Letter: April Is National Volunteer Month

Letter to the Editor01:00PM / Friday, April 15, 2022Print Story | Email Story

To the Editor:

Kindness and Compassion. April is National Volunteer Month.

Why do people volunteer? What do they get out of it?

We're taught from a very young age that we will feel good if we help others. It's true, volunteering gives us a sense of meaning, of purpose.

Thanks to a website, nextdoor.com, people can post requests for help. I just saw such a request from someone who knew of an elderly woman who was unable to walk her beloved dog and would have to give him up if she couldn't find help walking him. "Her health is declining, and the dog is her best friend."

I believe it's common knowledge that having something to care for can make a huge difference in someone's mental health as well as physical health; it can reduce anxiety and aid in recovery. Giving and receiving love is a basic need we all have. Sometimes a pet is all someone has. This is especially true of many elderly persons who would suffer social isolation without their pets.

Wouldn't it be wonderful if our towns took the reins to provide help to their citizens who are in need. Perhaps include the Police Department – this would be a great way for them to strengthen community partnerships. Schools could create clubs that would teach students community service and perhaps even give them credit. Dog walking would be a great job for a student!

Diane Perault
Williamstown, Mass.

Tags: volunteers,

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Mount Greylock School Committee OKs Updated Policy on Seclusion, Restraint

By Stephen DravisiBerkshires Staff
05:57AM / Tuesday, August 25, 2026

WILLIAMSTOWN, Mass. — The Mount Greylock School Committee recently approved an updated policy on time-outs, seclusion and the physical restraint of students.

The policy is based on updated state regulations that came down last winter. Superintendent Joseph Bergeron told the panel at its August meeting that his office waited on recommendations from the Massachusetts Association of School Committees that were released in May and ran the proposed changes past the district's legal counsel.

That timing — and an expectation from the commonwealth that districts have the updated policy in place for the start of the 2026-27 academic year — led to an expedited process for the School Committee, which did not do a first read with a vote at a subsequent meeting as is its practice.

"Policy JKAA speaks to the ways the school district and our procedures shall abide by the updated state regulations," Bergeron said. "We're not going to have a lot of leeway.

"Nothing about the way we interact with our students on a day-to-day basis is being shifted by this."

For example, the commonwealth does not allow schools to use "seclusion," or, "the involuntary confinement of a student alone in a room or area, with or without adult supervision," except some extreme cases, like when, "when student behavior poses an imminent threat of assault, or imminent serious physical harm to self or others, but only if safeguards are accounted for," the updated policy reads.

"From the state's perspective and my perspective, the idea of locking a child in a room without adult supervision is something we've never done," Bergeron said. "And it's something the state wants to make explicitly that nobody ever does."

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