For two hours, school board members wrestled with ways to heed calls to restore cut staff for valued programs but ultimately followed the counsel of administrators not to further tap reserve funds.

Community members described Margaret Della Rocco, who died after an accident on Monday, as the center of a close-knit family, raising her four children to work with and appreciate the environment.

"The stuff you sell, you have to work hard to get" is one of the many things Guilderland Elementary students learned by creating business to sell goods they had made.

The Guilderland Teachers' Association was fully reimbursed in February for the over $100,000 that was stolen from its dues but no one is saying where the money for reimbursement  came from.

GUILDERLAND — The day after the state settled on its final budget, with a much-ballyhooed $1.1 billion increase in aid to education, the school board here faced a hard reality: Not much had changed.

When twice the number of people expected showed up to take Civil Service tests at Farnsworth Middle School, the overflow parked in frozen fields that thawed as the day warmed.

Britton Schnurr, the psychologist at Lynnwood Elementary School, being honored with a Champions of Character award, has discovered that the kids most at risk are those who bully.

"The working poor and elderly just can't make their bills," says the chairman of the food pantry, which is reaching out for more volunteers, more food and donations — and more clients.

A Guilderland senior told her school board — with some members who no longer want to support Tech Valley High — that school brought her out of her shell, preparing her for life's challenges.

With three seats at play in the Guilderland School Board elections, only three petitions have been taken, two  by incumbents; candidates' petitions are due back on April 21.