Vermont Day School families gathered at Shelburne Beach recently to reconnect, welcome new students and faculty, and to celebrate its 5th anniversary.  In 2015, Vermont Day School opened its doors with 12 students, 4 faculty, and a powerful vision. Today, that vision is being realized, and continues to grow, as the school celebrates its 5^thyear of operation and begins the 2019-20 school year with 64 students in grades K-8.

“To think that our first 8^th grade class of students will be graduating this spring is really exciting!” -Sage Bagnato, Founder and Head of School.

Bagnato, who has over 25 years of experience in education, had dreamed of starting a new school for many years. “It has been such a rewarding experience to see our school community grow over the past 5 years. Starting a new school was an ambitious undertaking. I am thankful for the many contributions of our Board, families, faculty, and community partners who have made the school’s success possible.”

 

One of those supporters is founding Board Chair, Ed Wilkens. “Throughout my 44 year career in education, colleagues and I would occasionally dream about starting our own school,” said Wilkens.  ”Passion, possibilities, and people fueled those conversations, but we never took the leap to do it.  Years later, I met Sage, and she reignited similar dreams with her own powerful vision for what has become the wonderfully effective and successful Vermont Day School. I remain inspired and humbled to have been a small part of making Vermont Day School a very special learning community.”

 

The mission of Vermont Day School is to foster skills, knowledge, personal attributes, and work habits that enable children to thrive effectively, meaningfully and joyously in the world of today and tomorrow. The school realizes this mission through high quality project-based learning, which not only is a rich and engaging learning experience, but also prepares students to be 21^stcentury creative thinkers and problem solvers. Community partnerships with organizations like Shelburne Farms, Ben & Jerry’s, Lake Champlain Chocolates, Seventh Generation, and Burton have enhanced the student learning experience outside of the classroom.

 

The school, located near Route 7 in Shelburne, has nearly outgrown its current space and has plans to build an addition to accommodate new classrooms, a dedicated space for STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering, and Math), and a community gathering space. “We are growing with intention,” confirms Bagnato. “We are in need of a larger space to accommodate student demand and to fully realize our vision for building community partnerships, high quality STEM curriculum, and quality project-based learning.”

 

Founded in 2015, Vermont Day School is an independent, non-profit school that prepares K-8 students to be passionate learners, creative thinkers, effective collaborators and responsible global citizens in the 21st century. To learn more about Vermont Day School visitwww.vtdayschool.org.

This Spring, Vermont Day School students had the opportunity to work with Ben and Jerry’s for our Spring C.L.I.C. (“Create”, “Learn”, “Innovate”, “Celebrate”) week. We kicked off the week with a field trip to Ben and Jerry’s headquarters, where students met with Rob Michalak, Director of Social Purpose Impact, and learned about the company’s social mission and practices. During the field trip, students received their challenge: to create an ice cream flavor that highlights and educates others about an important social and/or environmental issue! Throughout the week, students worked collaboratively to develop their pint with a purpose. Examples of flavors included: “Ivory Twist”, “Pint of Pride”, “Make America Green Again” and “Champ Chow.” Students had the opportunity to present their flavors and concepts to Rob, during his visit to Vermont Day School at the end of C.L.I.C week. This was a fantastic opportunity for real world learning and we are thankful to Ben and Jerry’s for the opportunity to work with such an innovative company (that also happens to make delicious ice cream!).