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Monday, June 27, 2011

Menzo counts benefits of K-5 revamp

As published in the Record Journal, Monday June 27, 2011

By Russell Blair
Record-Journal staff
rblair@record-journal.com
(203) 317-2225

WALLINGFORD — The debate leading up to the decision last year to reconfigure the town’s elementary schools was often heated and contentious. But once the plan passed, school officials said the first year of reconfiguration went smoothly.

The change has brought about the advertised results: smaller class sizes, budget savings and an increased focus on literacy education for students in the K-2 schools, but there have been other benefits, too.

And while there were some bumps along the way, and logistical challenges the district had to tackle, School Superintendent Salvatore Menzo called reconfiguration “a community success.” Reconfiguration creates two smaller groups of elementary schools and makes it easier to offer uniform instruction to the district’s students, said Assistant Superintendent for Personnel Jan Guarino. She said it has been easier to hold meetings with staff and administrators from the four K-2 or the four grade 3-5 schools, rather than getting people from all eight elementary schools together.

Two of the big strategic plan items the district purchased for next year — the Treasures reading program and hundreds of tablet computers to create literacy stations — should help bolster the reading and writing skills of the district’s youngest students. The reconfiguration allows for better resource allocation, Menzo said, and the opportunity for technology and personnel to be divided in a more consistent manner.

An unintended side effect of reconfiguration has been a greater balance in enrollment across the district’s elementary schools. Menzo said that, at times, Parker Farms and Moses Y. Beach were at risk of being considered “racially imbalanced” by the state, but reconfiguration has offered more equity across the district. Menzo said another unintended benefit has been the opportunity for him to get more involved in the community. The plan, created in Menzo’s first year as superintendent, “helped me get out in the community,” he said. Reconfiguration required input not only from parents, teachers and the Board of Education, but community organiza­tions and the police and fire departments. “I would have made those connections, but it happened faster,” Menzo said. “We had a real reason for working together; it wasn’t just a meet and greet. You can’t measure the value of those relationships.”

Financially, reconfiguration has been a gain for the district. Menzo said the move saved $1.14 million, much of it coming because the district no longer had to pay for rental properties. Menzo said the school district could not have dealt with the slight (0.42 percent) increase in its budget recommended by the mayor without the savings. The alternative, he said, would have been more teacher layoffs and elementary school classes that would be nearing 30 students.
The plan passed the school board by a 7-2 vote in May 2010, with the two “nay” votes not necessarily against the idea of reconfiguration, but rather the pace with which the district seemed to be pushing it forward. Jay Cei, a board Democrat who voted against the proposal, said at the time that the district should take at least the next year to work out the kinks. Reached Friday, Cei said he felt the plan had worked well in its first year.

The district “believed having only half the grades in each school would provide better focus and more resources at each grade level. It appears they were correct,” Cei said. “Although it will likely take another year to fully implement the programs associated with this new structure, we are already seeing some educational benefits. I think we will see many more in one more year.”

Michael Brooder, a Republican, was the other board member to vote against the plan. At the time, Brooder, like Cei, said he wasn’t against reconfiguration, but felt it would be better to wait a year. But Friday, Brooder also said he felt the first year had gone well.

“With anything you change, there’s going to be hiccups in the beginning,” Brooder said. “But I think what’s most important is that they have the same good teachers. I think it went OK.” Brooder had a daughter in second grade when the reconfiguration passed, but she avoided the transition because Rock Hill became a grade 3-5 school. “I haven’t heard anything that leads me to believe it didn’t go well,” Brooder said.

Guarino said it took the cooperation of the entire community for the plan to work, and once it was set into motion, everything went smoothly. “We were moving 10 schools and we had less than $1,000 worth of damage or items we had to replace,” she said. “It wouldn’t have been possible without everyone working together.” The difficulties with buses that some parents experienced at the start of the year would have happened regardless of reconfiguration, Guarino said, because the district had planned to redraw the bus routes anyway.

Menzo felt the district was responsive and honest. “We listened to parents’ concerns,” he said.

But not all parents agreed that the plan had been well thought out. Erin Labbe, who has twin sons at Rock Hill, said she felt there was a lack of communication between her family and the school. “I feel like it was a big mess all year,” she said. “They didn’t have it together.”

Labbe said she felt that the district had to spend so much time selling the program to parents and dealing with angry feedback that it didn’t have time to properly plan for reconfiguration. Labbe, who has an older daughter at Dag Hammarskjold Middle School, said she had good experiences with the middle school and only had trouble with her twins after they moved from Moses Y. Beach to Rock Hill.

Administrators, however, say they have gotten many more positive responses than negative. Menzo said he has been receiving phone calls from parents who have seen improvement in their children’s learning. He added that for most of the parents who were against the change, once it was made, they were onboard with doing what was best for the kids. Many of the parents who lobbied hardest against reconfiguration have helped lead the charge to implement it in the town’s schools. “The loudest voices against have become our best problem solvers,” Guarino said.

The impact on student test scores likely won’t be seen for three to five years, Menzo said. But even then, it may be impossible to ever draw a direct correlation between any test score increases and the reconfiguration.

“I don’t think we’ll ever be able to pinpoint what leads to higher scores,” he said. “We don’t want to ignore the hard work of others.”

Tuesday, June 14, 2011

Bill to Limit Use of Credit Reports in Hiring Passes Legislature

For Immediate Release
June 14, 2011

Bill to Limit Use of Credit Reports in Hiring Passes Legislature

State Representative Matt Lesser (D-Durham, Middlefield and Middletown) announced passage during the final hours of this year’s legislative session of a bill (SB361) he sponsored to protect the privacy of job applicants' credit reports.

"In this economy, people can have bad credit for all kinds of reasons - there is no necessary link between your credit score and your job performance," said Lesser, who has been fighting for similar consumer protection legislation for the past three years.

Lesser cited stories from constituents, like David Greaves of Middletown who found employers turning him away because of his credit.

"You can get caught in a credit catch-22," said Lesser. "Laid off from your job, you max out your credit cards and then find you can't get a job because your credit is shot. The credit industry is telling employers that people with bad credit are lousy employees - but there is zero evidence of this."

Specifically, the bill prohibits employers from requiring an employee or prospective employee to consent to a credit inquiry as a condition of employment. Certain businesses, like financial institutions, could use credit checks when the credit history of the applicant is substantially job related, when it is otherwise required by law or when an employer has specific reason to believe an employee may have violated the law.

Over half of employers examine the credit histories of employees and job applicants.

“Connecticut has taken a powerful step to stop the inequitable practice of screening employees and potential employees based on their credit histories. Research shows that there is no credible evidence that negative credit reports correlate to job performance. I congratulate Connecticut on increasing job opportunities for workers that had been unfairly shut out of employment,” said Miles Rapoport, President of Demos and former Connecticut Secretary of the State. “

Lesser attributed this year’s passage of the bill to the strong leadership on the issue from Senate Majority Leader Martin Looney and House Speaker Christopher Donovan.

State Representative Matt Lesser is serving his second term representing the 100th Assembly District of Durham, Middlefield, Rockfall and Middletown. He is Vice Chair of the state legislature’s Government Administration and Elections Committee.

Monday, June 13, 2011

FROM WALLINGFORD - The show will indeed go on

V-Knight_SAs published in the Record Journal, Sunday June 12, 2011

This week’s “FROM WALLINGFORD” is written by my counterpart on the column – Stephen Knight

I believe there are more instances of the abridgement of the freedom of the people by gradual and silent encroachments of those in power than by violent and sudden usurpations.” — James Madison, 1788

The tradition of a fireworks show in the Town Of Wallingford will continue this year due to the efforts of Jason Zandri, Craig Fishbein and others who solicited donations from hundreds of residents. And the only obstacle all along that had to be overcome was financial. Never was there any other reason not to continue the tradition. The money having been raised, we now take for granted that the show will indeed go on. After all, who doesn’t love a fireworks display?

With this as a backdrop, I would like to take you to San Diego, California, where I was last weekend attending a family event. As I am wont to do when traveling, I picked up the local newspaper, the San Diego Union-Tribune. In it was an article about their fireworks event, and it is a cautionary tale that I think you will find alarming.

For the past twenty-seven years, San Diego has had a fireworks display put on by the La Jolla Community Fireworks Foundation. But this year, an envirokook outfit named the Coastal Environmental Rights Foundation took the group to court, contending the display was a violation of the 1970 California Environmental Quality Act. On May 27th, a superior court judge agreed, ruling that any function that required a permit from the city had to undergo an extensive environmental review — a review that takes up to a year and can cost tens of thousands of dollars. The ruling was so sweeping that it would have applied not just to fireworks displays, but block parties, birthday parties and weddings held in city parks, charity runs and thousands of other events. Last weekend, after an incredible public outcry and nationwide ridicule, the judge stayed implementation of her order for 90 days in order that the fireworks show could be held. But after ninety days, unless the ruling is appealed, this ludicrous judicial overreach will be in force.

It has been observed by many that, in the United States, cultural, political and legal changes very often begin in California and then move east. Californians pride themselves on being the leading edge of societal change. If that is indeed so, then what now appears to be just an odd ruling pertaining to one city three thousand miles from here may eventually become the prevailing groupthink everywhere, certainly including the People’s Republic of Connecticut.

The vast and ever-expanding web of environmental laws, rulings and regulations being formulated and carried out by myriad bureaus, commissions and agencies on every level of government used to have a narrow purpose of actually improving the environment. No longer. Those in power still claim this to be the goal, but it is becoming increasingly obvious to even a casual observer that the real purpose is an exponential expansion of the nanny state.

Everyone knows the anecdote about the frog and boiling water, wherein a frog placed in a pot of boiling water will jump out, but one placed in cool water that is then heated to boiling will sit in it and die. For the most part, we live our daily lives, too busy to notice that government is intruding in our existence more and more. But once in a while, we are handed a warning of that encroachment. By sheer accident, Judge Linda Quinn of the Superior Court of California has done just that. It was John Adams, writing to his wife, that suggested we Americans celebrate our independence from an oppressive British government with fireworks every 4th of July. And so we do. What a terrible irony it is, then, that our own government seeks to extinguish such celebrations through the oppression of a crushing, burdensome and intrusive regulatory regime.

Friday, June 10, 2011

Spanish Community of Wallingford (SCOW) to mark Flag Day on June 14

The Spanish Community of Wallingford has invited the public to its first Flag Day celebration at 5 p.m. on Tuesday June 14 at the Council Chambers in Town Hall.

The event will feature the Mariachi Academy of Connecticut and the U.S. Naval Sea Cadet Corps, Edson Division, in a program of patriotic music and prose.

Children and adults are welcome to attend. For information, call Maria Harlow or Evangeline Mendoza at (203) 265-5866.

The next 'Citizen Mike' to address Mantzaris resignation, Wallingford Housing Authority and the American Legion Building

Former Wallingford Town Councilor Mike Brodinsky next "Citizen Mike" public access show discusses the recent resignation of Town Attorney Adam Mantzaris.

Additional topics include a discussion on whether Town Councilor Gerald Farrell Jr. will succeed Mantzaris, given his recent announcement of not planning to seek re-election to the Wallingford Town Council where he is currently Vice-Chair.

There is also a segment on the recent departure of Wallingford Housing Authority commissioner William Fischer as well as some discussion regarding the proposals to renovate the American Legion Building.

The show airs on cable Channel 18 at 9 p.m. every night, except Sunday and it is also available online on demand via http://www.wpaa.videoalive.com/#