Sunday, March 20, 2016

THE EVERY STUDENT SUCCEEDS ACT of 2015

Highlights --- March 17, 2016 - 
Englewood Public School  District School Board Meeting.

Someone asked the following question.
What is ESSA? The question may have arisen in response to District website tab for ESSA parents.  ESSA parents are Title I parents. The student population of EPSD is more than 70% Title I. Students who qualify for free and/or reduced lunch are Title I. 

Click here for a Parent Friendly explanation of what ESSA is.

"On December 10, 2015, President Barack Obama signed the Every Student Succeeds Act (ESSA) into law as Public Law Number 114-95ESSA reauthorizes the Elementary and Secondary Education Act of 1965 “to ensure that every child achieves.”(1).." http://www.parentcenterhub.org/repository/essa-reauth/

Click here for a copy of the ESSA ACT (LAW)
Click here for a Summary of the changes made to ESEA and the Transformation into ESSA.
Click  here for Information on how ESSA Impacts Students with Disabilities
Click here for a great parent resource. Center for Parent Information Services - 

Click on tab 6 or 7 on this page. Substitute ESSA for ESEA wherever you see it.

The switch from ESEA to ESSA is a rather quick one for those who are not following Education Reformery News.


Wednesday, February 24, 2016

Saturday, November 21, 2015

The Burning Question About What is Right....

Paul Jayson ·
I was under the impression that when a student attended one of the county's academies the sending district paid the bill. I guess in this case that wasn't so.
Like · Reply · 3 hrs

Lucy D. Walker · 
You deserve a blue ribbon for that observation. Fact is, they may attend the County Academies for free. They just have to test in like all the other students. The Academy@Englewood is NOT a County School. It is merely a DMHS Academy program that was created under the guise of integrating Dwight Morrow High School. It did the opposite, after accepting and spending approximately 30 million dollars to supposedly integrate.

In the Englewood A@E Program the Englewood Cliffs students get priority over Englewood students before any test is given. In the beginning, entrance was supposedly based on Math Scores. Englewood students are not prepared to compete in Math or Literacy with Englewood Cliff's students or any of the other applicants. The cards are stacked in pre-school. School Choice is a Choice for students who do not live in Englewood. Englewood parents have begun to take advantage of this Choice by sending their children elsewhere. This has been a lose lose situation since the School Choice deal was struck.

Few would listen to those of us who know of the sending/recieving agreement. Englewood Residents were fed a line about how a great deal of money was coming into the District with students. That scenario ended circa 2008-09, when the Equity and Excellence millions stopped coming into EPSD. In reality, we have been supplementing the Education of students whose parents can pay the required tuition. There is also a discrepency in the actual amount that EPSD receives per School Choice student. This very publication has reported the amount as $10, 500. What iexactly is the correct amount?

It is time the smoke is blown away so we can all see what is actually in the mirror. Qualifying Englewood students/parents have been told that their children must wait until Englewood Cliffs students have been accepted into the Academy and counted. That does not nurture warm and fuzzy feelings from those of us who are keeping up with the charade.

Some of us have been demeaned in meetings by Englewood Cliffs parents who tell us that we do not belong in their PPA meetings. Right up in our faces, they have cried out for "Academic Segregation" on our dime. They were under the impression that they were paying tuition that covered buildings, heat, teachers and the right to have "Academic Segregation" and their own building with no chance of their children ever having to even walk the same halls as our children. They treated us like crap to our faces, and all the time their politicians were lying to them while ours lied to us. (30 million dollars spent to integrate, yeah right.)

Just yesterday, a friend told me that someone had suggested an answer to this problem.
The suggestion was that Englewood Cliffs and Englewood should merge School Districts.
Clearly that person has missed the point. The 2 school Districts merged long ago. I graduated DMHS in 1969 with more than a few Englewood Cliffs students in my class. DMHS was their high school. Back then, no one questioned that. What changed?

The burning question here is...Whom does Englewood's School Choice Program really benefit?

Tuesday, November 3, 2015

Make History

Elect a School Board that is of the People
and that upholds the laws of the 
State of New Jersey


George Garrison III Colum 2
Henry Pruitt III, Colum 3
Howard Haughton, Column 4