying-it-forward resonated with you. Learn more about Project Graduation by visiting their website here. As for the 8th grade celebration on June 14 from 7-9pm, the organizers need your help with set up after school on June 14th, clean up after the dance, and with food and drink donations. Please sign up if you can help us by following this Sign Up Genius link (8th Grade Celebration Help). If you have any questions, contact the 8th grade celebration team at [email protected]. Thank you for considering!
Here’s some reminders and updates for students and families:
Our Yearbook advisor Mr. Lewis has ordered several extra copies of this year’s Yearbook
that will be available to purchase by students and families who may have forgotten to
order one during the original window. Stay tuned for details of how to purchase.
Thanks to those families who have submitted their field trip permission form and
payment for the end-of-year field trips to Kimball’s (7th grade) and Canobie Lake (8th
grade). If you still need to send it in, please make an effort to do so this week. Within
the next week we will begin reaching out to families for whom we do not have a record
of their plans for that day.
If your child is not planning to be at school during the last day(s) of the school year, we
would appreciate it if you let us know so we can plan accordingly and account for
students during those days. You can send an email to Katy Frey ([email protected])
and it would also be helpful if you let your child’s team teachers know as well.
Don’t forget about the Empty Bowls event on Thursday, June 6 from 5:30pm to 7:00pm! This is an evening of art, singing and ice cream! Students will showcase their art and singing talents and invite families to a charity ice cream social. There will be an art show, Select Choir performance, a silent auction, and of course the charity ice cream social. The money raised from this event will be donated to the Acton Community Supper and Acton Food Pantry. The ice cream social is $5 per person with a $20 family maximum. The rest of the event is free and we hope many of you are able to carve out some time to join us.
The High School has released its updated Summer Reading List (click here to view) that it encourages all of its students, including rising 9th grade students (those are your kids, 8th grade parents!), to look at if they’re stuck for suggestions. Please note that the Junior High nor the High School do not have any required summer reading, but we all want to encourage students to find something to enjoy and read.
Finally, the Student Council elections were held last week to determine next year’s President, Vice President, Treasurer and Secretary. We first want to thank and applaud every 7th grader who ran in the elections. It’s not easy at any age to put yourself out there, let alone plan and deliver a speech to a few hundred classmates. The 7th grade class listened to a range of thoughtful and funny speeches by each of our candidates. Congratulations to next year’s Student Council officers: Secretary, Advikar Ananthkumar; Treasurer, Josie Hanlon; Vice President, William Wu; Co-President(s), Ryan Leo and Miller Lillie.
I hope everyone had a nice long weekend. Finally some good weather!
Have a great week, everyone.
Cheers,
