School News

Three times a year, Vermont Day School participates in C.L.I.C week (Create, Learn, Innovate, Celebrate), an opportunity to participate in an all school project with a unified theme. This week, students were immersed in our first ever virtual CLIC week, and focused on finding solutions to address the unique challenges we are facing during the global pandemic. Each day brought a new challenge! A few highlights included: choosing a local business and finding a creative way to provide support, creating artwork and hopeful messages for residents at a local senior center and the Critical Care workers at Fletcher Allen hospital, and engineering a new way to transport an object to a friend while social distancing and keeping six feet apart!

Every Thursday evening, Vermont Day School families are invited to participate in a family event night via Zoom. Highlights have included a Family Trivia Night, during which parents and students tested their knowledge of geography, history, pop culture, sports and more! During this week’s virtual STEM Challenge, participants were given the task of building a suspension bridge that would span 14 inch distance and hold as many pennies as possible, using only 2 pieces of paper and 6 inches of tape. Families had fun working collaboratively on this challenge at home, and their sharing their bridges with others via the Zoom call. The Thursday evening Family event nights have been a wonderful way for VDS families to stay connected during this period of campus closure!

Vermont Day School closed it’s campus on March 13th, 2020 in response to the COVID-19 pandemic. On March 18th, the school launched its Continuous Learning program to allow students to continue to advance their academic skills, and maintain connections with their classmates and teachers. Each day, students follow a suggested schedule that consists of classes in core content areas of Literacy, Math and STEM, along with Spanish, Art, Music and PE. The K-5 students are using SeeSaw for Schools as their digital platform for learning, while students in grades 6-8 are continuing with Google Classroom. Each classroom has daily video calls, where they may participate in literature circles together, work on a collaborative project in STEM or simply enjoy lunch together!

On December 18th, students at Vermont Day School loaded boxes of donations onto their school bus and delivered 1,031 pounds of food and dental hygiene items to the Shelburne Food Shelf. The Food Drive is an annual event for Vermont Day School with this collection far surpassing their initial goal of 790 pounds and setting the record for the largest in the school’s 5 year history. Susan Stock, of the Shelburne Food Shelf, also let the students know that this was the largest donation to the Food Shelf so far this year.

The 5th grade class led the initiative along with their teachers, Shannon Riddle and Erin Capps. “I look forward to Food Drive every year,” explained Capps. “It’s an authentic leadership opportunity for our students, and a great way to teach students to be active and supportive community members.” The 5th graders inspired families to participate in the Food Drive by holding signs up during morning and afternoon drop-off times, posting signs around school, and charting the school’s progress towards meeting their collection goal.

During the month of December, students learned about the concept of food insecurity. They invited Shelburne Food Shelf Board Members, Susan Stock, Dana Valentine, and Toby Knox to the school to talk about what they do, who they serve, and how it all works. They graciously answered enthusiastic questions from the crowd of elementary and middle school students and emphasized the importance of the Food Shelf in the community and how everyone can help.

photo credits: Alex Pintair, Ambient Photography

On Monday, October 28^th, Vermont Day School held a heartfelt Groundbreaking Ceremony to mark the building phase of a new addition. Attendees included key community partners including Lee Krohn, Shelburne Town Manager and Lou Natale, of Shelburne, who served as a community advisor on the project. Bob Bickford, Project Manager for Wright & Morrissey, and David Epstein of Truex Cullins were on hand to celebrate the milestone as well as Rich McClean of Lakepoint Property Management and Rob Wheeler of Northfield Savings Bank.

Sage Bagnato, head of school, introduced and thanked all of the community partners involved in bringing the project to fruition. Board Chair, Ed Wilkens, remarked on how far Vermont Day School has come in just five years and how proud he is to be involved with the school. Lee Krohn, Shelburne Town Manager, spoke of the impact a small school can have on a child’s future and congratulated Vermont Day School on its milestone.

Students and faculty marked the occasion by singing the school song and sharing their “hopes and dreams” for the new space. Remarked one middle school student,

“The old building ties us to our roots and the past while the new addition shows how the school is willing to grow with the times. I’m very excited that each class will have their own space to grow and learn.”

Vermont Day School, located near Route 7 in Shelburne, has nearly outgrown its current space and will build a 7,000 sq. ft. addition, nearly doubling its size, to accommodate new classrooms, a dedicated space for STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering, and Math), and a community gathering space.

“We are growing with intention,” says Sage Bagnato head of school. “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 high quality project-based learning.”

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^th year of operation with 63 students enrolled in grades K-8. The new space will allow the school to grow to about 100 students.

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.

Vermont Day School is pleased to welcome Ted Adler to the Board of Directors.

Ted is the founder of Union Street Media, the top real estate digital marketing firm, and Scout Digital, a web development and digital marketing company located in Burlington.  Ted is a strong believer in independent schools, the impact they can have on the lives of their students and the larger community.

 “I believe Vermont Day School is at the very beginning of a remarkable journey to become the best school in Vermont.  As an entrepreneur, I love to help things flourish and I’m in awe of what Vermont Day School has accomplished in a mere five years. I am honored to join the Vermont Day School board and thrilled to be a part of the school’s future.“  -Ted Adler

Ted is a former Keewaydin Camp staffman, a little league baseball coach and a volunteer soccer coach. He comes to the VDS having served on a number of boards throughout Vermont, including Spectrum Youth & Family Services, Vermont Public Radio, the Vermont Business Roundtable, the Greater Burlington Industrial Corp and the Middlebury College Alumni Association.  Ted lives in Burlington with his wife and three young children.

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. 

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!).

Vermont Day School 4th-7th grade students joined hundreds of other young students around Vermont at the Youth Rally for the Planet in Montpelier in early May. The students participated in the march, visited exhibits and booths, listened to speakers and talked with legislators. It was a great opportunity for our students to speak up and speak out!

In early April, parents and community members attend Vermont Day School’s annual all school project-based learning share. This was a wonderful time for students to showcase their learning from their latest STEM and Global Studies projects. In the morning, students shared their work with each other, allowing older students and younger students to visit each other’s classrooms and celebrate their work. In the afternoon, parents, board and community members were invited to visit the spectacular classroom exhibits.

For their Winter CLIC week, students worked on all aspects of a play production, including rehearsing lines and music, learning choreography, designing sets, creating costumes and supporting one another in all steps of this process! The week culminated on Friday, February 22nd, when Vermont Day School students put on a sensational performance of “Tellin’ Tales”, a series of folktales from around the world adapted by our Music and Theater Teacher, Kendra Gratton.