Woodstock CT Café

Good Morning Folks:

I’d like to take a moment to respond to “Don’t Buy It� on a couple of subtle but key points. With regard to the equitable allocation of resources between Woodstock Academy and Woodstock Public Schools, my personal position is that equitable doesn’t necessarily mean equal. It is clearly the case that the cost to provide a quality education to 9-12 grade students is higher than for 5-8 or K-4 students. The issue of equitable distribution really arises when Woodstock Academy is adding programs and the associated costs while Woodstock Public Schools is forced to eliminate programs. And within this formulation, there are really two parts; (1) when Woodstock Academy adds or improves programs which provide greater opportunities and (2) when Woodstock Academy adds entry level or remedial programs. The specific implications of these two cases may be a bit different but the outcome is the same, sub-optimal student achievement and poor use of educational dollars.

In the first case Woodstock Academy has an incentive to offer the maximum in both diversity and depth of its curricular and extra-curricular programs. This approach helps assure a product that is desirable and attracts the greatest number of quality students. In isolation, this is a laudable approach and would at first glance appear to be beneficial to Woodstock students. However, these actions can’t be viewed in isolation. With every program added at Woodstock Academy along with the associated costs, there are reduced resources available to the Woodstock Public Schools. Read the rest of this entry »

I enjoyed attending the candidates’ event at the Academy. I look forward to attending the event coming up at the Middle School. I just received yesterday in the mail an invitation to that debate. I turned around and quickly said that I would attend. I make my own decisions and the only reason I hadn’t RSVP’d earlier is that I hadn’t recieved a formal information about it earlier. I did look to reschedule a meeting I had planned the same night of the 29th once Becki Leavitt was kind enough to let me know ahead of time about there likely to be a candidates’ debate on the 29th. I hope that all candidates will make it.

I have very much enjoyed being the Chair of the Municipal Finance Advisory Task Force. I am very proud to be part of the “team” that is the Task Force. It was a collective “we” that has worked hard, researched many issues, asked a lot of questions, and found commonground to reach consensus on many meaningful recommendations we’ll be reporting to the good people of Woodstock. I thank each and every person on the Task Force. Being Chair has allowed me to learn much about our town government beyond what I already had learned from my serving as an Alternate member of the Planning & Zoning Commission (for 3 months to fill the remaining portion of a vacant term) in 2005 and my serving these past 5 years as an alternate representative from Woodstock to the Northeast District Department of Public Health (which does get involved in planning and zoning issues). I do have a “record” of accomplishments and involvement. Read the rest of this entry »