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Timberlane is going down the tubes, when will the school board stop it?
In 1975 the Timberlane Junior High School opened to much fanfare. I was in the eighth grade at the time. We had been attending double sessions at the high school for three years, while construction was going on. It, like the high school when it opened, was a model school, in layout, curriculum, and achievement. In the 70's Timberlane, believe it or not, was one of the highest academically rated school districts in NH. At a time when schools were something both much greater, and much less than they are today.
It was not a "middle school". There was no "Team Teaching". There was an English dept., a social studies dept., a science dept., a math dept., and so on. There was no "peer mediation", "grade inflation", "mandatory promotion", "SAC", "in-school suspension", or any of the other namby-pamby, wishy-washy, feel good, new age crap, that is currently choking this once fine institution.
I say it was one something more, because it was once a place where learning happened. Where Learning was EXPECTED to happen. Where Students were EXPECTED to do their work, maintain discipline, and accomplish a body of work in order to graduate on to the High School.
I say it was also much less than it is today because it was, at that time, more focused on the children learning than making the parents feel good about their child's performance, or lack thereof, as it is today. It didn't perform social work, as it does today. It didn't make excuses about children's laziness in failing to do homework as it does today. Contrary to the opinions of principal Hogan a child's natural laziness is not that child "doing their best" or "working at their pace" and the latter is never "ok"!
I am writing this because I recently had confirmation of something I had only heard about, and had not believed. I know of a child who graduated the eighth grade this year, and is going into the high school in the fall. A normal occurrence, I know, except that this child's graduated with 3 "F"'s and 1 "D-" all in core subjects. Unfortunately, the one subject that this child passed, with a "C", was language arts, and this child has not the ability to coherently write a report. No sentence structure, grammar, punctuation, spelling skills commensurate with an eighth grade education.
When the parent spoke to Mr. Hogan about this atrocity, the parent was told that their child had not graduated but had merely gotten a "promotion certificate". When the parent asked if the child had to go to summer school, Mr. Hogan replied that the child should. The parent, picking up on the "should", asked if the child's "promotion" was contingent upon successfully completing summer school? Mr. Hogan then replied that summer school was not mandatory, but should be attended by this child. The parent then asked "if the child was not sent to summer school, would the child still go into the ninth grade in the fall? Mr. Hogan said YES! He went on that "studies have shown that it would hurt(the child) developmentally more for (the child) to stay back than to go on" He said "(the child) would catch up in high school"! THIS FROM A PRINCIPAL!!!
Mr. Hogan then explained that High school is a credit based institution and some kids will get their 20 credits in 3.5 years, some will get them in 4 years, and some will have to take that extra class, or semester to graduate, and that's ok. Well, I say, NO that is not ok! This is the attitude that has created the situation where 21% of high schoolers can not read or write well enough to fill out their own job application. This is why 74% of College freshman have to take remedial math or English, their parents effectively paying college rates to teach their kids what should have been taught in high school. Education is the single greatest defining attribute of life. People are judged by how they speak and what they know. Professional door will open or close based upon a person's education, and we are leaving it in the hands of those who are more concerned with the children's self esteem than what they actually know.
Here are some facts for the parents reading this, that they may be unaware of. Students are allowed to take re-tests. If a student wishes to bring up their grade, regardless of that grade they may take the same test again, and take the average of the two grades. When they have to write a report, they are given a list of websites from which to gather their info., in most cases they merely cut and paste from those websites to form the report. They learn nothing! I know of four eighth grade girls who had to do reports on historical figures, Vincent Van Gogh, Harriet Tubman, Alexander Hamilton, Thomas Jefferson, and the reports they handed in were cut and pasted from websites. No original content! I thought they would learn a lesson from this and said nothing. They did learn a valuable lesson, they got "B"'s!
There is so much more to learn than there was when we went to school, and the district, particularly the middle school is doing a horrible job of teaching it., The curriculum is weak. And even that is not taught to full effectiveness. There seems to be little if any oversight.
Now here is my question to the school board;
What are you going to do to bring this school district back to its glory days?
We, as parents pay Timberlane $12,553/student per year! Timberlane has a $59Million budget and roughly 4700 kids district wide.
The Timberlane district currently boasts a 58% Proficiency level in grade 10 math.
The Timberlane district currently boasts a 76% Proficiency level in grade 10 reading.
This is what we consider acceptable? In 25 years this district which was 1st in the county, and 6th in the state, now places 15th in the COUNTY in reading, and 18th in the COUNTY in math!
We only have 8 more slots to fall before WE HIT ROCK BOTTOM!!! AND NO ONE IS DOING ANYTHING ABOUT IT!!!
I ask the school board these questions because they are not supposed to sit there and act as bobble-heads whenever superintendent McDonald says something. The school board is SUPPOSED to be running the district! They are the people we elected to look into these things, and see that we are getting the most for our money. We are not!
Does the school board look into, and question curriculum and practices? Do they discuss educational philosophy with Dr. McDonald, and inform him of the direction the district is to take in bringing up test scores and achievement?
This is the basic problem with public education, it is not responsive to the needs of its customers. It gets its money no matter what, whereas in the private sector, if a school had the deplorable standards of TRMS, it would go out of business, because its customers, the parents, would not pay $11,702/yr. for their kids to be shuffled along whether they did the work or not.
It doesn't work this way in the real world. When you have a job(in the private sector, this doesn't hold true for a government job) you have to perform to a certain level. You have to accomplish certain tasks, or you will be fired. Schools rarely make these demands anymore.
I want my school board to answer one question for me;
Why cant Timberlane have the academic achievement of Phillips Academy in Exeter, or even Boston Latin in Roxbury( a public school with significant minority enrollment), or even Central Catholic in Lawrence?
Or how about this question;
Why is it that I can pay $8,000 tuition to send my kid to Pinkerton, one of the best schools in the state, or $3,500 to St. Joes and Timberlane costs almost $13,000 to do an inferior job?
signed,
Mark R. Acciard
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One who knows that the citizens of Atkinson are all neighbors with her leadership to be dedicated and responsive to all.
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In Valerie Tobin, we now have a leader we know we can entrust with these responsibilities because they are part of her character.
It is our honor to endorse Valerie for election to Atkinson’s Board of Selectmen.
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In January 08 this blog had 16,000 hits and 1,500 unique visitors (for the month).
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"To All Atkinson Residents,
I am writing to ask for your help. A member of the Atkinson Police Department needs our help. I am here to ask for your help in Corporal John Lapham's fight for his life. As you are aware, John has been diagnosed with Leukemia. He has been once again hospitalized with an infection that is threatening his life. He is one of the bravest people that I have ever met. He has never asked of anything from the residents of the town. Now is our chance to step up and help both him and his family out. As everyone is aware John has been out of work for a few months. His family has been busy helping John to get better. He needs our help, and I am hoping that this town can step up to the plate and help. From the moment that I met John, I have admired him. He does alot, but never asks for anything in return. He has helped so many people in this town. I for one am one of those people. Please help him.
There is a fund set-up in his name at TDBanknorth in Plaistow. Any amount will help John, while he is out of work. It would be great if this town could help ease a burden off his wife.
Thank You
Also if anyone would like to send a card, please address it to:
John Lapham
c/o Dana-Farber/Brigham and Women's Cancer Ctr.
Inpatient mail
75 Francis Street
Boston, MA 02115
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Please show Corporal John Lapham, that this community can stand up and show our support to those in need. I for one, miss John and can not wait until he can get better and return to work. Please show him that we support him. "
18 comments:
Kudos Mark you are so right!
Personally I placed my children in private/parochial schools for that very reason. Then paid twice as they say.....our high high taxes and extra tuition.
This particular school boasted 98% rate of students going on to college. When my eldest graduated there were many students moving on to Harvard, MIT, Cornell, Tufts, Dartmouth etc.
By the time my youngest graduated. There were only 4 students accepted at these schools. And around 10% moving on to that "extra" year of high school.
The reason - this school has lowered the bar for entrance in order to get more MONEY.
Although my youngest received an education far better than Timberlane could offer this is one more example of the
dumbing down of America.
Our children, are being set up for failure.
You have hit upon a much broader problem than the reader realizes. Our nation and the very core of our lifestyle is at great risk.
I don't really know if the following dovetails with them, but maybe it does...
I'm a geek, an astro-geek in particular. its something I enjoy and something I've been involved with since I was 12 ~ 39 years ago. When my kids were at Pollard, and even now since they're out, I run (with PTA and Julie Matthews' help) an annual star party. The Goudreault's are nice enough to let us use their farm for an evening and I get 8 or 10 astro-friends to bring telescopes, and we show the kids whatever is in the skies that night, we have a speaker or two (in a greenhouse), have a bonfire and nighttime hay rides. Its all great fun and the kids learn a lot. typically (I think we've done it 5 times now...) we get 200 - 300 people. No cost to anyone. Until this year we had only had 1 teacher and no administrator attend. This year the principal attended. The point is not to blow my own horn, I don't need it (unless there's a winning powerball ticket attached!), but to say that 1st - 5th graders are interested and fascinated by science, and many parents are willing to take a night out to support them. I have the data.
This year I added teaching in the classroom to my repertoire. Over the course of the year I visited the HS 3 times to work with one teacher's 9th grade students and just today I visited the MS and taught 4 6th grade classes. By "teach", with the real teacher's support I run the class. We generally do a mix of hands-on project and slides and lecture.
The difference between 6th and 9th grades were unbelievable.
Today in 6th grade, over 4 different classes of kids, I'd say that 85% of the kids "had light in their eyes" - they asked great questions, participated, LISTENED, a couple in each class were struggling and I tried to focus on them, and each class had 1 or 2 kids trying to take over the class (their teacher was a lioness - they shut up quickly!). I had a great low-stress morning and if asked, I'll willingly return.
Compare and contrast that to 9th grade: out of each of 4 different classrooms I'd say 10% had that light in their eyes. 80% were just not there, they might as well have been at home, and the final 2 kids per class were actively trying to dis me and take over the class. Getting ANYTHING from these kids was like pulling teeth, and I am pretty good at working a crowd...the teacher is a very fine guy, experienced, interesting, knowledgable, cares for his students, is very involved. I committed to at least 3 visits - and I kept my commitment, but I may not do it again next year, it was just too tough emotionally. I was drained after each set of classes, and I couldn't reach more than 2 or 3 kids per class. When I looked at their grades in the online spreadsheet, 2 of the 4 classes showed that A MAJORITY OF THEIR GRADES WERE ZEROS. They didn't even bother to do homework or hand in papers/projects. If I "blame" anyone for this horror - I blame the parents more than their kids - the parents have plenty of ways to see how Junior is performing and choose not. Now these were CCP level classes, but in my book that means kids who probably will attend some college. I do not want to be the teachers they get in college.
How did the schools "lose" such a high percentage of kids, and their parents, in 7th and 8th grades?? The vast majority were interested in education in 6th, what happened?? I'm very confused by this and do not profess to know the answer. But clearly a lot of families are "checking out" in Middle School.
Just based on this slim data I'd say the problems we see in HS NECAP testing, etc, comes from middle school. If the kids and parents come into the HS already lost to the education system, it will take heroic efforts to recapture them. But it must be REAL efforts, not just smoke-and-mirrors feel-good garbage like Block Scheduling.
BTW - what's the difference between middle school and Jr high school?? I went to a Jr High, and its still called a Jr high.
Join us at: http://timberlaneschools.forumsland.com/ to discuss any topic, both positive and nagative, regarding the Timberlane School District.
Peter Bealo
I think topic or something similar popped up on this blog regarding the school system. One commenter made reference to a "Free Market" school system so that the parents could take their $12k dollars and rather than apply them to THS, to a school system of choice.
This would put THS in competition with other school systems (including private) for excellence in the school system.
Each grade that the student was attending would be responsible for educating, testing etc so that promotion to the next grade is made according to a set standard. Students that do NOT make the grade will either repeat the grade or attend a summer school program paid for by the parent. In other words, the parent is ALSO responsible for the child's education.
Students attending such institutions will be in accordance to the rules there which would include NO cell phones, Ipods, game boys or other devices that are NOT necessary for a proper education.
Lets face it, THS is just an over blown day care paid for with our hard earned tax money. Unless the student, parent and the education system is serious , it will all fail.
Lets face it... we live in small towns, and send our kids to a school district that goes above and beyond to make us all feel good.
The average Timberlane parent feels that our school is not the same as the public schools we hear the pundits complain about.
We don't bother to discover what it takes to get on the honor roll, we are excited that our kids made it.
We are so excited to put that "student of the month" sticker on our minivans, that we dont notice the minvan next to ours that has six of them, nor do we wonder why so many of these are floating around, nor what it takes to achieve it.
And when we parents go to the school and complain to the principal, we are given platitudes, about our participation, and our childs learning behaviors.
The bottom line is, the school is quite happy to blame the parents, while discouraging parental investigation into the running of our schools.
The fact is we pay the average Timberlane teacher $49,650.00/yr to teach our kids, everything they need to know to go to college. Only it is not almost $50,000 per YEAR, but $50,000 per 8MONTHS!!!
This is the same as the average salaried, or hourly worker working all year round making $75,000 per full year!
Now I am not denouncing teacher pay, but lets at least be honest about what it is, I dont think any of us begrudge the school district the money we pay them, IF THEY WERE EDUCATING OUR KIDS.... BUT THEY ARE NOT!
And this is unacceptable!
Mark, one thing that the parent does fail to do is discipline the student when discipline is needed.
When Little Johnny failed 8th grade the school system wanted to have him stay back. But when the parents got wind of it, they raised a stink and now little Johnny is in the 9th grade.
It is the same parents that allow their child to be disrespectful in front of others. They buy them and allow them to take and use their cell phones at school as well as ipods and other devices that are distractions to the education process.
Students can talk back to teachers without any form of punishment let alone if there is a physical spat that takes place also. Our society has lifted the authority from the teachers and has given it to the students. In the end we get a defective product that is more disrespectful and arrogant than their own parents.
I haven't followed the problems at Timberlane because my child is home schooled. And before someone rushes to accuse me of being part of the problem, Timberlane is not a factor in the reason why. I can say that I've heard horror stories, like a kid in middle school wearing ankle tracking device.
However, as a taxpayer, I, and we should all, demand the best for our dollars.
So, who is this school board and what are their qualifications?
no qualifications need to run for the school board other than resident of district and more votes than the other guy on the ballet.
I heard LT threatened to arrest anyone that did not vote for him. Just kidding. I don't think he would pull a Mugabe to get elected.
My father was on the school board for 20 years. That was back in the day when the district was high performing. He demanded perfection from us and expected the school district to always work toward being the best in the state.
None of that "feel good" crapola.
Timberlane is all about the 1%. The sb voted on a plan for a GED plus program. It will take 2 teachers. They have one already(probably one they did not have a position for next year) and another need to hire one. This is to help kids who enter their SR year behind about 14 credits. (It is almost 2 years in credits behind) They only estimate about 3 or 4 kids will use this, and the max is 15.
In the meantime the other 99% of the class can't read or write.
I also pulled my son out of the Timberlane School Disctrict and enrolled him in private school. He had an IEP as he had a reading and language based learning disability. His reading teacher gave him an F and in all his other subjects ge received A's and B's. How do you get an F in reading and do well in the other sobjects? Further the "special education team" never bothered to inform us that he was flunking reading even though we meet with them several times during the school year.
When my "little Johnny" came home with 3 "F"'s. I went to talk to Principal Hogan, to ask why noone called or sent an email, because every trimester I was in there meeting with my kids teachers and guidance counselors, to find out what was going on in class, what was being assigned, and what we could do to help. Every trimester, I gave all of them ALL of my numbers, and my email address. I got emails about every event at the school, but none about schoolwork. Every homework item I saw had a good grade. every test I saw had a good grade.
The reason for the "F"'s were missing projects! They offered to let the child make up the work!
Principal Hogan suggested Summer school but said it was not mandatory! I asked him if that meant that my kid was going on to the 9th grade whether they went to summer school or not? He said YES!
I asked what was required to pass summer school, were there tests? NO!, was there homework? NO!
What was the point I asked if you are going to simply promote the child for going to summer school, without having to do any WORK?
The result is we ordered a curriculum for the entire 8th grade year, and we homeschooled the child over the course of the summer.
THE SCHOOL DISTRICT DID NOTHING! AND THE PRINCIPAL ENDORSED THIS LACKADAISICAL APPROACH TO EDUCATION!
Unfortunately these horror stories are all too common - and not only at Timberlane. My grandson is graduating from a regional school district in Wolfeboro next Saturday and frankly, his language skills, reading, writing, spelling, etc. are about the fifth grade level - and he is graduating primarily because he racked up all his credits by his Jr. year in what I consider non-essential subjects.
School committee members should be the spokespersons for the townspeople they represent, much as our legislators are or are supposed to be. I have never heard anyone say that they brought a problem with their child's education to their town's school representative and saw some positive results. Tragic! Maybe if enough persons did demand more from them something would happen. The school administration needs to wake up and take a long hard look at the caliber of education that they are endorsing - and they would readily understand why this is called "the dumbest" generation.
Great, so now Mark has fallen into the easy trap of slamming teachers:
Quote: "THEY ARE NOT (educating our kids)." This is just a ridiculous statement, more befitting a cheap AM radio ranter than someone capable of reasoned thought, and it's frankly below you Mark.
Let's look at what has changed since the "good old days" of the 60's and 50's when people think that education was so good:
1)Video games: How many parents are allowing their kids to play 20-30+ hours a week of video games without checking to make sure they've done their insurance
2)The lack of discipline and respect shown by students: Remember when most kids were actually ASHAMED when they got an "F"? Remeber when kids would die before their parents would find out that they 'bad-mouthed' a teacher? Nowadays, what happens? A kid acts like a jerk to a teacher, gets disciplined, and then thet parent comes in and says, "How dare you say my child acted that way, they told me otherwise and I believe my child!" Then the administrator sometimes foolishly backs off and leaves the teacher legless in class.
3) Teachers are now expected to be counselors and social workers: Yep, it's not up to family to raise kids anymore, it's the job of the schools. Anti-drug and morality lessons: make the school do it. Need to make kids good citizens? Make the schools do it. Exercise for overweight kids? Make thet schools do it, we wouldn't want to inconvenience parents to make sure their kids get exercise. That talk about sex? Too embarassing for parents to do it, so let the schools do it.
And then people complain when schools don't educate kids in academics!!! When are they supposed to have the time: they're too busy raising your kids for you!
So Mark, don't blame the schools: remember you're the type of person that demands that we ask no more than providing an "adequate education" of our state, demands the highest of standards, and wants to do it on the cheap. Hypocrisy...
Look
I think you missed my point. My comments about "they" refer to the administration and the school board, as they have the ultimate authority.
The school, as I have said many times suffers from a weak curriculum, low expectations, low demands, little meaningful homework, education by watching movies, a "you tried your best" attitude on the part of the administration.
And with all of these problems, the school board goes for the band aid of block scheduling.
How about this; steal a GOOD schools curriculum, and put it in place intact! Dont tweak it, you will only screw it up. Dont think Reason does not seem to be a forte in the SAU.
And yes, I AM pissed, because a significant percentage of the kids in the middle school are being consigned to low wage jobs, by this district, and I think that for $13,000 per year, I can EXPECT that everyone involved will do their jobs, and provide an EXCELLENT education!
Is that too much to ask?
To June 10, 10:54 PM.
"And then people complain when schools don't educate kids in academics!!! When are they supposed to have the time: they're too busy raising your kids for you!"
How can you actually state that you are too busy raising our kids to educate them? That's no excuse for not doing your own job. You telling parent they are not doing their job and many are. In your case, the numbers prove the schools are ineffective. If you'd concentrate on education maybe we wouldn't have an EDUCATION PROBLEM.
I put my son in private schools from kindergarten on and he excelled. I knew better than to chance it in public schools because they historically do a poor job and the kids lag behind. Not everyone can afford to do this and every teacher and administrator has a PRIMARY responsibility to educate. If you have time after YOUR job is done right, then you can criticize.
If it is all the parents fault, and the parents are uninvolved in their kids education, then how is it that the demographics that does the worst in public schools; minority boys in inner cities; when placed into private schools, whether charter or parochial, perform with excellence?
What do private schools do with these "dregs of society" to quote a former chancellor of the New York city school district, that public schools do not?
The difference is that private schools hold both the student and the teacher accountable.
The difference is that the most motivated and involved inner city parents are the ones that go through the work of putting their children in private schools; these are the students that would have been the best students had they gone to their nearest public schools anyway.
And you might want to look at how the "Jock" crew at Timberlane ended up taking over much of the administration; 10 years ago there was quite a boys club of jocks that had a lot of power in that school. I don't know if it's still like that, but why don't you check to see how many former wrestlers, instead of academics, are running your high school over there. It might have something to do with the "weak curriculum".
Is the emphasis still on jocks over academics? If it is, then it's uninvolved parents largely to blame, allowing that to happen and working more on booster clubs than the National Honor Society...
I just graduated eighth grade at TRMS. I am disgusted by everyone's comments. I think that each and every one of you should step inside of an eighth grade classroom. The teachers ARE doing their jobs of teaching the students. In fact, many of them go out of their way! They write the notes on the white board, they provide handouts, and give detailed explanations. Some teachers even take class time to study for tests/quizzes! Most students pay attention DURING class, and jot down all the notes and important topics the teacher is talking about.
HOWEVER, it is when the students get home that it all goes downhill. I've seen it myself. Instead of studying for that final exam, or completing that project, or doing homework, they'd rather be on MySpace, or playing video games.
Whose fault is that?? The teachers cannot MAKE the student study or complete homework assingments. The teachers are doing all that they can. It is the parent's homework to make sure that the student is completing all of his/her homework assignments. NOT the school's.
Please...I think all of you need to get a grip. You'd be surprised how attentive most kids are in my eighth grade classes. Like I said, it's when they get home that it all goes downhill.
By the way...Mr. Hogan is actually TRYING. And, in my view, is doing a great job.
Sincerely,
an anonymous eighth grader at TRMS
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