AMHERST — Morning Movement and Mentoring, a program in its fourth year of engaging almost 100 seventh through ninth graders with before-school sports activities, is receiving statewide acclaim.
The Massachusetts Municipal Association in January awarded the program, founded informally by paraeducator Seiha Krouch and the Amherst Regional Public Schools Family Center, with its 2026 Kenneth E. Pickard Municipal Innovation Award at its annual conference.
Held three times a week before school starts, the program is designed to provide a welcoming space for students to play sports, lift weights, do arts and crafts, receive homework help and connect with peers and mentors. There are also field trips to college campuses and sporting events, and a journey to the State House in Boston to inspire students to achieve academic success.
The program aims to improve students’ physical wellness, mental health, school preparedness and sense of belonging, and boost academic grades, school attendance and self-regulation during the school day.
Krouch, who came to the United States as a Cambodian refugee in the 1980s, explained the concept of the program is to give students self-confidence, discipline and positive encouragement.
“My goal is and will forever be to give youth a safe place and space to exercise before and after school,” Krouch said. “My other goal is to develop trust with youth, create friendships and demonstrate what a big family is about.”
Beginning in 2023, the town partnered with the schools to provide funds for transportation. The program has nearly 100 registered participants, with an average daily attendance of 45 students from diverse backgrounds, with one-quarter of the students self-identifying as Hispanic or Latino, 22.4% as Black or African American, 22.4% as white or Caucasian, 19.7% belonging to two or more races or ethnicities and 6.6% Asian.
Students and student athletes from the University of Massachusetts and Amherst College regularly attend and mentor participants.
The director is Maria Grove, who is also student leadership development coordinator at Amherst College. “Every day of this program is an opportunity to meet young people exactly where they are and to remind them of who they can become,” Grove said. “This program is special because learning flows both ways; our students inspire, challenge, and teach our mentors just as much as they are supported in return. ”
Black History Month display
Black History Month is being celebrated with informational posters featuring municipal and educational leaders in the hallways at Town Hall.
Put together by the Diversity, Equity and Inclusion Department and other town staff, the posters trace the history of the celebration and provide various spotlights on contemporary individuals in the community and on the University of Massachusetts, Amherst College and Hampshire College campuses.
Among those with short biographical sketches are Amy Jordan, associate professor of African American history at Hampshire, Willie Hill Jr., the former director of the UMass Fine Arts Center, storyteller and narrator Onawumi Jean Moss, who formerly served as associate dean of students at Amherst College, the late Harold Clarence Boyer, performer and scholar of African American Gospel music, late American jazz multi-instrumentalist and composer Yusef Lateef and the late Jacqueline Bearce, Amherst College’s director of the Counseling Center, as well as various local educators and officials, such as Mary Custard, Liz Haygood, Marita Banda, Oumy Cisse, Talib Sadiq and E. Xiomara Herman.
Jeopardy! clue
In a category “Schooling You in Massachusetts” for a recent Tournament of Champions episode of Jeopardy! Amherst College, Mount Holyoke College and Smith College were all correct questions for the answers supplied.
The Amherst College clue, though, stated “original poems and manuscripts are part of the Emily Dickinson Collection at the Jones Library of this liberal arts college.”
The college was quick to put on social media that the clue was factually inaccurate. “Hey, Jeopardy!, here’s a clue for you for $800: This Massachusetts school’s library is actually called Frost Library.”
Both libraries do have collections of the famed poet’s works.
Health insurance increase drops
A spike in health insurance that had been projected to be around 18% will be much lower, according to Town Manager Paul Bockelman. The current increase will be around 8.5%.
Finance Director Sean Mangano told the Finance Committee that he will be updating budget forecasts. “The impact of health insurance will not be as great as it could have been under our original assumption,” Mangano said.
District 2 Councilor Lynn Griesmer said she considers this “amazing news.”
Mangano said every 1% premium increase drop means a savings of around $30,000 on the
town side, and will also benefit the public schools. “It will be a positive impact, for sure, a very positive impact,” Mangano said.
Shrinking packages
A new study led by a UMass economist shows that shrinking package sizes at grocery stores play a hidden, but important role, in food inflation.
Published in the International Journal of Industrial Organization, the study found that the average size of packaged food declined by 14.6% between 2012 and 2019.
“Our inflation calculation measures how much more costly life is if consumers didn’t pay attention at all to product sizes,” said lead author Christian Rojas, who chairs the department of Resource Economics at UMass.
Rojas and co-authors Edward Jaenicke of Penn State University and Elina T. Page of the U.S. Department of Agriculture make a distinction between “shrinkflation,” which is when an existing product quietly reappears in a smaller package at the same price, and “shrinkage,” defines as the steady introduction of new, smaller products that replace older, larger ones.
They suggest that shrinkflation is what often gets covered by the media, and that mandated per-unit pricing regulations could help consumers make smarter buying decisions and combat inflation.
Meetings
WEDNESDAY: Human Rights Commission, 6 p.m.
THURSDAY: CDBG Advisory Committee, 7 p.m.