Our weekly roundup of Wellesley schools and education news is sponsored by Tenacre School. Visit Tenacre at Open House, Curriculum Night, or during a Tuesday tour.

Wellesley Middle School students row, row, row their boat

Wellesley Middle School’s (WMS) newest class of 6th graders participated in team-building exercises at the Community Rowing boathouse in Brighton, MA. The children rotated between rowing on the Charles River in barges, fitness training on ergs in the fitness room, and team-building games with their classmates. The idea behind the field trip was to help to foster bonds and friendships between students who have come together as one large middle school class from Wellelsey’s seven elementary schools. Faculty, staff, and parents have noticed that bonds are sometimes slow to form as students leave their smaller elementary schools and come together at the 1,200-student middle school, which educates grades 6 – 8. The WMS Parent Teacher Organization (PTO) funded a portion of the trip as a way to promote the development of social and emotional skills during the transition to the new school environment. The WMS PTO is fully funded through charitable donations by WMS families. Their generosity ultimately provides students with these exceptional opportunities for learning.

PTO-funded field trips at other schools

Fiske Grade 2 students visited the Mapparium at the Mary Baker Eddy Library in Boston; Bates Grade 3 students will visit Plimoth Plantation later this month to learn about the Wampanoag People and the Colonial English community in the 1600s; Hardy 5th graders will go to the Mass Audubon Broadmoor Wildlife Sanctuary in Natick; and Sprague 3rd graders are looking forward to a field trip to Boston’s Museum of Science.

Dana Hall welcomes disability rights advocate, author, poet to campus

On Oct. 21, Dana Hall welcomed LeDerick Horne, a disability rights advocate, author and poet, to speak to the entire community about his struggle with an early learning disability diagnosis. Horne continued the conversation at lunch with a group of students who wanted to know more about how his disability and the ways in which being a person of color influenced him.

Dana Hall, Wellesley — Horne with the two students who introduced him, Isabelle Varsa ’20 (left) and Ashleigh Chiwaya ’23

Here’s how to get your school’s news into Swellesley’s weekly Schools Roundup post:

Send in a short blurb and/or picture about news and events going on at your school. Email: deborahcb100@gmail.com

Stuff that’s newsworthy:

Upcoming events such as bake sales, book sales, fairs, etc.
Dates such as for Back to School Night, meetings, etc.

Pictures of events that may not have been open to the public but that give people an idea of great things that are happening in your school, such as author’s visits.

Congratulations to faculty/staff who are retiring, or who are new hires.

The weekly deadline is Wednesdays at noon. The post will appear each Thursday.

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School News Beyond Wellesley — Riverbend in South Natick

Riverbend School, located at 39 Eliot Street, South Natick, held a groundbreaking ceremony on Wednesday, October 16th to celebrate the construction of a new classroom building that will contain three purpose-built Lower Elementary classrooms and a Design and Art room space. A stand-alone, full-size gymnasium will also be built. The project is expected to be completed by Fall 2020.