Malone Pays Visit to Peabody's Higgins Middle School

Secretary of Education Matthew Malone was in Peabody Wednesday morning, making a brief stop before heading up to Cape Ann for a forum.

Massachusetts Secretary of Education Matthew Malone stopped by for a visit in Peabody Wednesday at Higgins Middle School and liked what he saw. Malone praised faculty and staff for their innovative approach to teaching, despite some obvious challenges with the old school. Malone first spent several minutes with administrators, staff and local and elected officials talking about plans for the new middle school and several other ongoing programs as well as transitioning into the Common Core curriculum. Malone offered advice on various points, often drawing from his own recent experience as a superintendent, such as encouraging the city to try and secure maximum flexibility to have movable classroom walls in the new building in order to …

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Eighth-Graders Spearhead Citywide Clothing Drive

Two eighth grade students at Higgins Middle School, Katie Wallace and Matt D'Amato, have launched a citywide clothing drive to benefit other kids in need.

In their role as youthful ambassadors for promoting community service, Higgins Middle School students Katie Wallace and Matt D'Amato have launched a clothing drive, with the help of local officials, to benefit other kids in need. The eighth-graders are serving as Peabody's representatives in this year's Project 351 initiative. The program is sponsored by Gov. Deval Patrick and encourages student involvement in community service and leadership development. Mayor Ted Bettencourt, other local officials, faculty and staff gathered with Wallace and D'Amato Monday to kick off the Higgins Cares Peabody Clothing Drive, which lasts through April 10. Residents are encouraged to donate new or gently used children's clothing and footwear and they can …

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Student Charged With Assault By Dangerous Weapon After Incident at Middle School

A Higgins Middle School student will be facing charges of assault with a dangerous weapon and possession of a weapon on school grounds after an incident at the school on Wednesday.

Higgins Students Serve as City's Ambassadors in Project 351

Matthew D'Amato and Katie Wallace will serve as Peabody's ambassadors in the annual service program with Gov. Deval Patrick and both were nominated by Higgins Principal Todd Bucey.

Two Higgins Middle School students join more than 300 fellow eighth-graders today in Boston to represent the 351 cities and towns in Massachusetts for the 2013 kickoff to Project 351. Matthew D'Amato and Katie Wallace will serve as Peabody's ambassadors in the service program with Gov. Deval Patrick and both were nominated by Higgins Principal Todd Bucey. Bucey praised both students for their "compassion, commitment, humility, kindness and generosity of spirit." The program runs for a year with several leadership and service opportunities and kicks off Jan. 26 with a day of service. "I welcome Project 351 ambassadors from across the Commonwealth to the State House as we unite in the spirit of service," said Patrick in a statement. "Project…

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Sandi Drover

7:26 am on Saturday, January 26, 2013

Congratulations to both Katie & Matt! They will make fine representatives of Peabody for Project 351.   more ›

Higgins Students, Staff to Walk 1 Minute for Each Sandy Hook Victim

A walk/fundraiser will be held at Higgins Middle School Friday morning to support the Sandy Hook community and the shooting victims' families.

Higgins Middle School students and staff will walk one minute for each of the victims of the Sandy Hook School shooting in Connecticut. Higgins Principal Todd Bucey says the walk will also be a fundraiser to support the victims and their families. Any interested students and staff are invited to wear green and white (Sandy Hook's colors), join the walk and offer a $1 donation (or more) to the Connecticut PTSA Sandy Hook Fund. They can also donate a card or snowflake. Bucey said a card/poster will be available for people to sign that will be sent along to Connecticut as well. "From the minute we opened our doors on Monday, we have been overwhelmed by the outpouring of support from students and staff, wondering what they can do to help," …

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Eighth-Grader Gives Back With School Supplies

Middle school student Rachel Ellis took her money earned from her paper route and spent it on school supplies for fellow students in need.

Most kids, when they accumulate a few hundred dollars from their paper routes, start thinking about all the cool things they can buy, especially before school starts up again. Well, eighth-grader Rachel Ellis took a different route there. The Higgins Middle School pupil took her hard-earned money and, instead of spending it on herself, bought a bunch of school supplies and donated them all to her school. Rachel said she spent between $300 and $500 on the supplies, which included everything from paper, notebooks and rulers to erasers, pencils and pens. "I love my education," Rachel told Peabody Patch, explaining what inspired her generosity. "I wanted others to succeed [as well]. Higgins Principal Todd Bucey said he was happy to receive the…

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PHOTOS: The Annual Higgins Extravaganza

Sixth-, seventh- and eighth-graders got together to enjoy Treadwell's ice cream, find out their class assignments and enjoy other fun activities before the coming school year.

Students, their parents and younger siblings all got to enjoy some ice cream, courtesy of Treadwell's, at Higgins Middle School last week as the students found out their cluster and homeroom assignments for the year, along with some other fun activities. The school puts on the event each year with some help from the Peabody Education Foundation.

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Still More Work for School Building Committee Before Vote on Higgins

The momentum is building toward a vote, but there's still more legwork for the project design team before a preliminary design is ready to submit to the MSBA.

At this point, it’s mainly about dotting “i”s and crossing “t”s. Mayor Ted Bettencourt and the Higgins School Building Committee appear to uniformly support building a new middle school at this time, the only obstacle is that they have to justify every nut and bolt to satisfy state education officials, or so it seems. So technically, the question of whether the Higgins will see a wholesale renovation or an entire new building is still up for debate. After meeting with the Mass. School Building Authority two weeks ago, the firm managing the school project – Daedalus – explained to committee members that the MSBA needs to see a highly detailed “preferred option” for the school, as well as detailed versions of the other options that were …

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Higgins Spellers Battle it Out in Championship Bee

Higgins Middle School students competed in 13 rounds for three top spelling bee championship spots at the Northshore Mall.

After 13 rounds and three consecutive hours of spelling bee quizzes, Ashley Royer was the first place winner in the Second Annual Higgins Middle School Spelling Bee and Silent Auction. This was Royer's first appearance in the championship bee, which was hosted by the Northshore Mall, but she did compete in the bee for the sixth grade Sharks cluster last year. She's now a seventh-grader in the Bears cluster at the Higgins School. She competed against 29 champions last Thursday and plans to spell her way back to the championship next year as well. Her winning word was 'automatonous.' "I'm really excited I won," Royer said. "I wrote close to 1,000 words on flash cards and practiced them during school. They gave us a list of words they could …

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School Officials Hope to Revive After-School Program for Middle School

Interim Superintendent Herb Levine says final decision will be announced soon whether local Boys & Girls Club chapter will reopen or district will pursue another option.

Peabody school officials are searching for funding in an effort to help resurrect an after school program at Higgins Middle School, a local chapter of the Boys & Girls Club of Greater Salem. Earlier in November, school officials learned from the club that the local chapter was being shut down due to lack of funds. The Salem News reported on Nov. 17 that the Peabody chapter had refunded the $10 membership fee to middle school students and alerted parents that the program would not be returning for a fifth year. The popular program was brought to Peabody in 2007 by Higgins teacher Greg Passeri, who used to work at the Boys & Girls Club. School officials are now seeking to find the necessary funds to either revive the Boys & Girls Club …

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