Monday, November 28, 2005

State-of-the-Schools

The annual State-of-the-Schools address by Dr. Baehr was interesting and informative. We had a lot of questions from the studio audience, several emails and phone calls-so that we ran out of time and had to wrap up rather quickly. Unfortunately, we did not get to all the email questions, for which I apologize profusely. I have sorted the remaining questions and reserved those relating to the high school to ask at the January 23 meeting on Lowell High. Other questions will be brought up at the monthly meeting with the superintendent on December 8.

The studio audience included parent representatives and parent liaisons from the Bailey, Bartlett, Daley, Robinson and Washington schools, as well as school committee members Jackie Doherty, Kevin McHugh, Joe Mendonca and school committee member-elect Jim Leary.

One of the highlights of the presentation was identifying the mission of Lowell Public Schools as “A challenging educational environment in each school that supports ALL students to learn high level skills, concepts and habits needed for successful life-long learning in a democratic, multicultural world.” As Dr. Baehr pointed out, MCAS is not mentioned in the mission statement. That said, there was of course some discussion of MCAS scores, which are relatively flat statewide. To give some context to the test scores, we learned that the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP) ranked Massachusetts first in reading and mathematics for Grades 4 and 8 (based on Spring 2005 scores). So, what’s going on? It seems that MCAS is a harder test than most, with more writing and more open-ended, as opposed to multiple choice, questions. Massachusetts developed this test and set the bar for proficiency very high even before the federal government got involved with ‘No Child Left Behind.’ Now that the federal requirements have been grafted on top of existing state methods for tracking educational progress, our state finds itself in an untenable position – we are actually being punished for our high standards and lofty goals.

Saturday, November 19, 2005

Email your questions now!

The November 21 meeting (this Monday) will be another live broadcast from the Ch 22 LET studio, this time to hear the "State of the Schools" address from the superintendent. We are accepting email questions for Dr. Baehr on a first-come, first-served basis; please email Lowellcpc@comcast.net to get your questions answered on Monday night. There will also be a telephone number to call during the meeting.

If you wish to join the studio audience on Monday, the meeting will begin at 7 p.m., after at 6:30 reception to meet Dr. Baehr. The Ch 22 studio is on the 3rd floor of the the "new" building, right above the library - signs will be posted.

Tuesday, November 01, 2005

LHS Open House for Prospective Students

Lowell High School hosted nearly 300 parents and 8th grade students at an Open House earlier this evening. Held in the school’s auditorium, speakers included Headmaster Bill Samaras, Director of Curriculum and Instruction Wendy Jack, Coordinator of Student Support Services Norma Audy, Director of Student Activities Jill McNamara, Athletic Director Brian Martin and Director of the Freshmen Academy Jim DeProfio. We hope to be able to provide Internet access to the slides used during the presentation – we’ll give you the link in a future blog entry. The speakers were sandwiched between a short but inspiring video on this year’s Distinguished Alumni Award winners and tours of the High School and the Freshmen Academy. Mr. Samaras was kind enough to permit the Citywide Parent Council to address the audience to promote our upcoming meetings on November 21, 2005 (The Superintendent’s State of the Schools Address) and on January 23, 2006 (Lowell High’s Freshmen Academy). Both of these meetings will originate from the Lowell High TV studio and will be televised live on Lowell cable channel 22. The live format will permit call-in and e-mailed questions from the audience at home. If you have any comments, suggestions or questions for these upcoming meetings, please send them to mailto:lowellcpc@comcast.net.