Education

Fabulous Tapping

"Tap: The Rhythm Awakens" on Friday, June 11, and June 12 is the latest production from Our Fabulous Variety Show, its first stage show since December of 2019. To be held at the Children's Museum of the East End in Bridgehampton at 6:30 p.m. both days, student and adult dancers will pay tribute to the art and history of tap dance while celebrating each performer's own dance journey. 

Tickets are $15 and can be bought at the door, in advance by phone at 631-507-4603, or online at ourfabulousvarietyshow.org.

Audrey Smith, a Montauk School eighth-grader, and Daisy Pitches, who is in the seventh grade, have earned first place and a $1,000 prize in a national video competition that celebrates rural schools.

The Bridgehampton School District has chosen to place the same over-the-tax-cap $20.66 million spending plan on the June 15 budget ballot, with school board members appealing to the community for a second chance at the supermajority of voter approval needed for it to pass.

On May 18, the Bridgehampton budget was just two votes shy of that supermajority. The final tally was 150 to 103, or just over 59-percent voter approval when 60-percent approval was required. The proposed tax-levy increase is 8.93 percent, with a $1.67 million increase in overall spending.

Kids ages 12 to 17 who opt to get fully vaccinated for Covid-19 will be entered into a random drawing to win a full college scholarship, including room and board costs, to a SUNY or CUNY institution, Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo has announced.

Go With the Flow

Project Most's upcoming STEAM workshop for kids ages 3 and 4 is all about mixing paints and watching how the colors move and change. It will be held on Saturday, June 5, starting at 9:30 a.m. At 10:45 that morning, kids in kindergarten through the third grade can turn milk cartons into cars, and at 12:30 p.m., fourth through sixth graders can learn about water striders (a type of water bug) and take a challenge to make their own.

Part of what makes imaginative play at Hayground School so unique comes before recess even begins. The playground's new rainbow climber, a work in progress, crystalizes this special environment, one in which students are having hands-on involvement in the design and creation of a play space to best serve their imaginations. Sometimes that means mixing concrete as a 10-year-old.

Joanne Goerler didn't want to retire in January from her teaching job at the John M. Marshall Elementary School, where she had worked since 1989, but she didn't really have a choice. The Covid-19 pandemic posed a life-threatening risk to her immune system, which had been compromised by a blood cancer called myelodysplastic syndrome, a surprise diagnosis Ms. Goerler received in the spring of 2018 after having some routine bloodwork.

The Bridgehampton School District on Wednesday evening appointed a new superintendent, Mary T. Kelly, who was chosen from a field of 21 applicants.

"A number of issues that the district thought compromised the safety of our students" need to be addressed ahead of any contract renewal, the Sag Harbor School District superintendent told residents who are disappointed in the lack of compromise on a new contract between the district and Mashashimuet Park.

Springs School officials want everyone to know they can't use the school's brand-new soccer and baseball fields just yet because the sod is too fresh, and they want all-terrain vehicle drivers to know that there cannot be any riding across the fields at all.

To that end, the district will soon erect a fence around the new fields and will install security cameras at key places -- with an eye to catching the license plates of offenders.

All About Frogs and Bats

Who doesn't love frogs? Today at 4 p.m., through the East Hampton Library, the Quogue Wildlife Refuge will offer an up-close look via Zoom at Long Island frog species for children of all ages. Bats, though, might be a different story. These often-misunderstood creatures will be the subject of another library Zoom session, this one on Tuesday at 4 p.m. Sign-up information is online at easthamptonlibrary.org, or by phone at 631-324-0222, extension 2.

Project Most’s annual plant sale will be Saturday at the Neighborhood House at 92 Three Mile Harbor Road in East Hampton, from 9 a.m. to 1 p.m. There will organic vegetables seedlings, herbs, and flowers grown by its after-school students.

One can only wonder what Margaret Olivia Slocum Sage, Sag Harbor's greatest philanthropist of the early 20th century, might think of the newly emerged rift between two village institutions: the Sag Harbor School District, for which Mrs. Sage donated money to build what is now Pierson Middle and High School, and Mashashimuet Park, another one of her gifts to the people of the village.

Two years after banning the intentional release of balloons, the East Hampton Town Board appears poised to go further by also enacting a ban on the sale and distribution of filled latex and Mylar balloons.

While turnout was low almost across the board, the vast majority of voters in all but one local school district gave their stamp of approval to their districts' budgets on Tuesday. The Bridgehampton School District fell just short of the 60-percent supermajority of voter approval it needed to pass an over-the-tax-cap budget proposal of $20.66 million, but other districts — including East Hampton, Montauk, and Amagansett — saw budgets pass with more than 80 percent voter approval.

NAMM's Best Communities for Music Education lauds schools for their "innovative and resourceful music education programs." This year represents East Hampton's sixth straight such award.

Registration is open for East Hampton Town's summertime youth clinics and programs in sailing, basketball, tennis, and swimming. Swimming lessons are free, and the others range from $45 to $225 for each week of clinics.

On Tuesday, voters across New York State will head to the polls to weigh in on school district spending plans and propositions and to elect board members. Bridgehampton and Sagaponack seek to override New York State's cap on tax-levy increases, which will require approval of at least 60 percent of district voters. All but one local district, Montauk, are proposing budgets that increase overall spending. Here are the basics in each of the school districts The Star covers.

There are both pros and cons to keeping an eight-period day in place or retooling the daily schedule for nine periods, Springs School District administrators said Monday. A lively work session debate drew input from several teachers and school board members alike, all of whom said they wanted further discussion before any decisions are made.

In her first bid for a seat on the Springs School Board, Hella Drew will challenge Barbara Dayton, a two-term incumbent, in the May 18 election.

"We're in such a better place," said Adam Fine, the assistant superintendent of the East Hampton School District, summing up the progress since the beginning of the pandemic. As Covid cases taper down and outdoor celebrations start to ramp up, signs that we're turning a corner in the pandemic are everywhere in local schools — and gratefully so, administrators and students say.

The Amagansett School District will officially add a new bus stop at the Gansett Meadow housing complex starting in September after at least 25 local residents signed a petition that led the district to analyze student safety in that area.

Top-level shuffles continued this week in the East Hampton School District.

The announcement on Tuesday of East Hampton High School's valedictorian and salutatorian also signaled that the school district is in the thick of plans for end-of-year commencement ceremonies.

Three seats are up for grabs on the Bridgehampton School Board this year, with five candidates in the running to serve starting in July 2021 for three-year terms. The candidates are Ron White, Dwight E. Singleton, Jo Ann Comfort, Angela Chmielewski, and Michael Gomberg. Lillian Tyree-Johnson and Doug DeGroot, two longtime board members, are not seeking re-election.

Voters must be U.S. citizens ages 18 or older and must be residents of their respective school districts for at least 30 days before the election.

On Saturday, Stony Brook Southampton Hospital will host a car seat safety check from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. at 330 Meeting House Lane.

Students at the John M. Marshall Elementary School in East Hampton are raising money for wellness initiatives and the school's Hometown Heroes program through a dance-a-thon. Children are collecting pledges from family members, friends, neighbors, and businesses in exchange for a promise to dance their hearts out on Tuesday, when all gym classes will be dedicated to the fund-raiser.

Art for Kids and Teens

The next installment of the children's story-and-art collaboration between Guild Hall and the East Hampton Library is Monday at 3:30 p.m. The free program is ideal for kids ages 3 and up. Monday's story is "Swirl by Swirl: Spirals in Nature" by Joyce Sidman, followed by watercolor painting.

On Tuesday, teens are invited to a drop-in upcycled fashion workshop at Guild Hall, in person, with Jade Ford-Jathan. The free workshop is from 3:30 to 5:30 p.m. Sign-up for both programs is online at guildhall.org.

Officials at Sagaponack's little red schoolhouse are asking district voters to greenlight a proposed budget of $1.73 million, which despite having a year-over-year spending increase of just $27,572 is above the New York State cap on tax-levy increases.