Amherst Regional High School dealing with a cold reality
If ever a chart starkly demonstrated the treacherous waters that lay ahead for an education organization, this would be it:
Click to enlarge/read
Less costly are the students who leave via "choice" for another public school at only $5,000 per student. But add them all up and it comes to a whopping $540,000 carved out of the FY16 $30 million operation budget. Yikes!
PVCICS Death Star addition
The Pioneer Valley Chinese Immersion Charter School looms as the Death Star, expanding into a full high school with a gleaming new building to show for it. In just the past two years PVCIC has gone from 68 ARPS students up to 83 for the upcoming FY16 year. Double yikes!
Interestingly before the Chinese Charter School was founded the Amherst Schools had the opportunity to offer their Chinese language curriculum via the same founders who were rejected by public school officials, so they went off and opened their own Charter School.
Amherst Public School officials are now considering a major reorganization by "repurposing" the Middle School building, which currently houses 7th and 8th grade.
Administration report to Regional School Committee
The Regional Assessment Working Group, who are recommending their own major reorganization by having the four-town Region expand all the way down to pre Kindergarten through 6th grade, spent a lot of time discussing the "repurposing" of a building.
Amherst Regional Middle School ... mothballed?
The RAWG Final Report states:
"The law is not entirely clear about whether such decisions are matters of educational policy (School Committee domain) or administrative operations (Superintendent). To the extent that decisions are within the purview of the superintendent, the RAWG recommends that there will be a lengthy and open process before the use of a school is changed."
Either way let's hope school officials take to heart the concept of a "lengthy and open process," something the RAWG certainly has not demonstrated over their three year tenure.
49 comments:
Nothing left to do
but sing!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K6ZB7CsSw6Q
-Squeaky Squeaks
p.s. Aw, what happened?
Amherst doesn't have such a great reputation any more. My wife and I decided to raise our sons and daughter in E. Longmeadow instead of Amherst, a move that would have been unheard of ten years ago.
PVCICS is trying to raise their cap by 400 and build a whole new high school building. There rapid growth should be a concern for APS.
Instead of having high standards and expectations (with accompanying support for those who.need it), ARHS is dumbing down the curriculum and eliminating choices in hopes of having more students "pass" the min requirements of MCAS.
This is the wrong approach and has contributed to much disenfranchisement among the ARHS population, just look at all the problems in 2014. It is NOT working for most students. Broad changes need to be made. Just a sad state.
People vote with their feet/tires and vote with their dollars, and their time. How many of those 83 Amherst students' families, who now drive their kids to and from school (there is no school bus for Amherst kids to the Hadley campus) began their kids' school careers with highest hopes for a good experience in the Amherst Public Schools? Every single one!
At some point, they had to face the hard fact that the Amherst schools no longer deliver the goods: Course options have been narrowed. Language programs are evaporating. Academic strength recedes as a hare-brained 'social justice' curriculum displaces core subjects. Violence, unfair discipline practices, and imaginary racism dominate the airwaves. "Excellence" even became a dirty, politicized word.
Meanwhile as you point out, Larry, Amherst schools sink 50% more $$$ into the quicksand, per capita, than other districts in the state. And Amherst residents pay astronomical taxes to foot the bill.
Rather than be threatened by the success and expansion of the Chinese Immersion school, perhaps we should, instead, thank those families who live in Amherst and merely place their kids out to charter schools yet continue to pay sky-high Amherst town taxes... for services that aren't satisfactory, and that they are not receiving.
What's the category for kids who left for private school? What about home school? Is there a more detailed list or chart that gives a better picture of where the kids have gone to?
Personally I think Frontier looks like a much better choice than Amherst. All the parents I talk to feel like their kids just get an education. No social justice, no white guilt, no discrimination, no drama, well except that caused by typical teenagers feeling young loves keen sting.
Amherst's reputation is really sinking fast in the valley. At least Maria Geryk will have some sort of legacy to be remembered by. Bad schools and a great retirement package all at the students expense.
Maybe Maria G won't implode spectacularly, maybe instead she will just fissle out like a wet firecracker.
The Chinese charter school defiantly has a better learning environment with less crazy PC whining and reverse racism. Learn some Mandarin and make some real money in the future.
学会做真正的金钱在中国！
The problem is bigger than Maria Geryk.
In fact the day she was hired proved we have a serious problem. Here is a person with no background other than a fill-in position now being put in the position of superintendent.
She has failed miserably since being superintendent but with her resume you'd expect that.
Geryk is just a symptom of the problem though. The fact that she was put in the position shows that the bigger issue is the system in Amherst.
The school committee is a joke. The "club" that is the Amherst school system needs to be dismantled and it needs to be done now.
Unfortunately as we are seeing, it's far easier for a concerned parent to take a student out of the school system than deal with the issues that are the school system management in Amherst. This will only continue. It's already too late.
Change the school operations, management, committee, and get rid of the nepotism, corruption, entitlement, and narcissism that plagues a system that focuses on everything and anything but the advancement of the children.
Katherine Appy
Maria Geryk
Lawrence O'Brien
Rick Hood
Kathleen Traphagen
Amilcar Shabazz
You are all utter embarrassments and have all contributed to one of the worst environments for learning in the state.
I find it disturbing that some people consider an emphasis on social justice to be at odds with their child's development and education.
Colleges aren't just looking for grades and test scores. There are thousands of students with pristine GPAs or SATs. Colleges care about a student's personal qualities and also about that student's ability to understand other people and work with them. Here's a question Harvard asks prospective applicants:
"Would other students want to room with you, share a meal, be in a seminar together, be teammates, or collaborate in a closely knit extracurricular group?"
Source:
What Harvard Looks For
Developing an understanding of other people's perspectives can only increase a student's qualifications for college and career. In fact, I daresay that if a high school is ignoring that development, you should be mad about that. It's not to your child's benefit to emerge into the adult world with an inchoate cultural awareness.
Of course, there are issues in how this development is implemented. If some people have the perception that social justice is equivalent to white guilt, then we haven't done our job.
What college admissions look for:
1. A Challenging High School Curriculum
2. Strong Grades and an Upward Trend
3. Solid Scores on Standardized Tests
4. Quality Involvement in Activities
5. A Record of Community Service
6. Work or Out-of-School Experiences
7. A Well-Written Essay
8. Positive Recommendations from School Personnel
9. Additional Recommendations from Adults Who Know the Student Well
10. Other special Attributes or Awards
How to get into Harvard:
1. Maintain a high GPA
2. Get high scores on the SAT or ACT and AP tests
3. Demonstrate excellence through your participation in a club
4. Stand out by joining a sport or the school band
5. Volunteer in your community
6. Pursue your interests over the summer
7.Write an essay on a topic important to you
8. Have the best teacher evaluations
9. Add supplementary materials if they are necessary
10. Fill out the actual application in a thoughtful manner
11. Make sure that all aspects of your application are completed before you put it in the mail
12. Turn your application in on time (or early)
Social justice is nice but it doesn't get you into school. This town focuses far too much on social justice. If they focused on any of the things above (excelling in education and rel world experience) our students would be better prospects for college.
I didn't say that social justice gets you into school. I said that it's part of the package that schools are looking for. It's also just part of being an educated person in this century. Look at the web sites of top prep schools like Northfield Mount Hermon and you'll see that social justice and cultural awareness are part of the education that they offer.
What is the source of your list, Walter? Is it from the Harvard website? I don't think so. There are thousands of students who fit those qualifications. A student could have all of those things and not get in. That's because there are so many other students who have filled out the same checklist. It's not enough. Personal qualities often play a deciding role. The link I provided is on the Harvard site itself. And it looks a little different than the checklist you provided.
I would also challenge your statement that ARPS is one of the worst learning environments in the state. Please provide evidence to back up that statement.
I am spending most of today on the computer reading student work. Every student gets extensive feedback on their work. If the work doesn't meet a standard, I advise them on how to revise it. They keep revising it until it meets the standard. Isn't that cultivating excellence? If not, I don't know why I am spending my Sunday this way. I would rather snuggle up with a good book.
There are plenty of schools where students rarely write papers or where they get very little individual feedback from a teacher. There are schools where students never even read a complete novel. There are schools where math instruction never progresses beyond memorization. ARHS teachers knock themselves out to push students; it's really disheartening to have that hard work go unappreciated by people who are patently uninformed about what goes on in our school.
What is social justice anyway? And how does it differ from Plano old justice?
At $20,000 a student per year, I would consider opening a school if I was not that busy.
In the US, you only have to force a miniscule amount of information in the kid each year. For $20k, this is one of the best business deals in the area right now. $20k for doing little more than pushing paper around.
Even cooler, is that the community is proving we don't need public schools....and the $20k overpriced annual fee to educate a child is driving this no less. Perhaps an ACA style financing where parents pay direct or get insurance, only poor people get public assistance in stead of anyone who makes a baby?
The funny part is that we will spend $20k per student for 12 plus years. Now if these kids ever get jobs, it will likely take them 12+ years of work before they are bringing home $20k a year. Especially with all the huge wasteful (see Amherst Schools) taxes they will need to pay.
The education system is a religion designed to line the pockets of administrators and now teachers (who make well over the national median income at this point). Govt. ponzi scheme with your kids as the bait, you always bite. This religion is the the most popular one in Amherst.
Funny thing is more people around here believe in Amherst Schools as a education institution than believe in God, but there is more proof that God exists than a local educational value!
Ms Koch, based on what I hear you are a tough teacher. I like that. I push my children probably more than most in this area so appreciate a teacher who pushes children to learn and excel.
Just looked up a review of you by students. Not bad. Seems some room for improvement could be in the area of communication, empathy and support.
http://www.ratemyteachers.com/nina-koch/1042866-t
As for Harvard, it has a less-than 6% acceptance rate. After the grades are evaluated, many other things are considered, but that is ALWAYS after the grades. Unfortunately it takes a very special person to make it past the interview that your Harvard website reference does not go into. The overall foundation of that acceptance is not far off from other schools, just far more discerning. I was told what it takes to really pass that test by a good friend who is one of those that makes that decision at Harvard. I'll base my knowledge on that persons thoughts.
"I would also challenge your statement that ARPS is one of the worst learning environments in the state"
Sorry, I can not find anywhere I made that statement. I did say the system top-down is bad. That does not mean there are not many fantastic teachers. I know many of them. But the school system as a whole is far below what it should be in terms of results, management and operation. If it wasn't then parents wouldn't be pulling their children out of the system as fast as they are. That number is only increasing every year.
Amherst should have the best system in the state. Right now it is rated in the lower third. Teachers can only do so much. Then again, Amherst lost many great teachers over the years due to mismanagement too.
I'll always appreciate good teachers as any teacher who deals with me directly will tell you. I don't appreciate poor management. Don't confuse the two.
"What is social justice anyway? And how does it differ from Plano old justice?"
Old Justice was the blindfolded person holding a scale. It wasn't supposed to matter who you were, everyone was supposed to be equal before the law.
Everyone was an INDIVIDUAL and the concept of "prejudice" (literally "pre-judging" someone) was initially considered to be wrong because it violated this. Remember MLK2's "content of their character"?
"Social Justice" comes out of Marxist thought (it does) and holds that you should only have those rights which your *group* has (or doesn't have) -- with your sole identity being some really quite minor characteristics such as skin color, urinary tract & sexual preference -- and a quite arbitrary Nuremburg-like hierarchy of groups being imposed by fiat.
In other words, the White Heterosexual Male is always in the wrong.
Social Justice Education: "Why we must hate White Heterosexual Males...."
Nina Koch said...
"I find it disturbing that some people consider an emphasis on social justice to be at odds with their child's development and education"
I find it disturbing, but not surprising, that you actually said that Nina...
I think that the bullying incidents show, beyond any scintilla of a doubt, the extent to which Social Justice is nothing more than Jim Crow Part Deux.
Black thugs permitted to wild through the school, White kids being assaulted with impunity in what ARE hate crimes and nothing is done. Just like the Jim Crow South....
Oh, and as to Harvard, I kinda hate to tell you but the "Harvard" label ain't what it used to be and soon won't be worth what it used to be either.
Larry -- remember the power of the Catholic Church circa 1950? Higher Education evolved from (and has the same structural faults as) the Catholic Church and it's coming apart at the seams right now the same way that the Catholic Church was circa 1960.
Social justice is another liberal word for socialism. Look up the synonym of social justice and you'll often see socialism is in the results. Social justice wants you to ignore that there are inherent differences in people and wants you to blindly support the notion that no one should get ahead of anyone else regardless of the God-given differences in people. Social justice may even be a new-age term that replaces the beliefs we once had in God. Lately it goes as far as to say people of color have rights to break laws that others can not.
"Govt. ponzi scheme with your kids as the bait, you always bite. This religion is the the most popular one in Amherst. "
Liberals, the wolf in sheep's clothing who put down everything they really covet.
There is a difference between justice and social justice. Justice means that nobody is to be picked on because he is poor or favored because he is rich. It also means that nobody is to be picked on because he is rich or favored because he is poor. Everyone’s rights deserve the same protection. Thus, nobody should be taxed at a higher rate than anyone else, nor should anyone receive special government handouts.
Social justice is a form of egalitarianism. It strives for economic equality but it chooses to erase the gap between rich and poor by redistributing wealth akin to Marx and Lenin. It wants the rich to support the habits of the poor. Unfortunately that hasn't worked and has gotten worse for the poor due to many programs that strive for so-called social justice aka socialism. Truth is Americans income disparity cannot be eliminated. Unless you change human nature and incentives as the Soviet Union unsuccessfully attempted, economic equality aka social justice is unattainable.
The biggest problem in the social justice theory is that it fails to distinguish between economic disparities that result from unjust deeds and those that are part of the natural order of things. Liberals hate the thought that there is a natural order. Mention Wall St to a liberal and their eyes roll. The assumption is that Wall St is bad and making money, even lots of it due to hard work is wrong.
That is why social justice believes that is unjust for some people to be richer than others. It fails to take aptitude, talent, skill, work ethic, priorities, etc, into account. Let's remember not to confuse having more with corruption which in any arena is unjust and wrong.
It is the innate differences in people that created this country. Social justice hates the notion that those differences result in some individuals producing and earning far more wealth than others. It's sort of a new-fangled affirmative action for everything and everyone.
Of course we all want to combat the economic injustices of theft, fraud and deceit and strive to undo the injustices perpetrated by unethical public policies, such as the subtle theft of citizens’ purchasing power via central bank inflation; the corrupt government practice of doling out earmarks, subsidies, and myriad special favors, often to big businesses and wealthy individuals; destructive tax policies that decapitalize society, thereby retarding growth in labor productivity, wage increases, and higher standards of living; runaway government spending that imposes an incalculable and unconscionable debt burden on the next generations, etc.
We all want to be charitable, but that notion is not good enough to be part of the definition of social justice. Social justice has gone as far as to eliminate God from the world as best it can, changed Christmas into a bad word, and has made it impossible to be an individual in our society without being labelled odd or a freak, yet allows and pushes freakish behavior and lifestyles by changing terms to make everyone sound normal.
Social justice also wants to assure free-rides for anyone that can't excel on their own, anyone of color, and anyone who holds their hands out under the notion that it isn't fair that some earn greater incomes, so we should distribute it to those who don't.
Social justice strives to tear-down the wealth of those that earned it using such false analogies as an earning pie with the myth that the pieces of the pie are getting larger for the rich and smaller for the poor, when the reality is it's not one pie - there are many.
Life is not fair - an observation everyone understands intuitively. The rich want something they cannot buy and the poor covet what the rich already have. There was a day when a believer new we were all equal in God’s eyes. Unfortunately God has been replaced by social justice - a chimera, often sought but impossible to attain.
Nina Koch said
"I am spending most of today on the computer reading student work. Every student gets extensive feedback on their work. If the work doesn't meet a standard, I advise them on how to revise it. They keep revising it until it meets the standard."
The most enlightened professor I ever had once told me that she had absolutely no idea how my FORTRAN program could possibly have run, let alone run correctly -- but it clearly had so she was going to accept it as-is even though it definitely wasn't done the way she would have done it.
Something tells me that Nina Koch is neither this enlightened nor tolerant and (like Common Corpse Math) it isn't a case of solving a problem but solving it using the exact approach that is taught. This is not only fascist but a true barrier to learning.
But my professor was not only tolerant but curious -- she wanted to know why I was writing code to do things that the FORTRAN would do automatically -- things she'd never mentioned because she didn't expect anyone to know that they had to be done at all, let alone be able to understand what she was talking about.
BECAUSE she first accepted my (working) program and then pointed out that there were easier ways to do the same thing,
she learned that I knew a whole lot more than she realized -- and that I both needed to be taught and could comprehend things on a level far higher than most of her students.
Had she merely insisted I write programs "her way", at best I would have been trained to do simple tasks with technologies that were even then obsolete. (More likely, I'd have dropped the course.)
By letting me do it my way -- and then asking why I did some of the things I did, she taught me how to figure out how computers worked and decades later, that permitted me to learn about machines and operating systems that neither of us would ever have dreamed of ever existing.
Education versus Training -- there is a difference....
Social justice is also the bigotry of low expectations.
If you believe that women, minorities and gays are inferior people, then you believe that it is only "fair" to put your thumb on the scale to balance things out, kinda like how an adult playing soccer with 10-year-olds is going to hold back a bit to be fair.
Now, you've got yours and you aren't giving that up -- you aren't giving up a scintilla of your privilege and social benefits -- instead you will take away from someone who doesn't have and give that person's future to the minorities, the women and the rest.
And you'll feel good about it. And no one will question your privilege because you are appropriately socially just. And as to those whom you screw in the process -- well those chickens will come home to roost soon....
Plain old justice. (Sry...)
Great answer. Thx Ed
--original questioner. And of course it shoulda read "plain old justice.). Bad typist here.
Dunno bout the last part, but before that bit, you had me thinking "...kinda like that 'we're all equal" stuff I see around school.
I thank you for that answer. I think I am going to coclude that if justice can be done, that oughtta cover just about any situation. If justice is in the eye of the beholder who seeks to mold it to his or her view(s)-- then we'd all be in a heap o trouble.
Aw, lay off Nina.
Are you saying that "plain old Justice" trumps SJ? If only they taught THAT in scool.
Speaking of PC, I recall a bumper sticker: Who says your politics are more correct than mine?"
Funny how we all hate the rich yet we all wanna BE rich.
Justice- A young man in Ferguson, Missouri tries to steal a police officers gun, punches him and attacks him when the officer recognizes him as the suspect in a robbery that just occured. On his final attempt to attack the cop he is shot and dies. A jury find the officer acted appropriately.
vs
Social Justice- A young man in Ferguson, Missouri tries to steal a police officers gun, punches him and attacks him when the officer recognizes him as the suspect in a robbery that just occured. On his final attempt to attack the cop he is shot. A jury finds the officer reacted appropriately. People protest, stating he police officer went too far and should have let the person who robbed the store and attacked the officer walk away.
Justice- A man in NYC doing something illegal is surrounded and arrested, when he refuses multiple requests to get down on the ground he is taken down by police and subsequently dies from underlying health issues. A jury finds no wrong doing in the arrest.
vs
Social Justice- A man in NYC doing something illegal is surrounded and arrested, when he refuses multiple requests to get down on the ground he is taken down by police and subsequently dies from underlying health issues. People protest claiming the man was black and that police target blacks (even though the Sargent on the scene in charge of the arrest was black). A jury finds no wrong doing by the officers. Social Justice groups claim the police should have let him break the law and found something else to do rather than arrest him as he was black and only committing a lesser crime.
Justice- After a traffic stop a police officer approaches a vehicle with four occupants in Billings, Montana. The officer pulls his gun when the occupants act strangely and then repeatedly demands the occupants to put their hands on the seats and dashboard, in sight. The right front passenger keeps reaching in the area under the seat. After multiple loud requests to stop and place his hands on the dashboard, the officer fearing for his own life shoots the person three times killing him. It takes a jury 30 minutes to find the officer was justified.
vs
Social Justice- After a traffic stop a police officer approaches a vehicle with four occupants in Billings, Montana. The officer pulls his gun when the occupants act strangely and then repeatedly demands the occupants to put their hands on the seats and dashboard, in sight. The right front passenger keeps reaching in the area under the seat. After multiple loud requests to stop and place his hands on the dashboard, the officer fearing for his own life shoots the person three times killing him. A jury takes 30 minutes to find the officer was justified. No one even knows about the story because the occupants were white and social justice only exists for minorities who commit 90% of crimes but somehow should be allowed to or are unfairly treated by police officers according to social justice believers.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=41mbUNWZASc
Great response. To be continued...
I received an email tonight from a friend of a friend re: the proposed schedule changes at the ARMS middle school. I believe that some of these changes, especially the cuts/changes related to world languages, will increase the number of Amherst students/families looking elsewhere for their education. For example, the removal of Chinese classes from the middle school may only increase the demand for PVCIS.
----------------------
Hi All,
Please feel free to forward this to whomever you like. The following is a clarification on the decision process for the ARMS schedule proposal (that among other things cuts language 32% and cuts music 18%), that ARMS Asst Principal Mike Malone told me during a telephone call on Friday 1/9:
** Per the teachers' union contract, the design of the schedule proposal had to be fixed in place on 12/1/14. It now has to have an all-of-nothing decision to either accept everything or reject everything, made by the Superintendent by 2/1. There are no changes that can be made to anything: it either all goes through, or nothing goes through.
** The teachers' union contract requires that teacher feedback be solicited and replied to, but there is no such requirement to communicate with parents/community, or to present to the SC. The 1/8 parents meeting therefore was just and FYI; there was no parent input meeting/survey/etc prior to the 12/1/14 deadline to gather input or hear concerns.
** So while it's been widely known that parent/community members have no direct authority over a school schedule change, it's now clear that we had no input at all into the design as well. Just to be clear: this is not to say that school administrators may not have asked individual parents, SGC members, etc about their views; or that they did not try to factor in what they considered to be parent priorities. But they very clearly did not ask for this in a general/public way, and the 1/8 meeting was therefore only a courtesy.
As a result, if you would like to see this change delayed a year so that we can more fully work through concerns with the proposal, it means trying to influence the Superintendent's decision (which can be assumed to currently be one of support). Here then are my suggestions for trying to make this happen:
-- Email the SC members with your concerns & requesting a delay
-- Make the same type of request at the "public comment" section of the SC meeting on Tuesday 1/13, at 6:00pm at the High School Library. This is the only SC meeting before 2/1.
-- Email or talk to the Superintendent, Asst Superintendent (Mike Morris), ARMS Principal, and/or ARMS Asst Principal.
As to the actual Chinese charter school, I do not understand why any parent would send their child to a school that locks kids in a closet in solitary confinement when they misbehave. This actually happened at PVCICS in 2011.
http://www.masslive.com/news/index.ssf/2011/05/state_finds_case_of_neglect_at.html
Instead of punishment the school got more funding and can now lock more kids in the closet for 7 hours. Fabulous. Chairman Mao would be proud.
Nina Koch said...
"I find it disturbing that some people consider an emphasis on social justice to be at odds with their child's development and education"
Unfortunately, it happened here in ARPS. Maria Geryk and her administrators overemphasize PC and social justice over excellence. That is the driving force behind the curves that show ARPS enrollment decline year after year.
Families come to Amherst with high hope that their children will get an excellent education. Instead they get these PC and social justice agenda. Hot air blows without solid results.
I won't use the word "steal" to describe nearby vocational schools, or charter schools which Amherst students enrolled into. In reallity, these families are PUSHED OUT by the school administrators. Many families have tried to talk to the school administrators for positive changes in school. These falls on deaf ears. The families got more of the same rubbish.
Middle school usually have three teams in each grade. The current 7th grade only have two teams due to enrollment decline and family defection. As the current trend goes, I won't be surprised that both 7th and 8th graders will be uprooted from ARMS building and fit into ARHS building for cost cutting purpose. What will be property tax be for families? Figure it out.
Anon 9:06 AM
This is simply not true. The child was a bully and harass other kids. The troubled child was never locked in a closet. The case was ruled in school's favor. I heard that child's parent still wanted to send the child back to the same school That will tell something.
"Now keep in mind when a student is stolen away from a pubic school via Charter or Vocational Schools it costs the District the full amount of their average cost per student, which in Amherst is extraordinarily high"
re: Stolen
Larry, Much of your blog promotes free market. Curious to hear how you see charter/vocation schools as different?
(not a shot, genuinely interested)
Just to help the debate--charter and vocational schools are a form of public education.
Walter, before using 'ratemyteachers' as a data point, be aware that this is a tool some kids use to get back at teachers for disciplining them or otherwise holding them accountable. Friends of my children openly discuss this. Others have never heard of the website.
Did you all know there are two Walter Graffs?
Walter Graff (I) lives in Sunderland, where the schools must be pretty good.
Here's how he describes himself: "I am a polymath, often referred to as a Renaissance Man. The dictionary defines this as a person whose expertise spans a significant number of different subject areas. But you'll see me as the guy who can solve anything for you. I am a solution provider. You need something done. I have a solution, the resources, and the ability to do it."
Walter Graff (II) blogs a lot.
aren't the "two" Walter Graffs one & the same. the sunderland one sends his kids to the Amherst schools.
Anon 9:38 AM,
When I was running a Karate School and then a Health Club my favorite customer was one I "stole" from another business.
So I mean it in a positive way. Because after all, "when products compete they get better." Or die.
And my wife and I are original "founding members" of the Chinese Charter School (out of 15 individuals).
Walter, on January 11 at 9:51 am you said:
"You are all utter embarrassments and have all contributed to one of the worst environments for learning in the state."
Unless that was the other Walter Graff...
Will the real Walter Graff please stand up...
Nina, perhaps you ought to read the entire post:
Katherine Appy
Maria Geryk
Lawrence O'Brien
Rick Hood
Kathleen Traphagen
Amilcar Shabazz
You are all utter embarrassments and have all contributed to one of the worst environments for learning in the state. Didn't see your name in that list nor a reference to teachers. This administration and SC fail our children.
"Walter, before using 'ratemyteachers' as a data point, be aware that this is a tool some kids use to get back at teachers for disciplining them or otherwise holding them accountable. Friends of my children openly discuss this. Others have never heard of the website."
Yes correct. I was ignoring the clearly vulgar parts of the replies and noticed that if you look at quality content, clearly she is considered a harder teacher which sounds to me like she makes kids think on their own. Good to hear in a world where kids are put on pedestals just because. Hence why I think her review is relatively good.
I know the site has new management now and is addressing these students that like to get revenge. But that of course this begs the question, if they are bad-mouthing particular teachers, then what is going on. Could be any number of things. 65% of ratings on the site are positive so not everyone is badmouthing teachers.
Walter, if you are describing the school system as one of the worst learning environments in the state, then you are talking about the school system as a whole. That includes all of us-- the teachers, the principals, everybody. We are all part of the school system. If you didn't intend to include everyone, then you shouldn't make such a broad statement.
I didn't say that you addressed me directly, nor do I particularly care what impression you have of me. I was just making the point that it is not one of the worst school systems in the state. Lots of people are working hard to do their best for kids. It's frustrating to work that hard and then read baseless statements like yours. You still haven't provided any evidence for it. In what way is the ARPS system one of the worst learning environments in the state?
Larry do you happen to know the amount of kids that are currently opting out of the Amherst School System? Just curious as to how high a figure this adds up to. I've already opted one kid out and the other will be opting out starting next year.
The "enrollment graph" posted in the story above shows about 170 between "choice, charter and vocational".
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