SOLON & BEYOND, Week of September 14, 2017

by Marilyn Rogers-Bull & Percy
grams29@tds.net
Solon, Maine 04979

Good morning, dear friends. Don’t worry, be happy!

Have been looking forward to this first Solon School News for this new school year to share with all of you. The Principal’s Message: The Solon staff and I wish to welcome our new students in grades PreK-5 and their families to our school and to welcome back those who have been with us before. I hope all of you enjoyed a wonderful summer.

This year I am the principal of the Solon and Garret Schenck Schools but not CCS, which will allow me to spend more time at those two schools. Our school secretary Lisa Weese can help parents with any issues they may have and can help you make contact with me if you wish to.

Debby Haynie continues to serve as our lead teacher and will help me to handle discipline issues.

We are pleased to offer free breakfast and lunch to all students again this year under the district’s community eligibility program. Students can buy milk or juice for snack or to go with a cold lunch if they wish to for 30 cents.

Again this year our students will have healthy snacks provided through a Fresh Fruits & Vegetables Grant Program every day. Please contact us if you have any questions. Thank you for your cooperation. We look forward to a great new year!

Welcome to New Staff: We want to welcome the new preschool assistant teacher, Ms. Anne-Mieke Herrera, to our school this fall. She previously worked in the preschool program in Clinton. She replaces Anne Griffth, who is working in the Head Start program in Skowhegan this year.

We also welcome Mary Ashe, who is the new social worker, replacing Andrea Drumstas, who has left us to take a job at Stratton Elementary School. Ashe has a bachelor’s degree from UMF and a master’s degree from UMO. She worked as a social worker at Carrabec High School from 2008-2010. Sin ce then she has worked at the Spurwink School in Cornville.

We welcome both of our new staff members to Solon Elementary School.

Solon Elementary School has a very active PTO, which has provided lots of special activities and items for our students over the years. Please consider joining the PTO. For information, contact PTO President Alicia Golden or the school.

The PTO generally meets on the second Thursday of each month, at 6 p.m.

Remember to send in your box tops for education labels! Every boxtop helps the PTO raise money for school activities.

The PTO is looking for new parents to join them. They look forward to new members from our new families.

My many thanks to Solon Elementary for continuing to send me the interesting news about the school. It is greatly appreciated by me and I hope by all interested readers.

And now for Percy’s memoir of wise words entitled, True Gardening: “If you would grow a garden full of truth, Consider first the seed, then plow the land. You have no need of wealth or fame or youth, But you must have the will to understand. Of love and faith and service, freely sow, And give a space to mercy’s blessed balm. Allow no single weed of doubt to grow, And space the beds of thought with inner calm. The plot must be a place to draw apart For loving meditation , so designed That one can cultivate the quiet heart And reap the golden harvest of the mind. These high-heaped fruits of thought are your true goal, And seeds of destiny will feed your soul. (words by E. A. M. Moore.)