DNA - District News & Announcements

March 2023

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This newsletter is affectionately called the DNA because it's a beautiful collection of unique stories and experiences contributing to the development and function of our school communities. (Also it's an acronym for District News and Announcements ;) )

We hope you enjoy seeing some of these behind the scenes stories and will join your fellow community members at upcoming events!

The Multilingual Language Assessment team is working hard to identify new Emergent Bilinguals for Kindergarten 2023. Here is a little preview of some cute faces that are very excited to join FPS in September!

The Framingham Teacher Residency program is seeking applicants who are bilingual in Portuguese or Spanish to teach within Framingham Public Schools. Our program offers a full-year, full-time internship in a Framingham middle school (and potentially at elementary level next year) plus post-baccalaureate FSU coursework toward teacher licensure in the Sciences, Mathematics, English Language Arts, Spanish, or History. AmeriCorps and FPS funding will support successful applicants with a $26,500 stipend toward living expenses, making it more affordable for you to become a teacher.

Interested in hearing more about this opportunity? Email Everton Vargas da Costa to attend a future information session!

The Parent Teacher Home Visits Program in FPS is recognizing Marcia Passos (Fuller) and Amelia Andrade (Cameron) for leading the charge in our district. Marcia and Amelia have both conducted NUMEROUS home visits, so we want to celebrate their accomplishments and share their thoughts about home visits with all of you. CONGRATULATIONS and THANK YOU, Marcia and Amelia! Your work is making such a difference in the lives of students, families, and staff members in Framingham.

The Early Childhood Alliance of Framingham partnered with the Boston Children's Museum (BCM) to offer a newly created BCM initiative supporting social emotional development of our youngest learners and to educate the parents of children age 1-5 years old.

The 'Me, You, We' program is a 6-week series designed to demonstrate the progression of social emotional learning. Social-emotional skills are important for young children!

Through this program, children are learning to...

• Understand how they feel and put a name to it
• Manage big feelings and control their behaviors
• Make sense of other people’s feelings
• Find ways of caring about other people’s feelings
• Work nicely with others by following directions and taking turns
• Solve their own problems

Play-based activities were used in an intentional way while sharing tips and tools with the families. The beauty of this curriculum was the hands-on learning accompanied with a handout that came in every language. Participants also receive a kit with all the learning activities and tip sheets at the end of the 6 weeks. A picture says it all....

A Parent Testimonial:

"The 'Me, You, We' program sponsored by the Boston Children's Museum and facilitated at the Framingham Public Library was such a wonderful opportunity for both myself and my 4 year old daughter. We looked forward to class every Monday morning - the perfect way to start our week! The focus on social emotional learning was excellent - covering relevant topics such as bossiness (Who can you boss?), using our words to express our feelings, following directions, and taking turns. My daughter and I both learned so much and made so many new friends! We also got to take home a simply wonderful kit full of toys, books, art supplies, and learning materials at the end. We especially both grew fond of the facilitator, Jane, from ECAF who always brings joy and enthusiasm to everything she does." - AH

Our partners from the Greater Framingham Community Church received a $10,000 donation from Mutual One Bank to support ProjectDash which continues to provide fresh groceries for 90 families on a biweekly basis.

Pictured: Mark Haranas, MutualOne Bank CEO and President and Dr. Rev J.Anthony Lloyd, Greater Framingham Community Church.

Organized by School Committee Clerk, Valerie Ottaviani, the Framingham Fire Department came to the schools on FTA PD Day (March 9th) to teach CPR to staff. The nurses also participated in Stop The Bleeding training.

• All week at Barbieri Elementary School, visual arts teachers Jillian Marcelin and Dania Caballero-Dillon are hosting muralist David Fichter to complete their Artist in Residence Program. The theme of the mural, Celebrating Diversity, highlights the diverse Barbieri community. This is the culmination of a project that was underway when COVID hit. It's three years later, and now the Barbieri community gets to see the project come to fruition! More to come on this incredible masterpiece! We can't give it away, so here's a small photo snippet >>
• Thank you and Congrats to Nancy Killoran and Ben Smock, music teachers at Hemenway Elementary School, who recently hosted a beautiful concert - giving the Hemenway community a wonderful window into the music classrooms!
• We had another great showing for the FHS Marching Band and Color Guard this Saturday in Dartmouth. Both groups performed beautifully and received a lot of great feedback from judges and audiences! The Indoor Winds and Percussion received 1st Place with a total score of 86.05 (largest point leap in a single week!) and the Indoor ColorGuard received 4th place with a total score of 84.08! Congratulations to all the students and our team: Andy Jasinski, Diane Jasinski, Erin Morrill, Leigh Schoepflin, David Penn, and Aidan Beckman! Both groups will be at it again this Saturday in New Bedford!
• The FHS Drama Company had their final performance of Machinal Friday night, and it was incredible. Congratulations to the 80+ students involved in the production and to Chris Brindley and Peter Birren on their leadership!
• Last but not least, I would like to give a big high five to FHS visual art teacher Katie Mansfield (see the feature below alongside other FHS Submissions!). Katie received a Mass Cultural Council individual Artist Cultural Recovery Grant! These funds will support their ongoing project "Considering Queerness within Rural Recreation" as well as research focusing on "American Archetypal Cowboy Culture Abroad."

One of our Adult ESL students, turned teacher, turned film maker, has made a short film that is winning awards across the country! She also hired one of our long-term teachers as an actress. Congratulations Lyria Garcia - you are an inspiration!

Lyria Garcia, student, then teacher, then film maker.

June Murphy Katz, current teacher 17 years of service, actor in film.

Fatima Guedes, FAESL grad, current Prep Class Teachers, contributed props for the film.

Film Name: Waysland (Trailer)

Plot: Waysland starts with the number one obstacle facing most immigrants; insecurity with speaking English. Meet Teresa, a Brazilian immigrant dreaming of trading her dishwashing job to become the restaurant's hostess. The position opens up and Teresa gets the job with some help from her American roommate, Stella. Her moment of triumph is dashed when ICE agents arrive to arrest her. Stella temporarily diverts them but now Teresa needs a place to crash. The risks of helping her are high; sadly, her community turns its back on her. Stella reminds Teresa that her worth is not based on her immigration status. As she has done before, Teresa regains her strength and finds a way to solve her dilemma.

If your child's school is not included below, that does not mean they aren't doing wonderful, exciting things! We look forward to sharing even more news and updates in the Good News Network section of future District Newsletters!

Submit your good news to the Google Form for a special shoutout in future newsletters and social media posts!

In January and February, Environmental Club students visited kindergarten and first grade classes at the King, Dunning, Barbieri, Brophy, and Potter Road Elementary Schools to teach lessons on recycling, anti-littering, and protecting the planet. Club members and Environmental Science students developed the lesson plans with support from advisors Rebecca Maynard and Emily Rathmell. At most schools, the lessons were taught in English and in Spanish or Portuguese by bilingual members of the Environmental Awareness Club.

Read the full press release: Framingham High School Environmental Awareness Club Brings Multilingual Recycling Lessons to Elementary Classrooms

Four of Adrianne Schueller's FHS students have artworks on display in a student exhibit at the Worcester Art Museum. Congratulations Adrianne and students Julia Wilkinson, Megan Kwan, Pamella Araujo (Artwork photo >>), and Marrisa Covino! You can view the artwork at the Worcester Art Museum or right here!

This multimedia exhibit featuring student artwork from communities across central Massachusetts is part of Youth Art Month, a national celebration emphasizing the value of art education. This year’s show is sponsored by the Worcester Art Museum and the MA Art Education Association. The exhibit is open to the public through April 2nd in the Higgins Education Wing of the Worcester Art Museum. Admission to this exhibit is free. The Museum is open Wednesday - Sunday 10am-4pm.

The National Honor Society was excited for the return of their charity volleyball tournament! The tournament was last started in 2020, but was interrupted when COVID closed our schools. The prize money gathered in 2020 was added to the $5 per player contributions raised this year. Starting with 14 teams on day one, participants played until the last team standing took it all! The winning team was named 'We Showed Up' and their charity of choice was St Jude’s Children’s Hospital. Because of their win, $1,110.00 will be donated to St Jude’s!

The photo below includes the final two teams:

• 'We Showed Up' was led by John Hudson and consisted of all 11th graders: Garrett Jones, Ben Dionisio, Connor Lemay, Nathan Monroe, Brendan Walker, and Derrick Bilton
• 'Men in Black' was led by Ricky Costa and consisted of all 10th graders: Kevin DaSilva, Joshua Souza, Caio Silva, Kavan Frietas, and Gabe Menezes

Four of Scott Alberg's photography students have their photos on display at the Griffin Museum in Winchester. Congratulations to Scott, Hayley Muniz Santiago, Dylan Harris, Sam Lamont, and Meghan McCluskey! You can check out the work in Griffin Museum online exhibition of regional high school photography, entitled Singular Vision!

Several members of the FHS English department completed site visits at Westborough High School and Dedham High School, working with their colleagues in their respective English departments. Faculty from Dedham High also observed several of our classes at FHS. Our faculty saw (and presented) some wonderful, inspiring lessons and classes, and they look forward to the ways these site visits will influence their classes, their curricula, and their relationship with their profession.

Our faculty is hopeful that the 'Massachusetts ELA Coalition' will continue to expand to other districts so that teachers and department heads can approach the important, powerful work in our schools as a team. Thank you to all those who took part in hosting, visiting, or both!

Some FHS world language teachers have been participating in the month-long "Locura de marzo" in Spanish classes and "Manie musicale" in French classes. These events are nationwide, musical March Madness where French and Spanish classes from around the country are able to participate. Students listen to preselected songs in the target language, predict their own winning brackets and vote on their favorite songs throughout the event. Teachers have used the musical March Madness to involve students in authentic cultural conversations and expose them to a variety of music from the Spanish and French speaking world. It's a great activity for the students and fun for all!

Learn more about Locura de marzo and Manie musicale!

Rebecca Maynard, science teacher at Framingham High School, has been awarded a Project Kindle Fellowship from Earthwatch. In an effort to continue to raise awareness for environmental issues, Ms. Maynard will be traveling to Costa Rica this summer to complete field research on pollinators, which are animals who provide essential ecosystem services and play a crucial role in the production of many fruits and vegetables. Due to climate change, pesticide use, and habitat loss, pollinator communities are becoming more and more threatened each year. As part of this expedition, Rebecca will be working with local communities to plant trees to create agroforests, forests that grow in pastures around or among crops. This will help build the pollinator communities and provide livelihoods for low-income families in the region. She will also be collecting, surveying, and observing pollinators, and investigating how threats to bees and butterflies will affect the critical pollination services they provide.

Congratulations to Rebecca!

Members of the Environmental Awareness Club at FHS had the opportunity to connect with nature using art. Artist Beth Adoette visited the club on March 16th, discussing her work with students, and then allowing the students to explore their emotions to create their own mandala. Mandalas are circular in shape and represent how all life on Earth is connected. Ms. Adoette brought many beautiful objects for students to use, including shells, seeds, feathers, dried leaves, and dried flowers. She explained to students that creating the works of art allowed her to find beauty every day. Ms. Adoette collected items, created a mandala, and then photographed it once a day for 1000 consecutive days. The students did an excellent job and their work will be on display at the FHS library in April. For more information about artist Beth Adoette and her work, go to https://www.bethadoette.com/.

The Hap is a monthly digital newspaper by and for Framingham High School students - and now for the larger community to enjoy. Please feel free to spread the news!

March 13th Edition (#11): https://www.smore.com/b98h5

Katie Lee Mansfield, Visual Art Teacher at FHS was awarded a Mass Cultural Council Individual Artist Recovery Grant. These funds will support her ongoing project "Considering Queerness within Rural Recreation" as well as research focusing on "American Archetypal Cowboy Culture Abroad."

Hosted by the Asian Student Association on March 2nd, the Multicultural Fair was a huge success! There was an abundance of food from all over the world, along with cultural displays, and amazing student performances!

On March 3rd, Mr. Collins took nine Thayer students on a field trip to the Museum of Science. Students explored various exhibits and answered questions related to current class topics of the human body and climate change. The students most enjoyed seeing the electricity show!

On March 8, 2023 all 3 middle schools and FHS came together for a day of music workshops and jazz to celebrate "Music in our Schools Month." Middle school jazz band students were bused to FHS and participated in workshops. At 7pm over 100 students returned to FHS for a wonderful evening of collaboration and music sharing. A wonderful time was had by all!

March Madness: March Madness is in full effect at Cameron Middle School! Students and staff are reading and counting their pages to move through our championship bracket. The competition is fierce! At the time of submission, students had already recorded 6,447 pages. Staff were clocked 2,887 pages. It's safe to say they are WELL past that now!

Shout-out from a Cameron Parent (Home-Visit Program): Gostaria de Parabenizar a Escola Cameron Middle School, na pessoa das professoras Joanita Powell e Marta Cuenca pela tarde de ontem onde vieram conhecer a nossa família, pois minha filha Isabela Nobre estuda lá. Obrigada a todos da Cameron Middle School pelo trabalho realizado com excelência.

Home Visits: Cameron staff have completed over 30 home visits! The home visits allow us to meet the parents and child in their homes or in the community to discuss goals and how the school can support the child and the family. The visits have been fabulous!

MABE Conference: Simone and Mae have worked together to support emerging bilinguals for the past 12 years in Framingham Public Schools. They started at Fuller Middle School, (Simone in 2002 and Mae in 2011) and moved to Cameron Middle School in 2015 and 2016 to start the ESL program there. They have experience providing ESL instruction for WIDA levels 1-4 and have collaborated on writing curriculum in ELA, ESL, Social Studies and Science. They are passionate about culturally responsive teaching, multicultural education, and teaching. Being bilingual and multilingual themselves, Simone and Mae seek to teach the whole child and engage all families in order to reduce the social-emotional, socioeconomic and linguistic barriers that emerging bilinguals may face.

Their workshop, “Multilingual Mindfulness,” created for MABE’s annual conference, promotes academic engagement by supporting emerging bilinguals’ social and emotional development in the classroom while building their language capacity. Participants received ready-made materials and exemplars of gatherings, physical & mental energizers and a collection of tier 1 strategies to use in their learning environments to promote SEL development.

Jack Trompetter - A Holocaust Survival Story: Holocaust survivor Jack Trompetter was born in Amsterdam, Netherlands in 1942, when antisemitism in Europe was intensifying. Trompetter’s parents made the decision to go into hiding and give him up to a Christian family in order to increase his chance at survival. Jack Trompetter is dedicated to sharing his story and educating others on the Holocaust. Thank you to Mr. Trompetter who shared his story with the Cameron 8th grade students on March 17th.

Pi Day: March 14th was Pi Day. Cameron Math Department held a contest for students who could memorize the most digits of Pi. The winners are:

• Grade 6 Juliana Leurini memorized 55 digits of Pi
• Grade 7 Noelle Shen memorized 135 digits of Pi
• Grade 8 Keira McCauley memorized 222 digits of Pi

Congratulations to all the participants!

Project Dash: A group of fifteen 8th grade students accompanied Assistant Principal, Ken Hamm, to the Framingham Community Church to organize groceries for the Project Dash initiative. The Greater Framingham Community Church and Framingham Public Schools and continue to serve fresh groceries to 90 Families in the Framingham Community!

Eastern Central District Music Festival: Congratulations to chorus teacher Jade Espina and 8th grade students Bella Edwards, Berkeley Gentry, and Katie Brown who represented Cameron and the City of Framingham at the Eastern Central District Music Festival. Jade has spent countless lunch blocks and after school rehearsals preparing them for the auditions and concert.

From Jade Espina: I wanted to take a minute to celebrate these three 8th grade chorus students who sang with 100 middle school chorus students from around the eastern district in a concert last Saturday at Lincoln Sudbury Regional High School. I am so very proud of all of them, and all their hard work! Bravi! 🎶

A team representing Walsh Middle School / Framingham Public Schools achieved Highest Honors in the recent WordMasters Challenge™—a national vocabulary competition involving nearly 125,000 students annually. The eighth grade team scored an impressive 181 points out of a possible 200 in the second of three meets this year, placing tenth in the nation.

Competing in the very difficult Gold Division of the WordMasters Challenge™, Shanxiang Martin King earned a perfect score of 20 on the challenge. Nationally, only 68 eighth graders achieved this result! Other students from Walsh Middle School / Framingham Public Schools who achieved outstanding results in the meet include Alex Soor, Aurna Basumalik, Grace Cox, James Ramos, Anthony Shen, Abigail Sucich, Delilah Toback, Sophia Lally, Julia Randell, and Madeline Nable. The students were coached in preparation for the WordMasters Challenge™ by Anne Doucet.

The WordMasters Challenge™ is an exercise in critical thinking that first encourages students to become familiar with a set of interesting new words (considerably harder than grade level), and then challenges them to use those words to complete analogies expressing various kinds of logical relationships. Working to solve the analogies helps students learn to think both analytically and metaphorically. Although most vocabulary enrichment and analogy-solving programs are designed for use by high school students, WordMasters Challenge™ materials have been specifically created for younger students in grades three through eight. They are particularly well suited for children who are motivated by the challenge of learning new words and enjoy the logical puzzles posed by analogies.

Renee Colin & Kaitlin Scorzella, we celebrate and recognize your vital role as our School Social Workers. You provide in countless ways for our students, administrators, teachers, educators, parents, and the community! Thank you for all you do!

On Sunday, March 19th, one of our Walsh 8th grade band students (Maksym Pakhomov) participated in the Needham Multicultural Festival. There were over 20 countries represented at the festival—Max opened the concert and represented Ukraine! Thank you for sharing and congratulations Maksym!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I-dM1MVZ4Kc

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LbPWGIY6QuQ

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EStQJT0wUww

While production is still in progress, we can look to see one of our very own teachers as a featured profile on El Mundo Boston during an upcoming daily web tv show called "La Hora del Café".

The video segment created in conjunction with UniCare, a Massachusetts GIC (Government Insurance Commission) health care provider, will feature eight Latinos in Eastern Massachusetts working in state or local government. Mr. Jose Martinez will be sharing his story, talking about life and working as a teacher, especially as it relates to supporting our emergent bilingual middle school students.

Alberto Vasallo, President and CEO of El Mundo Boston and Producer / Host on Channel 7 WHDH recently came to Fuller Middle School and interviewed Mr. Martinez for the feature. We'll also hear briefly from Ms. Kerry Wood (Principal of Fuller Middle School), and Priscila Sousa (School Committee Chair and Massachusetts Representative).

B.L.O.C.K.S students, families and staff collaborated once again for another successful effort to help our community members in need. An impressive amount of socks and mittens were donated and will be dispersed to various shelters in our community. This is part of the continued effort at B.L.O.C.K.S. to promote kindness, and lay the foundation of understanding the impact and power of community support, for our youngest FPS students. Well done B.L.O.C.K.S.!!!!

Room 100 and 101 having some fun and working on group skills (requesting, sharing, and turn taking), identifying the colors of the rainbow as well as their fine motor skills (coloring, cutting, and gluing) in hopes to catch that sneaky little Leprechaun!?.....They didn't have much luck, but they were close!

McCarthy Celebrated World Down Syndrome Day on 3.21.23. Students and staff wore mismatched or brightly colored socks to bring awareness to Down Syndrome.

World Down Syndrome Day (WDSD) is a global awareness day which has been officially observed by the United Nations since 2012. The District will add this day to our celebration list for next year. Thank you to McCarthy Elementary School for helping to create awareness and acceptance!

Heather Flugrad, International Baccalaureate Primary Years Program (IB PYP) Coordinator at Harmony Grove Elementary School, is seeking 25 English or Portuguese speaking volunteers to mentor small groups of 5th grade students with their Exhibition projects.

At IB PYP schools around the world, students in 5th grade do a final inquiry project called the IB PYP Exhibition where they research and take action to share what they learn with their community. This year students are researching various global issues as they inquire “How can we be creative and take action to help make the world a better place?” (The associated photo is an example of an Exhibition project from 2019.)

Mentors facilitate five 30-minute meetings with a small group of 5th grade students. The commitment is 30-minutes each week starting the first week of May until Exhibition Day on Thursday June 8th when students present their projects to the community.

Please see the detailed mentor recruitment flier for a summary of this information and help share it with any contacts that you have who might be interested in this volunteering opportunity!

• English flier

• Portuguese flier

• Spanish flier

If you are interested in mentoring, please contact Heather Flugrad before April 14th! All Volunteers must also submit a CORI form before mentoring begins.

Barbieri's 5th Grade Hawk Helpers did a FANTASTIC job providing tours for prospective Kindergarten families - once in the afternoon and then volunteering their evening time and returning to facilitate tours at 6:30PM. When families want to learn about Barbieri Elementary School, there is no better way than to hear it first-hand from a student. They answered questions, pointed out details about Barbieri's procedures and processes and informed families about the details in the Kindergarten classrooms.

Stapleton Kindergarten is taking part in March Madness by reading several books by Mo Willems. Each day, students vote on their favorite of 2 books read that day. We're excited to see which book is this year's favorite Mo Willems book!

Stapleton Elementary School is having their 6th annual Online Auction! Bidding opens at 7am on March 20th and will close on March 24th at 9pm. There are 120+ items including Veterinarian for the Afternoon, Summer Camps (day & overnight), Family Fun Activities, Private Wine Class, Fitness Classes/Memberships, Theater Tickets, Amusement Park Admission Museum Tickets, and SO Many More! The success of our auction depends on our community. Participation is not limited to Stapleton families!

We ask that you bid often, bid generously, and help support Stapleton Elementary School PTO by sharing with friends, coworkers, and family near & far! All bidding will take place here: https://www.biddingowl.com/Auction/home.cfm?auctionID=2414

Thank you for your support!

On March 3rd, the Potter Road Read-a-thon encouraged students to put their reading skills to work! Each student read a set amount of time, depending on their grade level, to raise money for the Daniel’s Table. They made some great money to donate to a great cause!!

Full Time - Fuller OST Coordinator

The Coordinator of Out of School Time (OST) Program is directly responsible for the oversight of programs and operations for on-site at their school. The primary focus will be the coordination of program development and implementation; staff development, and budget management for the before and after-school program. We operate after-school programs until 6:00 pm including early release days, some vacation weeks, and summer.Through a collaborative effort with school staff and the community, the Coordinator’s role is to provide high-quality before/after school program experience to students that complement the education they receive in the classroom. With a strong focus on project-based learning, the program supports students by building and improving skill sets useful both today and tomorrow. The coordinator’s responsibility is to create a fun, engaging, and highly academic environment where students are expected to meet the same standards and encouraged to find their own path to achieving them. Through new and innovative strategies like STEM, Service Learning, Entrepreneurial programming, or Socio-emotional-based clubs we work to create students better prepared for college and beyond.

Campus Aides

Under the direction of the Principal or their designee, the campus aide provides supervision and direction to students in areas of the school campus and maintains classroom continuity to ensure that students continue to learn in their teacher’s absence in order to promote a safe environment for students and staff during classroom and non-classroom activities and to deliver Framingham Public Schools’ high expectations for achievement, equal access to high levels of instruction, the achievement of academic proficiency for all students, and the closing of the achievement gap among subgroups within the schools.

Summer Mentor (Elementary) & Summer Mentor (Secondary)

The Summer Mentor position is designed to work alongside the Manager of Special Programs and Program Coordinators during the Summer program. Mentors provide support to enhance the overall vision and quality of programming, lead a group of students through a daily schedule, implement and facilitate curriculum activities and delegate tasks needed from aide. This position is dedicated to deliver Framingham Public Schools’ high expectations for achievement, equal access to high levels of instruction, and the achievement of academic proficiency for all students.

Summer Aide (Elementary) & Summer Aide (Secondary)

The Summer Aide position is designed to work alongside the Summer Mentor position by providing support to enhance the overall vision and quality of programming, complete delegated tasks to interact with students throughout a daily schedule, and co-lead student groups and classrooms through different project based learning curriculum to promote access, teamwork, and leadership throughout our community.

Confidence is feeling sure of yourself and your abilities. This month, the Social-Emotional Learning (SEL) curriculum is all connected to this theme/trait and is supported with activities during morning meeting, mindfulness, discussions, books, art, team-building, games and more!

7 Conversation Starters About Confidence:

• Discuss a time you felt super confident. Discuss a time you did not feel confident.
• What does confidence look and sound like? At home? In the community?
• How can others help increase your confidence?
  
• How can you help others feel more confident?
• What actions cause others to lose their confidence?
• Is it okay to not be confident in everything you do?
• How does persistence help build confidence?

Two Confidence Themed Read Alouds

• How Full Is Your Bucket?: Tom Rath and Mary Reckmeyer (Spanish) (Portuguese)

In this story the main character learns a valuable bucket filling metaphor and watches it come to life as the day unfolds. Every moment matters. Each of us has an invisible bucket. When our bucket is full, we feel great.

• I Like Myself: Karen Beaumont (Spanish) (Portuguese)

In this story using rhymes and beautiful illustrations the reader learns to celebrate self-acceptance and self-love. The text uses high energy and imagination to encourage us all to have the self-esteem to appreciate everything about ourselves -inside and out.

Open Spirit Videos

In partnership with Open Spirit in Framingham, check out these custom made videos about our theme of the month. They include mindfulness and yoga with our themes.

Confidence Yoga

Confidence Yoga - Spanish

Confidence Yoga - Portuguese

Confidence Meditation

Confidence Meditation -Spanish

Confidence Meditation - Portuguese

The Town of Natick and the City of Framingham have partnered on a project focused on the intersection of climate change and equity. The Metro West Climate Equity project aims to reduce the social, environmental, and economic vulnerabilities that affect Environmental Justice communities across the three municipalities and to build local resilience to climate change. In this next round of the project, project partners hope to create climate readiness communication materials for the communities most vulnerable to climate change.

Community Liaisons will work individually and together with the Metro West Climate Equity project

team to Advise City/Town project partners on the impact of climate-emergency events, resources that could make their community more ready for climate emergency events, and the City/Town-led responses needed to support their community during climate emergency events; Review City/Town-created climate readiness communication materials; and Identify ways of sharing climate readiness messages with their communities

If you are interested in being a Community Liaison and you live, work, or study in Framingham and Natick, are at least 16yo, comfortable with English, and able to participate for the full length of the project - please read the PDF linked below for more information!

An Offering of the Chris Walsh Center for Educators and Families of Metrowest at Framingham State University: A virtual support group for parents and caregivers seeking to learn more about 504s, IEPs, and the special education process in Massachusetts

Register: https://www.eventbrite.com/e/support-for-caregivers-navigating-the-iep-process-registration-534126575967

When: Thursdays in March from 7:00 - 8:15 PM EST. ( March 16, 23, &; 30)

Where: Virtual via Zoom (link to be provided upon registration)

Who: A group of 15 parents of children and young adults in Massachusetts between the ages of 3 and 22, interested in learning more about the process of identification, eligibility determination, evaluation, services, accommodations, and more.

Facilitators: The group will be facilitated by Courtney Edman, MS, PT, CEIS, and Carol Cohen, M. Ed, CAGS. Courtney is the Founder and Director of 2tametheshamE, a company whose mission is to coach, educate, inform, and advocate for the needs of neurodivergent individuals and their parents and Carol is an educator who has worked in a variety of roles in public and private schools, including guidance counselor, teacher, and assistant principal. Since 2020 she has been the special education administrator in a public school district in Massachusetts.

Cost: Free. Space is limited to 15 participants. All participants must register prior to the start of the first meeting.

Topic: What is a 504? What is an IEP? Does my child need a 504 or an IEP? How does my child get evaluated for one? What does eligibility determination mean? What services are provided in an IEP? What is an advocate, and do I need one? What is my role as the parent of a child on an IEP and how do I support my child that is on an IEP? What is my child’s role? What do I do if I am told my child doesn’t need an IEP and I disagree? If you have any of these or other questions about the special education process and system, you are not alone! Supporting your child who is on or might need a 504 or an IEP can be very confusing and daunting. We want to help you by providing information, answering your questions, and providing support so you can navigate the process for your child.

For More Information: If you have any questions or concerns or would like to have a virtual meeting with a member of the Chris Walsh Center Staff, please email the Chris Walsh Center.

Check out the recent newsletter including highlights from the Early Childhood Alliance of Framingham! It is jam-packed with news, info, and events from Framingham's youngest learners.

The Media and Communications Office hopes to increase the frequency of these good news and opportunity compilations. We are improving and refining the submission process over time and always appreciate hearing from staff, parents/guardians, and students with events, accolades, shoutouts, and more.