■Pupils at the Lilly Kindergarten in Florence were visited yesterday by a favorite friend who is very much in season now. Santa Claus greeted the children and gave them each a candy cane.
■Duane Robinson, director of Northampton’s Academy of Music, cordially invites all area parents to take or send their children to the Academy on Saturday for a free theatre Christmas party sponsored by the management. There will be cartoons and the feature presentation “Ring of Bright Water” starring Bill Travers and Virginia McKenna.
■Nearly 20 volunteers who work in the Emergency Cot Program joined with advocates for the homeless, including two clergy members, to demand housing in a rally at City Hall Monday afternoon. After some marched down from the Northampton State Hospital, where vacant buildings are being eyed for use as a shelter, the group sang and chanted in a protest they said was aimed not at city leaders, but at state officials.
■At 1:30 a.m., four Santa Clauses walked into Jake’s Restaurant on King Street and ordered coffee. It seems that the Santas were in the middle of making deliveries about the city when they ran out of steam. “They looked exactly like Santa,” says Jessica McClelland, 25, who waits on tables at Jake’s.
■An Amherst Regional School Committee member said Tuesday that the district should consider new approaches to recruiting minority teachers, because of a persistent racial disparity between students and staff. While 52% of elementary students and 63% of secondary students are white, 82% of elementary staff and 85% of secondary staff are white, according to a report the committee discussed Tuesday.
■An estimated 3,500 children from around the region will have visited Santa’s Trains at Look Park, formerly known as Santa’s Workshop, by the time the ever-popular feature closes for the season at 4 p.m. on Saturday. Santa’s Workshop opened about 40 years ago at the former Pancake Cabin at Look Park, moving to the park’s train depot after the restaurant burned down. In 2009, the attraction moved to the more spacious and luxurious Garden House.