"June 2, 2008 Forum Questions and Answers" from Walter Nardelli

June 2, 2008 Forum Questions and Answers

Question 1: How can we overcome some of the differences between houses?

Answer:
The curriculum and expected outcomes are the same. It is available on our web site under curriculum and in more detail at the CSSU web site under departments. That is the document that is guiding instruction and is based on our national and state standards. Teachers do bring different strengths to their instruction and this creates slightly different experiences in each house. For example, every single lesson on the Civil War isn’t exactly the same, but they all study the Civil War and expect students to know the causes of the war. The areas that we are hearing the least concerns about are mathematics and literacy. These are curriculum areas that we have worked on aligning the most. In both math and literacy we have many common assessments in place. This is the work that needs to happen in science and social studies.

Concern 2: Parents worry if children are placed in the right house.

Answer: There is no right or wrong house. Each house has different strengths and no matter where your child ends up he/she will have opportunities to grow and learn. Our hope is by opening up house changes at the end of 2nd and 6th grade, parents will be less worried about their child being placed on a house for four years.

Question 3: What is the make-up of students in Full House?

Answer: There are 31 students in grade eight assigned to Full House.

Question 4: How can we better balance the identity of the house with the identity of the school?

Answer: This has already been established with faculty as a goal to on next year. We are currently working on building a schedule that allows all of our 5/6 students and 7/8 students to go to lunch and recess together. We are also brainstorming and implementing other ways to create a stronger sense of school. This year the graduation speeches are not being selected by house. Instead, all students were invited to respond to a prompt and two from the middle school were chosen to be read at graduation. Our school Climate Committee will write their goals this summer to include other ways to grow our sense of school. We’ve asked every person in the school to think about what they can do to increase our sense of school and with everyone working on this issue we will be able to balance the sense of school and house better.

Question 5: How was the decision to go to full day Kindergarten related to the change in configuration?

Answer: It wasn’t. We would have reduced the number of classroom sections regardless of whether kindergarten was added or not. We knew that for the past two years our student population was declining. With pressure from the community of Williston to bring in a budget with a reasonable percent of increase, this was the year to act.

Question 6: How was the community engaged in the reconfiguration process?

Answer: We surveyed the community. We had seven hundred and forty-two responses. We then took the information gained by the survey to craft a first step solution for next year. Along the way, information was shared/discussed with the FAPAC and at public school board meetings. Before going further, more information and more community dialogue would be needed.

Concern 7: House balance gender issue

Answer: Any time you allow parents to have an opportunity around black and white issues (grades/no grades, kiva/ no kiva, siblings) there is a potential to create imbalance in houses. If you honor the parent’s request (especially at this time when students were being moved due to the dissolving of houses) then it has the potential to throw the balance off and in this case gender. If we do not honor parent input, then we are told we did not listen. We are working to rectify this situation. This will have to be studied very carefully as we talk about offering more configuration options.

Question 8: Are we meeting the State of Vermont requirement of 120 hours of instruction for social studies and science in the middle grades?

Answer: We believe that we are or very close to the 120 hours requirement when taking into account both direct instruction and instruction that is integrated within other areas. We are currently conducting an audit to tally the time. This process is complex as some of the instruction takes place directly in a science or social studies class and some takes place within other instructional areas. An example of this is literature circles. Most houses spend some time reading books related to social studies. Both social studies concepts and reading strategy work are part of the instruction. As a school, we are making a determination as to how much of the time should be counted as social studies and how much as language arts.

Question 9: Can the school intentionally share “best practices” across houses as a way to increase consistency of houses?

Answer: Yes, this work was actually started in the upper houses this year. Teachers brainstormed topics together and intentionally shared house practices related to these topics at faculty meetings. This work will continue well into next year.

Question 10: How will the school ensure that all students who moved to different houses don’t miss any of the required science and social studies curriculum?

Answer: Now that students have been placed, the science and social studies committees are aligning students with where they are in the 4-year curriculum rotations and identifying the potential gaps and overlaps. Once that has been completed, the school will tap into a variety of existing school resources to provide students with instruction in the areas needed.

Question 11: If the enrollment continues to decline or if it increases, how will the house system adjust to this?

Answer: The current model was put together with that thought in mind. It can be adjusted to meet the student population numbers. In addition, the Williston School Board is forming a committee to review the Williston Conceptual Frameworks which will also address this issue.

Question 12: How are our students with lower socio-economic backgrounds performing?

Answer: We are not making AYP (annual yearly progress) in this category in both reading and math. Over the past few years, we have been boosting our resources to address this issue. This year we have added all day kindergarten. We have also increased our math interventionist to 100%. We have increased our Reading Recovery resources by another .5 position. We have also added another .5 home-school coordinator to help families access the basic resources that they are entitled to. In the past, we created another EEE classroom due to high numbers. All of these initiatives directly impact this student population and their academic needs.

Question 13: How can my student have more music instruction than science or social studies instruction?

Answer: All upper house students take one 6-week rotation of keyboarding each year. In addition, students may choose to participate in band or chorus or both. Band and chorus take place during the 11:05 block each day and each meet 4 days per week. A small number of students choose to participate in both band and chorus, along with their required keyboarding class. If you compare this time allocation to direct science or social studies instruction, it might look concerning. However, you need to compare both the direct instructional time and the integrated time together to get a fair comparison.

Question 14: How can we all work together to decrease the negative tone in the community and work together on behalf of our students?

Answer: Communication. We have FAPAC meetings every month where administration, teachers and parents discuss issues, communication in general, the budget and more. Please take time to attend. In addition, we have created an administrative page in the “Bell” and a way the community can reach us and ask questions. We will also be more proactive in getting information out about programs and practices that parents should be aware of. The School Board will also host curriculum information nights as part of school board meetings on a regular basis.

Question 15: How will the administration communicate better with the parent community?

Answer: In response to some of the concerns around communication, the administration is providing the parents with weekly updates in the School Bell. In addition, an e-mail account has been established for parents to ask questions at any time. Throughout the summer, we will be posting updates about next year on our website for parents to access.

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Monday's Community Forum - What did you think?

After taking some time to digest the outcome of Monday night's community forum, we now want to share some of our thoughts and feedback we have already received with the hope of garnering additional feedback from those in attendance.

We want to thank everyone who attended the forum and particularly those who addressed the administration, school board and the community with their comments and questions. There were very powerful statements throughout the evening both praising and expressing grave concerns about our schools. We know how hard it is to publically express your thoughts and concerns particularly with a topic which generates such great personal and social emotion. It is reassuring to know how many people in this wonderful community care and want what is best for all of the children in our village.

We also wish to acknowledge and thank the School Board for scheduling the forum and for the formation of a new Frameworks Committee which will convene this summer and work through December. We look forward to hearing the reworded background and charge of this committee and who the chosen committee members will be. (Please see this week's School Bell for further information.)

We do want to share that our campaign was not aware that there would be no dialogue from the Administration and/or School Board at Monday's forum. The lack of participation from the Administration and School Board was disheartening and very hard for many to accept.

When our Reconfiguration Committee met with Walter Nardelli, John Terko, and Carter Smith; teachers Al Myers and Margaret Munt; and two school board members, Laura Gigliotti and Deb Moody (who attended as citizens) on May 12th, we were left with an impression that the Administration would answer all of the questions from the May community forum at the future School Board-sponsored forum. At this meeting, Walter also pledged to conduct an "audit" of the number of hours of instruction taking place in all four core subject areas across the Upper Houses and stated that he would present the results of this audit at such a forum.

The goals of this future forum were clearly communicated and agreed upon by all in attendance. We were never informed that written responses via the School Bell would replace a public discussion of the questions and answers. Upon reading Walter Nardelli's written responses, we were left to assume that further exploration and clarification of these answers would take place when we all came together for the forum.

We wholeheartedly agree with those of you who attended on Monday expecting more from this forum. It is unfortunate and frustrating that we all missed a wonderful opportunity for education and answers and, more importantly, an opportunity to exchange ideas with the school. However, we really want to move forward and collaborate with the Administration and School Board to further improve our schools. In order to facilitate change, we need to keep up our efforts to communicate cooperatively and with civility.

We do not agree with Walter's decision to respond to community questions and comments exclusively in the School Bell. This simply cannot be the only avenue of communication between the community and the school. With this in mind, we will attempt to explore a more meaningful and responsive method of communication for the administration to consider and would entertain any suggestions you may have to present to them.

We look forward to your feedback regarding the forum and welcome comments and suggestions from the Board, Administration, and teachers. Please feel free to comment, ask questions, or provide suggestions that will help us continue to work for our children and our schools either via email or on our blog where we will post this letter.

Thank you.

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