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by Melissa Bailey | Mar 9, 2010 12:39 pm

(24) Comments | Commenting has been closed | E-mail the Author

Posted to: Schools, School Reform

NHPS Does your balloon fly high? Or does it bobble near the ground?

The answer may determine whether your school stays open in its current form.

Those two bubble shapes will signify the difference between a top-performing and a “failing” school when the district issues grades next week.

The school district plans to grade six to eight schools as pilots for its nascent school reform drive. Schools would be given individualized management plans—possibly including extra resources or different work rules—based on their performance. Officials plan to name the six to eight schools at a 4 p.m. press conference Monday in City Hall.

Melissa Bailey Photo Schools chief Reggie Mayo (pictured) explained the new grading system at Monday’s school board meeting. He unveiled what the three-tiered grading system will look like, and how it will work. Click here to view his presentation.

While other districts grade schools with a simple A to F scale, New Haven has chosen a more complex method. It looks like a bunch of balloons on a chart. (A sample chart, with fictitious schools, is pictured at the top of the story.)

Each balloon corresponds to one school. If your school has a large balloon that sails to the top right corner of the chart, it would qualify as a top-performer. If your school’s balloon is smaller, and sinks toward the bottom left corner, it could be a “failing” school.

Three factors go into the balloon’s placement: student performance on standardized tests, student growth on those tests, and student “engagement.” The basic goal is to grade schools into three different tiers. (Click here to read more about that.)

The horizontal axis is for student growth, with the highest growth toward the right. The vertical axis is for student performance, with the highest performance toward the top. The size of the balloon corresponds to how engaged students are. A big balloon means kids are well-adjusted and don’t miss many days of school. Schools with poor attendance, and where students face socio-emotional problems often associated with poverty, would get smaller balloons.

After mapping the schools onto this chart, Mayo plans to place them into tiers. Schools in the top-right corner of the map would fall into Tier I. Schools in the bottom-right corner would fall into Tier III. The middle-ranging schools would fall in Tier II. There’s no formula for how the tiers would be separated; Mayo said he’ll lean toward grading a greater proportion schools in Tier III, acknowledging that more need improvement.

Tier I schools, the top-performers, would be given more autonomy. Middle-ground schools would be placed in Tier II. Tier III “improvement” schools would get extra resources. A select few failing schools, dubbed Tier III “turnaround” schools, would be closed and reopened under new work rules, possibly as charters. Mayo plans to pick six to eight schools, at least one in each of those four categories, for a test-drive to take effect this September. Starting in November, all schools will be graded annually.

For the initial batch of grades, Mayo is also reserving some wiggle-room to use “qualitative factors” to place the schools into tiers. That means when placing a school into a tier, he’ll take into account three subjective factors: the quality of the school leadership; how ready the school is to take on reforms; and what resources are available to support the reforms. He said those “subjective” factors are needed for the first pilot year, when schools will be asked to make major changes on a rushed timeline. He also said he hopes he’ll be able to make some subjective decisions in future tiering, too.

On Monday, only the six to eight pilot schools will be placed into a tier. The rest of the district’s 47 schools won’t get a grade, but they will get a sense of where they stand by looking at where they land on the chart.

How exactly will the grades be calculated?

Katya Levitan-Reiner, a data analyst and recent Yale School of Management graduate brought on board in December to aid the district’s reforms, gave the break-down of the factors going into a school’s grade.

Student performance. For elementary schools, this grade will be based on the past three years of Connecticut Mastery Tests. Here’s how it works: Take the percent of students who scored at least proficient on the CMT in a given subject in 2008-09. Average each school’s reading and math percent together. Do the same for years 2007-08 and 2006-07. Then combine the three years’ scores together, using a weighted average that places more emphasis on the most recent year. The same calculation will be done using the higher standard of “at goal” instead of “proficient.” The result will be a percentage from 1 to 100, signifying how many students who are “at goal” or “proficient” on the CMT tests.

For high schools, do the same calculation, using the Connecticut Academic Performance Test instead.

Student progress/growth: This year, only elementary schools will get a “growth” grade. The calculation starts on a student level. Here’s how it works: Take student Joe. Measure how well he improved on the 2008-09 CMT test, compared with other New Haven students who started at the same academic level the year before. Give him a growth percentile—e.g., he grew more than 66 percent of his peers in that cohort. Repeat for students Maria, Tyquan, Gerry—each student in the school. Then take the median of all of those students’ growth percentiles. That’s the Median Student Growth Percentile (MSGP) for 2008-09. Repeat the calculation for year 2007-08. Average the two years’ MSGPs, with more weight to the more recent year. Voila—you have an overall score, from 0 to 100, showing how much students improved at one school, compared to the rest of the district.

Mayor John DeStefano was quick Monday night to ask why the students’ growth is being measured compared only to students within the district, instead of statewide. Mayo said the district could look statewide in the future, by importing a lot of data from the state government, but decided not to do it this year.

High schools don’t have a growth metric yet.

College success. High schools will also be judged on another factor: how many students complete their first year of college within two years after graduating high school? The New Haven Public School system got these numbers from the National Student Clearinghouse. They’re not the best numbers: There’s only a 85 percent accuracy rate. But they plan to look at the past three years of graduates’ post-high school success as one factor in grading high schools.

Student engagement. For elementary/middle schools: take the school’s attendance rate over the past three years, weighted to place emphasis on the most recent year. Also look at with how well kids fared on the Teacher Child Rating Survey, where teachers grade their own students on questions like: does Sally have many friends? Does she cope well with failure? Average the attendance and the survey scores.

For high schools: combine rates of attendance and retention over the past three years, with more emphasis on the most recent year.

Big balloons correspond to high numbers on this scale.

At the end of all the calculations, the elementary schools are ready to be mapped.

Since high schools don’t have a growth metric, they won’t be mapped with a balloon on a chart this year, said Levitan-Reiner. However, they will be able to look at the numbers for how their school performed on three metrics.

At the end of Monday’s statistics lesson, one parent came forward with a lingering concern.

Dominic Maldonado (pictured), a grandfather of two boys at Wilbur Cross High School and Christopher Columbus Family Academy, said he worries about the “psychological impact” of grading the schools. What if his student finds out he’s a high-performer in a Tier III school? Maldonado said he’d be inclined to move his kid out of a school that was graded in the lowest category.

Board members acknowledged the negative impression a Tier III label may carry. However, they said being judged a “turnaround” school should not be seen as a curse. It will be an opportunity to get more resources, said Superintendent Mayo. The board agreed to give parents a better sense of how these grades will affect their students’ educations when they unveil the first grades next week.

Comments

posted by: anon on March 9, 2010 1:00pm

How about putting the additional “rescue” resources into the troubled neighborhoods that the students come from, not just into the troubled schools?

School test score achievement, and later life achievement, is linked far more with social conditions, like poverty, crime, noise, stress, litter, unemployment, lack of food, lack of social capital, no health insurance, etc., than it is to anything about the schools themselves.

It’s nice to have a bunch of balloon charts on test scores, but let’s make sure they are meaningful.

Trying to improve achievement without addressing the underlying causes of most of the achievement (or lack thereof) is a recipe for failure.

posted by: cedarhillresident on March 9, 2010 2:00pm

“Does your balloon fly high? Or does it bobble near the ground?”

can you tie it in a knot can you tie it in a bow?

sorry had to

posted by: concernedwestvilleres on March 9, 2010 3:35pm

The big problem with this balloon chart, other than the fact the logic behind it is convoluted, is the schools have the onus to be the source of achievement gains. We can’t rely on schools alone to overcome socioeconomic issues such as poverty and English as a Second Language families.

One of the highest factors in low student achievement is poverty. If schools operate on a 9-3:30 day and send children home to do homework where families can’t help the children learn or do their homework then you’re not going to see improvement. The unions and district have to work together to find a solution where qualified people can tutor the lower performing children after school so the lessons are learned and ingrained in them. This has to happen at an early age so going forward not only will school achievement increase but so will the actual students learning.

Too much blame is placed on teachers and not enough on upbringing and socioeconomic factors. Teachers Unions are a big problem and need to show real flexibility. Administrators need to work the funding to ensure teachers have the resources to teach their classes. Parents need the resources and ability to have their children learn and retain the knowledge. And children need to know that if they learn and do well they will have access to opportunities to move out of poverty regardless financial conditions.

Let’s reform the schools but let’s do it right and have everyone work together to make it happen. Our kids don’t need failed programs, they need to learn and overcome.

posted by: fingers on March 9, 2010 4:23pm

The Y axis says At or above Goal. Not proficient. Those two things are VERY different. Most high schools are going to be down in the lower quadrant JUST on this. http://www.captreports.com

posted by: fing on March 9, 2010 4:31pm

Here’s how New Haven did at or above goal on each of the tests for each of the high schools.

http://solutions1.emetric.net/captpublic/CAPTCode/Report.aspx?data=5AF84D8A1FD23C0416036251EDF4030

Here’s what it says when you factor in AT OR ABOVE PROFICIENCY:

http://solutions1.emetric.net/captpublic/CAPTCode/Report.aspx?data=75795CB881D49273DAEECED9529FF276

Two VERY DIFFERENT pictures.

posted by: Threefifths on March 9, 2010 4:40pm

The balloon is full of hot air from King john and the puppet school board.They for got to tell you that the other balloon fly high is the nine percent tax balloon to pay for this.
Wake New Haven This is happing all over this country. In fact this is the same plan that then are doing in New York.Rember Mr.Harries is from New York.

Bloomberg�s 12-Step Method to Close Down Public Schools
By John Tarleton
From the January 29, 2010

There is a method to his madness. Bloomberg and his Chancellor Joel Klein have initiated shut down or initiated the closing of more than 100 public schools, many of which have deep roots in their communities. No two situations are exactly alike. Nonetheless, here is a handy template to go by if you are a mayor who is eager to break up large public schools and hand over their buildings to privately run charter school operations, but don�t want to leave your fingerprints at the scene of the crime:

1 Establish a charter school with selective admissions process and access to more resources inside an existing large school building that you covet � remember that it�s easier to target people-of-color communities, which have less political power.

2 As charter school grows by a grade each year, allow the original large school to become increasingly overcrowded with classes held in the library and auditorium and rooms for special activities like arts and music eliminated.

3 Watch talented teachers and students stream out of the large school as the downward spiral begins. Don�t forget to praise the salutary effects of �choice� and �competition.�

4 Close other nearby large schools and send low-performing students to the large school you have targeted.

5 Require the large school to continue to enroll students throughout the school year, many of whom have special needs or behavioral problems, while exempting the charter school from such obligations.

6 Funnel high numbers of kids being released from juvenile detention to the large school while exempting the charter school from such obligations.

7 Declare the large school to be an unsafe �Impact School.�

8 Watch exodus of students and teachers intensify.

9 If after the large school begins to raise its performance levels, pick and choose the data you need to declare the school to be �underperforming� and in need of being closed.

10 Issue a press release congratulating yourself for making �tough decisions� and �putting progress before politics.�

11 Disperse low-performing students from the large school you have just closed to other struggling schools you would like to see dismantled.

12 Begin process all over again. It�s addictive.

This is being take to court.

http://cityroom.blogs.nytimes.com/2010/02/01/teachers-union-and-naacp-sue-to-stop-school-closings/

Like I keep saying.Keep On voting for this Two Party system and this is what you will get.

posted by: City Hall Watch on March 9, 2010 4:50pm

Cedar Hill:
You crack me up. I had a good laugh. Thank you. ...

Finish the song: “does your school hang low?”

posted by: FIX THE SCHOOLS on March 9, 2010 5:39pm

All this anticipation. For what?

We all know which schools are and have been failing for years! Just loook up your school’s CMT scores which have been published for two decades and read it and weep. So parents with kids in tier III schools ought to be THRILLED because finally their school will receive resources and attention and be fixed one way or another.

ANON and CONCERNED, enough with the “poverty excuse” already. We have schools in our midst that successfully educate children despite their socioeconomic status.

“We will never get rid of poverty UNTIL we fix our public schools” - Joel Klein

posted by: robn on March 9, 2010 6:55pm

Here’s your chart….that’ll be two hundred and eighteen thousand dollars please…

posted by: Threefifths on March 9, 2010 7:52pm

FIX THE SCHOOLS

ANON and CONCERNED, enough with the �poverty excuse� already. We have schools in our midst that successfully educate children despite their socioeconomic status.

James A. Baldwin
Anyone who has ever struggled with poverty knows how extremely expensive it is to be poor.

�We will never get rid of poverty UNTIL we fix our public schools� - Joel Klein

We will never get rid of poverty until the people wake up and stop this corporate plutocracy that keep’s the mass of the people in poverty.

posted by: Kumbaya on March 9, 2010 8:40pm

So student progress is measured by the CMTs. Not that we teach to the test here in New Haven, no sir.

And “student engagement” is measured by whether or not kids show up? Do they take a pulse as well?

posted by: cedarhillresident on March 10, 2010 7:24am

ROBN!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

CHW anything for you :)

OK Am I the only one that finds this to be a sad expensive JOKE!!! Give it up. This is all about PR and getting MONEY MONEY MONEY!!!! To pay for things that have NOTHING to do with teaching kids!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

posted by: Outa here on March 10, 2010 8:54am

Another tax bill…another gimmick…where does it end?

posted by: FIX THE SCHOOLS on March 10, 2010 9:19am

CHR,

Having followed the failure of our schools for a very long time, and now seeing the approach being taken now, I can assure you that this is not about the money. This is not about PR or gimmickry.

This is a well-intentioned, well-designed attempt to close the achievement gap. And in doing so, more of our citizens will prosper economically.

posted by: Threefifths on March 10, 2010 10:50am

Wake up parent’s this is going to set your school childern back even further.This is noting more than a Education Pozi Scheme. We can improve with the system we have already.Case in point if your house need a roof do you buy a new house or you fix the roof. This is being push all over this country by the corporate plutocracy to line there pockets. Don’t fall for this.Ask your self can King John be trusted. Also ask why is there no elected school board if they care so much for par.This is going to fail big entstime,mark my word’s.

posted by: Morris Cove Mom on March 10, 2010 11:37am

concerned westvilleres: While your points are valid, your solutions are not. We don’t owe any students the parents they lack, and we cannot afford to provide tutors to families who choose not to get involved, learn English, or ignore their children.

But we do need something. The lack of basic parenting and care for some children is what makes them behavior problems in school, which rub off on the kids with involved parents, which makes parents like me wish they could afford a private school education. It’s why people pull their kids out of public schools. Why should my kid suffer the lack of attention and teachers be forced to correct behavior issues that can be easily corrected at home? But are not?

I’m sick of hearing my 4th grader tell me that class was hard because the same 3 kids acted up again, putting everything on hold repeatedly, while the teacher barely disciplined them. The teacher said her hands are tied, that she can chastise them, but unless something big happens, nothing is really done. It’s like there is no plan in place for the children with mild to moderate behavior issues, just severe issues.

Instead of relying on the city or state to provide monies for tutoring, why can’t we get the school system to form a partnership with literacy guilds, Big Brothers/Big Sisters, and the Boys & Girls Clubs? We need volunteers to fill in these gaps, and they have people willing to contribute their time and effort. Now all we need to do is get them all in the same room.

posted by: Claudia Herrera on March 10, 2010 2:45pm

The school Christopher Columbus in Fair Haven, was in terrible conditions, just to pass-by you feel depressed. Now it’s a brand new building, healthy environment in the classrooms with qualifies educators, the community surroundings and parents participation should be all in equal measures. Personally, I don’t think we should be focusing only in the school reform. The challenge is HOW the schools can reach efficiently with the parents and communities.

New Haven has tremendous multicultural population and is not failure factor. Worthington Hooker is a great example, according to many is the best school in this City. carefully and respectfully I say the parent’s level of education is the one that made the difference and I don’t mean, these parents don’t want to their children be better is just they CAN NOT inspired what they don’t know or have.

This is hard to figure out when I heard, this people need education. I think for whom? To the giver or to the receiver? Culture for me means traditions, way of living, and way of well being for generations and in some cases survival. You can scream all out the way things are done in here but nothing will work if WE don’t UNDERTAND that we can not change nobody’s way, except to invited them (parents, community) to be part and also RESPONSIBLE of the growing and failures of our kids. Schools have known these for a long time. Why spend so much money in consultants? Why we don’t invest this money by creating workshop IN the schools (after schools 4:00 to 6:00 pm) for local parents to work with their children. Can be a Photography, cooking class, sports, and arts but, especially help for home-works. We have talent in our communities.

This can be an open invitation for everybody. Our kids will be around to a neighbor who knows them, closer to moms. The city can use the money to create local jobs and pay this parent with talents. In this case I not supporting volunteers the idea is create responsibility, commitment and accountability. Volunteers can be use as a extra supports.

The result may be awareness!! by creating longer relationship with the school, parent and our communities.

posted by: Jonathan Hopkins on March 10, 2010 6:36pm

Neighborhood reform undoubtedly leads to natural school reform. School reform may help some things but it is ultimately a misguided endeavor.

A friend of mine from school that attended with me k-12 was extremely hard working, smart and was the first person in her nuclear family to attend college. Her younger brother was 3 years behind her and attended the same schools, yet he began getting in trouble with the law when we was a young teen and started skipping school in the 8th grade until he dropped out two years ago for good. My friend had the same classes I did, did the same work (much better work than I did), did the same homework and is doing extremely well in college. So did her brother, yet because of neighborhood influences that he got involved in, his great access to a good education was squandered. According to my friend, her brother had always been “afraid” of the street when he was little and as he grew up, the way to confront his fears seemed to be to become part of the problem himself.
So yes, we can reform schools and it will likely help some kids to “rise above” the issues in their neighborhoods through self-realization and such, but we will have those kids that don’t make it. This exact thing already happens now though.
Another issue is of the kids who do get good educations (like my friend) they don’t come back. She is living in the city where she goes to school and only comes back for weekends occasionally. She just can’t deal with her old friends and can’t be in her neighborhood anymore. We’ve educated her right out of New Haven’s failing neighborhoods. However, I do know some people that come back and get involved in the city, but the vast majority of people I went to school with have left the city to go to school, to work, to live with relatives, etc because of failing neighborhoods.

I can think of a dozen other examples just like this of friends who got caught up outside of school or had siblings that did. School reform will likely not change much of anything-many kids will still get involved in the streets even with access to a great education, and some kids will get the education and go elsewhere never to return with a minority who come back and fight the uphill battle against failing neighborhoods.

posted by: Hood Rebel on March 10, 2010 10:17pm

Sorry John Hopkins, I see it differently than you do. I see my friends and family from the hood who’ve had access to high quality education, and family support, do extremely well in college and live fulfilling lives. Several have returned to work and live in New Haven. You don’t reform struggling neighborhoods without rethinking your approach to public education. New Haven is on the right track. Read the book “Whatever It Takes”

posted by: Threefifths on March 11, 2010 10:46am

Hood Rebel on March 10, 2010 10:17pm

Sorry John Hopkins, I see it differently than you do. I see my friends and family from the hood who�ve had access to high quality education, and family support, do extremely well in college and live fulfilling lives.

Not anymore. A new study was done that show’s
that While American high schools graduate about three-fourths of their students in four years, American colleges graduate only about half of their students in six. High Education is now having a problem. Feel free to read this report,

http://www.aei.org/docLib/20081030_EduOOct08_g.pdf

In fact how come for the past five years the unemployment rate for people who have access to high quality education is sky high.

You don�t reform struggling You don�t reform struggling neighborhoods without rethinking your approach to public education. New Haven is on the right track. Read the book �Whatever It Takes� without rethinking your approach to public education.

Neighborhoods are struggling not because of education,They are struggling because of the corporatist class that monopolizes the vast wealth of society for its own ends. Job layoff and high taxes and lack of wage increase are also the problem. Like on my block Layoff from at&t pratt whinery and other companies who have move out of this state. I agree with John Hopkins tat we must fight the uphill battle against failing neighborhoods. Let me tell you something.Go over to the milford mall at around
7:00 P.M. and you will see students that are working in the mall shops.I was talking to some of them that live on my block and some who live in other parts of the city.I said to them when do you have time to study and do your homework. Then told me sometime’s they don’t have the time at all beacause they must work to help pay the bills at home.Some of these childern are working after school to help keep the light’s on and gas on.Some I talked to also help with the rent. Some are living in shelters. So the neighborhoods are struggling because of this system of corporatist exploitation which is now having a inpact on the middle class which is in that high quality education model.

New Haven is on the right track. Read the book �Whatever It Takes�

No New Haven is on the track of helping The corporatist keep the vast wealth of society for its own ends.This is what this school reform is about. And that is the corporatist class maintaining its rule and The corporatist and their agents IE: puppet school board which is not elected run the education system so these corporate vampire’s make a profit off of the working people and the oppressed.

Here are two books to read.

The Death and Life of the Great American School System: How Testing and Choice Are Undermining Education (Hardcover)
By.Diane Ravitch
Here is some of the ting she say’s.

Ravitch includes clear prescriptions for improving America�s schools:
leave decisions about schools to educators, not politicians or businessmen
devise a truly national curriculum that sets out what children in every grade should be learning
expect charter schools to educate the kids who need help the most, not to compete with public schools
pay teachers a fair wage for their work, not �merit pay� based on deeply flawed and unreliable test scores
encourage family involvement in education from an early age

I like these two statement.

leave decisions about schools to educators, not politicians or businessmen.

expect charter schools to educate the kids who need help the most, not to compete with public schools.

Also this book.

Bracey, Gerald W. (2002). The War Against America’s Public Schools: Privatizing Schools, Commercializing Education. Boston: Allyn & Bacon.

Bracey makes a convincing argument that the whole school choice spectrum�from charter schools to vouchers�is supported by a movement concerned with turning American education into a profit-making sector of the economy. His argument is well laid out for the reader. He supports it with a three-prong approach. First, he demonstrates that dire education statistics, which appear in public reports and the media, often represent analyses performed by those with an interest in undermining the status quo in education. Analyses are skewed to make American education look abysmal. Second, he shows that the commercially interested enemies of current education stand to gain in making a variety of choice programs available to American parents and students. Finally, he provides evidence that existing school choice programs offer little evidence that choice is likely to improve American education. Hence, claims of education privatizers that they are motivated by an interest in helping educate young Americans are suspect.

Savage Inequalities: Children in America’s Schools by.Dr. Jonathan Kozol.

In fact check him out on book c-span.

http://www.booktv.org/Watch/10694/In+Depth+Jonathan+Kozol.aspx

posted by: Jonathan Hopkins on March 11, 2010 1:17pm

Hood Rebel,
I acknowledged in my post that I know people who have stuck around in New Haven after high school, and have come back since being at or graduating from college, but of the people I know, the majority have not come back. I guess we know different people.

Does that book deal with New Haven specifically? If not, then it is irrelevant to me.

Everyone that was in my classes in school throughout the years had access the exact same in-school education that I did, I know because I was there. Yet people still did not get a desirable outcome that leads to a life of personal fulfillment and socially productive and responsible behavior and it was not because the education failed them, it was because the neighborhood and/or the home failed them.

I am not against more effective education of our youth, I think its an important but still secondary endeavor.

Schooling in New Haven was always local and successful til problems began at the neighborhood level in the mid 20th century. People were leaving neighborhoods for the suburbs in droves and teachers were included in this exodus. The problem stems from a period of middle class exodus that allowed the always present underground criminal element to now flourish and because almost main stream, which began in the late 60s and by the cocaine boom had exploded to really violent and destructive crime. Teachers were no longer a part of the entire community-they had to be imported and as a result of failing neighborhoods the schools declined.
The parents of children today need meaningful employment that produce goods and services that help people and make people’s lives better, not a mcdonald’s uniform that serves heart attacks on a bun, which then increases everyones cost of living for having to pay for emergency hospital visits or government checks that produce dependence. This will help families rebuild and support their children financially and emotionally, which will help children do better in school, which will make the schools better.

If we took the kids from a failing school and put them in hooker and took the hooker kids to that failing school, the grades would primarily follow the students, not the schools with slight variation.
Schools are fundamentally a product of neighborhoods. It is a very recent occurrence of the last 40 years that people live somewhere based on school performance. Magnet schools were created as a way to address neighborhood segregation in neighborhood schools by shipping students around, not solving the real issue. Charter schools are another bandaid that doesn’t solve fundamental problems in neighborhoods.
Black migrants from the mid 20th century came to northern industrial cities in search of meaningful employment that produces goods for people all over the world, but within the decade after the mass migration began the manufacturing jobs had been sent to Mexico, India, China or suburban communities that barred blacks from moving in to them initially. The services and businesses also left the neighborhoods for the suburbs, leaving blacks (and puerto ricans) in crumbling neighborhoods with no jobs, services or opportunity that had been so plentiful just a decade earlier.
New Haven’s neighborhoods were constructed mostly as upper class mansions and workforce housing. Schools were created in response to community desires, neighborhoods were not built around schools.

posted by: Claudia Herrera on March 11, 2010 10:31pm

Poverty is it self explanatory word for struggling neighborhood.

Faultier in the other hand is a very strong word that should be use with care and kindness.

Understanding is a guide of success.

Everybody has stories and we valuate them because for the impact and lesson we learn form
them.

Ignorance is the worst Poisson to the humankind.

But Dream and Hope are in my opinion the more powerful word in any kind of language

Schools will be able to help with TWO only. Understanding and Ignorance.

Family, parenting, churches, community (specially struggling ones) Will be the most important Universities to help with the rest.

I share this story.
My Cousin, He live in Fair Haven since he was in first grade and went to Saint Rosa of Lima, Today he is a senior on UCCAN. He wants to be a Dentist. This boy specks 6 languages.
Spanish, English, Italian, German, French and Japanese. He speaking all fluently. He also being the fist on his class in different occasions. He works on the cafeteria�s university and his parents have a small Mexican bread business in Grand Avenue (Fair Haven).

Hope his dreams can come successfully truth and not being judge for less be cause he�s coming from a struggle neighborhood and if he one day he chooses to NOT come back to New Haven , that will be his own choice and free to do what is going to be a better fit for him.

Please be kind and sensitive when you want to use the �F� word. FAULIOR. Because struggle neighborhoods has so much good to give.

posted by: Tom Burns on March 12, 2010 12:04am

Hood, Hopkins, three-fifths and even Fix—-make very good points here——-We move cautiously into reform knowing that no one has yet to get it right———-our teachers are second to none——we simply ask that you listen for a moment to all the professionals on the front lines, who loves your kids—-believe me we do and they love us back——-I want to thank all those parents who gave me the opportunity to interact with their children over the years——-so many successes, yet we harp on the negatives——-let us all go forth from here with a positive attitude and belief that together we can get it done for ALL of our kids—-all of the time—-no excuses——get on board—-we need your support, for alone we will not succeed——Tom

posted by: Tier 1 & 3 revealed? on March 12, 2010 6:01pm

On Wednesday, March 10, Mayor DeStefano essentially announced that Edgewood and Davis schools will be the trial Tier 1 schools (originally to be announced on Monday, March 15). On Friday, March 12 the NH Register said they had been tipped that Urban Youth (34 students) will be one of the two turnaround schools for next year. Wow, that’s brave New Haven… What about letting true leaders take on the big challenges, such as Wilbur Cross HS? It’s looking unlikely that John and “Doc” are going to let real change happen for our kids anytime soon.

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