Dear Group Members,
This is a report on the Asbury Park School Board meeting of Thursday,
October 18. As only one member of the BOE, I am obliged to say that I
do not speak for the board.
As meetings go, this one was relatively short (7 to 9:10 PM) and
almost rancor-free! The public was given the opportunity to speak on
agenda items, and no member of the public came forward at that time.
The administrators responsible for curriculum gave us a 20 minute
presentation on the testing results for the district. Overall, the
results did show a slight improvement in some grades, a substantial
increase in others, and flat or even a small decrease in isolated
cases. There was enough of an improvement, believe it or not, for the
state to say that we have met "A.Y.P", that is adequate yearly
progress for the first time in many years. Of course, what is
adequate progress for the state is just rising from the depths that we
had plumbed. But it is progress nevertheless, and it must be built
upon. Donna Muzzicato, the new director of curriculum, gave us a
presentation on what each school in the district is doing to correct
past deficiencies and to improve instruction. (In my view, improving
instruction and increasing test scores are not necessarily synonymous,
and we are off to the best year in a long time in all of our schools,
especially the Intermediate School and the High School. But we have a
long, long way to go.)
Mrs. Sanders and I did get into a bit of a tussle in reference to the
new Math Program for grades 3, 4, and 5. She regretted our disposal
of "Communicator Math" and I cheered the fact that it was gone and
replaced with a more traditional program, namely McGraw-Hill.
"Communicator Math" is now used fully in only one other district in
New Jersey, namely Jersey City, the home of the originator of the
program, a favorite with the State.
When the time came for the public to speak on non-agenda items, four
members of the public came forward. One said that not all teachers
had received materials and books yet. Mr. Parham, the Acting
Superintendent, said that he personally would see to it that the
situation was remedied the following day. The other comments
pertained to the Little League, which our closed session was to be
about, and others asked us to set a date for a community forum on the
QSAC report and to improve communication with the public via a newsletter.
Our closed session lasted about 20 minutes and when we returned, voted
to give the Little League the green light to go ahead with their
second phase, pending resolution of typical Asbury Park deed
restrictions and submission of a site plan that has already been
prepared. Danny McKee and the rest of the parents and friends (and
the kids, of course) of the newly revived Asbury Park Little League
should be commended for working so hard and jumping though all the
bureaucratic hoops presented to them. Their determination in this
often-frustrating place is very admirable.
When it came time for comments from the Board, I expressed my dismay
at the firing of the woman who had done so much to put the SPOT
program (our school based youth services program at the high school)
in such good shape last year. She was summarily fired by the outside
agency that the State of New Jersey forced us to outsource the program
to. They had said our kids would lose those services at the High
School unless we handed the program, which was finally going very
well, over to an outside agency to run inside the high school. Some
board members, including myself, voted to do so when that agency said
they would retain the woman who had run it so well. With no warning
at all, she was fired this month. I would hate to think that this was
a "bait and switch" tactic to get approval, fire the director, and
then replace her almost immediately. We do not treat our own employees
in this manner, and we expected, perhaps naively, that no one running
a school program for our kids in our high school would treat their
employees so abruptly and without any due process whatsoever. Some of
the BOE members asked our administrators to look into the situation
and report back to us.
Frank D'Alessandro
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