REVIEW OF Hudson College BY Alum, Gabriela Petrilli

(4) Overall Experience

What I liked best about Hudson was how inclusive the school is. You are able to be yourself but are still able to grow, in the ways on how you can express yourself with different clubs, all of the sports teams, and on dress down days and certain school events. Also you meet all kinds of people with the diversity they offer at Hudson. I found that I was able to discover different sides of myself that I never really considered and opened up a little to new experiences as well. I really found most of the school events in elementary and in high school to be super fun, like June fest, the concerts and plays and all of the House Events, because you were able to be with your friends, do fun activities, sometimes show your spirit and be competitive at the same time, but still show good sportsmanship and end up with a smile on your face. In elementary, every month the teachers recognize personal traits with some of the students and acknowledge them with the Character awards, traits such as Respect and Perseverance. If there was anything I would change about Hudson, it would have to be have to be a little bit about the uniform. Overall, I've been completely used to the uniform, but sometimes they can be a bit strict about the uniform, when it comes to little things like not being allowed to wear black leggings in the wintertime underneath the kilt, the black shoes being over the ankles etc. So if they were a little bit more lenient about certain rules with the uniform that would be great improvement for sure. I have definitely felt that Hudson has prepared me for the next steps in my life, because they have taught me good principles to practice, like being on time, making sure to hand in assignments on time, and how to collaborate with people. For a student enrolling here, once you start, the first few days might be a little hard but once you start to become comfortable and opening up, then you can really start to find your people and even have friends in different grades.

(5) School Leadership

I felt that the school leadership and administration was amazing. They were really respectful. They would call you down personally if there was anything wrong or to remind you of something and they would always have morning and afternoon announcements of important reminders. They were super caring and friendly. Their communication was excellent, because they would sometimes check up on you to see how you were doing, they would inform parents with emails about certain issues if necessary and would reply to emails as soon as possible no matter how late the email was sent. They would help you with certain requests like forms, locker information, printing out things occasionally, schedules and for high school, helping you with certain class choices. Also I felt that they have handled discipline issues fairly and pretty well.

(4.5) Teaching

I was really happy with the majority of teachers I had in my Hudson school experience. There was a perfect amount of respect, professionalism and fun between the students and the teachers, when it came to class time and out side of class time as well. I found that most of the teachers were very passionate and knowledgable about their subjects and were pretty helpful when it came to answering questions. I definitely thought that they were very effective when it came to communication and constructive feedback, because they defined what needed improvement for each student in the report cards and the parent teacher interviews and when I asked them as well. I have felt that there were some classes more than others that I was more passionate about, that inspired my interests more for sure, but all of my teachers definitely challenged me to do the best that I could and if needed, gave me some realistic goals to try to achieve. Also the teachers use the Google classroom format to make sure that your work is submitted in, and to post classroom material as well, to help with studying. The teachers are pretty on top of it when it comes to submissions of work, but they are willing to give extensions when necessary, for an appriorate reasons and they linent if you need help with the assignment or if you away for appointments, religious reasons, etc. Also at the beginning of the school year, they define their classroom expectations and how much is taken off for late work, within reason. In particular, from elementary school, the teachers who had a great impact on my life was the music teacher Mr. Greeson, my grade 6 teacher Ms. Bastien, who is now the lower school principal, my second grade teacher Ms. Ross, and my grade seven teacher Ms. McCarthy. Also other really great teachers in the elementary school is, Mr. Minty (my old supply teacher), Mr. Bedard and my grade 8 teacher, Mr. Veleno. For high school, the teachers who had a great impact on my life was Mr. Yovanny, Ms. Brunet, Ms. Cafaro, Mr. Winter, and Mr. Ortega. Overall, the teachers here are awesome, and they really care about you and your own personal development, academically and you as a person.

(4) Academics

I felt the that academics were pretty good. For the elementary school, it's an eight day schedule, so depending on what day you were on you would have those subjects, except math and english was everyday, all year round. For high school, it's a 3 semester school year, so you have eight classes, except for grade 12 you only have 6 classes. So for the first 2 semesters, you would have 3 classes and a study period for 4 months, and then the last semester you would have 2 three hour long classes with a small break in between. That's why I decided to stay at Hudson for high school because of the schedule and my friends, even though I had moved. They have a variety of classes, whether you were more into the arts, the sciences and maths, or other focuses, for high school, as long as there was enough interest and there wasn't any schedule conflicts. You started to choose almost all of your classes in grade 11 and grade 12 once you are done your mandatory classes. I thought that I was challenged and pretty well supported enough with every course, because the teachers wanted me to practice my skills with the material given to me and also expand my learning as well. The students can sometimes be competitive, but overall the teachers just want you to do your best and see how well you can do with your own progress and accommodate you the best that they can.

(5) Extracurriculars

I really loved the extracurricular opportunities here at Hudson, in elementary and in high school. I found that I was really able to express myself with the clubs that I was apart of and felt supported whether I was in a club or a sport. There many clubs to choose from, and a lot of sports teams to be a part of depending on the season, like the play in elementary, drama club, dance club, yearbook and photography, cooking club, Hudson heroes, things like scientist club, badminton, ultimate frisbee, soccer, etc. As I mentioned previously, even if there wasn't a club you were interested in, you were always encouraged to start your own club, if there was enough interest. Only some clubs were competitive when it came to availability and the sports teams were more competitive since there were a limited amount of spots available but overall in was open to anyone. I felt that I had a lot of fun and could really express myself. They will also let you know what day the club is and if it's at lunch or after school and they were pretty good about scheduling and rescheduling if necessary.

(4) Students

The student body of Hudson has grown a lot since I first started going here in Kindergarten. It has expanded so much that they had to open another floor for elementary here and then open another floor for the high schoolers on the Stella Maris side. There is definitely a diversity of students for the most part and there are a lot of international students that come to the school as well. For the most part, everyone is very spirited, passionate and respectful. I felt that it was pretty inclusive, whether you had a lot of friends here or if you had a few friends here, but you could always find somebody and you could even make friends outside of your grade as well, because some classes were split classes and because of the clubs. Also, I felt that was a balance for the socio-economic background of students as well, along with ethnicity. I felt that sometimes when you're with the same people for a long time, there will be some people that you might not get along with, there will be people that you're casually acquainted with, and there will be people that you'll be great friends with, so that student body and class is well balanced.

(4) School Life

My Hudson school experience was pretty balanced. There were some days where I was super excited to go to school and other times I felt like school was a little bit overwhelming, whether it was with school work. But once I found my group of friends or one friend and peers to hang out with, I knew I was going to be ok. I think that a lot of people were happy to be at school because there are many places to hang out and to socialize and there are many events and activities that we could really express ourselves and show our spirit that came to balance out the academic stress and were great stress relievers, right before exams or before holidays. Also I found that Hudson is really unique because of the events, like the Holiday and Spring concerts and June fest for elementary, and the potlucks for both and the House events, for the high schoolers, like Cultural day, A.I.R, the pep rallies and June day. Also Hudson does a lot of fundraisers that are really important, sometimes has a few assemblies to talk about important issues as well and they also have PD (or PA) days and pizza days for both elementary and high school. If I had to make any suggestions for improvements, I would have to say that I wish that the school could try to balance out the PD days for high school more or allow one mental health day, for more stressful months to help students. Overall, though my experience at Hudson is an experience I will never forget!

(4.5) Community

I think that Hudson has a very good sense of community. Parents and guardians are definitely welcome and included when it comes to certain events, like the start of the year barbecue, coming in for the science fair, watching the plays in elementary school and also the parent teacher interviews, where they can meet the teachers and some of the students helping out the teachers, while they wait for their interview. Sometimes family members and guardians are asked if they would like to share their experiences about certain issues or about their professions. For my alumni experience so far, I have been able to connect with a lot of the past students on Hudson's new connect website and I keep in touch with a lot of my classmates on social media, such as Instagram. I also follow the Hudson Instagram, to see the updates on school life, events and the achievements of fellow classmates and my friends in other grades.

(4.5) School Location

I think that location of Hudson is really good because for high schoolers there are many restaurants and fast food places you can eat at, if you didn't order huskies kitchen. There's a nice convenience store close by that you can go there with friends after school and there's a small fire station, that I remember going to when I was in kindergarten field trip. Also Hudson is really close to Piccininni, centre so elementary and high school students go there for certain events since it's a walking distance. Also it's really nice when we walk or run the neighbourhood for the Terry Fox run fundraiser, with the teachers supervising and directing us, so we get to explore the neighbourhood. Also it's really convenient with TTC location as well.

(5) University placement and counselling

I thought that the guidance consuellor, Ms. Wise was very good with the university application process. She gave some website resources to start looking at colleges and universities, before grade 12, to see what I might want to go into, since I didn't really have a clear vision of what schools or programs I want to go into. She started the application process well in advance, to let the students see a variety of universities with the university fairs on specific days and made sure everyone was present. She set aside specific days for a few students to set up their OUAC accounts, so that they were able to accept offers, when offered and advised students to apply for three or more programs if even you knew which one you wanted to go to. She sent emails to check up on your progress and to tell specific details for accepting offers. She sent out university information if you needed to contact them in any way. Also, if need be, she'll spend time with you one-on-one in her office, when possible, to give you guidance and support. Overall, students are in very good hands when it comes to the application process for post-secondary and she is very dedicated and caring about every student.