The Foxcroft Chronicle

On Wednesday Foxcroft Academy welcomed approximately 140 new students (new boarding students, transfers, and members of the class of 2016).

FA’s new bleachers

athletics, school events,

Construction on “The Lodge” is coming along quite nicely.

Posted 10 months ago

school events, boarding,

Farewell to Foxcroft Academy’s boarding students from the Class of 2012!

Check out the clip below to see a great farewell video created by FA Director of Residence Life Karen Smith and John You ‘13.

boarding, school events,

Mr. Shorey’s end-of-school letter

June 12, 2012

Dear Parent/Guardian:

It is hard to believe the year has come to a close, and at least we did not use many snow days so that the students can enjoy a longer summer than they did last year. I am writing to provide you with information as we close for the academic year and to thank you for working with us this past year. It was a wonderful year!

We have three faculty members who are leaving the Pony Herd. Mr. Adkins: Social Studies, Mr. Ellis: Director of Music, and Ms. Perkins: English. We greatly appreciate their contributions to our students and wish them well. We are in the midst of the hiring process and we can announce that Josh Guthrie has agreed to become our Director of Music and Luis Ayala will be joining the ESL program replacing Mrs. Chevalier, who will be staying home with her new baby boy. Due to the number of student requests for courses, we will be adding an additional math position. We are very impressed with the candidates and our searches will conclude over the next two weeks.

As you are aware, we are collecting all of the iPads for the summer to re-image and prepare for next year. The iPad program went very well and further integration will continue next year and beyond. Many high schools around the State have been visiting FA and observing classrooms as they will be embarking on this endeavor in the near future. We are purchasing new covers for the iPads and, once again, you will have the opportunity to purchase insurance.

In a previous mailing, I sent you the updated dress code. Again, there were not a lot of changes; however, it is our feeling that we are all on the same page and you can expect that our dress code standards will be strictly adhered to. The dress code will be posted online for your reference before school shopping late in the summer.

Like last year, there is a summer reading and report requirement as we feel it is essential that our students read over the summer. You will be able to find the requirements and book list at foxcroftacademy.org by selecting the Academics button and then the library button. (See attached) You can view an exemplar of an “A” project at http://www.schooltube.com/video/635355e298c8437bb6ac/The-Hunger-Games-Book-Trailer.

Finally, I would like to congratulate everyone for a great year. I must admit we have the very best students and we look forward to the incoming freshmen class and new boarding students joining the Herd in the fall. I hope everyone has an enjoyable and safe summer break.

So Ponies, Ride on!

Mr. Shorey, Head of School
Foxcroft Academy

Congratulations to Foxcroft Academy’s Class of 2012!

Congratulations to the outstanding students of the Class of 2012, who graduated on Foxcroft Academy’s East Lawn Sunday afternoon. Those who were unable to make the graduation ceremony can view it in full by clicking on the video clip above. The ceremony included speeches from Head of School Arnold Shorey, Valedictorian Yuemeng Jia, Salutatorian Chris Shorey, Faculty speaker Wayne Strout, and Keynote speaker Eliot Cutler.

Outdoor basketball court ready for players

The new basketball hoop across the street from Foxcroft Academy has been up and running since Monday. The court was added as part of the Foxcroft Academy Tennis Initiative, and it already got some use yesterday when Mr. Shorey engaged in a heated 3-on-3 game with five of FA’s finest.

The court will be well-lit in the evenings and is sure to see plenty of action throughout the summer. “I expect to see people playing on it just about every night,” said Robert Trotter ‘12.

school events, athletics, basketball,

NHS and Key Club team up to help local cancer victim

In an emotional presentation at last Friday’s assembly, Foxcroft Academy seniors Stephen Sharrow, President of the National Honor Society, and Lucy McDermott, District Treasurer for New England District of Key Club International, presented Mike White, father of Dexter senior Tyler White, with two $300 checks. Tyler, an Exeter native who has been an excellent athlete at Dexter High School, goes to the Lafayette Cancer Center each day to receive chemotherapy in his fight against Stage 3 testicular cancer.

Many FA students commented that the presentation was the most emotional and heartfelt event they’ve witnessed during their time in high school. “This was a wonderful example of young people helping an individual even though he happens to attend a rival school,” said NHS director Peter Hartel. “We’re all human beings, and we need to help others in times of need.”

Photo taken by Sam Phillips ‘13.

school events, clubs,

Students dedicate 2012 Yearbook to Doreen Emerson

At Friday afternoon’s assembly, Foxcroft Academy seniors Delaney Benson and Taryn Lane dedicated the 2012 Yearbook to Doreen Emerson, who has taught at FA for the past 28 years. Click on the video clip below to see the dedication:

school events, faculty,

Candidates lobby for Student Council presidency

At Friday afternoon’s assembly, three sets of candidates—Louis Lafache and Ryan Rebar, Sam Phillips and Raychel Poisson, and Gabi Henderson and Brittany Sletterink—campaigned to succeed Chris Shorey and Zach Evans as president and vice president of the Foxcroft Academy Student Council. Click on the video clip below to see their speeches.

Posted 12 months ago

Spring Fling coming tomorrow afternoon

Foxcroft Academy’s annual Spring Fling celebration will take place tomorrow afternoon. The afternoon will kick off with a cookout (12:27-1:12), and then there will be a special assembly (Yearbook dedication) from 1:15-1:30. The remainder of the afternoon will consist of the Talent Show and variety of outdoor activities.

Now seems like as good a time as any to revisit last year’s epic hot dog eating contest. The battle royal, which featured contestants Craig Chambers (freshman), Louis Lafache (sophomore), Zach Evans (junior), Andrew Marshall (senior), and Chris McGary (administration), can be viewed in its entirety below:

Jia and Shorey finish as FA’s Valedictorian and Salutatorian

Mr. Arnold Shorey, Head of School at Foxcroft Academy, has announced Yuemeng Jia as the Valedictorian and Christopher Shorey as the Salutatorian of the Class of 2012. Foxcroft Academy’s graduation ceremony will be held on Sunday, June 10 at 1:30 pm. Baccalaureate will be held prior to graduation at noon. Mr. Eliot Cutler, Chair of OneMaine, will give the Commencement Address.

Yuemeng (Joyce) Jia is the daughter of Wei Jia and Jiming Wang of Beijing, China. She currently has a GPA of 3.99. Joyce has been a member of Key Club and Orchestra for all three years since she came to study at FA, and she is a 2012 Rose Award recipient. She is also a member of the Math Team and captained the team this year. Joyce will be attending the University of Virginia next year, where she intends to major in Mathematics and Chemistry.

Chris Shorey is the son of Arnold and Stacy Shorey of Dover-Foxcroft. He currently has a GPA of 3.97. Chris played football for all four years of high school, obtaining his first varsity letter his sophomore year, and was a captain his senior year. He is the president of the Student Council, vice-president of the senior class, and the vice-president of the Key Club. Chris is a member of the National Honor Society and a 2012 Rose Award recipient. He also participated in baseball and obtained a varsity letter his freshman and junior year. Chris will be attending Colby College next year, where he will be studying Government and Economics, as he one day hopes to practice corporate law.

academics, school events, student feature,

MASL names Mr. Shorey “Administrator of the Year”

Congratulations to Head of School Arnold Shorey, who has been selected as “Administrator of the Year” by the Executive Board of the Maine Association of School Libraries (MASL). Mr. Shorey will receive a “Library Media Service Award for Administrators” plaque and a $500 donation to FA’s library media program made in his name.

The Library Media Service award is intended to honor administrators who, through individual leadership and sustained effort, have made worthy contributions to the operations of effective school library media services within the educational program. The award is also intended to recognize the responsible and influential role of the school administrator in developing successful school library media programs, and to stimulate planning, implementing, and support of school library media services.

Administrators must be nominated by a current MASL member. Foxcroft Academy Library Media Specialist Tina Taggart nominated Mr. Shorey for the award. Below is the letter she wrote to the MASL:

Tina Taggart’s nomination letter for Arnold Shorey:

Foxcroft Academy is a town academy that has 467 students currently. We have a diverse population, as we take students from Charleston, Sebec, Dover, Harmony, and Monson and also accept boarding students from all over the world. Our boarding program currently has more than 90 students from 9 different countries. We have special ed students, college prep students, and students that don’t particularly want to go to college. We are a rare commodity as we try to be all things to our community.

We have over 8000 books, various magazines, and three purchased electronic databases. When I came to Foxcroft, we had no databases outside of Marvel, no magazines, and a collection of books so outdated that the students never even bothered to look for anything to read here; that first year we had less than 500 checkouts for the year. Getting the library moving in the right direction was difficult. I was told not to discard a 1978 set of encyclopedias—they were leather bound and “looked good”. Even when I pointed out that the USSR was no longer a country, I was not allowed to get rid of them. When I wrote the library policy, I was told that if a parent challenged a book it was to be removed.

When Arnold became the head of school in 2010, the first thing I asked him for was a change to the challenged book policy. He agreed to a review panel and accepted a policy that was in line with the ALA standards for challenged books. Feeling empowered, I approached him with the need for a bigger budget. Explaining that we were dealing with 21st-century students that were more electronic than book-oriented. I wanted more electronic databases to fit the needs of the school and complement MARVEL. I pointed out the need to have a movie license for copyright protection. He agreed. My budget increased by $8000. This allowed me to keep purchasing books and have the electronic databases that will help our students in their pursuit of knowledge.

Arnold has encouraged teachers to use me as a co-educator and to help in the research instruction at the Academy. Our students now learn three forms of citation. He has asked me to be on the technology team, which was key to our 1-to-1 deployment of iPads. My title has changed from “Library Director” to “Library Media Specialist”.

Last year I had my first incident of a parent challenging a book. Arnold pulled out the library policy and explained to the parent that there was a procedure in place that needed to be followed. I could not change the parent’s mind about the book. The parent’s argument was that it was warping our children into misbehavior. We proceeded to the panel portion of the book review, and everyone agreed that the book was not offensive and would stay in the collection. Other than when we read it to review, the book never left the shelf. Arnold sent a formal letter explaining our decision to keep the book and dealt with several follow-up phone calls in a very professional manner. We now have two copies of this book on our shelves.

For the 2011-2012 school year, Arnold and I worked on extending the library hours. For this to happen we needed to hire another ed tech. While other schools are cutting library services, Arnold has increased ours. We are now open Tuesday-Thursday until 8 pm and every other Saturday. Our goal is to build the program up to extend the hours even more. Arnold’s formal statement about libraries is as follows:

“The library is a resource of knowledge. It is a place that supports and facilitates learning. It is essential to FA as it houses information and is a place that teaches students to learn and to seek information efficiently and properly in all mediums. It supports life-long learning, collaboration, analytical thinking, and problem solving, which are all major components of our mission.”

Arnold has shown the value of a library in hard economic times and has supported the library when it was not easy to do so. He should be awarded the administrator of the year.

Photo at top: Arnold Shorey and Tina Taggart

academics, library, school events,

Eight alumni inducted into the FA Academic Hall of Fame

Foxcroft Academy would like to congratulate the following alumni for being inducted into the inaugural class of the Foxcroft Academy Academic Hall of Fame at a ceremony held in the FA gymnasium on Saturday night: David Mallett ’69, Laurie Gagnon Lachance ’79, Dean Smith ’86, Chad Poland ’91, Stephen Witmer ’94, Andrew Witmer ’94, Heidi Ryder Bray ’94, and Stacy Stitham ’98. Because Foxcroft Academy aims to connect great students of the present with those of the past, this ceremony was held in conjunction with the presentation of medallions to Rose Award recipients from the Class of 2012: Maitland Bell, Ethan Bryand, Xuan (Suezy) Chen, Rachel Cody, Shuchang (Soki) Du, Matt Hewett, Yuemeng (Joyce) Jia, Maddy Kelly, Jae Young (Jason) Lee, Jiarong (Tina) Li, Jiayang Lu, Kedi (Cody) Ni, Yangshengjing (UB) Qiu, Chris Shorey, Yuanjiang (Candy) Song, and Brent Thomas.

The fall alumni publication requested alumni, community members, parents, and faculty (past and present) to nominate Foxcroft Academy alumni who demonstrated “success at Foxcroft Academy through academics and/or visual and performing arts, leading to notable accomplishments in a chosen career path.” The selection committee then drew from a large pool of candidates generated by these nominations, eventually settling on the eight inductees named above. A second class will be inducted next spring, with nominations being collected over the course of the next year.

Biographical details for each Hall of Fame inductee will be posted throughout the next few weeks. (These bios have also been published in the spring alumni publication.)