Lisa Seff, a Springs School science teacher, will soon be literally on top of the world, or close to it. Ms. Seff has been selected to be part of an elite team of six teachers and six researchers who will explore and collaborate in the frozen north — in this case in Barrow, Alaska, one of the northernmost cities on the planet.

    Ms. Seff, who began the application process in September, was one of 200-plus applicants. She survived several elimination rounds and learned on Jan. 4 that she had been chosen.

    “There was one teacher, it took her five years to get accepted,” Ms. Seff told the Springs School Board on Monday night. “And she had already been to space!”

    The program, called PolarTREC (which stands for Teachers and Researchers Exploring and Collaborating), is supported by the National Science Foundation, and will culminate for Ms. Seff in a two to six-week trip with a researcher, Carin Ashjian of the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institute, most likely in mid-August.

    “It will be ‘summer’ there,” Ms. Seff said, placing quote marks with her fingers. The daily high temperatures could get up to 35 degrees.

    According to its Web site, “the goal of PolarTREC is to advance polar science education and understanding by bringing [kindergarten through 12th-grade] educators and polar researchers together through hands-on field experiences.” This will lead, it is hoped, to improved teacher knowledge of multidisciplinary polar science, improved instruction, and, of course, empowering and engaging the students with reports from the Arctic Circle.

    Ms. Seff said she hopes to use Skype to communicate with not just her upper-grade science classes but the school community as a whole. There was talk at the board meeting of hooking her in to the weekly Spirit Meets that Springs holds for students through fifth grade.

    February brings a one-week trip to Fairbanks, Alaska, for an orientation, and Ms. Seff can hardly wait. “I am so excited about this,” she said.

    When the research trip begins, Ms. Seff and Ms. Ashjian will spend most of their time on the scientist’s 43-foot vessel, studying zooplankton and phytoplankton. To those who may be a little dusty in basic elementary-school ecology, zooplankton is the name for small, drifting animal organisms in the ocean or seas. Phytoplankton are free-floating plants.

    Ms. Seff is looking forward to “keeping an eye on” the phytoplankton, which can give clues to global warming, and the zooplankton, which is a favorite food of bowhead whales.

    She also looks forward to being able to visit the school in Barrow, which, she said, is similar in makeup to Springs.

    “It’s a small community,” she told the board. “The school population is 60 percent Inuit children, and it’s a fishing community with lots of history.”

    Ms. Seff’s goal is “to set up a long-term relationship between the research community and Springs School,” she said, and “to bring the whole school with us” through communication and lesson plans, which are supplied by PolarTREC.

    Many who gathered at a community forum at East Hampton High School on Tuesday night to paint a picture of the ideal district superintendent were there to say their piece about the interim superintendent, Richard Burns, who has garnered high marks from parents and staff. But Raymond Fell, who has conducted many head of school searches for districts up and down Long Island, wanted direct answers to his questions and gently kept speakers on topic.

    Once people understood that there was to be no grandstanding, they settled in to the job at hand — developing a punch list that would serve as an outline for the perfect candidate.

    The crowd was so large that the forum was moved from the district office to the new cafeteria space. Mr. Fell, a superintendent search consultant with the Eastern Suffolk Board of Cooperative Education Services, walked the group through a series of questions about the professional and personal qualities they desire in a superintendent.

    Some suggested that he or she have a background in early childhood education. One speaker pointed out that the East Hampton Day Care Learning Center, which provides prekindergarten to the district, does not offer many of the services available in other buildings in the district, most notably a school nurse. Art McCann, who has been an East Hampton taxpayer for 35 years and worked for school districts in Westchester County, said that “it can take a superintendent a long time to get to know the community.” Mr. Fell and his assistant, Terri Sweeney, spun that into “a knowledge of the culture, history, and community of East Hampton.”

    Someone else talked about the importance of having a good rapport with staff, and said the district needs a good communicator who could keep lines open with faculty, parents, and community.

    Daniel Hartnett, who until recently was the district’s bilingual social worker and has just taken on the job of being the assistant principal at the John M. Marshall Elementary School, said it is crucial “to have an advocate for children and for families in the community. Almost all programs have recently been defunded.” A new superintendent would need to develop creative partnerships with local politicians, he said.

    A technology background was also high on some speakers’ lists. And one person called for a candidate who is “student and people-centered, not building-centered.” Also on the punch list: a superintendent who is creative during difficult times and has experience with budget cuts.

    “And someone with a passion for the learning process, for life, for the community, for the school,” another man suggested. A champion for progressive education with a multicultural philosophy was also added to the drawing board.

    The board will advertise for the position in The New York Times, most likely the Jan. 22 Sunday edition, along with two ads that will go into “Education Week,” a trade publication, and on monster.com.

    The third Friday in February is the last day that the board will accept résumés, after which the interview process will begin.

    When asked if Mr. Burns had applied, Mr. Fell said, “No one has applied yet.”

    What, exactly, is a sea womp?

    It’s a sea monster that has blown into Accabonac Creek with plenty of attitude, wreaking havoc with the local flora and fauna, and it is the brainchild of the Springs School’s fourth grade.

    Last night the Super Fun 61 Opera Company (composed of 61 fourth graders) brought the curtain up on “The Tale of Sea Womp” at Guild Hall to a packed and appreciative audience.

    This foray into the land reserved — at least in the minds of most elementary school students — for rousing renditions of “Kill the Wabbit” was begun by Sue Ellen O’Connor and Colleen McGowan, two art teachers at Springs, 15 years ago, after Ms. O’Connor became aware of a Metropolitan Opera program called Creating Original Opera.

    “They offered to train teachers,” Ms. O’Connor said when she sat down for a few minutes on Sunday during the dress rehearsal at Guild Hall. There wasn’t the time or money that first year to send anybody to the program. There was, however, a manual describing the finer points of putting on a full-scale opera with children. “We went by the book,” she said with a smile. “We did it cold.”

    It started with a rumor: “The Rumor,” the first opera produced in the school’s commons room, was a collaboration by the fourth, fifth, and sixth grades.

    Ms. O’Connor loved the program right from the get-go. “I saw students empowered and excited,” she said. “I had never seen anything like it before.”

    The fourth grade is in charge of the creative process from beginning to end, from soup to nuts, from the first line written to the last bow taken. The students come up with the idea, write the play, design the sets and costumes and the lighting and sound, generate the program, and manage sales and promotions. “It’s authentic education,” Ms. O’Connor said.

    There are, of course, some adults involved. This year, in addition to Ms. O’Connor, the staff includes Eileen Goldman, Kate Rabinowitz, Margaret Thompson, and Lisa Weston, with music provided by Kyril Bromley and John Gibbons.

    But it is about, and for, the kids. More than 600 students have participated in the opera program over the past decade and a half, and it has become a part of the Springs School tradition.

    “The kids from kindergarten on know about the opera,” Ms. O’Connor said. “They’re excited in advance — ‘Oh, my sister was in that one,’ ‘I saw that one last year.’ The standard has become very high.”

    Sure enough, Ally Friedman, who plays an electric eel, said she is looking forward to it. “I saw my sister do it a couple of years ago.”

    Colin Freedman is playing the part of a snapper. He said he enjoyed the writing process, although he was a little nervous about the impending opening night. “But I’m excited to do it,” he said.

    Jeremy Vizcayno, the flounder, was flip-flopping for a while. “I did want to do it, I didn’t want to do it,” he said. “Finally, I did want to.” He is especially excited about the fourth-grade trip to the Met in February, when the students will get a chance to see a performance of “Aida.”

    This year’s production is chock-full of local references and humor. “One character says, ‘I’ve been all the way to Louse Point and back,’ ” Ms. O’Connor said. She hopes the students come away from the experience “feeling that they can do almost anything,” she said, “and with a love of theater.”

    There are two performances today, at 9:30 and 10:45 a.m., and tomorrow at 9:30 a.m. The shows are free, and the public has been invited to attend.

Historical Scholarships

    The Bridgehampton Historical Society has introduced a scholarship program for high school seniors who live in the greater Bridgehampton area, including Sagaponack and Hayground. The historical society’s mission is to inspire the documentation, preservation, and interpretation of the history, oral history, and cultural traditions of Bridgehampton and its surrounding communities.

    In line with this mission, the society has invited students to submit oral history essays by March 15. Each essay must be an account of a local occurrence, must be between 1,000 and 1,500 words, and must be a recollection by someone from the Bridgehampton area pertaining to that place. Finalists will be selected by April 30, and the winner will receive a check for $1,000.

    Those with a historical bent can find out more by visiting bridgehamptonhistoricalsociety.org or by calling the society.

On the Music of Film

    The Ross School will present an evening with Carter Burwell, a composer of film scores, tomorrow at 7 in the Senior Building Lecture Hall on Goodfriend Drive in East Hampton. Mr. Burwell, a parent of two Ross students, will speak about his work, including what it is like to work on big-budget Hollywood movies, how he got started, and his creative process. A question-and-answer session will follow.

    Those who attend will also be treated to a 7:30 p.m. screening of “Twilight,” for which Mr. Burwell supplied the evocative score. The event is free and open to the public. Along with almost every film made by the Coen brothers, Mr. Burwell also scored “The Kids Are All Right.”

    With an acceptance to Cornell University in the fall, Sam Miller, a Pierson student who will be his graduating class’s valedictorian, is planning to study computer science as a possible major.

    However, it is his foray into organic chemistry in Robert Schumacher’s Advanced Placement chemistry classroom, where he has isolated a compound from beech trees that could be made into a powerful medicine, that has brought Sam to the forefront of the most prestigious pre-college science competition in the nation.

    Sam has made the first cut of the Intel Science Talent Search 2012, one of 300 of the nation’s brightest culled from 1,839 applicants — the most the competition has ever seen. Modern-day real geniuses compete for $1.25 million in prizes and scholarships in categories ranging from math and physics to biochemistry and engineering.

    The 300 semifinalists are each awarded $1,000, with another $1,000 going to their school. If Sam makes the next cut to be one of the 40 finalists (he finds out next week), he could be eligible to be the grand-prize winner, who is awarded a $100,000 scholarship.

    Dr. Schumacher, affectionately known as Schu by Sam and others, has sent a student to semifinalist status for the past seven years of the Intel competition. His brother, Richard, is also a teacher at Pierson, and they tag-teamed Sam, with Robert as supervising scientist and Richard as teaching mentor, providing equipment that Sam needed through previous employment with a pharmaceutical company.

    “I was inspired by Schu,” Sam said on Tuesday. He explained that he had continued the researach of Ailish Bateman, a former Pierson student, working with a sooty mold compound derived from American beech trees.

    “She had isolated anti-fungal properties,” he said. His work tested for micro-bacterial properties and discovered an antibiotic that could work against drug-resistant infections.

    In light of this week’s news from India, where a particularly nasty strain of drug-resistant tuberculosis has been uncovered, discoveries like this could be of paramount importance.

    Sam hopes to publish a paper on his findings later this spring, most likely in the Journal of Natural Products, a publication by the American Chemical Society.

    “It’s exciting,” said Robert Schumacher. “This is the junior Nobel Prize. And it helps to show someone, even someone as intelligent as Sam, how much work goes into formulating a science paper.”

    Kate Mueth and the Neo-Political Cowgirls dance company will hold a mini workshop for girls 8 to 18 on Dec. 18 at the Hampton Ballet Theatre School in Bridgehampton.

    The workshop is for girls from all walks of life, and no dance experience is necessary. Combining journaling and storytelling with expressive movement, the four-hour workshop will culminate in a dance theater piece set to music and based on the participants’ personal experiences.

    The workshop costs $50. Preregistration, which is required, will be held from noon to 4 p.m. on Dec. 18. Ms. Mueth can be e-mailed for more information at [email protected].

Edible Schoolyard

    The Springs Seedlings Project will host the next meeting of the Edible School Garden on Wednesday at the Springs School. Founded by two of the school’s parents, Bryan Futerman of Foody’s restaurant in Water Mill and Joe Realmuto, the executive chef at Nick and Toni’s in East Hampton, who raised money to build a greenhouse and garden, the project is now open year round and has become a model for other edible schoolyard efforts.

    The meeting will take place in the school’s greenhouse from 4:30 to 6 p.m. It will include a tour of the Seedlings Project’s work.

    A dire prediction was heard Monday night on the effect of the recent state law imposing a 2-percent cap on tax levies for all municipalities and school districts.

    Speaking at a meeting of local school districts with students in the East Hampton schools, Anthony Cashara of School Aid Specialists, a firm that works with schools on state aid and other revenues, said the new law would “change the way schools operate. It will slowly squeeze, and permanently reduce, the amount of money schools have to operate.”

    The joint meeting, held at East Hampton High School, was called to review the ramifications of the cap. “It’s a brand-new world we’re entering,” the East Hampton School District’s interim superintendent, Richard Burns, said. “There is spotty and limited information from New York State.”

    The biggest problem, Mr. Cashara said, is that “there have been no written guidelines for public schools on this, after having been passed four or five months ago.”

    Using PowerPoint, Mr. Cashara told the representatives of the six school boards at the meeting that the new law nevertheless had “some wiggle room.” It isn’t “really a 2-percent property tax cap; there are certain things excluded based on how the numbers fall.”

    Capital improvements and pension and retirement costs above 2 percent are exempt from the cap, for example. However, if voters defeat a budget twice and a district is forced to adopt a contingency, or austerity, plan, the tax increase is zero, Mr. Cashara said. “Any increases at all have to be absorbed through program cuts.”

    However, a supermajority of voters in a district — over 60 percent — could veto a budget based on the 2-percent cap. Then, Mr. Cashara said, “there’s no limit. People are still voting on a budget, not a tax levy.” If a budget with a less- than-2-percent increase in the levy gets 60 percent of the vote, “you’re tied into it.”

    Mr. Cashara noted that “the law might be changed, because when this hits Albany, with these different interpretations, the Legislature may say, ‘Wait a minute, this isn’t what we voted for.’ ”

    Mr. Cashara explained that New York City and its school districts had been exempt from the cap, while at the same time it had been tied until June 15, 2016, to New York’s rent control statutes. Mr. Cashara said there was “no obvious reason” to link the bill to rent control “except to gain interest from New York City Democrats, to bring them into the discussion.”

    During the following discussion, Kathee Burke Gonzalez, the president of the Springs School Board, asked, “If a budget doesn’t pass at 60 percent, but a proposition does, does the proposition pass?”

    “The way this is written right now, no,” Mr. Cashara answered.

    “What does this do to negotiations?” Laura Anker Grossman, the president of the East Hampton board, wanted to know. “If you have 4-percent steps, will contracts start including provisions for freezing steps for a contingent budget?” That was one of the issues on Mr. Cashara’s list, but it was one without an answer at the moment.

    “Never has there been such a proposed change mandated with so little information,” he said. “Always beware of laws that pass at 2 in the morning. This law was introduced at midnight in Albany, didn’t go to the Education Committee, went right to the floor, and was passed,” he said.

Nutcracker Ballet

    The Hampton Ballet Theatre School and the Conservatory of Ballet and Danse Arts will present Tchaikovsky’s holiday classic “The Nutcracker” this weekend at Guild Hall and the Southampton High School.

    At Guild Hall, the Hampton Ballet Theatre School production choreographed by Sara Jo Strickland, will be staged tomorrow at 7 p.m., Saturday at 1 and 7 p.m., and Sunday at 2 p.m.

    Admission is $20, $15 for children under 12, and tickets are available in advance by e-mailing [email protected].

    The Southampton production, choreographed by Megan Cancellieri and Betteanne Terrell, features two Conservatory of Ballet and Danse Arts sharing the role of the Sugar Plum Fairy — Ciena Quinn, a Bridgehampton High School senior, and Sarah Talmage, a senior at East Hampton High School. Showtimes are tomorrow at 7 p.m., Saturday at 1 and 7 p.m., and Sunday at 2 p.m. Tickets cost $15, $10 for children 4 to 16 and grandparents.

Bread & Poetry

    Tomorrow evening, the Hayground School in Bridgehampton will play host to a family event, “Bread & Poetry: A Saggitarian Reading.” The evening, hosted by Hayground Forum, a community initiative, is the first in a series titled “Bread & . . . ”

    The poets Cheryl Boyce-Taylor and Kathy Engel will be on hand to share poetry, and participants will also have a chance to bake their own focaccia bread and shop with local vendors.

    The evening begins at 6 p.m. Hayground is located at 151 Mitchells Lane in Bridgehampton.

Lights, Camera . . . Camera?

    Sue Ellen O’Connor, a teacher at Springs School and an award-winner for the “Springs In Action” television show that she produced with students, has sent out a note that the film club at the school is in need of camcorders. The younger students use mini DV recorders to make movies for their film festivals, and there just aren’t enough to go around this year.

    With technology constantly changing, Ms. O’Connor is hoping that some families may have this sort of camcorder to donate. Two are needed. Those who are upgrading to the latest video camera and have no use for their old one can contact her at [email protected].

Young Playwrights Performance

    Ten short plays written and performed by high school students from the East End and the Bronx will be presented at Stony Brook Southampton’s Avram Theater on Saturday at 7 p.m.

    The free event marks the end of the 2011 Young American Writers Project high school playwriting program, led by Emma Walton and Will Chandler, and will feature plays by students from Bridgehampton, Pierson, Southampton, Eastport-South Manor, the Ross School, Shelter Island, Westhampton Beach, and the Foreign Language Academy of Global Studies in the Bronx, written in collaboration with professionals.

    Professional actors will appear in the plays, which run the gamut from comedies to dramas, with the subject matter drawn from issues that are important to the students.

    The Avram Theater is in the Fine Arts Building on the campus of Stony Brook Southampton.

Snowy Adventure

    On Saturday, the Dolly Wagglers of Vermont will take their puppet show “The Mystery of Ice Mountain” to the Goat on a Boat Puppet Theatre in Sag Harbor. With rod puppets, live music, and intricate scenery, this is a tale of an expedition in a remote, snowy region that leads to mysterious encounters. It is good for all ages.

    Shows are at 11 a.m. and 3 p.m. Tickets cost $10, $9 for grandparents, and $5 for children under 3. The theater is on East Union Street behind Christ Episcopal Church, and its Web site is goatonaboat.org.

    A petition filed by parents who live in the area of Woodbine Drive, Glade Road, and Sandra Road to bring back a discontinued bus stop was denied by the Springs School Board on Monday night.

    The written petition submitted earlier in the year caused the school board to commission a child safety zone study, as the parents who petitioned stated that the area, which is just within the one-mile cutoff for buses, was hazardous for kids walking to school.

    The Eastern Suffolk Board of Cooperative Educational Services, in consultation with the New York State Department of Transportation, determined that the area did not qualify for the establishment of a child safety zone. However, Michael Hartner, the district superintendent, was directed to ask the East Hampton Town Board for a reduced speed limit there and a blinking yellow light.

    Also Monday night, Bill Hallman, the school’s library specialist, gave a presentation on the library media program and the Common Core Learning Standards. He told the board of the revamped school library Web site, “where kids can find the right resources and bring it back to the class,” he said.

    When it comes to book borrowing, Mr. Hallman was pleased to report, “We’re 1,100 books over where we were last year.”

    David Baird, the head bus driver, presented Cheryl George, another driver, with a citation. “Cheryl saw a child, unattended, walking on the side of the road,” he said. “The child needed assistance. Cheryl made an important difference in that child’s life that day.”    

    Mr. Baird also continued a discussion of propane-fueled school buses, which are more expensive to purchase but save on fuel and are better for the environment in the long term.   

    The Amagansett School library was decked out in holiday finery on Tuesday as the Amagansett Holiday Store — goodies and gifts piled high on four large tables — opened for business.

    Unlike other, or any, South Fork businesses, all items ranged in price from 50 cents to $5. Almost all of them were donated or purchased at a deep discount from local stores. And the median age of shoppers was about 8 years old.

    “It’s for the kids,” said Holly Li, the store’s planner and a parent of two children at the school. “It’s a great way for them to learn how to shop for others and assert their independence.”

    Prekindergartners through sixth graders — the entire Amagansett School student population, in other words — are allowed into the two-day holiday store one grade at a time.

    “We send letters home explaining it,” Ms. Li said. “Sometimes the kids come in with a list of people to shop for. Sometimes the family gives them extra money, and sometimes they use their allowances.”

    Although the store has been running during the holidays for about a decade, only recently have local shops — Crossroads Music, Stuart’s Seafood, Gone Local, BookHampton, Amber Waves Farm, and Mary’s Marvelous — gotten involved, which is thanks to Ms. Li’s reaching out to the Amagansett business community.

    “Last year BookHampton and Amber Waves were really generous,” she said. “It’s so great to have others on board. With even more businesses, it could be even better.”

    Charlene Spektor, BookHampton’s owner, called the gifts “an investment in the future. It’s wonderful that kids can give books to their parents, that they consciously think, ‘My parents read — this is a good idea.’ What could be more fun?” she said.

    With the economy being what it is, Ms. Li is even more appreciative of the businesses that donated goods. “The idea was for the stuff to be from overstock,” she explained. “But nowadays, stores don’t really keep a lot of overstocked items. Also, it’s the holidays. It’s a busy season, and for the businesses to donate so much,” she looked around, “it’s really extraordinary.”

    Trinkets and stocking stuffers dominated, with guitar picks for Dad or Mom, different bread and cookie mixes, chocolate treats, toys and books, boiled wool ornaments, even jewelry, as well as other items that just begged to be played with.

    Although, Ms. Li said, “if the kids have extra money, they buy a little something for themselves,” the purpose of the store is to allow the children a chance to think of their loved ones and buy gifts for them.

    A pre-K student entered the store