>Given all the mess with the school system the Ridgewood blog asks form BOE candidate Greg May his thoughts
RB: Greg, thanks for taking the time to give your thoughts on the situation going on within the school district.
GM: Well thank you, I must say I do enjoy reading the Ridgewood Blog and seeing some of the comments that folks post.
RB: Greg give us your take of the failure of the school system not meeting the national standardized test?
GM: Well first off, I am disgusted with the excuses that I read in the Ridgewood News and on the school district website. I can understand the fact that we had one district factor group that didn’t meet standards. From what I read, it seems that instead of saying “Look folks, we are sorry. We let a group of students down and we will be working to improve where we dropped the ball,” all we got was how we are being penalized and NCLB is unfair. Whether or not you think NCLB is fair or not, it is a tool that we can use to asses what the children are learning. It seems to me that we have a problem and it needs to be fixed.
RB: What would you do to reform the system?
GM: Well first, I think the BOE needs to take responsibility. Second I would look at what changes should be made in the curriculum and see what we, as a district, need to fix in order to bring all students up to standards. I can accept that for $76 million, we have flaws, but when we don’t try to fix them I start to wonder if the taxpayer’s money is being spent wisely. Also, with all the unfunded mandates the district is faced with, we should look into the legal aspects of opting out of these mandates. Simply put, if the State and Feds want us to comply with the regulations they set forth, they need to fund them. If they don’t live up to their legislation why should we comply?
RB: Didn’t you campaign on excellence in education?
GM: You know on the outside of the high school it says a “Tradition of Excellence in Education.” One of the themes I campaigned on was returning to that excellence. We have lowered the educational standards. A couple of years back there was a study released that stated a college senior today received the same quality education that a high school senior received in the 1950’s. By lowering the standards, we are failing the children. We need to return to those standards that our parents and grandparents had.
RB: Any other thoughts on this mess?
GM: I for one would like to see the Board and district take responsibility and stop the finger pointing. Tell us what you are going to do to fix this. This finger pointing seems to be a recurring trend. Over the past year it was we have lost home-rule, the year before that it was the State doesn’t provide the proper funding. We hear doomsday speeches around budget time, but never is there any we have a problem and we are going to work correct it.
I also hope with the promotion of Dr. Arilotta, we can move in a more proactive way to improve the school system. I was very impressed with Dr. Arilotta and I think he will be good for the district. I do wonder with his qualifications, why does the district need to search for a new superintendent. He seems like a good fit for the position and I think he would do a good job.
RB: Any plans to run again?
GM: Well it is too early to say. I have thought about running for the BOE again and I have also had thoughts about possibly running for the Village Council. I haven’t made up my mind yet and I really don’t know what the future holds. I have been pretty happy working with the Ridgewood Taxpayers Association and acting as kind of a watch dog on local government spending. I haven’t ruled anything out. I do know that if people want me to run I would gladly do it.