ORLEANS – On Monday of last week, the Girls on the Run team at Orleans Elementary School made their way around the school grounds. The route was the same one the 14 runners have been following twice a week since March, but this day was different. Teachers, staffers and family members gathered outside to cheer the team in one of their final practices before heading to Boston for this Saturday's Girls on the Run...

ORLEANS – Out behind Orleans Elementary School, past the athletic field, a newly cleared path winds its way through the woods out to Boland Pond. Just before the path meets the water, a series of newly constructed benches sit waiting to be used. Students and staff at the elementary school last month began using the new outdoor classroom, the pathway and benches which were paid for by the Orleans Conservation T...

ORLEANS – The select board last week got a glimpse at two very different educational realities. At Orleans Elementary School, the student population continues to decline. Gail Briere, chair of the Orleans Elementary School Committee, told the board March 22 that since the 2020-2021 school year, enrollment at the school has fallen from 175 students to 145 this year. The same holds true at Nauset Regional Hig...

ORLEANS – Tiffany Wood-Wright never had issues with her four children taking the bus to and from school, that is until recently. The East Orleans resident, who has children in the Nauset Public Schools including a first and fifth grader at Orleans Elementary School, said adjusted bus routes implemented in early December due to a lack of drivers have caused problems for her and other elementary school parents. ...

ORLEANS – Select board members say short-term rentals need to be regulated, and requiring that those properties be registered with the town was seen as the first step in that process. But voters at Monday's special town meeting said the proposed registration bylaw put before them was not ready yet. Voters also gave the go-ahead for submission of a request to ban fertilizer use in town to the state legislatu...

ORLEANS – How much is too much to spend to improve an aging building? That was the question the select board wrestled with last week as it faced a $1.4 million request to make heating, ventilation and air conditioning improvements to portions of the Orleans Elementary School. Board members expressed reluctance Aug. 31 about putting that much money into fixing the building, the original portion of which date...

ORLEANS – The old normal? The new "new normal?" "We're still trying to figure out what to call it," Nauset School Superintendent Brooke Clenchy said. However you term it, the 2022-2023 school year promises to restore some of the pluck and excitement that has been dulled not just in Nauset, but in districts and schools nationwide since the start of the COVID-19 pandemic in 2020. Two and a half years after...

ORLEANS – Talks on siting a new fire station on Orleans Elementary School land came to an impasse last week, leaving plans for the project up in the air. The town's fire rescue station feasibility study committee voted July 11 to endorse a plan to demolish the existing fire station on Eldredge Park Way and build a new station nearby on an acre of elementary school land. But the committee quickly rescinded its ...

ORLEANS – As efforts to site a new fire station in town continue, the select board doesn't want to rule out the possibility of keeping the existing station intact for some other future use. Built in 1987, the current fire station on Eldredge Park Way no longer meets the needs of a modern fire department. The town initially explored the possibility of renovating the existing building, but it was determined last...

ORLEANS – The deadline to return nomination papers to run in the May 17 annual town election came and went Tuesday, but there will be no contested races. Candidates could take out papers for election or re-election to the select board, board of health, Orleans School Committee, Nauset Regional School Committee, Snow Library Board of Trustees and the positions of town constable and town moderator. Incumbent ...

ORLEANS – What is life like day-to-day for students and staff at Orleans Elementary School? It’s a question that Molly Jenks gets asked a lot by people around town. “If you don’t have kids in school for whatever reason, if you’re too old or too young or not a parent, you don’t know what’s really going on,” said Jenks, a member of the Orleans Elementary School Council. “How do we get people to understand all th...

ORLEANS – A proposal to site a new fire station behind the existing facility on Eldredge Park Way would also allow expanded Orleans Elementary School parking, as well as a quicker tie-in to town sewer. The Orleans School Committee heard a preliminary pitch Jan. 12 from Ron Collins, the town's facilities manager, to site a new fire station on an unused acre of school land. The town is seeking a vote from the co...

ORLEANS – The Orleans School Committee is interested in hearing the town's proposal for possibly siting a new fire station on elementary school land, but members say they're not committing to anything. The committee voted 5-0 Dec. 20 to host a meeting Jan. 12 to discuss the idea in concept. Town Administrator John Kelly, Facilities Manager Ron Collins, Fire Chief Geof Deering, Orleans Elementary School Princip...

ORLEANS -- I arrange to meet Garrett Dutton, better known as G. Love, at his home, a cozy, Cape-style farmhouse complete with a garden, goats and chickens. It's a mild December afternoon, and I'm slightly early as Dutton pulls up behind me in a charmingly beat-up powder blue pickup. Dog in lap, he extends a hand out his window for a shake and invites me to park over on the grass. Dutton's music with G. Love an...

ORLEANS - Heading into last month's special town meeting, select board members anticipated that one article in particular might stir up some discussion in the Nauset Regional Middle School Auditorium. The Orleans School Committee's request for $495,000 to fund a universal pre-kindergarten program in town was expected to draw some back and forth, especially given the cost, which was to be funded through a Propo...

ORLEANS — When you were in grade school, did your teacher ever tell you to stop looking out the window? Next month, that childhood urge to be outdoors will be put to good use as Orleans Elementary School reopens during an ongoing pandemic. “We do anticipate even in the cooler weather we’ll have windows open,” Principal Elaine Pender told the elementary school committee Aug. 13. “We expect to have to adjust a...