My Goal in Blogging

I started this blog in May of 2008, shortly after my election to the School Committee, because I believed it was very important to both provide the community with an opportunity to share their thoughts with me about our schools and to provide me with an opportunity for me to ask questions and share my thoughts and reasoning. I have found the conversation generated on my blog to be extremely helpful to me in learning community views on many issues. I appreciate the many people who have taken the time to share their views. I believe it is critical to the quality of our public schools to have a public discussion of our community priorities, concerns and aspirations.

Friday, September 10, 2010

Education Matters: ARMS principal taking steps for improvement

This is the first week of my semester, so I've been swamped - but will finish the summary of the last Amherst SC meeting this weekend. In the meantime, here's a link to my September Education Matters column in the Amherst Bulletin (http://amherstbulletin.com/story/id/181393/).

One more note: the Regional SC meeting for next week (September 14th) has been cancelled -- we will meet next on WEDNESDAY (so this is the HS library, not town hall), September 22nd, at 7 pm. That meeting will include the district improvement plan as well as the law firm vote (and will not be shown live, since it is not at town hall).

10 comments:

Michael Jacques said...

I couldn't agree with you more. Mike Hayes said he would hit the ground running if he became the principle. He is indeed doing just that. Great job by everyone involved.

Anonymous said...

Catherine, you kindly left out of your column how much heat you took for voicing parent concerns about the middle school -- concerns echoed by other teachers in the system. You poiont out potential problems, look for information and then demand solutions. Thank you, on behalf of our schoolchildren and many parents, for your leadership and williness to speak out, despite constant criticism

Anonymous said...

Catherine, you kindly left out of your column how much heat you took for voicing parent concerns about the middle school -- concerns echoed by other teachers in the system. You poiont out potential problems, look for information and then demand solutions. Thank you, on behalf of our schoolchildren and many parents, for your leadership and williness to speak out, despite constant criticism

Curious observer said...

Did Dr. Beers help with the analysis, improvements and detail of the middle school improvement plan? If yes, could the same assistance be useful to the high school's reworking of their plan?

Anonymous said...

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/39100605/ns/health-kids_and_parenting/?ocid=twitter

self harm increasing and not tied to study halls.

Anonymous said...

what's the middle school doing about this?
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/09/14/education/14suspend.html?src=twt&twt=nytimes

Anonymous said...

Sorry but I really don't feel like punching in 22 letters, numbers and backslashes to find out what you two people are talking about. Could you jot down a line or two to say what you want to say?

Anonymous said...

Anon 12:42 -- use your cut and paste!

In regard to the NYT article:
I thought that, although suspension rates at ARPS were slightly higher for students of color, they weren't significantly higher. They certainly are not 3 or 4 times higher. And I'd like to see this data reported in terms of income or other factors (in addition to race). Are low SES white students also being suspended at disproportional rates?

Thanks for the link to this post.

Anonymous said...

Left click, highlight, right click, copy. Then paste up in the "www" line.

Anonymous said...

Cut and paste works great but the title of the NYtimes article is Advertise on NYTimes.com
Racial Disparity in School Suspensions