>The fly wonders why the BOE went ahead with the purchase of TERC 2 for both Travell and Orchard based on teacher work from this summer and the Travell parent survey results which are on the school web site under ‘math info for parents’ at the bottom of the list. Seems like a waste of $9000 for Beth Fisher-Yoshida, her work isn’t even completed, and yet they purchased the ‘new and improved’ math?
>If you have stayed quiet, especially in Orchard,you now have the worst curriculum you can buy in the United States.
Maybe you should have gone to a BOE meeting.
I’ve heard the Math Moms are done with this fight and backing out of it.
>Parents don’t let the public schools ruin your kids because of their politics.
You’re paying for this. Say something to the principal and make him protect your children from this dumb, dumb math.
>First – Fifth Grade Responses (223/331 returned) 67.4% return
TERC got only a 3.2 approval rating on a scale of 1 to 5, that’s not overwhelming majority.
https://schoolsite.capturepoint.com/assets/resources/Travell%20Survey%20-%20Summary1.pdf
Look at the Travell survey
>Everybody quietly sign up for your tutors.
And then when your kid gets stellar grades, our schools can say “You see? TERC is great.”
Don’t bother mentioning the tutor. They’ll marginalize it as at best a slight value-add, instead of the meat of your kid’s learning.
There’s no winning. Just send your emails of complaint to Beth. She seems to hold the cards right now.
They should never have approved this purchase while there’s conflict resolution going on. It reveals their disingenuous intent.
>Typical BOE tactics. Wait until the doldrums of summer, when no one is around, then ramrod through anything your little heart desires. When the parents come back in september, the deed is already done. The board will then say, “We’ll hire another consultant to talk this over!”. Mean while the damge is done; continuing and cumulative. The new interim was just a distraction for Botsford to get her way. Even if she gets voted out, her dirty work will remain. Another sad day for Ridgewood.
The next OED will define deaf oligarchic arrogance as the Ridgewood BOE.
The board’s agenda of pushing through curriculi that will focus on advancing a small number of the overall student body, the articulate/artistic female, will crush the remaining ~85% of the student body, both male and female. Wait until they all apply for college. All – 100%, will be lacking the background necessary to succeed in higher education because even though the small percentage might well excel here in Ridgewood, they will not, as a group, excel anywhere else.
>So does this mean the Hawes principal can bring in TERC to our school? The Ridgewood Views has nothing on this. Figured I’d ask here. You seem to be getting the news first.
>PJ do you allow for advertisements for tutors on your website or do they have to pay you a finder’s fee?
>It’s just Orchard and Travell because they had the old version of this horrible program.
The math moms have probably put a hold on the rest of the town getting it too soon.
But one wonders why Orchard is quiet and Travell is so vocal.
>Travell has had it the longest and so those parents have seen their kids unprepared for middle school.
but I guess cmp changes that
maybe that is why cmp was brought in and now the high school math too
>Why did the BOE hired a conflict resolution consultant? They new or at least know they are not interested in what parents have to say or the reasons for the low scores of Travell and Orchard. They are making fun of our children intelligence, capabilities and their future. Thank God for TUTORS. Thank God for SMART parents. Thank you math moms for opening our eyes to this FIASCO.
>While the BOE fiddles with our children’s futures, the vaunted tradition of excellence in Ridgewood’s schools is burning down.
So, when is a “ranking” just a “list?”
When Sheila says so…that’s when.
Amen.
>I just hope teachers will put our childrens interests before the BOE interests.
>Thank you, 12:42, for reminding us of the teachers who work furiously to rise above all the politics and restricted curriculum, and quietly do the right thing.
I can’t imagine what this is like for them. If you’re one of those teachers, thank you.
>We should just get rid of the BOE and put the teachers in charge.
The teachers work hard for the kids while the BOE works hard to prop up the omnipotent administrative system, no matter it’s failures and lapses.
No one loves them, no matter how much of their time they WASTE at dog & pony show meetings trying to show us how hard they are working (at screwing the taxpayer).
>The teachers have these numbnuts as bosses.
Poor teachers
>The teachers need to band together and speak their minds.
At this point, it would really help.
>Teachers can’t speak their minds, they have to rely on the union reps could speak for them.
Maybe they can suggest that the money spent on the Prism courses go towards real tuition reimbursement for college credits.
Or they could mention Ridgewood should stop recruiting from Montclair State because we want ‘cheap’ teachers and put more money in the budget for salaries so we can recruit experienced teachers from other districts.
They could mention the District should get at least three competitive bids on every purchase, such as smoke alarms installation and curriculum, so we can save money and maybe pay the people who make it still work(teachers) more.
Every dollar wasted could go to them and doesn’t.
Parents say we are overtaxed, teachers say we are underpaid and the District buys TERC2.
>Our board members seem way in over their heads with running the school district. They rely on their school administrators to guide them. Our mediocre school administrators rely on pricey outsider consultants to guide them. It’s like the blind are leading the blind are leading the blind. Your right 12:18, let’s put the teachers in charge. They’d have this district shipshape in no time.
>The writer of vormath.info got it right.
The board’s interpretation of the survey as equating to approval of TERC demonstrates there are now new ways of doing math.
The approach in our district: Use distorted math to justify the teaching of distorted math.
Well, they’re consistent, if nothing else.
>Someone said above they heard the math moms are backing out.
Is this true? If no one picks up the slack, we can now watch the train wreck that happens next. I, for one, will continue to do my small part.
Regardless of what happens next, though, I don’t think the district will ever really return to its old culture of shutting parents out of curriculum and methodology decisions.
Especially in regard to math and sciences, a district with such an educated base of scientists, engineers, and mathematicians needs to assign their opinions some value and include them in the process. They’ve been an untapped asset for too long.
Cultural changes are always a bit painful and ugly, especially in public schools. There will always be people who resist and get emotional about the friction. That’s just par for the course.
I think good things have happened here, in spite of some casualties that couldn’t be helped.
Best part is, our kids will be better off for the cultural changes. And they are what this is all about.
>Doesn’t seem like the math moms are backing out. One of them was at Monday’s BOE meeting and was quoted in this Friday’s Ridgewood News. Another math mom was also quoted in that same article. And http://www.vormath.info has both Friday’s article posted and a letter to the editor about the math. Seems like it still is about the math for those moms.
>district will be better off when ideologues like Ives and Botsford trot off to some other district
the public education system will be better when they retire
this is strictly an opinion on their professional ideology and not on their person nor level of professionalism (both personally and professionally behaviors are above reproach)
what they choose to follow for education pedagogy and ideology is not what blue ribbon schools do
they are at the far left of educational ideology
so far left that to go any further they would drop off the spectrum
and their fingers into the structure and processes in our district will have a negative lingering affect long after they move on
and that lingering effect is not to raise us up to lighthouse or blue ribbon district status
but to see the district continue to be living off of a reputation
a reputation built on embracing the fundamentals, teacher led instruction … traditional rigorous education
and that is an opinion
>”Regardless of what happens next, though, I don’t think the district will ever really return to its old culture of shutting parents out of curriculum and methodology decisions. “
This is wrong, they are moving ahead in spite of the 200+ names petition. They have just spent money on a program that only got a 3.2 approval rating from parents.
There has been no change here and there will not be unless there is a major overall of the BOE and Botsford and Ives.
>Sorry but board members don’t respond to petitions — never have — never will. You need to get the people to the board meetings.
>To 2:37… what other petitions have been presented to the Board before?
>I believe 2:37PM was referring to people who “petitioned” with a problem. They are ignored.
True “petitions”, with signatures, I think have never been brought to the BOE before.
Old timers can jump in and correct us on this history.
>200 hundred signatures oppossing the site placement of the new addition at Orchard were given to the BOE (the school has a student population of some 350 children) and they were totally ignored.
As Mr. Hutton said, “the trian has left the station.”
Yea, and the folks at Orchard were railroaded.
>only if our 5th graders didn’t have TERC would they be smarter than the BOE.
>I don’t know about that 1:30 PM. If any of our board members were half-way smart in math, they would denounce TERC.