In south Berkshire County, we are just about a month into hybrid schooling, with most children attending two days of in-person school per week and completing two days of remote classwork from home. On Wednesdays, no one attends school in person in either Berkshire Hills or Southern Berkshire regional school districts, and students only log on for one synchronous meeting. Visitors to Greenagers and Berkshire South Regional Community Center might, on a Wednesday, hear 50 or so students playing soccer or tag or chasing one another with worms — or see, at other times, the same students poring over math worksheets or iPads with an adult nearby to help troubleshoot long division or password problems.
This is because we are also just over a month into Community Learning in the Berkshires (CLuB), a COVID-19-era collaboration between the school districts and Flying Cloud Institute, Berkshire South, Greenagers, Flying Deer Nature Center and Volunteers in Medicine, profiled Sept. 28 in The Edge. (Full disclosure: I represent Flying Deer Nature Center, on CLuB’s founding coalition, as board chair.)
Since Sept. 21, 111 (and counting) local students who might otherwise have been left alone at home or fit into piecemeal childcare arrangements have been accessing their remote school lessons with adult assistance through CLuB. At Greenagers they’ve also been visiting sheep and ducks, picking vegetables and beautifying a woodsy stretch of the Appalachian Trail with forts, and creating dances based on their countries of origin. At Berkshire South they’ve been tuning into bird calls, making their own picture books, stretching their trekking muscles, and collecting black birch twigs and pine needles to make their own wild edible tea. Organizations like Flying Cloud, Flying Deer and Berkshire Pulse have been able to pivot to CLuB grant funding that would, in normal circumstances, support in-school programming.
CLuB coalition members established their common set of guiding principles over the summer. “We believe this [COVID-19] crisis demands a new way of thinking and collaborating, and an all-hands-on-deck approach to public education. We believe in an equitable allocation of educational and childcare resources. … We are not aiming to create a “less bad” option to that of staying home alone, but rather engaging, nourishing, rigorous and fun school days for our children.”
But like most every other aspect of life these days, nothing about CLuB has been easy, straightforward or smooth. Parents are anxious about their children falling behind, children are eager to be with their classmates, even if virtually, and staff have learned the hard way that laptops and iPads lose power quickly in the elements. On the CLuB side, it’s difficult to plan staffing levels because no one can be sure how many students will show up on any given day. But Flying Cloud Institute executive director Maria Rundle finds it easy enough to focus on the bright side: “We’re able to give individualized attention to kids. We’re able to pinpoint the children who need side-by-side, one-on-one help, and we have volunteers and tutors every day to provide that.”
When I arrived for a visit at Greenagers’ April Hill campus at 10 a.m. on the cold, rainy morning of Oct. 28, the hem of Maria’s long skirt was already saturated. I caught her hustling up the hill to fetch hot water bottles for that day’s cohort of third-, fourth- and fifth-graders. In the middle of her task, the voice of Aretha Whitehead of Greenagers cracked over the walkie talkie, asking Maria to check in. CLuB staff, like teachers in their classrooms, must take attendance and, perhaps due to the rain, there were quite a few students absent who need follow-up. On the way to meet Aretha, we watched a volunteer from Berkshire Bounty unpacking the week’s produce — along with bread from Berkshire Mountain Bakery — that would be packaged up and delivered home with students later that day, from both Greenagers and Berkshire South. (About half of CLuB students are eligible for food assistance.)
In the Summer Room, Naomi and volunteer Pam Johnson were having issues with Google Classroom. The system was not recognizing Naomi’s log-in information and kept kicking her out. Maria comforted the pair, reminding them that Wednesdays are lighter on meetings and heavier on self-directed work. “Naomi, can you find an assignment you know you need to turn in, and can Pam help you?”
We left the Summer Room as they looked up missing assignments on Canvas, the web-based learning management system used by Berkshire Hills for remote schooling. Then we headed over to the barn-side tent to deliver water bottles to the little ones settled in as snugly as possible, legs dangling from lawn chairs under a tent beside the swiss chard garden. As the bottles were being nestled inside of shirts, an enormous, noisy flock of Canada geese demanded our attention, and we all streamed out of the tent to watch them stream overhead and fly away in the direction of Salisbury, Connecticut. Ivanna Aguilar-Maldonado of South Egremont kept her hot water bottle on her lap with her snack, and in between mouthfuls of applesauce, said she liked everything about CLuB, except the really cold, rainy days.
The kindergarteners and first- and second-graders I found sitting under a large tarp, among storybooks and helpers. The propane heater was awaiting a new delivery of propane, but the chill was not dampening the spirits of new friends Simone Walker-Thomas and Sophia Gilkes, who finished reading and work on a treasure map for the time being and were playing with their hand warmers and giggling. “You just have to shake it, and it gets warmer!” Simone lives in Great Barrington, and Sophia lives, she says, in Massachusetts.
While they giggled, another Sophia got help with a math application on her iPad, and a couple of boys particularly well-prepared for the rain headed up the hill to gin up interest in a soccer game. The middle-schoolers were spread out with their blankets and devices among six tent stands in “tent city,” which had originally been set up for visitors — volunteers, donors, through-hikers on the AT. Each cohort has its own designated shelter spot in case of extreme weather events. Other than that, though, kids are outside — thus the hot water bottles and hand warmers.
Meanwhile, over at the Berkshire South CLuB site, there were happy shouts coming from the lawn adjacent to the parking lot. School time was on pause for the time being, and Raven of Flying Deer Nature Center was in charge. That means hiking through the forest, rain or shine. Devin Franklin, program director at Flying Deer, loves rainy days and so, he claims, do the kids: “The parents are always worried about the rain, but at the end of a rainy day, the kids always shout, ‘That was the best day ever!’ It’s like clockwork.” I tried to catch Roman Raifstanger, covered in mud from head to toe, to ask if he was having a good day. He yelled something to the effect of, “Yes!!” before dashing away to slide in the mudslick he’d created. Mariah Dastoli, fifth-grader at Du Bois Middle School, was more contemplative, and said she liked her birch tea, and being outside all day.
Children enjoying themselves in a cold rain? In the middle of a pandemic? One week out from the most contentious election of our lifetimes? Hope does spring eternal. Despite the challenges — the lost connections, the school-parent-CLuB misunderstandings, the ticks, the anxiety, the uncertainty of it all, the girl who breaks out in sniffles, the chilled fingers — Maria Rundle sees something new and promising at CLuB.
“After 13 years living in community at Gould Farm, I see what’s happening with us here. We —CLuB, the schools, the families — are really in community, for the first time, and seeing how connected we are.”
CLuB has raised nearly $350,000 to date through individual donation and foundation grants, from a $100,000 grant to $75 from a Greenagers neighbor. That’s halfway to the fundraising goal. The team takes heart in the fact that, as the weather gets colder, the community only gets more generous. In addition to Berkshire Bounty, Berkshire Mountain Bakery, Guido’s Fresh Marketplace and, soon, local restaurants, CLuB has received support from Kenver and Barrington Outfitters for warm-weather clothing. Jane Iredale of Iredale Cosmetics continues to arrive at April Hill bearing all manner of outerwear, which is now neatly divided by cohort and available for any chilly kiddo. Ilana Steinhauer, executive director of VIM, said of CLuB’s fall bounty, “In a community where so many nonprofits exist, this program is an example of the power of collaboration both in terms of programming and fundraising.”
There are still spots available in CLuB, and parents can apply here.
