Photo credit: Boyd A. Loving Snapping Turtle Lays Eggs As Police Ensure Safety of School Children
May 30,2013
Boyd A. Loving
9:32 AM
Ridgewood NJ, Due to the proximity of the nearby Henrietta Hawes Elementary School, Ridgewood Police dispatched patrol officers to ensure that a large snapping turtle laying eggs on the front lawn of a home in the 400 block of Stevens Avenue was not disturbed by children walking to school on Thursday morning.
Ridgewood PD Patrol Officer Peter Gillen, pictured, was especially thrilled to watch the egg laying process as this is his last day on the job after serving as a uniformed patrol officer for 25 years with the Village of Ridgewood. Best wishes to Officer Gillen for a long and happy retirement!
Princeton to honor four secondary school teachers including Medha Jayant Kirtane from RHS
Posted May 28, 2013; 11:30 a.m.
by Michael Hotchkiss, Office of Communications
Princeton University will honor four exceptional New Jersey secondary school teachers at its 2013 Commencement on Tuesday, June 4.
This year’s honorees are Medha Jayant Kirtane, Ridgewood High School, Ridgewood; John McAllen, Point Pleasant Borough High School, Point Pleasant; Robert O’Boyle, Hopewell Valley Central High School, Pennington; and Deane Stepansky, Nutley High School, Nutley.
The teachers were selected for the award from 62 nominations from public and private schools around the state. Each teacher will receive $5,000, as well as $3,000 for his or her school library.
“In the final analysis, if great teachers are measured by what their students accomplish, the four teachers we honor with this award represent the very finest teachers in the profession today,” said Christopher Campisano, director of Princeton’s Program in Teacher Preparation. “By challenging their students to go beyond the superficial, by encouraging them to be skeptical, and by challenging them to test the limits of what they thought was possible, these four teachers enable their students to become confident, critical and creative thinkers.”
The staff of the Program in Teacher Preparation selected 11 finalists, each of whom was visited at their school by a member of the program staff. Award winners were selected by a committee that was chaired by Dean of the College Valerie Smith. The panel also included Campisano, University faculty members Miguel Centeno, Joshua Katz and Stanley Katz; Judy Wilson, superintendent of the Princeton Public Schools; and Samuel Stewart, executive county superintendent of schools for Mercer and Middlesex counties.
“These teachers serve as a testament to the quality of education found in our schools today and serve as an inspiration to all future and practicing teachers,” Campisano said.
Princeton has honored secondary school teachers since 1959. The University received an anonymous gift from an alumnus to establish the program.
Teachers honored this year are:
Medha Jayant Kirtane
Medha Jayant Kirtane is in demand — in class, during lunch, after school, even on the tennis court, teachers and students at Ridgewood High School say. Some students want to discuss an assignment; others want to talk about life outside the classroom.
“That Medha is such a perennial student favorite is all the more remarkable (at first glance) because she is one of the most rigorous teachers that students will ever encounter,” wrote Gavin Stewart, an English teacher at the school, in a letter supporting Kirtane’s nomination. “She demands excellence from her students, and although she ‘demands’ with a smile, her standards are nonetheless admirably high. To earn an ‘A’ in Ms. Kirtane’s class is truly an accomplishment!”
Kirtane has taught a range of social studies classes during her eight years at Ridgewood and has helped revise or rewrite several course curricula, principal Thomas Gorman said. Her current course load includes an interdisciplinary senior seminar that emphasizes independent research interwoven with intensive discussion in a small-group setting.
Lauren Cubellis, a graduate of Ridgewood High School and Princeton University, said the seminar pushed her to think critically about history and question assumptions.
“It was the most difficult class of my high school career,” Cubellis wrote. “But it was also the most exciting class I had ever taken. Medha was able to turn history into a living and breathing record of humanity.”
Kirtane said she tries to instill her students with curiosity, diligence, sincerity and critical thinking skills.
“I want my students to engage with themselves, me and each other to ignite their passion to learn and create ideas anew,” Kirtane wrote. “From that heated process should emerge a distilled vision of what should be and how each of them can work, within and beyond their communities, to achieve their goals.”
Outside the classroom, Kirtane leads the high school’s girls’ tennis team and was named division coach of the year in 2009, 2010 and 2011. She is also faculty adviser to the school’s Asian Festival and the Student Broadcast Club.
Kirtane earned her bachelor’s degree from Williams College and a master’s degree from Harvard University’s Graduate School of Education.
Join the Fight Against Common Core
Lindsey Burke
May 29, 2013 at 7:45 am
Two competing forces are pushing on America’s K–12 education system today.
One is an effort to infuse education choice into a long-stagnant system, empowering parents with the ability to send their child to a school that meets her unique learning needs.
The other is an effort to further centralize education through Common Core national standards and tests.
Across the country, education choice options have been proliferating rapidly, including vouchers, tuition tax credits, special needs scholarships, and education savings accounts. Educational choice is a revolution because it funds children instead of physical school buildings and allows dollars to follow children to any school—or education option—that meets their unique learning needs.
CHOICE EMPOWERS PARENTS to direct their child’s share of education funding, giving them options beyond an assigned government school.
CHOICE PRESSURES PUBLIC SCHOOLS with a much-needed competitive atmosphere, which works toward improving educational outcomes for students who take advantage of choice options as well as students who choose to attend their local public schools.
CHOICE HELPS KIDS. Seventeen states and Washington, D.C., now have private school choice programs—and more states are considering implementing choice options. Education choice represents the type of innovation and freedom that will provide long-overdue reform to the K–12 education system, and holds the potential to truly raise educational outcomes for every child across the country.
But at the same time this encouraging shift toward education choice is underway, there is a push to take education in the exact opposite direction through Common Core national standards and tests.
COMMON CORE IS an effort to centralize education by dictating the standards and assessments that will determine the content taught in every public school across the country.
COMMON CORE HAS NO EVIDENCE that it will improve academic outcomes or boost international competitiveness. But the Obama Administration has pushed states to adopt national standards and assessments in exchange for offers of billions of dollars in federal funding and waivers from the onerous provisions of No Child Left Behind.
COMMON CORE ASSUMES that top-down, uniform standards and assessments—driven by federal bureaucrats and national organizations—are preferable to the state and local reform efforts guided by input from parents, teachers, and taxpayers.
States have been competing to improve their education systems by implementing education choice options and other reforms such as alternative teacher certification, transparent A–F grading systems, and a focus on reading achievement. Check out innovations in:
Florida
Idaho
Indiana
Arizona
American education is at a crossroads: One path leads toward further centralization and greater federal intervention. The other path leads toward robust education choice, including school choice and choice in curricula.
Common Core takes the path toward centralization, and state leaders should seize the moment to resist this latest federal overreach. National standards and tests are a challenge to educational freedom in America, and state and local leaders who believe in limited government should resist them.
Is the Dollar Dying? Why US Currency Is in Danger
Published: Thursday, 14 Feb 2013 | 12:49 PM ET
By: Jeff Cox
CNBC.com Senior Writer
The U.S dollar is shrinking as a percentage of the world’s currency supply, raising concerns that the greenback is about to see its long run as the world’s premier denomination come to an end.
When compared to its peers, the dollar has drifted to a 15-year low, according to the International Monetary Fund, indicating that more countries are willing to use other currencies to do business.
While the American currency still reigns supreme — it constitutes $3.72 trillion, or 62 percent, of the $6 trillion in allocated foreign exchange holdings by the world’s central banks — the Japanese yen, Swiss franc and what the IMF classifies as “other currencies” such as the Chinese yuan are gaining.
IRS higher-ups requested info on conservative groups, letters show
By Lisa Myers, Rich Gardella and Talesha Reynolds
NBC News
Additional scrutiny of conservative organizations’ activities by the IRS did not solely originate in the agency’s Cincinnati office, with requests for information coming from other offices and often bearing the signatures of higher-ups at the agency, according to attorneys representing some of the targeted groups. At least one letter requesting information about one of the groups bears the signature of Lois Lerner, the suspended director of the IRS Exempt Organizations department in Washington.
Jay Sekulow, an attorney representing 27 conservative political advocacy organizations that applied to the Internal Revenue Service for tax-exempt status, provided some of the letters to NBC News. He said the groups’ contacts with the IRS prove that the practices went beyond a few “front line” employees in the Cincinnati office, as the IRS has maintained.
Responsibility for sidewalk repair costs debated in Ridgewood
Wednesday May 29, 2013, 12:22 PM
BY DARIUS AMOS
STAFF WRITER
The Ridgewood News
The Ridgewood Council is still undecided whether it will change the village’s existing sidewalk policy, specifically the terms that place maintenance and repair responsibility on residents.
Discussion regarding sidewalk repairs has emerged in recent months as the destruction caused by Superstorm Sandy coincided with the Ridgewood Environmental Advisory Committee’s (REAC) ongoing efforts to draft a new shade tree policy. Some council members believed the timing was right to modify the regulations and incorporate them into the policy.
At issue, according to Mayor Paul Aronsohn, is when a village-owned tree causes damage to a sidewalk, either by overgrown roots or when one is felled by nature. In those cases, residents whose property adjoins the damaged sidewalk must shoulder the cost to fix it.
Benefits of later school openings touted in Ridgewood
Wednesday May 29, 2013, 12:16 PM
BY LAURA HERZOG
STAFF WRITER
The Ridgewood News
Speaking recently about Ridgewood High School’s (RHS) new professional development program, students and administrators had mostly good things to say.
Since its introduction last May, the program has offered teachers several extra hours throughout the year to meet and students more time for sleep or work.
And now, after a presentation for Board of Education (BOE) members last week, the BOE is equally on board with the program, which is designed to provide staff members with an opportunity for collaboration between departments and individual staff members.
Are You Concerned You May Have a Genetic Risk for Cancer?
May 28, 2013
Nelly Oundjian, M.D.
Director, The Valley Hospital Clinical Cancer Genetics Program
Laura Klein, M.D.
Medical Director, The Valley Hospital Breast Center
Gary Breslow, M.D.
Plastic Surgeon, The Valley Hospital Medical Staff
Ridgewood NJ, Angelina Jolie’s decision to have a preventive double mastectomy after learning that she carried a mutation (alteration) in a gene that put her at an 87 percent risk of developing breast cancer highlighted a complex dilemma for women with family histories of breast or ovarian cancer. At issue: a mutation in either the BRCA1 or BRCA2 gene increases the risk of developing breast cancer by as much as 87 percent, and the risk for ovarian cancer by up to 44 percent.
And it’s not just women who are affected. Men with the mutated BRCA2 gene are at increased risk for male breast cancer, and both men and women with the BRCA2 mutation have an increased risk for pancreatic cancer.
So, how do you know if you are a candidate for genetic testing for cancer?
There is no simple list of criteria indicating which individuals should undergo testing. However, those with a strong family history of breast or ovarian cancer, or a personal history of breast, ovarian or pancreatic cancer should consider being evaluated for genetic testing for BRCA mutations. The following additional factors indicate that the probability of detecting a mutation is high enough to warrant consideration of testing:
• A family history of close blood relatives with breast cancer, ovarian cancer and pancreatic cancer, particularly breast cancer diagnosed before age 50
• A family history of male breast cancer
• A BRCA1 or BRCA2 mutation has been discovered in your family
• Your family is of Ashkenazi Jewish descent and there is a family history of breast, ovarian or pancreatic cancer.
The cost for BRCA1 and BRCA2 mutation testing usually ranges from several hundred to several thousand dollars. Insurance policies vary as to whether or not the cost of testing is covered, but most cover the screening for appropriate high-risk patients. If you are considering BRCA1 and BRCA2 mutation testing, you should inquire about your insurance company’s policies regarding genetic tests.
If you do test positive for the BRCA mutation, you have options. These include enhanced cancer surveillance like having Breast MRI alternating with mammograms and breast ultrasound every 6 months and transvaginal pelvic ultrasound, medications to reduce your risk of developing breast cancer, and preventive surgeries, such as prophylactic double mastectomies and removal of the ovaries and fallopian tubes (bilateral salpingo-oophorectomy) after child bearing age.
In our experience, most medical insurance plans will cover the cost of enhanced surveillance and prophylactic and reconstructive surgery in high-risk patients that are carriers of the BRCA mutation.
Valley recently launched the Clinical Cancer Genetics Program to offer comprehensive cancer risk assessment, cancer genetic counseling, and predictive genetic testing to individuals with a personal and/or family history of cancer. If you want for more information or to schedule a consultation to determine if you are a candidate for BRCA screening, please call 201-327-8765.
Mail carrier from Ridgewood among 7 charged in $2M tax refund scam
Wednesday May 29, 2013, 12:49 PM
BY PETER J. SAMPSON
STAFF WRITER
The Record
A mail carrier from Bergen County was among seven people charged in a federal criminal complaint unsealed on Wednesday with conspiring to fraudulently obtain more than $2 million in government tax refund checks using stolen identities.
Lourdes Ortiz, 40, of Ridgewood, and Gloria Rivera, 39, of the Bronx, were both U.S. Postal Service employees who allegedly accepted bribes to divert refund checks from their mail route in Queens, N.Y. They surrendered to postal agents on Wednesday.
Fausto Bernard, 48, of Newark, was arrested by postal inspectors and agents of the Internal Revenue Service and the Secret Service.
Another defendant, Luis Pena, 43, of Yonkers, N.Y., was arrested Tuesday night. The four are expected to be brought before a federal magistrate in Newark this afternoon for an initial appearance.
New rules will define Spelling Bee experience
Wednesday, May 29, 2013
BY THE RECORD’S STAFF
The Record
Indrani Das packed two suitcases for her trip to Washington for the Scripps National Spelling Bee. One carried her clothes. The other — far more important – contained the precious cargo that could make or break her quest to capture the national championship.
It was a 17-pound dictionary.
That oversized book, and an imposing stack of other materials, loom especially important this year because of a rule change that, for the first time, requires contestants not only to spell any word in the dictionary, but to define some of them, too.
The new rules, announced in late March after the national field was set, were a surprise to 13-year-old Indrani, an eighth-grader at River Dell Middle School who will represent North Jersey in the event this week.
“I always thought the Spelling Bee was just about spelling,” she said during an interview in her Oradell home, adding, “They should have told us earlier.”
“Real Housewives of New Jersey” “Joe” Giudice will go on trial July 15 on charges he posed as his brother to get a driver’s license
Tuesday, May 28, 2013 Last updated: Tuesday May 28, 2013, 6:21 PM
BY JOHN PETRICK
STAFF WRITE
Giudice in April rejected a plea deal that would have gotten him four years in state prison. The prosecution has maintained that that is its final offer.
The trial date was scheduled during a status conference on the case by state Judge Greta Gooden Brown in Paterson. Miles Feinstein, the defense lawyer for Giudice, and Jay McCann, a Passaic County assistant prosecutor, said in court that a mid-July start would give them reasonable time to prepare.
“We are happy that a trial date has been set and we look forward to Joe being exonerated,” Feinstein said following the brief hearing Monday, in which Giudice attended with his mother. Both declined comment.
State joins discussion on Graydon Pool ramp in Ridgewood
Tuesday May 28, 2013, 7:46 AM
BY DARIUS AMOS
STAFF WRITER
The Ridgewood News
The wait for a 100 percent ADA-compliant ramp leading into Graydon Pool just became longer, and residents from all over Bergen County recognize the ramifications of the delay: wheelchair users and others with disabilities must wait at least one more year before they can enjoy the centerpiece of Ridgewood’s historic swimming park.
MARION BROWN/STAFF PHOTOGRAPHER
Buy or license this photo
Daniel Saunders (left) and Cindy Randazzo of the New Jersey Department of Environmental Protection speak to residents during a meeting on accessibility at Graydon Pool.
New Jersey Department of Environmental Protection (DEP) officials toured the grounds of the sandy-bottomed pool last week prior to a two-hour discussion with dozens of residents, all of whom supported full accessibility to the pool but were at odds with one another on the means of achieving it. The purpose of this week’s meeting, according to Daniel Saunders, administrator of the DEP’s Historic Preservation Office, was to “achieve balance” among all sides and help the village move forward with the project.
The discord between residents who support the installation of a concrete ramp at the pool and those seeking alternatives is at the root of the lengthy process, which is approaching three years. But after several public discussions and review of various schematics, the Ridgewood Council last fall approved a ramp design that would be constructed in time for the start of the 2013 swim season.
The Preserve Graydon Coalition letter published in the March 2, 2012, Ridgewood News :
To the editor:
Once again, paving threatens Graydon Pool – not the whole pool this time, but an important part of it.
The Village Council has applied to the County Freeholders for a $60,000 block grant for a concrete ramp leading into the 12-foot section of the swimming area. The ramp, including a $12,600 aluminum handrail drilled into the patio wall, would begin with a long concrete sidewalk at the corner of the bathroom building and cover the sand along the front of the Pavilion. It would circle the north spillway, then make two 90-degree turns before entering the water in a 34-foot stretch along the wall below the patio, ending with a landing platform of a few more feet.
In the grant application – posted at preservegraydon.org – the village cites as a basis for the design “our review and discussions with residents and those who use the facility.” Sounds good, but no needs assessment was done. No general discussions with residents were held. And this ill-conceived plan would neither satisfy Graydon patrons nor remove barriers; in fact, it would add some.
The application states that Ridgewood would spend an additional $15,000 in municipal funds on the concrete project. Yet with modern materials and devices, the desired effect could be achieved non-invasively, less expensively and to serve a far broader population.
Allendale’s Crestwood Lake, another municipal lake with a sandy beach, meets Americans with Disabilities Act requirements with a beach wheelchair that goes over sand, a floating wheelchair that goes into water and folds flat for storage (https://mobi-chair.com), and removable water-permeable roll-out mats (which Graydon doesn’t need).
At Graydon, a floating wheelchair could easily enter the water at the spot near the lap lanes in the 4-foot area where part of the low fieldstone wall has been removed. This shallower area, close to The Stable’s about-to-be-upgraded parking lot, would accommodate all ages and abilities, whereas a ramp into the deep end would be harder to reach and suit few or none. In any case, a water-safe wheelchair would have to be bought for water entry; metal wheelchairs are not used on sand or in pools.
Among many other problems: A ramp in the northeast corner would catch detritus floating toward the spillway, creating an unsightly safety hazard. Seniors and others desiring a firm, quick foothold into the water would not choose to traverse a 40-foot ramp. They merely want existing ramps upgraded.
Of likely concern to countless residents, whether Graydon patrons or not, is the large amount of impervious material that would be added to the flood hazard area 12 months a year in a pool used three months a year. Our village engineer noted at a recent meeting that we would never reduce flooding until we stopped paving the floodway. What part of Hurricane Irene don’t we understand?
If council members want Graydon kept natural, as four claim they do, and wish to make Graydon more barrier free without exacerbating flooding, they will seek better alternatives and withdraw the application, or if the grant money is offered, refuse it.
Marcia Ringel
Alan Seiden
Co-Chairs, The Preserve Graydon Coalition
Curriculum shift planned in Ridgewood schools
Tuesday May 28, 2013, 11:22 AM
BY LAURA HERZOG
STAFF WRITER
The Ridgewood News
Beginning next fall, district students will experience a language arts curricular shift.
There will be a movement toward more grammar education, an increased emphasis on the introduction of more non-fiction texts into students’ overall coursework, and an earlier focus on typewriting skills in elementary school.
With a five-year plan, a team of K-12 administrators and teachers is addressing a dip in sixth grade students’ language arts proficiency test scores, which lag behind the scores of some sixth-graders in other districts that are socioeconomically similar to Ridgewood.
The plan will also implement both state recommendations and local feedback from parents, students and professionals with careers that require extensive language arts skills.
Texas legislature passes tax cuts for businesses
By Corrie MacLaggan
AUSTIN, Texas | Mon May 27, 2013 4:59pm EDT
May 27 (Reuters) – Texas lawmakers sent Governor Rick Perry more than $1 billion in proposed business tax cuts shortly before the end of the biennial legislative session on Monday.
The tax-cut package – the final piece of which was approved by the House and Senate late on Sunday – includes an extension of a business franchise tax exemption for small businesses and a rate cut for businesses of all sizes.
The Republican-majority legislature also approved about $300 million in electricity rebates.
Perry, a Republican, had called on lawmakers to pass tax relief for businesses. Thirty-five states are taking up tax reform in their current legislative sessions, according to a recent survey by the National Conference of State Legislatures.
Texas’ franchise tax legislation removes inequities and lowers the tax rate for more than 800,000 businesses, according to Lieutenant Governor David Dewhurst, a Republican.
Passing the proposal “sends a clear message that we are committed to sustaining the country’s best climate for job creation and economic growth here in Texas,” Dewhurst said.
