Tag: Ridgewood Schools

>HOW LABOR DAY CAME ABOUT; WHAT IT MEANS

“Labor Day differs in every essential from the other holidays of the year in any country,” said Samuel Gompers, founder and longtime president of the American Federation of Labor. “All other holidays are in a more or less degree connected with conflicts and battles of man’s prowess over man, of strife and discord for greed and power, of glories achieved by one nation over another. Labor Day…is devoted to no man, living or dead, to no sect, race, or nation.”

Labor Day, the first Monday in September, is a creation of the labor movement and is dedicated to the social and economic achievements of American workers. It constitutes a yearly national tribute to the contributions workers have made to the strength, prosperity and well-being of our country.

Founder of Labor Day

More than 100 years after the first Labor Day observance, there is still some doubt as to who first proposed the holiday for workers.

Some records show that Peter J. McGuire, general secretary of the Brotherhood of Carpenters and Joiners and a co-founder of the American Federation of Labor, was first in suggesting a day to honor those “who from rude nature have delved and carved all the grandeur we behold.”

But Peter McGuire’s place in Labor Day history has not gone unchallenged. Many believe that Matthew Maguire, a machinist, not Peter McGuire, founded the holiday. Recent research seems to support the contention that Matthew Maguire, later the secretary of Local 344 of the International Association of Machinists in Paterson, N.J., proposed the holiday in 1882 while serving as secretary of the Central Labor Union in New York. What is clear is that the Central Labor Union adopted a Labor Day proposal and appointed a committee to plan a demonstration and picnic.

The First Labor Day

The first Labor Day holiday was celebrated on Tuesday, September 5, 1882, in New York City, in accordance with the plans of the Central Labor Union. The Central Labor Union held its second Labor Day holiday just a year later, on September 5, l883.

In l884 the first Monday in September was selected as the holiday, as originally proposed, and the Central Labor Union urged similar organizations in other cities to follow the example of New York and celebrate a “workingmen’s holiday” on that date. The idea spread with the growth of labor organizations, and in l885 Labor Day was celebrated in many industrial centers of the country.

Labor Day Legislation

Through the years the nation gave increasing emphasis to Labor Day. The first governmental recognition came through municipal ordinances passed during 1885 and 1886. From them developed the movement to secure state legislation. The first state bill was introduced into the New York legislature, but the first to become law was passed by Oregon on February 2l, l887. During the year four more states — Colorado, Massachusetts, New Jersey, and New York — created the Labor Day holiday by legislative enactment. By the end of the decade Connecticut, Nebraska, and Pennsylvania had followed suit. By 1894, 23 other states had adopted the holiday in honor of workers, and on June 28 of that year, Congress passed an act making the first Monday in September of each year a legal holiday in the District of Columbia and the territories.

A Nationwide Holiday

The form that the observance and celebration of Labor Day should take were outlined in the first proposal of the holiday — a street parade to exhibit to the public “the strength and esprit de corps of the trade and labor organizations” of the community, followed by a festival for the recreation and amusement of the workers and their families. This became the pattern for the celebrations of Labor Day. Speeches by prominent men and women were introduced later, as more emphasis was placed upon the economic and civic significance of the holiday. Still later, by a resolution of the American Federation of Labor convention of 1909, the Sunday preceding Labor Day was adopted as Labor Sunday and dedicated to the spiritual and educational aspects of the labor movement.

The character of the Labor Day celebration has undergone a change in recent years, especially in large industrial centers where mass displays and huge parades have proved a problem. This change, however, is more a shift in emphasis and medium of expression. Labor Day addresses by leading union officials, industrialists, educators, clerics and government officials are given wide coverage in newspapers, radio and television.

The vital force of labor added materially to the highest standard of living and the greatest production the world has ever known and has brought us closer to the realization of our traditional ideals of economic and political democracy. It is appropriate, therefore, that the nation pay tribute on Labor Day to the creator of so much of the nation’s strength, freedom, and leadership — the American worker.

[Source: United States Department of Labor]

>The Ridgewood Public School system employs at least 3 people, that the Fly can ascertain, who oversee the implementation of our math curriculum. This does take into account the Superintendent of schools. They are the Asst. Superintendent for Curriculum, Instruction & Assessment, the Supervisor of Curriculum, and the District Mathematics Supervisor.

There may be more like a Director of Mathematics, but since the district does not provide this information on its web site, and short of filing a request for it under the Freedom of Information Act, this is what we could gleam from the district’s own Newsline publication.

So, for approximately $400,000.00 a year (including benefits) there are at least 3 people in charge of our district’s math program and on top of this we’re paying outside consultants to help us determine the future of our math curriculum?

This should raise doubts about the competency of the people employed to serve our community, that it costs so much and takes so many to get it wrong.

>P.J.:

An interesting article about journalist Stanley Kurtz’s experience in spelunking through the recently-released records of the Chicago Annenberg Challenge, founded by Bill Ayers, and chaired by Barack Obama, can be found at https://www.swamppolitics.com/news/politics/blog/2008/08/obama_campaign_confronts_wgn_r.html

The reason I’m bringing it to your attention is the point raised in the following comment left by a reader of the article:

“Missing from the comments so far is any discussion of what Stanley Kurtz talked about finding in his search of the archives. One item he mentioned concerned an organization that applied for money to fund a program promoting the celebration of the Juneteenth holiday. Apparently Juneteenth is an event that began in 1865 to mark the end of slavery. This request was approved and funds were provided from the Annenberg money. Another request for money from an organization dedicated to improving math skills of its participants was turned down. According to Dr. Kurtz many other academically oriented applications were also rejected. This information was taken directly from documents in the archive. Now I don’t have a problem with people celebrating and remembering their cultural heritage but if your goal is to improve academic performance it seems funding programs to improve math skills would be far more important. It is also apparent that Senator Obama was instrumental in determining which requests for grants were accepted and which were rejected. His priorities in this example do little to inspire confidence in his message about hope for a better future.”

You would think that the Chicago Annenberg Challenge would leap at the chance to fund projects designed to improve the math skills of public school children. Unfortunatlely, to read the above comment is to conclude that Bill Ayers and his ilk only assume roles in an education-related organization if they think it will be an easy mark to pilfer money to fund their radical political priorities.

Fast forward to this year, and we learn, upon reading this blog, that Bill Ayers was recently elected vice president for curriculum of the 25,000-member American Educational Research Association (AERA), the nation’s largest organization of education-school professors and researchers.

Surely the AERA knew what it was getting in electing Bill Ayers to such a position. Since Ayers was “elected”, there must be a majority of people in that organization who share his radical outlook, which as we now know, does not coincide with the best interests of public school children.

The official State of New Jersey Education websites have links to only two national education-related organizations, namely: Bill Ayers’ American Educational Research Association (AERA), and Assistant Superintendent Botsford’s Association for Supervision and Curriculum Development (ASCD).

Guilt by association?

Not necessarily, but readers of this blog are also aware of the radical positions held and tactics used by the ASCD to advance their agenda, which seems to have very little to do with improved educational outcomes, and much more to do with social engineering. Unless I’m shown otherwise, I will lump CAC, AERA, and ASCD together as radical political organizations masquerading in education-related clothing.

>Thursday, August 28, 2008

BY JOHN MOONEY
Star-Ledger Staff

With New Jersey’s public schools soon to open, teacher contract talks are so far seeing little shift in salary increases, but they are yielding some cost savings around health benefits, according to the state’s school boards association.

In about 80 contracts settled since January, salary increases are averaging about 4.57 percent, a little less than the 4.61 percent average last year, according to the association. Still, including contracts previously settled, the average increase for 2008-09 is so far roughly the same as last year’s.

But the association’s annual back-to-school report said more than 80 percent of the new pacts have provisions that reduce the public’s cost for teacher health benefits, from less expensive plans to requiring teachers contribute toward their premiums.

Among the latest contracts with cost-cutting moves were Kingwood and Tewksbury in Hunterdon County, Washington Township in Morris, and Newton in Sussex, according to the association.

In Newton’s new contract, salary increases average less than 4.4 percent over three years, and new hires will only be offered managed care plans while deductibles will rise in the traditional plans.

The estimates are sure to change, as more than 125 contracts are still outstanding going into the school year, a pretty typical number for the end of summer.

The New Jersey Education Association, the statewide teachers union, downplayed the salary averages or other contract developments with so many talks unresolved. “It’s a little too early to tell what the trends are,” said spokesman Steve Wollmer.

Of the contracts talks under way, neither side reported any impasses that are likely to lead to disruptions in the start of school. The state’s last teacher strike was in North Warren Regional in 2003.

But some are getting testy, including in the state-run Paterson schools where talks have been going on for nine months and are now in their third session with a state mediator. The union’s leadership said the district has proposed no salary increases, along with a longer school year and further givebacks in benefits.

“It is the worst proposal I have ever gotten from management: very, very severe and very, very anti-union,” said Peter Tirri, president of the 3,900-member Paterson Education Association. “It’s like nothing I’ve ever seen.”

>Readers request information on football tragedy ………

PJ please post some of the news coming out of Waldwick given the tragic death of a 13 year old boy. I know much of Ridgewood would appreciate a place to post condolences and talk about the situation. A frequent visitor to the blog the occassional mention of our surrounding communities gives us context and comradelier for all that we discuss.

The Associated Press

WALDWICK, N.J. – A Waldwick teen collapsed and died during recreational football practice on his 13th birthday.

Sean Fisher’s mother tells The Record of Bergen County she was home making cupcakes for her son’s birthday when he lost consciousness Monday.

An EMT rushed onto the field and paramedics used a defibrillator. They were unable to resuscitate him. Fisher was pronounced dead at Valley Hospital in Ridgewood.

The cause of death isn’t known.

The boy was due to enter eighth grade next week.

The school district is offering counseling services and a meeting for parents is scheduled for at 7 p.m. Tuesday at the high school.

,,,

>I wanted to post a recc for a fantastic Chinese (actually Taiwanese) place in Ridgewood, NJ. We just went last week for lunch after not having been there for awhile and everything was as wonderful as we remembered.

We had:

– Dumplings. These are out of this world. IMHO, better than any I’ve had in NYC or on the west coast. The owner makes them herself every day with thin skins and generous pork and shrimp filling. They’re steamed rather than pan fried. They also have a pork and chive option. I’d have to say that these are probably the best dumplings I’ve had anywhere, including Asia (with maybe an exception for two especially fantastic Shanghainese soup dumpling places in Shanhai and Taiwan…but those are a different type of dumpling).

– Eggplant and garlic sauce. The owner recommended this because my girlfriend loves eggplant. I’m not a big eggplant fan but have to admit this was delicious. Perfectly garlicky with a smooth brown sauce and fresh chunks of eggplant.

– We had a daily special dish that I think was called ‘Stir-Fried Filet Mignon with yellow and green onions”. Think it was maybe 10 bucks and was blown away. Very generous tender chunks of filet with a great onion sauce and the onions themselves.

The place itself is very non-descript and has maybe 7 tables. It’s also off the main drag of Ridgewood but not far from it. And, tremendous value. I think we spent around $40 for three of us with the dishes above, a few others I’m forgetting and soups. We also took some dumplings home frozen and they were almost as good as the ones we had freshly made a couple of days prior.

I remember the noodle dishes here also being really good but we didn’t get those this time. This is one of those places that a lot of people probably keep secret since I didn’t see much on it on this board.

Do others know this place? What do others think?

https://chowhound.chow.com/topics/552460

>Charges wealthy towns resist because of race and class prejudice

Tuesday, August 26, 2008

BY TOM HESTER

Star-Ledger Staff

The chairman of the New Jersey NAACP’s housing committee yesterday charged that prejudice against minorities and the poor is one reason 34 higher-income towns have gone to court to oppose new affordable housing rules.

“They don’t want people who look like me in those neighborhoods,” Mike McNeil of Lakewood, the NAACP housing chairman, said at a Statehouse news conference held with the Cherry Hill-based nonprofit Fair Share Housing Center. “It’s not just racism, it’s not just because you are working poor. Someone says you are building affordable housing and they automatically assume the people are jobless and out on the street.”

The groups said the towns objecting to the state Council on Affordable Housing’s new way to determine their “fair share” of affordable housing are among the state’s least diverse.

“Our analysis shows that many of the towns that are objecting the loudest to the new regulations, particularly those that have sued the state in an effort to reduce their housing obligations under COAH, are some of the very wealthiest places in our nation,” said Adam Gordon, a Fair Share attorney. “These towns are complaining about their obligations, but they actually have to build 20 percent less affordable housing than before. They have been assigned reduced obligations, but they are complaining the loudest .”

Stuart Koenig, a lawyer for 19 of the municipalities and an official with the New Jersey State League of Municipalities denied the charge, insisting the towns are questioning the methodology used by the COAH that produced what they believe are unfairly high numbers of affordable housing units.

“These are not municipalities trying to avoid their obligations,” said Koenig. “They are upset with the rules.”

Koenig said the towns have met past affordable housing obligations which increased their population. He said under the rules, the towns are expected to produce more affordable housing because they now have more people.

Koenig said that for Bernards to meet a state demand for 206 affordable houses and apartments, it would have to allow developers to erect 1,131 units by 2018. The Corzine administration wants to see 100,000 affordable units provided state wide over the next 10 years.

Mike Cerra, a League of Municipalities legislative analyst, said 214 municipalities have joined in court action opposing the COAH regulations.

“Fair Share Housing Center has chosen to vilify the very municipalities that have stepped up to the plate to embrace the Fair Housing Act and have filed their compliance plans with, and have asked for certification from COAH,” he said.

The towns that have challenged the new COAH rules include Bethlehem, Clinton Town, Clinton Township, Greenwich Township (Warren County), Montgomery, Peapack-Gladstone, Readington, Roseland, Roxbury, Summit, Union Township (Hunterdon County), Warren, Watchung and Wharton.

Tom Hester may be reached at [email protected].

>Mark Bavaro @ Bookends Tuesday, September 2nd – 7:00pm
Former NY Giant Tight End from the 1986 Championship Team, Mark Bavaro will sign his book: Rough & Tumble!

September 7th 15th Annual Fall Car Show
Presented by Ridgewood Chamber of Commerce
Come to E. Ridgewood Avenue to view a wide selection of cars. For more information contact the Chamber at 201/445-2600 or www.ridgewoodchamber.com

September 14th Ridgewood Street Fair
From Noon to 5PM come stroll E. Ridgewood Ave and enjoy the handmade crafts and art work of all kinds. A variety of food and activities for children will be available. Raindate: 9/21.

Dionne Warwick@ Bookends Tuesday, September 16th – 6:00pm (NEW TIME)
Grammy Award Winning Singer, Dionne Warwick will sign her new children’s Book: Say A Little Prayer… don’t miss this one… bring the kids!

Robert Wagner @ Bookends Tuesday, September 23rd – 7:00pm
From the hit TV Show; Hart To Hart, Robert Wagner will sign his new book: Pieces Of My Heart; A Life.

>https://www.gazette.net/stories/08142008/fredlet165341_32459.shtml

TERC Investigations math.

Thursday, Aug. 14, 2008

If you don’t know what it is, and you have an elementary student, you need to educate yourself.

Look it up on the Internet , and you will see the testimony of parents and teachers, students and principals who have been horrified by this poor teaching curriculum.

Math professionals’ review of this elementary math teaching curriculum puts it at the bottom in terms of educating children in basic math and preparing them for a future in math.

Investigations has not been recommended for use by the National Math Panel. In Virginia, third-graders’ standardized math test scores have gone down since TERC Investigations was implemented.

This is the math your child will be taught in Frederick County Public Schools starting this fall.

Sadly, the public’s concerns have been brought to the attention of our own Board of Education, but either the majority of them do not believe what others have experienced, they do not feel that mathematicians who hold doctorate degrees know what they are talking about, or they just don’t care.

Only two members of the school board voted to reconsider using TERC Investigations for this school year. They felt strongly enough to reconsider its use.

Sadly, the rest of the board has been sold on this product.

Obviously, those members are blindly taking the word of the “math specialist” who is selling it, rather than really looking at the proven poor track record of this curriculum.

We, as parents, have so much power to control what our children are being taught and how they are being taught. I know you are busy. I have three children younger than 13 and work outside the home.

But this is too important an issue to overlook or to hope someone else will take care of. We need to band together, educate ourselves, and intercede on our children’s behalf.

Visit our Web site, FrederickEducationReform.com, for information about TERC Investigations math. Talk to your children’s principal about your concerns once you, too, have read the facts.

Contact the Board of Education. That’s why they are there.

Let’s let them know that we are entitled to have a say in what kind of math they are teaching our kids and what is being left out.

Suzanne Middleton, Frederick

The writer is a member of Frederick Education Reform.

>By Deborah Medenbach

August 22, 2008 6:00 AM

SHANDAKEN – After a six-hour search Wednesday, authorities located a 6-year-old New Jersey girl who disappeared from her family’s seasonal home.
Misa Tamura of Ridgewood, N.J., reported her daughter, Migumi, wandered off sometime before 12:20 p.m. from their vacation home on Upper Birch Creek Road, police say. State Troopers Elizabeth Apmann and Kevin Kesick located Migumi Tamura six hours later more than a mile from where she was last seen, officials say. The girl suffered only minor scrapes to her arms and legs.

>

Well, there you have it. Ridgewood High School had its new cupola placed atop the building yesterday. It’s almost an exact replica of the old one.

>Posted by dmurphy

August 20, 2008 19:55PM

New Jersey’s state debt swelled by almost $2.2 billion last year even as Gov. Jon Corzine campaigned to rein in borrowing, state officials have confirmed.

The additional borrowing pushes the state’s debt load to $32.9 billion. Including $3.6 billion in bonds being repaid with payments from a national settlement against cigarette manufacturers — which the state Treasury does not count in its debt calculations — the state’s total debt load is $36.5 billion, nearly triple the level of a decade ago.

State bond documents show that the bulk of the new debt run up last year was attributable to the state’s $8.6 billion school construction program and transportation projects.

At a news conference Tuesday, Corzine touted a new initiative to pay down $650 million in outstanding state debt. That initiative, which uses unexpected tax revenues to cover the debt payments due on a host of outstanding bonds, is expected to save taxpayers about $130 million a year in bond payments, the governor said.

Asked today about the growth in overall state debt, Corzine said he remains committed to limiting new borrowing, but acknowledged there will be some under approved plans to finance transportation improvements and schools.

“I would like to do more, we just don’t have the capacity to do it,” Corzine said. “It doesn’t mean that when we have capital needs such as protecting people from roads and bridges crashing and killing people that we’re not going to take those steps to have those kinds of investments made.”

Repaying the state’s debt is scheduled to cost about $2.8 billion this year, a jump of about $115 million over last year’s debt costs. But Corzine said his debt retirement plan will cut that tab by at least $130 million.

“What we’re doing is when we have a chance to pay down debt, we’re taking it,” the governor said. “And that is very unusual by any comparison with any state.”

Wall Street firms that assess New Jersey’s creditworthiness applauded the governor’s effort to pay down debt early. Fitch Ratings, for instance, commended the state for “recent positive and decisive actions to correct a chronic structural imbalance and begin addressing the state’s long-term liabilities,” including the $650 million debt paydown.

Last year’s $2.2 billion jump in debt is about half the pace at which debt grew between 2002 and 2006. During those years, New Jersey’s debt grew by $16.1 billion, or an average of better than $4 billion a year.

Later this year, the state is scheduled to borrow another $1.7 billion for highway and mass transit projects. But Corzine is scheduled this fall to unveil a new plan that would head off future borrowing by raising billions of dollars for transportation improvements through increased highway tolls or other means. That would replace a proposal Corzine floated unsuccessfully earlier this year that would have used steep toll hikes to raise the funds needed to pay down half of New Jersey’s outstanding debt.

Star-Ledger writer Claire Heininger contributed to this report.

>Thursday, August 21, 2008

BY GARY CARTER

We need a rational, not an emotional or political, way of looking at health care needs in New Jersey.

MORE THAN 10 years ago, during my fourth year as president of the New Jersey Hospital Association, I wrote the following in a newspaper article:

“Hospitals are important community resources, a source of security whether we use their services or simply take comfort in the fact that they’re there. It’s never easy to watch as one closes or changes to another health care mission. But the reality today is that some hospitals must close to keep in stride with a changing healthcare landscape.

“So while the heart pleads, ‘Please don’t change my local hospital,’ the mind knows that our state has too many empty hospital beds, and that the surplus is driving many hospitals into deep financial losses. Those losses could threaten quality and ultimately drag down the entire state’s health care system.”

Since then, almost 20 hospitals have closed. But I still think there are too many hospitals, and I am not alone in that thinking. The final report of Governor Corzine’s New Jersey Commission on Rationalizing Healthcare Resources (also known as the Reinhardt Commission) stated, for example, that the Hackensack-Ridgewood-Paterson area – which includes the former Pascack Valley Hospital in Westwood – had a larger-than-necessary supply of hospital beds for its population.

Closing a hospital is a gut-wrenching, emotional decision, but in the end, those communities that do so are the ones best positioned for the future of health care. I believe that is exactly what has happened in Bergen County: that the people of Bergen County have stronger, more viable health care services available to them today – and will for years to come – as a direct result of having one less hospital.

Less is better
Another interesting aspect of the closing of almost 20 hospitals is that during this time, according to the findings of the state Department of Health and Senior Services, the quality of care in New Jersey hospitals has improved.

In November 2007, the Pascack Valley community of Bergen County took the tough but necessary step of closing Pascack Valley Hospital. Prior to its closing, the hospital’s occupancy rate was less than 40 percent, and since its closing there has been no report that access to care has been adversely affected. I live in a community without a hospital, and the closest one is, on a good day, 20 minutes away, and I don’t believe I have an access issue.

Now, according to “Healthy interest in Pascack” (Page L-1, Aug. 17), Hackensack University Medical Center has proposed the development of a new acute-care hospital at the Pascack Valley site. For all of the reasons I have outlined above, and many more, this is not a good plan. It flies in the face of the findings of the governor’s commission, and will only serve to weaken the hospitals that have so ably served the patients of the Pascack Valley Hospital service area.

It is tempting to say the investment of $80 million by a for-profit, outside firm is a good idea. But in reality excess capacity, regardless of whose money it is, only increases the cost of health care, and it is already too expensive. While we have taken many steps in the past decade to correct the fact that there are too many hospitals and beds in New Jersey, this would be an enormous step back. I wonder how the state could ever accept an application to essentially reopen Pascack Valley Hospital when its own commission indicated that the area had too many hospitals. The right thing to do – and, in my view, the only thing to do – is to ensure the newly established strength of existing Bergen County acute-care hospitals by not allowing another one to open.

I urge Corzine, the health commissioner and the state’s Health Planning Board to heed the conclusions of their own report and develop a statewide health plan, so that we will in fact have a rational – not emotional or political – way of looking at the health care needs of New Jersey.

As I wrote more than 10 years ago, letting our hearts win out over our minds when it comes to health care is a grave mistake. That’s something none of us wants. My mind knows that, and my heart does, too.

Gary Carter is former president of the New Jersey Hospital Association, a Princeton-based trade organization that represents 114 hospitals throughout the state.