Krisjann VanOpdorp awarded the GLSC Administrator Merit Award
Claire Sehringer led well received workshop
 
Over Columbus Day weekend, members of our school committee and faculty attended the 28th Annual Conference of German Language Schools (GLSC) in New York City. Once again, this conference (co-sponsored by the Bundesverwaltungsamt and the Consulate General of Germany in NYC) proved to be enlightening and interesting, providing our teachers (Liliane Becker, Claudia Burggraf, Petra Friedman, Uta Fuchs, Ute Gröning und Silvia James) and principal Claudia Bonmassar as well as school committee chair Heidemarie Tirey and former school committee member Claire Sehringer the opportunity to exchange experiences with other schools and participate in workshops. Here are some highlights: 

 
Krisjann VanOpdorp received a well deserved GLSC Administrator Merit Award for her contributions to our German Saturday School here in Boston, mainly as founder of what by now must be one of the largest German libraries in the U.S. featuring more than 5,700 German books and media items altogether! Kris founded a parent initiative to build a library shortly after she enrolled her daughter in our school in 1992. Since then she has worked tirelessly in and supported the library and school as a parent volunteer, many years also serving as school committee member, overseeing the growth of the library and the development of a fully-automated lending system.
 
After 15 years of putting many, many hours of her time - despite a demanding full-time job - into the service of our school, Krisjann will leave at the end of this year as her youngest son graduates from our 10th Grade class. Please join us in congratulating Krisjann for this award when you see her wandering the hallways, or most likely, working in her favorite place in this school: the library!
 
Claire Sehringer who was instrumental in developing and implementing the volunteer-or-pay system at our school a few years ago, led a very well attended workshop at the GLSC on how to build a parent volunteer system and how this could serve as a model for other schools. It was under Claire's leadership that our school, driven by the continuous growth in enrollment and growing administrative tasks, implemented a system in 2003 that helps run a school of close to 300 students almost entirely with the contributions of parent volunteers.