The science of...science.

District Science Panel Presentation
Tuesday, November 30
7:30 - 9 p.m.
Education Center, 49 Cottage Place, 3rd floor

The Ridgewood Public Schools Curriculum Communication Committee is hosting a panel presentation on science on November 30. Parents and guardians are invited to come hear what scientists from our community have to say about:
-- What students need to learn about science by the time they graduate from high school
-- How schools can promote interest and excellence in scientific learning
-- What knowledge, skills and attitudes students will need over the next 20 years to be scientists and/or scientifically literate leaders in their chosen fields.

The list of participating scientists will be available shortly and I'll post that info here when I have it.

Why is the District doing this now? It's part of our rotating curriculum review process. In 2010-11, Science and Social/Emotional/Guidance are in the "Program Review" stage, which is followed in 2011-12 by Curriculum Writing. You can download and review the entire Curriculum Review Plan by clicking here.

Unfortunately, I won't be able to attend this presentation, as I'll be at my son's RHS Soccer Banquet. But I'll be so interested to read the report and hear from parents who attend. Let me know what you think!

On the agenda for Monday’s meeting of the BOE.

Tomorrow night is our first BOE meeting since mid-July. There are several business items on the agenda, as well as our annual “Board Retreat” where we discuss our self-evaluation of the Board and discuss goals for the 2010-11 school year.

Please note: unlike what is stated in the agenda, we will begin at 6:00 with Board business FIRST, and then move on to the Board Retreat items after 7:30 p.m. (Our representative from the New Jersey School Boards Association will be facilitating the Retreat section, and he cannot be here until 7:30.)

Agenda highlights (click here for full agenda on RPS website):

Update on referendum projects, including status and estimated completion dates for the various projects currently underway.

Approval of new curriculum, which was worked on over the summer. Some of the new curriculum is for Math in grades K-2. (Remember, we previously started with grades 3-5 with EnVision Math. Now it’s time to phase in Grades 3-5.) There is also new curriculum for several new courses added at the high school. Whenever new textbooks are purchased, there is a need to review and make sure the curriculum guide matches up. You can see the list of new curriculum guides at the end of the agenda on the website.

Approval of several appointments of new staff, including our new Supervisor of Wellness/Athletic Director, several new teachers, many changes in staff assignment, co-curricular stipends, new substitutes, etc.

Acceptance of donations for the athletic field lighting.

Approval of change orders for various referendum projects. The agenda includes descriptions of each change, along with the status of the bid and what the change order means to the project’s total budget. All of the change orders are for unforeseen construction issues, such as discovering the wrong (not per current code) type of wiring inside the Ridge ceiling, discovering the water main under Stevens Field, discovering rotted wood inside Willard’s roof, etc. This is why there were contingency funds included in every project’s budget – because we knew that when we opened up some of these buildings, we would undoubtedly find things we didn’t expect, but that need to be fixed.

Discussion of the revised policy for School & Facility Naming Rights. The Board believes there is a potential for raising some funds with naming rights for facilities such as fields, etc. We have been approached by some interested parties. This new policy spells out how it would work. We’ll talk about it tomorrow night.

As always, you are invited to attend our Public Meeting, which begins tomorrow at 6:00 PM at the Ed Center, 3rd floor. It will also be broadcast on Channel 77 and webcast on our website (click here). You can also watch the archived webcast later.

Any questions, comment here or email me lauriegood@mac.com

Nationwide Common Core Standards are ready for review by the public.

Here is a link to the Common Core Standards, which represent an effort by the Council of Chief State School Officers and the National Governors Association to standardize curricula across the country (except for Alaska and Texas, which have declined to participate). The standards are available for public comment until April 2nd.

You can view various sections (Reading, Math, etc.) online or print out PDFs.

Middle School math scores are up.

Updated 1/24/10 @ 2:22 p.m.

At Monday night's Board of Education meeting, Assistant Superintendent for Curriculum, Instruction & Assessment Regina Botsford and Grade 6-12 Math Supervisor Dan Ilaria gave a presentation of NJASK math scores in grades 6-8, showing improvement in scores since the current Connected Math curriculum (program) was introduced. The percentages of students scoring Advanced Proficient have increased the most. This has sometimes been a popular topic of discussion throughout our math journey here in Ridgewood, so it was good to see and share some data that supports what the district has been doing with middle school math.

Click here to see the full report, which is on the District website.

As always, standardized test scores are just one measure of student learning, but it is noteworthy to see these particular scores moving in the right direction. It's also worth remembering that a textbook or program (like Connected Math) is just one element of teaching -- many other factors influence student performance, most importantly the teachers themselves. Not every change (up or down) in student test scores can be attributed to textbooks alone. In other words, news like this is good, but it's a snapshot.

Textbook List Online

FYI, the list of district textbooks which was approved at the 8/25 Board of Ed meeting is now available online. The list covers all grades from K through 12.

Click here to see the textbook list.