Letter: Bilal for Williamstown Select Board

To the Editor:

I am writing to urge Williamstown voters to elect Bilal Ansari to the Williamstown Select Board on Tuesday, May 10. Dr. Ansari has dedicated himself to a life of service, to helping people resolve difficult situations. He listens intently and responds carefully with compassion. He appeals to our best nature. These are essential skills needed at this moment in our town.

Dr. Ansari does not believe that he alone has the solutions to all of the challenges facing our town. Instead, he wants to hear from those comfortable speaking up and also those who, until now, have not felt comfortable nor heard at all. He believes it will take a village to share concerns and work together to make Williamstown a better place for everyone to live and work and grow. But making that happen takes a special type of skilled leadership.

Bilal Ansari is the candidate blessed with that skilled leadership and a stake in our town's quality of life. He has deep roots in this town: his ancestors lived and worked here. He is committed to an approach based in kindness and inclusion. He is the candidate who can and will help us reach a new, inclusive and more equitable chapter in our town's history.

I ask for your vote on May 10 for Bilal Ansari for the Williamstown Select Board. Thank you.

Hugh L Guilderson, Ph.D.
Williamstown, Mass.

Mount Greylock Regional Class of 2026 'Embraced the Unexpected'

By Tammy Daniels iBerkshires Staff
04:38PM / Saturday, June 06, 2026

Speaker William Apotsos says the class took the red pill, embracing the unexpected; classmate Madison Powell tells them they're still becoming the people they will be. 

WILLIAMSTOWN, Mass. — Mount Greylock Regional School sent 67 graduates off with diplomas and a cap toss on Saturday. 

 

The seniors queued up to enter the school gym with "Pomp and Circumstance" and scattered out the doors to "Choose Joy." 

 

It was the choices to be present that had gotten the Mounties to this day, said William Apotsos, whom the class had selected as their graduating speaker. "They didn't just decide to be present, they refused to be absent."

 

When one little girl had thanked him for being there to referee a youth soccer game, it drove "home the importance of not only being present but refusing to be absent," he said. 

 

Being present had been difficult in the transition between remote learning during the pandemic and returning to the school, when the class had to figure out how to be present together — physically, mentally and socially. 

 

"There is always the safe route. Stick to what you know, stick around people you know, and never really leave your metaphorical shell that you built up over your time at home. ... Then there was the more dangerous: put yourself out there, embrace your impact option,"  Apotsos said. 

 

"It's very much a red pill and blue pill situation, and what I am most proud of, that pretty much every single person on this stage took the red pill. They chose to embrace the unexpected and decide that they wouldn't let a couple years of isolation determine who they were going to be."