Woodstock CT Café

from Con

Just to clarify, you (Newcomer) first say that “the issue must ALWAYS remain between each individual woman and her God…and her Church” and “At no point in the decision is there EVER a place for the U.S. government to force a choice on a woman.” I haven’t heard any argument that the Government is forcing a choice directly on a woman – in what way is that happening?

The argument I’ve heard is that by including contraceptives in what is covered by the insurance provided through employment, the CHURCH is being forced by the Government to effectively pay for those contraceptives because they are paying the premiums (even though conservatives always argue that such expenses are actually and in fact paid by the EMPLOYEE because it is passed through in every instance – that would seem to defeat the argument in it’s tracks, but I understand that’s not the case because the Church is the one making the insurance premium payments – just wanted to illustrate yet another way these arguments can so easily be turned on their head by repeating exactly what is said in other arguments).

Anyway, in what possible way is the Government FORCING a choice directly on a woman? She is employed, has coverage that includes contraceptives and it’s her choice whether to use her insurance to purchase contraceptives, right? Or are you employing the argument that I outlined above, that she is really the one paying for OTHERS to purchase contraceptives against her conscience? The first part of your first paragraph is confusing in that way. Anyway…

The manner with which you framed your argument demands that I first accept certain of your buried assumptions upon which your conclusions rely – the sophists used to do this to good effect, but it’s not a valid method of debate and has been exposed to be ‘intellectually dishonest’. The classic example of a ‘forced assumption’ is the lawyer asking the defendant in the witness chair “Yes or no – do you still sell heroine to grade school children?”. I do not accept certain of your assumptions, as I will describe. First, let me stress that I believe that whenever someone makes a truly ‘blanket’ statement like Mary did (and you do a little in your comment), it is incumbent on anyone involved in the debate, no matter what side, to keep the debate honest by challenging such statements. Read the rest of this entry »

Undoubtedly, the Greek language is the basis of our culture and fundamental element of our national identity and this very well know around the world our expatriates, proving that the Greek Education is what gives the universal dimension of Hellenism.

On the occasion of today’s feast of the Three Hierarchs, patron of letters, which is celebrated with devotion and in the Greek Diaspora, we attempt a brief history in Greek educational things in America, where according to the theme of education interested in Greek immigrants still from the 18th century. The first known case of founding Greek school in Newfoundland dates back to 1776. Read the rest of this entry »

From A Student

I just listened to some fragments of the recordings, and something that caught my attention was the discussion of the posting of the minutes on the website. As a casual Minutes reader, I would prefer that a draft be posted ASAP. If I were to attend the meetings, I would want to read the minutes from the previous meeting before going to the next one, and knowing the agenda of the next meeting well ahead of time. If the minutes are approved as-is at the next meeting, they can be changed from draft to board-approved on the site, and if changes are made, post another copy that says board-approved and delete the draft, or leave it up until, say, two meetings after the one it was made for.

I was also disappointed when the letter from the librarian regarding the elimination of the media clerk position at the MS started to undergo discussion but someone digressed and they never returned to that letter.

I’d like to agree that more people should voice their opinion, but I admit that that would make me a hypocrite; same with most Cafe readers.

On a side note, I was very interested to read the 2-23-12 BoE packet, which contained a few letters regarding a student at the Academy who sent a letter to Mr. Walker with concern about emergency evacuation of the Academy building and mold in the two classrooms beneath the library. There is a letter from Mr. Caron explaining that the Academy building has been brought up to code numerous times. I don’t know anything about that, but I do know that it takes quite a while to get down from the 3rd floor of that building, having experienced a drill from a classroom up there last semester. Brianna indicated that there is only one door on each side of the building. This is partially correct; we use one door on each side of the building for evacuations since we gather on the town common out front. In a real emergency, the other doors facing the Bowen building could be utilized, placing a door in each corner of the building.

However, the mold in the basement of a library was interesting to me. Mr. Caron assures the reader that the maintenance department is being extremely proactive and staying on top of things… he seemed rather defensive about that. Mr. Caron indicates that the maintenance department discovered the mold during a periodic checkup, by saying, “…during regular facilities checks in the mid-January timeframe, staff discovered a small patch of mold in one of the classrooms.” In reality, though, it was a teacher who discovered the mold in his classroom. I heard him talking to the teacher next door and, if I remember correctly, he said that he told the maintenance director (Mr. Gerum) about the mold but that Mr. Gerum said it only a wet spot. I saw a picture and there were indeed several dark spots maybe a few inches in diameter clustered in one area. Contrary to Mr. Gerum’s statement, it was mold, and enough of it for them to demolish the walls in both the classrooms, and, from what I could tell, the lower 3 feet or so of the drywall in the hallway and the piece in the stairwell that is regularly used, rinse everything with bleach, and redo the walls and repaint. Read the rest of this entry »

Go to YouTube Audio recording of the Woodstock Academy presentation at the Woodstock, Connecticut Board of Education Budget Forum held on February, 18, 2012 in the Woodstock Elementary School Gymnasium.

 A stark contrast from the Woodstock Board of Education in terms of ambition for their students, and looking towards and planning for the future.

Next page for a closer view. I do not know how bad the injuries were. John
Read the rest of this entry »

When the Chairman of the BOE doesn’t advocate for the education needs of the children of the Woodstock and twists arms to get board members to vote for what he wants, this is what you get. Shame on you Sara Harkness! And your not kidding me, Rosendahl.

from John

In the week of February 24, 2012, a controversy surrounding the identities of the voting members of the Movie Academy arose mentioning one derogotory example who was a nun. I thought to myself, ‘This must be Dolores’ … Dolores Hart. A few days later the news caught up with the controversy and confirmed that the nun was Dolores … a beautiful young woman, then and today.

Here’s a picture of Dolores with one of my favorite actors, Montgomery Clift, in “Lonelyhearts” (1958). My favorite Montgomery Clift movie is “Wild River” (1960) with Lee Remick which portrayed life in Appalachia, much like it existed in West Virginia where I went to college. The second picture is Dolores today, still a beautiful woman.

Thinking of Dolores jogged my memory to an experience in my youth when I was a sophomore at Bethany College in West VA – the ‘small college of extinction’ – my frat brothers preferred saying, derived from a sign-post on the main road which then stated “Bethany College, Small College of Distinction.” Now I see they’ve added the word “National” to the phrase… Hmmm, Small College of National Extinction? Ernie Wetzel also went to Bethany about ten years later. Fifty years in retrospect, it was a fine place to be which prepared me for a significant career in Molecular Biology and Biotechnology. I have recalled the experience in the early spring of 1963 often and fondly but never thought of bringing it up until Dolores came back in my life this week. Read the rest of this entry »

Visitors can surge when something of great interest or controversial is posted.

 Use the link to the right.

Go to YouTubePlay video Audio recording of the Woodstock, Connecticut Board of Education Budget Forum held on February, 18, 2012 in the Woodstock Elementary School Gymnasium. Supporting documents for this meeting can be… 01:31:31 Added on 2/22/12

 

Over the years we have been threatened with lawsuits for things we have said at the Cafe and done in politics. We got two meritless complaints at the same time when this one was filed. Of course, I knew the outcome of this ridiculous complaint years ago. These same litigants have threatened to sue more people than just us here in Woodstock. They’ve sued the school system multiple times and wasted taxpayer money. One threatened to sue the town in a letter to the Villager if the Board of Finance didn’t accept his fuzzy math. If I go to PACER I can find other lawsuits that failed. The SEEC left this until now because it was meritless. One of these litigants is actually an alternate on the Board of Finance because of a lack of ethics on the part of his town committee. The other town committee has been equally unethical in their choice of candidates.Click to enlarge.

Please attend the Board of Education Meeting Thursday Night Feb. 23rd, at 7PM

Woodstock Board of Education
Woodstock Public Schools
147a Route 169
Woodstock, CT 06281

Dear Members of the WBOE,

I am unable to attend the Budget Forum this Saturday.

Please consider my comments in Citizens’ Participation, and as you make your determination on the budget you bring to the Board of Finance.

Most importantly, please make it your first priority to advocate for the children of the Woodstock Public Schools. This is your greatest obligation and your primary constituency. Other constituencies in town have an active voice. The students have you.

Please bring the Board of Finance a budget that reflects the real needs of the school system. This budget should address the staffing, programs, technology, infrastructure, administrative support, transportation, and materials required to deliver a good education to Woodstock’s students in the twenty first century. This budget submission is the only place the Board of Education has this opportunity to educate the Board of Finance, parents and the community, and to advocate for the requirements to help our children be prepared as they move into high school, and successful as they compete in the world. Do not sell them short.

Please retain our good teachers and coordinators, and invest in their ongoing professional development. Give every consideration to the crucial role of our teacher aides in the classroom, supporting students and leveraging teacher capacity. Retain our coordinators who ensure consistent, integrated delivery of learning standards in each grade level and classroom, and who support our technology. Quality instruction is the primary factor in student achievement. Do not bring forward a budget which dis-invests in our teaching staff and its support.

Restore Art fully to our 7th and 8th graders. The resource requirements of the state- mandated SRBI program should not be plucked from our Art and SPICE programs. The resources for SRBI should be accounted for and funded with our other state- mandated Special Education requirements. Art as a curricular subject for every student is foundational to the development of an expressive language, innovative and disciplined habits of mind, and the twenty-first century skills of creative problem-solving and critical thinking.

Please fully retain a vibrant Gifted and Talented program at both WES and WMS. Academic enrichment is a relatively low-cost, high impact means to provide a creative and challenging curriculum for high achieving students. By offering the program at both schools, all students are given opportunities to develop their capacities in innovative approaches to learning.

Please avoid responding to budget pressures with fiscally- tempting but short- sighted reductions in our already lean administrative infrastructure. Our superintendent’s and principals’ offices are extremely lean given the size of our district and the increasing workload they have handled over time. In recent years the Board of Education researched whether it could streamline these offices and move to a part- time superintendent. The WBOE found that these moves would be both fiscally and educationally imprudent. Woodstock has one of the lowest administrative overhead structures in the state. Moreover, these positions help to ensure tight expense management and high quality service in areas such as transportation, special education, health insurance, building and grounds management, and grants application and management. Under the administration of our full- time superintendent our students achieve above average and improving results (as measured by comparative CMT scores and trends) at a cost per student well below average. Further reductions to our administrative offices will increase costs and diminish educational quality over time.

Everybody understands these are tight economic times with fiscal constraints including the limitations of Proposition 46. Our students do not get to wait for better economic times to prepare for high school and their future. Dis-investing in education is shortsighted and diminishes the Woodstock community as a whole. Please advocate strongly and forcefully for our students’ educational needs.

Respectfully, Lindsay Paul

cc: Francis A. Baran, Superintendent
Members of the Woodstock Community

from Dean

The graph at this site shows historic gas prices in US over the last 5 years. The prices were higher under Bush (to Mary Mapes).

The reason that fuel prices are so high is for the following reasons:

1) There are two wars going on in the Middle East and lots of other saber rattling. That encourages commodity investors to bet that the price of oil will increase, which it then does. Before Bush began his war of choice in Iraq, gas was below $2 a gallon.

2) China and India are now major comptitors for oil. They werent ten years ago.

John, you said that Kennedy wanted to extract us from Vietnam, but the record is not all that clear on that. Kennedy was constantly trying to placate the hawks with the Bay of Pigs, putting nuclear missles in Turkey (creating the Cuban Missle Crisis) and putting advisors and soldiers in Vietnam. He also approved the coup that overthrew and killed Diem in Vietnam and plunged that country’s government in chaos throughout the rest of the war. Kennedy’s cabinet and Joint Chiefs of Staff were all hawks. The reason why Johnston stayed in Vietnam because he was pressured by Kennedy advisors to go win that war.

My pick of best and worst presidents since Roosevelt:

1) Roosevelt-carried country through Great Depression and WWII.

2) Reagan- turned culture of country around from feeling sorry for ourselves to one of pride. Also, will give him credit for winning Cold War.

3) Eisenhower/Truman-Patriots first, did what was best for the country and not for their careers.

4) Clinton- I disliked the guy but give him credit for the economic expansion and financial growth for everyone, Also leaving with a balanced budget.

5) Obama – He has his right wing and left wing critics. But if you can piss off the extremists on both sides, you are doing something right. Avoided catastrophe from the Great Depression, and actually got national health care program done.

more on Obama from Dean:

1) Bush brought us the Great Recession, Obama took over in the depth of it and we were out of the technical recession within 9 months.

2) I read this weekend somewheres (NYT or WSJ probably) that our stock market is the only market among western industrialized countries whose value is higher than from before the start of the Great Recession. We are doing better than everyone else (even though it still sucks).

3) Finally at last started getting some successes in Afghanistan, killed Bin Laden while Bush team management of the war allowed Bin Laden to slip away. Killed more terrorist leaders than Bush with increased drone strikes in pakistan and other places.

4) Passed Health Care Bill. Clinton backed down when he started to catch heat on this. Obama pressed on and I give him credit for that courage. This is something that we need to be competitive in the world market. Our system nw is badly broken and not sustainable.

6) Bush 1 – Very competent administration to get things done.

7) Ford/Carter- Both nice guys with good intentions but not really smart or tough. Didn’t get anything done. But getting nothing done is better than the disasters the others left us with.

8.) Nixon- Did alot of very good things, opened relations with China to isolate Soviets, EPA, Medicare, etc…, but complete lack of moral judgement.

9) Kennedy- Number of disasters or close disasters, once you got past the Camelot nonsense. Almost started WWIII by putting missles in Turkey which caused the Soviets to put missles in Cuba.

10) Johnson -Horrible execution of Vietnam War, Great Society changed culture of country in wrong direction.

11) Bush 2 – What can I say, 2 poorly run wars, lied to country about one of them, worst growth in family income, economic policies lead to Great Recession, dollar at lowest value since Civil War, all time high prices for fuel, could go on and on with this. He wasnt a smart man, Reagan wasnt either but had the good sense to put really smart people around him. Bush put cronies and yes men around him.

READ HERE

from Trish

I just wanted to let everyone know that the quilt up for raffle on the fund raiser site for Tracy Thompson which was so lovingly assembled by Donna Lynch and tied to finish by the WES staff has been won by Linda Bernardi. This is ironic since Tracy was trained by Linda as her replacement in my office after Linda won her election as tax collector. Upon hearing that she had won, Linda immediately wanted to donate the quilt back to Tracy’s family. So it is with a sense of joy and sadness that the quilt will be given to Tracy’s new granddaughter, MiaRose. I also wanted to offer my sincerest thank you to the wonderful people who helped raise over $9000 for Tracy and her family.

The Academies are now cashing in on their unique legal status. See today’s article in the Norwich Bull. What do you think they are selling to the foreign students?

“Under the boarding school option, NFA would be responsible for arranging housing, which could include students living with families in the community or school-owned houses or dorms.”

The Academy has recruited 38 Chinese students (check that: 50 foreign student including some from European countries). My understanding is that these students pay about $40,000 in tuition to come to school at the Academy. No doubt the presence of international students should enrich the social and intellectual environment at the Academy. The Academy was offering approximately $1000 per month to local residents who took in Chinese students. It appears now that the Academy wants to use these nearby houses as dormatories. This particular house is located on the northeast corner of the intersection of Old Hall Road and Route 169.

January 19, 2012 Regular Meeting Minutes
PLANNING & ZONING COMMISSION

Section X. CONTINUED UNFINISHED BUSINESS (moved in agenda order)
c. #SP579-08-09m Woodstock Academy Student Housing issue – Boarding house at 599 Route 169

Richard Baron, fire marshal has issued a report dated January 5, 2012 that states the maximum student occupant load for the building would be 15 and there are other requirements of smoke and heat detectors, fire alarms, required lighting, outside stairs going to the second floor. There is a small apartment and there needs to be a door installed so the house parent would be separated.

Terry Bellman, building official has also provided a letter which states that currently the building code only allows a maximum of six students on the first floor of the building, because the apartment on the second floor has a tenant which constitutes a mixed use and therefore requires fire separation. Once the tenant vacates the premises, there will be modifications required to meet the building code and then additional students, a maximum of 15 for the entire building, will be allowed at that time. Zoning regulations do not contain a definition for student housing and there isn’t really a category for this type of permit. Fortin would like to discuss this at the subcommittee meeting.

This use may not be permitted under PZC regulations. There is discussion on how this student housing might fit it into the regulations and how to move forward in a way that makes sense. It is recommended that the Woodstock Academy propose a text amendment.

Joseph Campbell of Woodstock Academy and Attorney Cotnoir are present to answer questions. Attorney Cotnoir is working with WA to create this text amendment and it will be submitted at the next regular meeting. It was decided that a Notice of Violation, which is the first step in the process, should be issued to Woodstock Academy letting them know that there is a violation.

The time frame between a Notice of Violation and the next step in the process should allow WA enough time to get this text amendment and a subsequent application submitted for consideration. Mr. Campbell stated for the record that there are six students living at this address currently. There are nine new boarding students expected for the new semester, but they will be living with local families. The third house that was purchased for student use by WA is currently empty, according to Campbell, and will remain that way until this is
resolved. [At least two of these houses are on the hill. Admin]