Welcome to our website! White River Valley School District is proud to enter the 2022-23 school year with plenty of choices for our students and their parents/guardians. There has been plenty of renovation and construction going on throughout the district over the summer. Work will be continuing at the elementary during the first semester with the high school renovations to be completed by October. Students and staff will greatly appreciate the upgrades!
We are excited to enter year three of our Regional Opportunity Initiative “Ready Schools” Implementation program! We continue to strengthen our work-based learning initiatives. Wolverine Enterprises LLC is a student-led business model that is making headlines across the state for its innovative approach to teaching soft employability skills. We have been fortunate to receive grant funding from the Career Pathways department at the Department of Education to continue to build great learning opportunities for our students. We will continue to immerse our students into more STEAM (science, technology, engineering, art, and math) academic programming as designed by Mr. Jacob Graham, our WRVSD STEAM district coordinator. Mr. Graham will be organizing the Jr. Wolverine Enterprise program at our middle school and elementary school. We will continue to train all PK-grade 8 teachers/staff in the Trust-Based Relational Intervention program to help our students with trauma and other tough situations in their lives. We will also continue educating our students about careers and opportunities at all levels.
It will be another exciting year at White River Valley High School as well. The Wolverine Enterprises LLC, a series of six student-led businesses, enters year three of operation for all juniors and seniors. This focus on the building of our local workforce talent will help give students entrepreneurial skills, soft skills, and a focus on future careers. Through our acceptance into the Conexus Apprenticeship program, opportunities to gain actual salaries for their work is a great learning feature for our students. It really is “earn, while you learn!” We thank our many business and community partners who are helping us give our students great life experiences! True “hands-on” work experience is helping to build our local workforce for the future, while also preparing students to be enrolled, employed, or enlisted upon graduation.
Other highlights at the high school…freshmen and sophomore students will continue to participate in eight different LIFE mini-courses to gain “real life” experiences that aren’t always taught in the classroom. Topics like financial literacy, etiquette, car maintenance, resume writing, application completion, SAT/ACT preparation are among the mini-course curricula. 2022-23 will also be year four of our involvement with the Advanced Placement TIP grant through the University of Notre Dame. WRV HS has grown our AP program offerings to include ten different courses across our curriculum, helping to build the rigor in our courses that will help students prepare for life after high school.
Student safety will continue to be a priority at WRVSD. We will address Covid with common sense. If we can partner with families to self-check students prior to their arrival at school, we can make sure that students have great academic, social, and emotional experiences as we build our local talent towards future success. We will continue to offer students online learning opportunities during 2022-23 on a medical need basis. Parents will need to contact their building principals for more information. We shall be continuing our afterschool program in all three buildings that can help with homework, tutoring, social-emotional adjustment, and individual learning needs. The program will run until 5:00 Monday through Thursday and will include transportation between schools at the conclusion of the day.
I am excited to see what our students can do in this new school year under the direction of highly-skilled faculty and a dedicated staff! I invite you to come and be a part of WRVSD…a place where DREAMS are GROWN…and students excel!
Regards,
Dr. Bob Hacker, superintendent