Martha's Vineyard 1996 was a year of storms. There were tempests of the natural sort: September's Hurricane Edouard, though less fearsome than predicted, tore into the Island with gusts up to 80 miles per hour, tossing tree limbs around like chopsticks. An unexpected January blizzard dumped 20 inches of snow on the Island, the biggest one-day tally in nine years. Rain was a dreary, dull constant. The Vineyard absorbed a record 61 inches of rainfall this year, and the Island often looked more like Seattle than a sunny paradise.

Here’s a proposed expedition every bit as adventurous (but not nearly as brutal) as Capt. Shackleton’s trek across South Georgia Island: Why not sit down with loved ones and plan to attend every last event being staged over the coming weekend — Dec. 11 to Dec. 13 — of the Christmas In Edgartown extravaganza?

The classroom is both comfortable and practical. Furnished with stacks of books, a Macintosh computer and a sprawling leather sofa, it is a bright room with windows offering a view of a forest and enough light to nourish three potted plants.

Here, nestled in the giant L-shaped sofa, half a dozen students read novels and write in journals. Some talk quietly, and others work on "dialogue journals." That means they write entries directed to teacher Meredith Collins, then leave the notebooks in a basket, where Miss Collins finds them and writes responses.

In Max Butler's first weeks at school, he will help set up a computer system.

Max, 12, will also join other students of various ages in a writers' workshop. He will take classes called understanding math and algebra, studies in science and problem-solving.

And that's only the first month.

An advisor with the new Martha's Vineyard Public Charter School helped Max design this schedule recently. In coming weeks, they will decide what comes next.

"It's pretty exciting," said Max, of Gay Head. "For the first time ever, I can't really wait to go back to school."