Every year at the beginning of the school, parents and school staff ask themselves how the new year will go. The parents ask where they can help and the administrators ask how to get more parents involved in life of the schools. Where there is a will there is a way. Both groups can find answers in the form of shared-decision and board committees. Although the both types of committees have been around for a long … Continue reading →
Under the influence of the current accountability trend, The New York State School Boards Association (NYSSBA) aligned its methodology of evaluating superintendents and school boards to the HEDI matrix. (A sample of the matrix as used by NYSED is below). The 18-page evaluation guidelines are available on the association’s website. The NYSSBA guidelines evaluate more aspects than the matrix. The association added fields dedicated to the quality of the community-school board relationship and the … Continue reading →
At the beginning of February, I reposted in our local FB group dedicated to schools a picture from a vigil held in Port Washington. Some time passed by until a couple of days ago I read an article entitled “Have We Lost Sight of the Promise of Public Schools?,” by Nikole Hannah-Jones, published in the New York Times. The article enticed me to develop the facts I learned behind the picture into a story … Continue reading →
Stats Malverne residents approved a 2016-17 school budget. The $54.5 million budget was approved by a margin of 662-261. The budget is a 1.99 percent spending increase over the current year and it comes with a 0.83 percent hike in the school tax levy. Voters also elected challenger Jeanne D’Esposito to the Malverne Board of Education with 530 votes. She beat out incumbent Michael Taylor, who received 246 votes and Jan Kasal who received … Continue reading →
Every year in May, school district stakeholders in New York elect their representatives to the local school boards. There are around 120 of them in Long Island alone. The school boards consist of 5 to 9 ordinary residents who earn living in their line of profession and, in addition, they volunteer their free time on behalf of the students and community. The school boards govern the school district. In many communities, the school districts … Continue reading →
I launched the blog on March 22nd, 2013, inspired by a website launched by an anonymous group of Malverne UFSD activists whose mission was to promote their candidates for the BOE. Their mission ended with the elections. I intended to post information related to Malverne school district 12 for a longer time. Perhaps, for as long as I have kids in the school district, which could be another 12 years. I broadened the topic … Continue reading →
Few reflections on two Malverne UFSD BOE “meetings in public” that took place on 11/24/15 and 12/8/2015, respectively. Two days before the Thanksgiving and in anticipation of being served something better than “cookies and common core,” I attended a special BOE meeting on 11/24/15. It was supposed to start at 7 p.m. At 7:25, an absent board member was contacted by phone. While waiting, we shared our family Thanksgiving habits. The socializing came to … Continue reading →
The Malverne UFSD BOE opened the May session in public by announcing the Malverne high school was awarded the gold badge in a pilot project Schools of Opportunity. This school year, the project was available in Colorado and New York only, as the project’s co-founders, Carol Burris and Ken Welner, reside in the respective states. The recognized schools got public attention in Washington Post, in the column Answer Sheet (here and here). This publication … Continue reading →
Malverne UFSD residents approved the budget; that is good. But the residents also re-elected the incumbent who was at the first Dr. Hunderfund’s contract extension and salary increases in 2012 and at the second superintendent’s contract extension at the special meeting in 2014. In both instances, the acts of “amendment,” as the BOE calls the extensions, happened by adding them to the meeting agenda without prior discussion “in public.” … Continue reading →
In May, schools are administering local assessments that, like the standardized state tests, are used to evaluate the teachers (APPR). In June, between the 1st and 10th, selected schools are assigned to administer “field tests.” I described the nature of field tests in two posts (here and here). Briefly, these tests are collected, not graded, never returned. They help Pearson, test developer, prepare future tests. The following neighborhood schools were assigned to administer the … Continue reading →
