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General News: Students, Teachers Say Goodbye to COH School
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| Colleen Dunning and her daughter, Molly, the last of her children to attend COHES. |
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| Family and friends enjoyed a reception after the ceremony. |
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| Kindergarteners Rachel Murphy and Elise Maldonado enjoyed chocolates. Murphy's brother moved up earlier. |
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| Mrs. ODell said goodbye to some of her current and former students. |
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| Mrs. Weyser and her second-grade class. |
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| Mrs. McWilliams is looking forward to moving to Shanghai, China. |
June 24, 2011
As the skies opened up with a heavy rain, the Moving Up ceremony was held for some 50 fourth-graders at Cornwall-on-Hudson Elementary School Thursday morning.
It was a special day not just for the students who were saying goodbye to their elementary school but for three of the teachers who are moving on to the next phase of their lives
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Three Teachers Retire
Heather Odell, Victoria Weyser and Diane McWilliams spent their last day at Cornwall-on-Hudson Elementary School hugging children and laughing as they talked about why they were retiring this year.
Ms. Odell has worked for the Cornwall school district for 37 – 35 of them as a teacher at COHES. She said she never gets sad at graduation and tells her students “if only you knew how many great things are waiting for you, you would be happy.” She was happy as she spoke about a planned moved to live by the sea in Mystic, Connecticut.
Mrs. Weyser noted that she has worked continually since she was 12 years old and that she is looking forward to a chance “to just be”after 25 tears if teaching at COHES. “If I want to read a book in the middle of the night, I’ll do that,” she said. Her second-grade children crowded around her in the classroom and when asked what was the best thing that happened to them this year, their adoration was clear when they said “Getting Mrs. Weyser.”
Diana McWilliams, an academic intervention specialist, is not leaving teaching, though she is leaving COHES. She and her husband are returning to their international teaching, this time in Shanghai, China, where they will teach at the Shangai American School. They are bringing their daughter, Dacia, with them and she will finish high school in Shanghai.
Parents Turn Nostalgic at Moving Up
If the teachers were happy to move on to the next chapter, some of the parents of the fourth-grade children seemed a bit nostalgic about leaving the close-knit community at the school. Colleen Dunning, whose three children even had the same teachers for second, third and fourth grades, said she was sad to have her last child move up. “We are going to miss it here, it’s part of you,” she said. “It’s a little society that keeps going.”
Mrs. Gail Wheman was also happy at the end of her first year as principal at COHES, a position she took over last September from long-time principal Kenneth Schmidt. She said she came from a large school with 900 kids and noted that it is great to know all the children by the first name. “The community has welcomed me with open arms,” she said “It’s been a great first year.”
Down in the cafeteria where the PTO had laid out a delicious-looking spread of cookies, Commodore chocolates, cake and other goodies, the fourth graders and their siblings ran around, eating and laughing, happy to be out of school once again.
Comments:
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COH Elementary is indeed a special place. We are so grateful to the faculty and staff that made it that way.
posted by thom munterich on 06/25/11 at 5:24 PM
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