from Frank Corden
So to the point, the only position you (WVG) have mentioned that I took that is contrary to your views has to do with Woodstock Academy. You stipulated to items, one that I supported the efforts of the BoE chair to propose legislation changing the statutory status of WA. The second is a general point regarding WA’s budget actions having a detrimental impact on the K-8 programs.
I was not involved or knowledgable of the chair’s action regarding meeting with State legislators. Further, I don’t recall Sherrie Vogt’s name ever being mentioned during the BoE meetings. With that said, I do believe that the governance of WA is structure in a manner that makes it unresponsive to the needs of Woodstock, the largest sending town. If a change in the statutory status or governance structure of WA is a means to that end, I certainly would seriously consider supporting it.
With respect to the second point, I do believe that the budgetary actions of Woodstock Academy have had detrimental impacts on the K-8 system. The education budget is of a fixed size as defined by the Board of Finance. When tuition for Woodstock students to attend Woodstock Academy increases substantially and those increases aren’t adequately addressed by the budget imposed by the Board of Finance, Woodstock Public Schools takes the hit.
In 4 of the 6 years I served this community on the Board of Education, unjustifiable increases in the WA budget directly resulted in cuts in staff and programs at Woodstock Elementary School and Woodstock Middle School. The cuts included teacher reductions, elimination of dedicated gifted and talented programs, institution of pay to play for athletics and elimination of other after school academic activities (late buses for students needing extra help and competitive academic programs such as Public Speaking and History Day). In some cases the volunteer donations and the Woodstock Education Foundation, the Athletic Boosters and the Music Boosters have partially restored some programs, but not all of them.
My frustration in this regard is focused on the lost opportunity for Woodstock students to adequately prepare for the opportunities available at Woodstock Academy. Unless Woodstock students participate in programs at WES and WMS to build awareness and skills in these areas, when they arrive at WA they are at a competitive disadvantage to students from other towns. Funding programs at WA where Woodstock students aren’t able to effectively participate or be successful isn’t sensible.
What is difficult to understand, is that WA seems blind to the practicalities of the situation. By limiting the opportunities available to Woodstock students in K-8, Woodstock Academy limits it’s ability to be successful. Woodstock students are the largest component of the raw material that WA brings in as freshmen. The better prepared Woodstock students are when they get to WA, the more the WA faculty and staff can do with them and the more successful the students will be 9-12.
A better cooperation between WA and the sending towns (and not just in budgets, but in program and curriculum initiatives) would go a long way to assuring that all students get the best out of their high school experience. Anything less is a dis-service to the students and not in WA’s long term interest.
I’d like nothing better than for this community to view education as the national strategic imperative that it is and not as a responsibility we need to fund at the lowest expense possible. We consistently spend on a per pupil basis in the bottom 5% of the state. How much more could our students accomplish by the time they leave Woodstock Academy if we spent closer to the median? We’ll never know.
Frank, this EXACTLY why I’m extremely disappointed with you. This is NOT the Frank Corden I knew and supported in 2001. The Frank Corden I knew and admired back then was a fiscal conservative who would have shuddered and become enraged with a Board of Education member who made statements such as you made here.
If you think for one minute that per pupil spending is the solution or the be all, end all yardstick, you are wrong and you NEVER would have said that in 2001. You and I used to talk about poorly performing schools whose per pupil cost are near the top of that list and we both agreed that particular statistic is meaningless. Now here you are saying something completely different that what you and I talked about back in 2001. That’s what I mean Frank when I say I have become extremely disappointed with you and so have MANY other Republicans in Woodstock. Never mind disappointed, “outraged” and “disgusted” might be more appropriate descriptions in this case.
When staunch Democrats like Kevin Ford sing your praises, it makes me wonder and when I hear from more and more Republicans that they no longer support you, it makes me sad, then angry because I feel you let us all down, all of us who worked so hard for you back in 2001. Then we continued to support you and got you on the ballot in 2003 and you got elected! So many of us were absolutely thrilled that we had what we first thought was a level-headed conservative on the Board of Education but again, you ultimately let us all down.
Like I said earlier, you lost your way and I never would have imagined in my wildest dreams that this would have ever happened to you.
Unfortunately, I’ve seen this happen with Republicans in other towns. Well meaning conservatives get elected to the Board of Education and literally get brainwashed. Frank, have you ever attended any of those CABE workshops or classes? I’ve looked into their crap and that’s exactly what it is, a complete bunch of bull$hit run by liberals with hidden agendas who think money grows on trees. It looks like you drank their Kool Aid and dramatically changed the way you think from that guy I first met in 2000 and supported in 2001 when you forced that Republican primary and then ran as a petitioning candidate.
This is just interesting to read because it really illustrates some of the problems we are up against. No one that I have heard on the present BoE would argue that the solution to all poorly performing schools is simply to throw money at the problem. I agree that extremely high per pupil spending solves nothing because the problem in those cases is not adequate funding. Having said that, it is a non-sequitur to then come to the conclusion that per pupil spending doesn’t matter.
Similarly you can’t necessarily get a substantially better performing car by throwing more and more money at the purchase price. Is a $300k car $250k better than a $50k car? However, by the same token it would be fallacious to then come to the conclusion that purchase price doesn’t matter and a $100 car is just as good as an $18,000 one.
Let me ask everyone to think on this. Is it enough to spend $1.00 per pupil per year? If you think it is, I’d be curious to hear your justification. If you do not think it is, you have agreed in principle to the idea that to some extent per pupil spending does matter, there is a point where you can no longer provide a good education if you don’t spend enough.
If you have agreed to the principle behind the later then we are left with a discussion about what is the amount you need to spend to provide a good education given the cost of inputs. I won’t speak for Frank on this but it is my view that we are not living up to that standard.
A related issue is that prop 46 does not leave enough to properly prepare the PK-8 for the opportunities in the Woodstock Academy AND adequately fund the Woodstock Academy to have all the programs we admire in it. Instead we are left with a shortage of funds to meet both goals and this creates structural friction between the Woodstock BoE and the WA BoT.
I do have to get the wife back in here to read WVG’s post. Nothing personal to “staunch Democrats” but she has fits of laughter when that term is applied to me. I have been a lifelong independent (fiscally conservative and socially liberal) and the only reason why I had to make a decision is because in CT I can’t vote in a primary unless I register with a party (in MA I could switch back and forth on primary day). Given who was in the Whitehouse in the mid 2000s I chose the Democrats. I’m more fiscally conservative than most; I can’t bear to carry a balance on a credit card, where I work I don’t even approve purchasing myself a new computer out of my own budget unless my current one is absolutely dying. I’m not big on spending money unnecessarily. However money that I do see as necessary, that’s another story altogether. Blind frugality is irresponsible and has been the ruin of many a business; education is no different.
Thanks,
Kevin
This post represents my personal opinions and in no way should be considered an official act of the BoE or that I am speaking on behalf of the BoE in any way.
WVG is a great example of a right winger who is not a conservative. By her logic, spending in the K-8 program needs to be controlled, but God help anyone who dares to challenge the Academy budget. The fact that she is willing to give the Academy a free pass regardless of its impacts on any other part of the Town’s budget is hardly the markings of a fiscal conservative. It is giving a free pass to friends and special interests that has been the national Republican calling card for the last 10 years.
WVG also needs to learn more about how even private sector businesses are run. She seems to think that money is not needed and that the schools can run as effectively with less money. There is no business in the world that operates this way, businesses with available capital can do alot more things to position themselves for the future than businesses without. WVG and her kind always like to point to Hartford and Bridgeport as why spending more money in schools makes no sense. However, those schools are fighting problems that few people in Woodstock can understand. I want to point out that most of the best performing schools in this state also spend near the top of the list.
WVG would rather have Mr Corden and the BoE stick their heads in the sand when they see problems that challenge their special interests as opposed to doing what is needed to address the problem. Thankfully, over the last couple of years, most of the Town disagress with them.
WVG, you’ve completely missed the point. My approach to governance comes directly from my experience in the private sector. … (see Frank’s new article. Admin).