WRV Weekly News | 8/1/25
Hello WRV Community!
We are excited to have shared the White River Valley Strong newsletter with you over the past few weeks. It was created as a pilot project to gauge the community's interest in helping our groups and leaders communicate and learn about the happenings in our area, all aimed at fostering community engagement. As our UVM summer internships come to a close, we will be temporarily pausing the weekly newsletter. We would like to thank UVM Leahy Institute for their support, and Terra, our Bethel Strong summer intern, for jumping into this project. We value the great community interest and feedback this summer, and look forward to continuing conversations about how a longer-term community newsletter or other communication solutions might help our organizations better collaborate and share information.
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What’s next for Bethel Strong?
WRV Community Schools Summer Internship Program Wrap Up
WRV Community Schools Summer Internship Program Final Presentations
Opportunities to Join and Get Involved!
What’s next for Bethel Strong?
Plans are in progress and several opportunities lie ahead as we contemplate the next steps in redefining Bethel Strong. Bethel Strong is our local mutual aid group, established in 2020, to tackle the challenges posed by the pandemic emergency response. It functioned at that time as a platform for our community to share information and connect to resources in order to remain safe and stay at home, while meeting basic needs. Over the years, Bethel Strong has brought people together to revitalize the Bethel Area Food Shelf, an initiative focused on combating local food insecurity worsened by the pandemic. It has also supported efforts to improve accessibility and has aided in the creation of recreational opportunities through the renovation of our community trail systems. In the upcoming months, as we update the Bethel Strong website, and redefine its mission, we will continue to share initiatives focused on community engagement, resilience and opportunities for our neighbors to engage and support one another. If you are interested in participating in defining future plans, please contact us at BethevtStrong@gmail.com.
WRV Community Schools Summer Internship Program Wrap-Up
Thanks to the partnership with UVM and the WRVSU Community School Program, community groups and organizations throughout the area are paving the way for future initiatives. Here’s a quick overview of what the interns accomplished and the resources they’ve contributed:
Bethel Strong-Community Design Solutions
Terra helped Bethel Strong create a pilot White River Valley Community Newsletter to help area groups and organizations share updates, upcoming events, and news with each other. We also developed a weekly pop-up community mixer/market event in conjunction with Bethel’s summer concerts and using the Placemaking Trailer. These activities helped Bethel Strong explore how we can help share information and connect our neighbors, resources, organizations, and committees. Bethel Area Food Shelf launched its sustainability project tackling food insecurity challenges, and several groups and organizations were able to showcase community work. Hosts: Rebecca Stone and Cindy Metcalf (bethelvtstrong@gmail.com)
White River Valley Middle School - Community Trail Work
Ella helped the land manager with the final implementation of the Bethel VOREC grant, focusing on trail system improvements at Bethel School Forest and Bethel Woods including trail maintenance, new signage, Placemaking Trailer support, and volunteer engagement. Host: Chris Fors (wcfors@gmail.com)
WRVSU-Child Nutrition Program
Alex supported the WRVSU Summer Meals program by planning, packing, and distributing Summer Meal Kits at the Royalton and Bethel campuses, developing educational materials, recipes, and a newsletter, and helping to develop relationships with local farmers and businesses to establish local food sources for the Child Nutrition Program. Host: Mischa Johnson (mjohnson@wrvsu.org)
WRVSU Central Office-Communications and Outreach
Gretchen spent the summer supporting year two of the WRVSU communications strategy, supporting the transition to a cloud-based student information system. She helped create a newsletter, supported community outreach, and worked to improve district-wide communication systems. Host: Ray Ballou (rballou@wrvsu.org)
White River Valley Middle School, Bethel Campus-Makerspace
Robbie spent the summer learning about the new Makerspace equipment shop and created guides in consultation with staff. He created guides to support K-12 learners and adults and created signs for local school campuses, trails, the Tunbridge Forest, the Bethel Public Library and Bethel Area Food Shelf. Host: Pierre LaFlamme (plaflamme@wrvsu.org)
WRVSU Central Office-HealthHUB/South Royalton Health Center
Sofia spent the summer working with the cross-sector team to help improve child health/learning through analyzing school attendance data, drafting communications materials for attendance campaigns, and event planning for family engagement. Host: Dr. Ashley Miller & Anda Adams (dr.ashley.miller@gmail.com and aadams@wrvsu.org)
Vital Communities-Upper Valley Farm to School
Alexa supported the Upper Valley Farm to School Network as they developed curriculum, worked in school gardens, engaged with educators, and compiled other educational resources. Hosts: Anna Hubbard (ahubbard@vitalcommunities.org) and Francey Slater (fslater@wrvsu.org)
White River Natural Resources Conservation District - Agroforestry & Garden
Quinn, Kate, and Isabelle helped maintain vegetable gardens and tree nurseries, managed open garden hours, and supported the development of agroforestry and master curriculum materials and tree nursery maps. Host: Karen Ganey (karen.nrcd@gmail.com)
Bethel Public Library-Communications
Sophie helped assist library staff to create a new website for the library, explore cataloging software options, design instructional signage and manuals, create a community newsletter, and inventory library books. Hosts: Cathy Day & Lisa Campbell (bethelpubliclibrary@comcast.net lisa.campbell@wrsu.org)
White River Valley Herald-Journalism
Emma spent the summer working with the editorial team in the 16-town region. She wrote news stories for the paper, attended local government meetings, conducted interviews, and developed a long-form reporting project. Host: Tim Calabro (tim@ourherald.com)
WRV Community Schools Summer Internship Program Final Presentations
If you are interested in hearing from the interns and their hosts about the experiences they’ve had working here in our area this summer, please join them for the WRV Community Schools Summer Internship Program-Final Presentations on Tuesday, August 5 at 3:00pm at the White Church Hall, 129 Church St, Bethel.
Opportunities to Join and Get Involved!
As you can see, we have engaged in strengthening our opportunities to connect and interact with one another throughout our communities. If you have time, talent and interest in being involved in the Bethel Strong planning process, the Bethel Area Food Shelf Task Force, or any of the community initiatives developed during these summer internship experiences, please contact us at BethelVTStrong@gmail.com or contact any of the hosts who mentored the UVM interns this summer.
