See the article in the Norwich Bull.
“Once the top choice of Brooklyn students, Woodstock Academy has seen dozens leave the school for other choices this school year.
It’s a trend that has the Board of Education wondering what’s happening at the academy.
‘Why are our kids not choosing the academy like they used to?’ said Joan Trivella, a member of the Brooklyn Board of Education…”
This article points out that two members of the Brooklyn Board of Education are also members of the Woodstock Academy Board of Trustees which implies that they have some knowledge of the inner workings of the Academy. These Trustees are, in reality, only token Trustees. The problem of reduced enrollment at the Academy will lead to a 4.6% increase in Academy tuition according to the Bull.
What is the longterm plan that the Academy is pursuing:
- Is the Academy becoming a Chinese school?
- Was the investment in expansion of the athletics wise?
- What would Confusius say about this situation?
He who will not economize will have to agonize?
Killingly High School is impressively shiny and brand new. I wonder how many people choose a school by the way it looks rather than by their record of Academic success. A simple google search will show you that Ct Math and Reading scores for Killingly are consistently much lower than for the Academy, Just a thought.
This may be a demographic issue rather than a teaching issue.
Take the time to talk to the kids and their parents – I don’t think those Brooklyn BOE and Trustee members have done that. I know that if you don’t take the time to offer a listening ear you will not hear what is being thought or said by those making these changes. This is not easy because getting a teenager to trust an adult is not trivial. Add to that the average teenager does not communicate well, but is very emotional so conversations need to be well thought out prior to engaging a teenager.
One of the simple facts of schools is that they need talk with their students after they leave to gain feedback about why. Many of the BOE members of the Schools don’t look at the students as a consumer of the product of education only the parents and costs. I am not trying to get a full “corporate approach” to teaching, but to improve you have to take a hard look at yourself in the mirror and see both the warts and the beauty. Once you are willing to take those kind of honest reviews, then put a plan in place to then find a way to work/remove/improve the warts while not loosing sight of the good parts? From reading and listening about the Woodstock School district I know that we are not getting an honest review of our schools from those that work within them. Take a hard look at all of the local school districts and see if the teaching staff (many of whom do talk with their students and get the messages form the kids) are allowed or asked for their feedback without repercussions from the Administrators if the message differs.
I believe that the import part of the article is the 4.6% WA proposed increase in the costs and how that is going to impact the sending towns education budgets! How is that increase along with the needed increases of the lower grades schools in the different sending school districts going to be handled as the budgets start to more refined and presented to the public and we find out that the State’s reimbursements for schools is reduced!
The State Dept of Education is controlling and driving the costs that we in the towns have to pay. So where/when are our elected state officials to get control on this State Department? The Feds/State directives are telling us at the town level you need people with PHD’s to handle the increasing amount of paperwork/documents that are needed to get what money you do get from the State/Feds. Look at the systematic approach that the rules from the state are putting on the towns to meet state mandates (mostly unfunded)! These laws/rules are being allowed by our elected officials and I think this is a time for us to ask those hard questions.
It could be as simple as length of time on the bus and where their friends are. Not enough information to say.
If what the article says is true that students were asked to leave the Woodstock Academy to go to Killingly (presumably by someone at Woodstock Academy) that would be very disturbing.
Thanks,
Kevin
When I first read John’s article, I thought “Why are our kids not choosing the academy like they used to?” really meant “Why are our PARENTS not choosing the academy like they used to?” I was wrong. According to the article in the Norwich Bulletin, it IS the kids who want to leave, primarily because, they feel less welcome. Jo Ann Gerardi-Voccio, Chair of the Brooklyn BOE and a “member” of the Academy board said, “Kids tell me they were told they should leave the academy and attend Killingly (High School).” Yeah. That ought to do it. Oh, and the annual tuition per student paid by Brooklyn is $600 less at Killingly and apparently includes transportation. It is true, as Libdem pointed out, that Killingly is lower ranked than the Academy but as John said, that could be a matter of demographics. As for the kids, being made to feel welcome is a very important factor. Joan Trivella, also a dual board member, said of Killingly, “They do a really nice job with their open house now. They make the kids feel wanted.”
Who knows, unless you ask, how many other CT high schools would be delighted to have the Academy’s unwanted students?
To expand on Libdem’s #1 and my comment above:
According to SchoolDigger.com,*… (see Diane’s new article. Admin).
The article is very poorly written and lacks journalistic substance. Many unanswered questions that simply lead to conjecture and false assumptions.
I agree with Ron that the issues run very deep. I wouldn’t be surprised if the Brooklyn BOE preferred that their students go to Killingly HS just to save a buck, regardless of quality -but now its me making assumptions.
Kevin,
The asking/pushing of students out of WA has been occurring for some time. Some of these students are what can best be described as “trouble makers”, but the point is that WA has the ability to do this with students that come from sending towns that have choices. Woodstock based students have really only two choices Ellis Tech and WA. Also note that it could be that some of these students that are being asked to leave are not in the top 1/4 of the class ranking and thus someone feels that other schools might have a better teaching environment for them. A cynic might say “how do I raise our state exam scores and push down those of other surrounding schools?”
The bus ride length and how to pick up the students after they do something after school is one of the reasons. But when you talk to the Parents and students that leave you will get more insight as to what the daily problems are within WA. Each and every HS has their problems and bright spots, with WA being no exception. That is why I said a good organization has to look hard in the mirror to get better. WA has been over the past 20+ years good at doing that to grow the student population/enrollment. Most recently they have proactively done this with their being more aggressive to recruitment of foreign students to help in managing the costs of operating a school of WA’s age and size.
The point of self examination is that WA is doing it, but the local school boards don’t seem to be. If they have then they are not sharing that information. One can only assume that the sending towns WA Board of Trustees members are attempting to help fix any problems encountered (under the radar of the public)- but then we (public) are still left out of the knowledge/details if this is happening. Many warts of a system/organization are hidden from being put under a bright light allow all to view. Is that what has been happening and the article in today’s paper is just trying to bring light to what is reality with what is and has happened to some of the WA students? Can we assume that is the case given that the article is not positive from WA point of view…
I’d like to know if the students choosing Killingly were low or high academic achievers.
If WA is losing good students to Killingly they should be very worried.
If I was a teenager living in Brooklyn, I probably wouldn’t go to WA just because of the bus ride. Not every teenager is worried about academics.
It would be interesting to see if Woodstock students were allowed various choices how many would choose WA.
In the 90′s, Brooklyn students were pretty evenly split between WA and KHS. When KHS was put on probation due to poor facilities, Brooklyn students started going to WA in much higher numbers, in some years, close to 90%. Now that Killingly is no longer on probation and they have a new facility, the numbers are going back to where they used to be. It just kind of makes sense. As to kids being told to transfer, who is telling them that – perhaps other kids?
Thanks Jk. That makes good sense to me.
Randy,
For Woodstock students the Woodstock Academy is the only choice for a traditional high school experience. They have other choices such as Ellis, ACT and Middle College but those are not the same category.
Thanks,
Kevin
Ron,
I have no idea if it is true and you seem to think it is which is fine. The thing that worries me about that is if true it speaks to the culture of the organization. The town of Woodstock has a responsibility to make sure all of its students are educated the best way we can. This includes the gifted ones and those that may be struggling, even the “trouble makers”. I worry that if the culture of Woodstock Academy is to de-value and push out students of other towns that may be having some challenges, then the students from Woodstock who are having some challenges are also likely to be de-valued and not receiving the educational opportunities they deserve even if it isn’t as likely that they will live. As I stated, the town has as much responsibility to them as anyone else.
I don’t have any evidence that this is happening; it is just what I read in that article and now from you. If so, yes I find it disturbing.
Thanks,
Kevin
Wow, I meant to say leave not live. That sounds horrible!
What Woodstock really needs is twenty or thirty big, fast, strong Chinese students who LOVE FOOTBALL (male or female, it doesn’t matter as long as they can block, tackle and score touchdowns). Some Canadians like football…maybe there’s a way to get some of them Canadians to come to Woodstock Academy, plus, there’s the new WA hockey team and pretty much all of the Canadians love hockey, hey.
The Norwich Bull. comments section of the Woodstock Academy article mentions that a mac-book is provided to each student enrolled at Killingly High. I am not sure if this is true, but it would definitely help getting 8th graders to attend Killingly instead of WA.
Also during the major renovation to WA in the late 1980′s, the Agriculture/vocational program/equipment was removed from the campus. This was during Mr. Troy’s tenure as Headmaster, and he did not see a need for a vocational program at WA. During my middle school tour of WA, the administration told us we could attend Killingly if we wanted to learn about farming/agriculture. Some middle school teachers still thought WA had a agriculture program at that time. WA regarded the farming/FFA to be part of their past, not future.
I always found it odd that Killingly had the agriculture/vocational program for Northeastern Connecticut and not WA. Given the town of Woodstock’s pride in farming and rural activities having the agriculture program at WA made complete sense. Knowing Woodstock had an agricultural education program only 20 something years ago, the academy would love to have that bargaining chip back when recruiting middle school students to enroll at WA.
Kevin,
I have heard through some of the kids and parents that they have been suggested to find alternative schooling choices – and that is the nicest word phrasing that I can use. The other way to phrase this is via the question to the student/parent of the student – “If you don’t like it here don’t you have choices of schools you can attend?”.
We all understand that the full spectrum of students need to be taught coming from Woodstock. We know that everyone is talking/questioning the top of the class kids, but I am not hearing any thing in reports/changes from the middle/bottom 3rd kids that they are being asked any thing about their experiences at WA. – This was the point of my other notes, where the BOE’s of the sending towns need to really look into the experiences the students are actually having at the WA. We all know that some of the students will be leaving on their own, others I believe will tell you if asked that they don’t “fit” in at WA. Did the student fell that they were bullied? There are a host of questions that need to be asked. This becomes especially important after the Sandy Hook tragedy.
I believe that there are students that will not finish school for a variety of reasons many of them start in the home/family. There are students that don’t have a good outlook on life (read drugs, abuse, etc…) and schools are being asked to do too much in trying to solve these social problems. The point is that we need to find out why students want to or do leave school – WA is not the only one that has this problem, but WA is local master at not answering direct questions that the other public HS’s in the area have to. (Example; What is your graduation rate?)
I know that WA has some outstanding staff that care about the kids. This is the same at all of the local HS’s and sending towns. The issue is that to keep improving, a school should be open and honest at looking at it’s warts and trying to work on a plan to improve those areas. Is this really happening at WA? If it is why is this not one of the points/news bulletins being released/published to the public? Based on the lack of publicity of these kinds of changes/improvement projects one can only assume that it’s not occurring.
Kevin as someone who does a great job of informing us (via this blog) of the inner workings of the Woodstock BOE, does WA provide any of this kind of detail to the Woodstock BOE?
One last thing: Those that have a problem/ax to grind will make noise, but we don’t ask the silent majority that make up the bulk of students.
Just a thought, perhaps Killingly is actively recruiting Brooklyn students, especially those with good academic histories in an effort to boost their own failing program..
I have recently,with in the past 3 mos. worked with 2 W.A. grads 2012 & 2011 both of them had expressed that they and others felt second rate to the Chinese students because they seem to get catered to more because of the amount of money paid to W.A..Besides who wants to play football for a team that the only consistant things are losing and looking for a new coach.
Woodstocker,
A quick peek at the KHS website seems to confirm what you read in the comments section of the article. Each KHS student receives a mac book. If you click on the link below and go to the left sidebar and click on the 1 to 1 FAQ’s section, there’s a memo dated 2009 regarding students needing to bring their mac books to school fully charged. So apparently, they’ve had the mac books for a few years already.
http://www.killingly.k12.ct.us/Domain/52
Ron, the WA Class of 2012 had a 100% graduation rate that school year, so I would imagine the trend is fairly high from start to finish. First 100% in several decades, don’t remember when exactly. I remember how ecstatic Mrs. Favreau and we were when she shared the good news with us.
Anon, I can understand that. It definitely seems to me as though the Chinese kids have more intellect than we do. They’re heavily involved in math and science, and I once heard a teacher say that it’s probably because math and science is universally understood, whereas they have more of a language barrier in history or English, so they enjoy doing those things because they aren’t as much of a struggle.
No hard feelings against the Chinese kids. They work their tails off, being in the library before and after school working and being with the math and science teachers (in particular, it might be a universal trend) before and after school almost daily for extra help. They definitely value math and science. Only problem (for me) was that I got a lot less attention from the teachers because there were always a group of Chinese kids in there as well when I was, so what would have been about 10 minutes of help turned into me waiting for an hour.
For the past few years, since building the new HS, Killingly has recruited Brooklyn students relentlessly and effectively….(see EV’s new article. Admin).
FaStudent:
100% graduation rate for the class of 2012? How many of the students that started out as freshmen in the fall of 2007 at WA really made it to the graduation in 2012? Go and ask WA about the drop out rates and get an answer besides something like “we don’t/can’t have that data because students from sending towns that have choices cause inconsistencies with the data.”! All of the public HS’s and School districts around Woodstock have to keep track of that kind of data and are required to provide that information to the State BOE. Understand that WA does a great job of spinning answers better than any other school district in the area. WA is in effect a regional HS for 3 to 5 towns, but they tend to find ways to not have to present data like the other public HS’s in the area. I understand their reasons, but any person that is good at doing data analysis could figure out a way to provide answers. 100% graduation rate – I think you might want to look at what data was and was not used to come up with that answer.
Ron, I don’t know, but I would imagine based on that that the rate was pretty high from fall 2008 to spring 2012. One of these days I will compare my freshman and senior yearbooks and tally up who left and get some sort of estimate.