It’s that time of the year when we have to get ready to say goodbye to the Class of 2023. This year there are 128 graduating seniors, each with their own story to tell. Additionally, five staff members are leaving us who also have great memories to share.

The Seniors 

Do you know all those amazing sounds that happen at the assemblies? Well, you can thank Otis Neville who puts his tech talents to work at each and every assembly. He also recently came in second in the solo Battle of the Bands competition. His favorite memory from Harwood is spending time in the music department. Otis is very talented on the guitar and loves to work with the music department staff. He wishes he had gotten involved in the program earlier in school but still cherishes the time he has spent working with them. Next year Otis plans on becoming a roadie for bands that need him and who knows maybe one of those bands will be able to use Otis’s fantastic guitar talent.

A standout personality and a familiar face around the halls of Harwood, Nathan Kudriavetz is certainly not shy. When we asked what Nathan’s favorite memory of Harwood is, he said,

“ All of the spirit weeks. I really like how everyone gets together and has a good time. “ One thing he’ll miss is “the feeling of walking down the halls and around the school and knowing everyone and seeing familiar faces.” But he does have some regrets. If he were doing it again he would  “probably join more clubs. It just would have been cool just to get out there more.” After six years at Harwood filled with good times and many memories, Nathan plans to attend Merrimack College this fall.

Owen Duffy’s story is a unique one. He has the great honor of being the very first Harwood Student Plaid. With his endless school spirit and support, he was the perfect fit for the position. “Next year I plan on going to CCTV and doing some online classes and working at the same time,” Owen said. He will miss the staff here at Harwood and his previous schools. Owen has had a great time here at Harwood through his high school years and is definitely gonna be a person this school will remember for a long time. 

A captain for both varsity lacrosse and varsity basketball with an outgoing personality, Iyah Lavit does it all here at Harwood. When asked about his favorite Harwood memory, Iyah said, “Winning a lacrosse  championship with some of my closest friends.”  He’ll miss “the community and all the teachers, and how they act with the students.”  He had some good advice for underclassmen: “I definitely wish I tried harder my freshman year. Definitely focusing more on my academics freshman year.” After six years at Harwood, Iyah will be continuing his lacrosse career and education at the University Of Southern Maine where he plans to study psychology or sociology.

Even though Harper Haase left Harwood after eighth grade, it seems like she never left. Before moving back to Vermont, she lived in Los Angeles, California where she spent the first three years of high school. She’s glad she returned to to us for her senior year: “Definitely being able to move back and get to spend senior year with my childhood friends” is a favorite memory for her. Harper doesn’t wish she could change anything about during her time at Harwood. As she said, “ I think I’m perfect.” After a great last year in Vermont, Harper is moving to the Big Apple where she will attend Parsons School of Design, the number one art school in the country. 

Olivia Cyr’s time at Harwood has been very memorable. She’s always loved Spirit Week and how much it brings the school community together for fun competition. There has only been one other class to win spirit week all four years, so accomplishing that is a pretty big deal for her and all the other seniors. She also decided this year that she wanted to be more involved with sports, so she mangaed the boy’s lacrosse team. Olivia is going to miss how the Harwood community comes together at sporting events. Being able to see how many students, staff, and parents come out to support the sports teams is a special thing.This year Olivia has joined clubs that are working to bring school change, and she wishes that she joined those clubs sooner. After graduation, she plans to attend Utica College in New York as a nursing major. 

Retiring Teachers

We know we will miss our departing staff members as well.  Along with music teachers, Bruce Sklar and Chris Rivers – profiled in another article in this issue – our retirees include Kathryn Youngdahl-Stauss, Ellen Bruneau, and Tom Strasser. 

Tom Strasser

Mr. Strasser started his teaching career in Wilmington, North Carolina. He subbed at middle schools that are on the edge of the projects, and ended up working at Michael Jordan’s Middle School. “Then I had the middle school and high school fighting for me to teach there. So I ended up working at Michael Jordan’s High School. That was cool, it was good to see him in his early life.” Then he came to Harwood which was very different from North Carolina. 

Things at Harwood have changed too. “Back in the day, I used to be in a classroom with a chalkboard. And we used to have a projector that was an old school projector that would have a bunch of optics to it. Light and a bunch of mirrors and it would project something up on a screen. Today, we have a presenter and a big nice TV set or projector system there that does it. So a projector versus a digital projector. We had this old calculator, the TI 83 that helped us do some math stuff. And in today’s world, we have Desmos and all these new apps on the computer that run so much better. And in just the last couple months, AI has become really strong. Teachers are gonna have to adapt to it. … But if they start catching up now, I think it’d be a good thing. Because I think it can be really a benefit for the classroom.”
After he retires, Strasser plans to coach cross country skiing at Harwood and do some club coaching as well.

Ellen Bruneau

Ellen Bruneau has been working at Harwood for 45 years, perhaps the longest of any staff member ever. Last winter her long service was honored by WCAX, naming her as a superhero. 

As a paraeducator, her favorite memory is working with the special ed kids. When asked about what she was gonna do after retirement, she said, “I might do some substitute work, but other than that, I have no idea what i’m going to do next.”

Ms. Stauss

When asked how long Ms. Stauss had been at Harwood, she said that even though she only started teaching here eight years ago, “I did my student teaching at Harwood in 2010. And because my own children went through the school, I was an advisor for a club here even before that.”  She has many favorite memories including experiences outside of the classroom. “The Socrates Cafes that the Harkness Leaderships classes have put on have drawn nearly two hundred  from the community back into the school this year alone. I also have older memories that are pretty wonderful. When I was teaching Midsummer Night’s Dream in Global Studies, we would go out into the woods and shoot little vignettes of kids performing scenes, and then I would edit them all together in a movie. It was really fun to watch kids who’ve never thought that they’d be able to get Shakespeare, see themselves performing Shakespeare.” 

This summer Ms. Stauss is finishing a third degree in English, “Because,” she says, “everybody needs three of them.” Her final project is directing and writing a film based on the 100-year-old diaries of a farmer who lived in her hometown, Granville. “I’m going to be using his experiences as jumping off points to talk about my own experiences of living on a hill farm in Granville, Vermont for 34 years.” After that, she plans on “playing with my husband Roger, as much as I want to, because I don’t get to do enough of that when I have to be at school all day.”