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Sweet Traditions
With winter still lingering in Vermont, March brings the sweet arrival of sugar season. This Tradition Thursday, we celebrate the kickoff to maple sugaring, a practice deeply rooted in the landscape and culture of our campus. Our original Sugar House once stood where West Hill dormitory currently is situated. Today, the Sugar House can be found up Shepard Lane, nestled in the heart of our 450 acres, surrounded by the quiet beauty of our sugar bush.
The process begins in late winter when temperatures begin to fluctuate, freezing nights followed by warmer days. These conditions cause sap to flow within the maple trees. Students and faculty head into our 7 acres of tapped sugar bush to drill small holes into mature sugar maples and insert 530 taps, or “spiles.” From there, the sap travels through a network of tubing that winds through the woods and carries the clear, slightly sweet liquid downhill to the Sugar House.
Once collected, the sap is stored and then boiled in the evaporator. Because sap is mostly water, it takes patience and steady heat to concentrate the sugars. As the sap boils, steam billows from the Sugar House and the liquid slowly thickens and darkens into maple syrup. The syrup is then carefully filtered and graded before being bottled. Maple syrup is graded based on its color, clarity, and flavor, which are influenced by when the sap is collected during the sugaring season. Grading helps consumers choose syrup based on how strong or delicate they want the flavor to be.
With Vermont Academy’s educational philosophy based on four historic values of ingenuity, independence, community, and love of the land, the maple producing process is integrated into our curriculum. Students in several science classes take part in each step of the process, from tapping trees and monitoring the sap lines to helping with the evaporation and learning about forest ecology and sustainable land management. The reward for their work is getting to taste the final product, often served in our dining hall, connecting the classroom directly to the land around us. Over the past several years, Vermont Academy Sugar House has produced an average of 180-200 gallons of syrup, which averages out to about 0.35 gallons/tap. Make sure the next time you are on campus, you stop by our school store to purchase your own bottle of maple syrup made right here, honoring tradition and the land.
And here’s a fun sugaring fact: it takes about 40 gallons of sap to produce just one gallon of maple syrup.
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Once collected, the sap is stored and then boiled in the evaporator. Because sap is mostly water, it takes patience and steady heat to concentrate the sugars. As the sap boils, steam billows from the Sugar House and the liquid slowly thickens and darkens into maple syrup. The syrup is then carefully filtered and graded before being bottled. Maple syrup is graded based on its color, clarity, and flavor, which are influenced by when the sap is collected during the sugaring season. Grading helps consumers choose syrup based on how strong or delicate they want the flavor to be.
With Vermont Academy’s educational philosophy based on four historic values of ingenuity, independence, community, and love of the land, the maple producing process is integrated into our curriculum. Students in several science classes take part in each step of the process, from tapping trees and monitoring the sap lines to helping with the evaporation and learning about forest ecology and sustainable land management. The reward for their work is getting to taste the final product, often served in our dining hall, connecting the classroom directly to the land around us. Over the past several years, Vermont Academy Sugar House has produced an average of 180-200 gallons of syrup, which averages out to about 0.35 gallons/tap. Make sure the next time you are on campus, you stop by our school store to purchase your own bottle of maple syrup made right here, honoring tradition and the land.
And here’s a fun sugaring fact: it takes about 40 gallons of sap to produce just one gallon of maple syrup.
Vermont Academy is a coed college preparatory boarding and day school in southern Vermont, serving grades 9-12 plus a postgraduate year.
