Each District School Working To Achieve Building Goals

by Melany Gray

(November 13, 2008) At their November 12 study session, the Mamaroneck Board of Education heard about building goals from administrators at each of the district’s six schools. The presentations highlighted the extent to which administrators have been “working to provide more continuity across the district,” noted Superintendent Paul Fried.

Observing that there did not seem to have been much collaboration when he arrived in the district, Dr. Fried appeared pleased with the building leaders’ efforts to provide consistency, and with the faculty’s renewed interest in collaboration. Board members also expressed appreciation for the extent of progress that has been made.

The discussion of building goals follows last month's study session on priorities for the district as a whole. (See: Mam'k Schools Set Specific Goals For Student Learning.)

Elementaries Focus on Math, Website and Collaboration

Presentations from the elementary schools featured as a priority the implementation of the revised TERC mathematics curriculum for grades K-5. The only exception was Mamaroneck Avenue School, which implemented the revised curriculum last year in all grades and will be working this year to better align both mathematics assessments and instruction with state standards.

Each of the four elementary schools also recognized updating their school’s webpage on the district’s new website as an important goal, with building administrators observing that the website would facilitate communication with parents and the greater school community.

Another common elementary theme was increased collaboration among teachers and the extent to which that impacts professional development. This included sharing within grade levels, across grade levels and across schools. Several building administrators reported that faculty members are making good use of the extended faculty meeting time negotiated in the last teachers’ contract. Murray Assistant Principal Cruz Soler noted that teachers “have been asking for extra meetings.”

Assistant Superintendent for Curriculum and Instruction Annie Ward observed that the new district website, which allows for feedback from conferences and workshops to be registered on interactive blogs, is facilitating the ability of teachers to share ideas and work between buildings.

Secondary Schools Focus on At-Risk Students

Current building goals for the secondary schools are targeting at-risk students, with Hommocks Principal Seth Weitzman and his team focusing on best practices to identify and support students before they reach the “D and F list.” Similarly, Mamaroneck High School Principal Mark Orfinger and his team have worked to identify students who are at risk and provide an array of new academic and therapeutic interventions to support them.

Dr. Orfinger noted that the secondary building goals looked “skewed away from curriculum and instruction” because they did not include the more specific goals being developed by each department at the middle and high school. Mamaroneck High School’s English department, for example, is examining the writing curriculum for each grade; social studies teachers are constructing lesson plans, and the science department is developing syllabi.

Dr. Fried noted that the department goals are the mechanism by which secondary schools really focus on “the academic end of things.”

Common Threads

In addition to the obvious commonalities, the presentations highlighted the extent to which the schools are using assessments and other data both to plan programs and curriculum and to evaluate what is working. As observed by Dr. Fried, use of data is now more in the “forefront” of building goals.

Both Dr. Fried and School Board President Linnet Tse recognized the extent to which the goals direct attention to individual students, by working to better differentiate curriculum and to provide additional support for at-risk students. The attempt of the goals, summarized Ms. Tse, is “reaching all the students.”

Next Week: Decision on the Capital Bond

At the conclusion of Wednesday’s meeting, Dr. Fried announced that the board will be discussing and determining the scope of the district’s capital bond at their next meeting on Tuesday, November 18 at 7:30 pm. The board has been weighing which projects to include in the bond and whether to have the community vote on one comprehensive bond or two smaller ones. (See: School Board Told "Don't Cut the Bond")

Members of the public are invited to attend, and the meeting will be televised by LMC-TV. Surveys seeking community input are available online - see Bond Survey - but to be considered in time for the board discussion, they should be completed by Friday, November 14.

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