Are Our Schools In Crisis?: Summer Board Meetings are Important!

It was decided at the June 28th board meeting that the meetings scheduled for July would be held at Grieco Elementary School

Just because it is summer time doesn't mean that the fight has ended. There is no vacation when your child's future is on the line.  Show you care. Attend the summer board meetings. Let this Board of Ed. and this Superintendent know that you care and that you are watching.

Wednesday, July 13
Board of Education Special Meeting
7:00 PM
Executive Session, to discuss items permitted under the Open Public Meetings Act

Thursday, July 21

Board of Education Meeting

Closed session: 6:30 PM

Open session: 8:00

Grieco Elementary School

Thursday, August 18

Board of Education Meeting

Closed session: 6:30 PM

Open session: 8:00 PM

Grieco Elementary School
Durie Ave. across the street from the stadium

Are Our Schools In Crisis?: Not Another Pilot Program!

Some opportunities ARE really PIE in the sky ideas for many reasons. School districts should beware of stretching too hard at the seams. If teachers are rationing paper and the children do not have textbooks, you don't put up a $14 thousand or $19 thousand dollar tent and let it stand from Monday to Sunday. Unless you really need the money, why would you jump at every pilot program or grant that surfaces? It is time to take care of home. Straighten out home and students from other towns will want to attend your school choice without bribes of special treatment and separation from the general school population.

Parents also get really sick of being told that their children are being used as guinea pigs again. We take programs and never evaluate the effectiveness of them. The last thing we need is another program. Englewood jumps on every single grant that is offered. Our Board of Education Members are grant junkies. We watched the board jump on an offer today that is clearly not for us, because of the distressed  state of the district. They knew that $100,000 was not a lot of money for the participating program. This did not stop them from working out the amount they would have to add to it in order for it to work. $140,000 more. Now do we need money? Something fishy here much? They saw another way to stick it to principals, teachers and parents that they have labeled unruly. They didn't care that our district has just had a major shake up. The middle school is being reorganized. Principal from the Middle school shuffled, Principal from the high school shuffled, assistant principals shuffled from high school, middle school and elementary schools. Two major program changes in curriculum and instruction and a new Superintendent once he figures out how to get the money he wants.

Hello Board of Education. All is NOT well. We should get ourselves together. The last thing we need right now is to subject our students to another Pilot program.

No one expects you to jump on every single grant that is offered. That is fickle, not to mention just plain greedy.

Business is booming. Facilities are beautiful. Profits are high. Scores are down. Academies are NOT numder one in the State. Academies were slated to be evaluated after two years. Did it happen? It was evaluated as part of Dwight Morrow High School. So why does the Board President continue to claim they are the best in the state. I know for a fact that the criteria for admission in Englewood is less rigorous than of the Bergen County Academies. Smoke and mirrors. I am choking right now. Avid has not been evaluated. Ivy has not been evaluated. Small Learning Communities have not been evaluated. Average children with the capacity to achieve are being neglected and some are even being segregated to a place that resembles a reform school in nature. More of them are slated to move into this same environment, because public silence signifies agreement.

Are Our Schools In Crisis?: Sometimes Silence Signifies Agreement

I arrived at the DMHS Alumni Educational Alliance picnic late and did not get to see many of the people that I wanted to meet. I had my two little grandkids with me. One moves significantly slower when in that situation. I was only in Dwight Morrow High School for 2 years. I was also on work study leaving school before 1pm each day. Consequently, I spent very little time even in the cafeteria where I would have mingled. I had to support myself during high school. I even worked as a maid and nanny for a family in Tenafly in order to contribute to my Grandma's household expenses. When I got my yearbook, I put it down and did not open it again until I joined Facebook and started looking for former classmates. My memories of DMHS are quite different from people who grew up in Englewood.

I do however understand how people may attack a tradition and use the demolition of that tradition as a way to emasculate a people. This is a tactic that has been used world wide throughout the existence of mankind. I am a strong history buff. Dr. Segall and Mr. Garrison knew exactly what they were doing when they removed the plaques and banners that represent the strong sports history of DMHS graduates. They have been putting the plan in action to change the colors and the name of the school since early 2000. ( "We must segregate in order to integrate." These were the late Dr. Grieco's words.) We have the segregation he spoke of, but when will the integration begin? They have also been monitoring the attendance at the picnic and other Alumni functions. As long as the Alumni Organizations are only involved in fundraising to benefit its members and to give scholarships, they are participating in their own erasure.

After reading the agenda for June 16th again, it has become quite clear that the Board has no respect for Alumni. They only want the Scholarship money to keep coming. They also want to make sure that the Alumni Association knows who is boss. They thought Curtis and I were part of the Association. They know that their wrongdoings have been uncovered. Dr. Segall and board members have put through changes that needed a board resolution to make official. Regardless, of what you think of me, this is being done without formal objection from anyone. If all of the Alumni Associations of DMHS continue in their own division there will be nothing left of our Alma Mater that we recognize. 

I am not against the Academy. What I am against is that the Academy is an honors program that separates the students physically. Any student that takes an honors class in the Academy is recorded as an Academy student. NOT SO. This is causing an unreal number of children to be counted as Academy. Those students do not get all of the special consideration of the Elite children. Also the process of getting into honors period is too restrictive for the average student who does not have the right parentage or address.

When students leave Quarles School they are already slated into the Ivy program which becomes Academy Prep in Janis Dismus. I am speculating now. If a student is already reading in first grade they are placed in IVY based on his/her address and reading ability. (Meanwhile, a very high number of special education students have been included in classes at Quarles with children without disabilities. For the teachers among us, we know that the children w/o disabilites have a slim chance of learning to read and write while the autistic, down syndrome and numerous other classifications get all of the attention.)

In pre-K the odds have already been stacked against the students w/o disabilities. Now I have a question. How many Blacks and Latinos have their children classified at 3 years old and younger? Give a PIE AWARD to anyone who says, slim to none. These children never move into the public school from Quarles. They are only in the public schools long enough to pick up the classification and the money that will pay for their education all the way through high school.

While we are trying hard to keep our kids out of special ed. they are fighting to get theirs in so the money will follow them right out of the district to all of the special schools. Some of these schools are out of state and we the taxpaying public are paying for the tuition and the transportation. They have now removed all of the old agendas from the District website, because we ignorant Blacks and Latinos were reading too much for our own good and we uncovered this situation. It should be noted here that I am NOT against parents fighting for their children with disabilities. I am against the way the System has not dealt with the children who do not have disabilities at the Pre - K and Kindergarten level. I have been told by board members on several occasions that things will only change when parents come out to object. That very statement lets us know that they cannot be trusted to uphold the oath taken to make sure ALL children get a thorough and efficient education. It means that if a large enough group makes enough noise, then perhaps that group will be considered. They cannot be trusted. It hurts my heart to admit, because of all the young ones, but it is nonetheless true. My mission is to inform parents of the situation so they may make informed decisions from there. The district is nurturing oppositional attitudes in children from the time they enter school. Is there any wonder why so many people have decided that they would prefer their kids in charter school buildings that cannot hold a candle to our beautiful public facilities?

Meanwhile, little Sally or Enrique over there who had no disabilities and has a great capacity to learn has been neglected. It is a miracle if any of them are able to read by the time they enter 1st grade. The Ivys go from Grieco Elementary to McCloud. At Janis E. Dismus Middle School the Ivys become Academy Prep. (Oh and our children have become disagreeable and angry without knowing why by this time. They are now proposing another school that would remove these disagreeble children that they have created by neglect to an Alternative School.)

The special and privileged IVY/Academy Prep children are then tracked into the Academy. These children are already labeled as Academy from 1st grade. Now you tell me. What is going on here? Oh and, the children of the board members and folks affiliated with that click ALL end up in the Academies. That is the reason they pretend to object to the DMHS Alumni Educational Alliance giving a Scholarship to DMHS students.

Academy students are only referred to as DMHS students 2 times. They are DMHS students when they want the Scholarships. They are Dwight Morrow High School Students on their diplomas. The state of New Jersey does not recognize the Academy as a school. This is the reason DMHS must be erased. The Academy will arise out of the ashes like the historical and mythical phoenix.

In case folks were not aware of the fact. Mr. Garrison made his presence known during the picnic. He drove slowly by. He also sicked his daughter on me at the June 28th board meeting when I objected to them changing the colors. I openly asked for a truce and to have the plaques returned and the gym floor repainted to maroon and white. I have never seen a white girl head wiggle so much in my life. I was shocked into silence when the man trained his daughter onto me. She was  yelling and head wiggling like a crazed teenager. Mind you, I was not even talking to her. I was talking to the Board President who had been instructed to show us the proposed brick sign they plan to erect on Knickerbocker road that gives an honors program top billing over the sports teams. I was suggesting that it was improper and inconsistent to list a program there when no other program is listed there. If a sign is erected, it should read, Dwight Morrow High School, home of the Raiders.

As you see from the video, the Board of Education have opened a dialogue suggesting that the Alliance is discriminating against children. As far as I am concerned, the Alliance needs to answer them, because they have been publicly challenged.

Every teacher that has been hired with the exception of one or 2 since Dr. Carlisle came into the picture has been female. I will also suggest that the Board of Education has not done "due diligence" in researching this man's past employment. Beginning September 2011, the teaching staff of the EPSD will be close to 74% whte female. At first glance this seems whiter than it was when I graduated in 1969. Are we going backwards. When will the integration that Dr. Grieco spoke of when he started the Academies begin? We are waiting.

Business is booming, facilities are beautiful, profits are high, programs are flailing, and students are failing.

How did we say the children were doing?

Are Our Schools In Crisis?: Are Our Children Getting Lost in the Mix of the Melting Pot?

How important is History? How many times must the many scholars demonstrate with data driven research that everyone needs a healthy connection to their past? Cultures that we are eager to emulate, nurture their children with a good dose of a rich cultural legacy filled with age old traditons that connect them to their ancestors. (examples: the Chinese, the Japanese, the Jewish, The Africans who still live on the Continent and the list goes on) Children and adults gain a sense of pride when they are able to trace their roots. Know who you are, then mingle, with your identity intact.

Lucy D. Walker & the late Rosa Parks

A really good friend of mine, a math teacher, married a Jewish man. My friend is no longer with us. Her daughter recently married a Jewish man. The ceremony was officiated by a female Rabbi, who is also an Educator and a Yoga Instructor. (A new and different kind of combination) It was a beautiful ceremony and even though I did not understand the words, the saying of them was mesmerizing. I was awe inspired. The actual ceremony and the physical decorations were based on traditions that date back to before Christ. This is a fine example of a rich cultural history. Americans of all natiionalities and religions must be able to teach traditions that date back to before America existed. (We must forget about the "Melting Pot"... since this suggests that we will lose ourselves in the mix) We must never lose ourselves or our children in the mix.

In the small hamlet of Englewood, NJ and in others across the country, a small group of people try to reshape history to their own convenience. This is the reason that we must never allow the tampering with History in the schools. We must know the History in order to prevent this tampering.  The Civil Rights Movement happened and is still happening. The System of Slavery happened and remnants of it still exist. The Spanish Inquisition Happened. The Holocaust happened. The Systematic Elimination of  America's Original People happened. We do not want the past to repeat itself.  When the schools refuse to teach our traditions, we must teach them ourselves. We must also let it be known that the schools are not teaching inclusive history. Our children must be armed with a strong sense of self. Right now "Self" is having a difficult time. Many children have become disenchanted with our silence and inaction. They have turned to groups that make them feel wanted. Our children are asking for our help. Help them embrace their ancestors without shame.

            

"Business is booming, facilities are beautiful, profits are high, but how are the children?"

Are Our Schools In Crisis: New and Improved or Recycled?

June 27, 2011

VIA EMAIL & CERTIFIED MAIL

EPSD President and Board Members
Englewood Board of Education
12 Tenafly Road
Englewood, NJ 07631

Dear EPSD President and Members of the Board,

I am writing to formally object to the assignment of Peter Elbert to the Dwight Morrow High School as principal for the upcoming school year in September 2011. This letter shall serve as my formal complaint. Peter Elbert was transferred to the Alternative High School at the Russell C. Major Liberty building in September 2010. The Englewood Board of Education made that decision because the Middle School was unable to reach the state mandated average yearly progress in the No Child Left Behind Act. Additionally, the 2010 New Jersey Assessment and Skills Knowledge test showed that the Janis Dismus Middle School failed to meet the state’s Adequate Yearly Progress in the same content for five consecutive years during Mr. Elbert’s assignment as principal there.

I would like to remind you that the New Jersey School Ethics Act (N.J.S.A 18A:12-23), Code of Ethics, paragraph (c) requires local board of education members to vote to appoint the best-qualified personnel available after consideration of the recommendation of the chief administrative officer, and paragraph (h) which states that you will vote to appoint the best-qualified personnel available after consideration of the recommendation of the chief administrative officer. The selection of Peter Elbert violates both of those. There are other more qualified principals with better track records such as Dorian Militeer, Malva Wise-White, and Joseph Bell. I strongly believe that the shuffling around of principals is neither in the best interest of the District, nor its students.

We want changes that improve our school district, not break it apart. Englewood parents want to keep their kids in town, not send them to private schools in other districts. It is your responsibility to give the children of Englewood the schools and the programs they are looking for. Assigning a principal who has a record of spectacular failure to lead the same students which he failed in the Janis Dismus Middle School is disgraceful. In doing this you fail our children miserably. Please consider the consequences to the community and reconsider the assignment of Peter Elbert to principal of Dwight Morrow High School for the fall 2012 semester.

Thank you,

Donna Sumler
Concerned Parent/Englewood Resident

cc: Senator Frank Lautenberg
Senator Robert Menendez
Congressman Steven Rothman
Senator Loretta Weinberg
Assemblywoman Valerie Vainieri-Huttle
Governor Chris Christie
Chris Cerf, NJ Department of Education
Robert Gilmartin, Acting County Superintendent of Schools
Englewood Residents