Author Archives: Kimberly Moritz

We need our state senators and assembly members to support fully funding UPK in every district in ways commensurate with the rest of our K-12 school system.

What’s it called when everyone in a system agrees about something and yet nothing seems to change or is done about it? In public education, an example of this problem is Universal Pre-Kindergarten (UPK) funding.

Universal Pre–K is a movement within the American education system to make access to preschool education available to all families, similar to the way kindergarten is available to all 5- and 6-year-olds.

Except it’s not universal or available to all families. Most districts who offer UPK have a lottery system in which they randomly pull names of children within the district up to the number of spots provided for in the grant funding the individual district has applied for and received.

Then the families who are lucky enough to be awarded the spots have to be able to get the child to and from the half day UPK and figure out child care for the other half of the day. If I’m a working mom out of the district, how do I make that work?

We send out letters to sixty families every year that tell them that their child has been awarded a spot in our UPK program that is run through a private provider in Springville, the Early Bird ChildCare Center.  Pat Marcello, along with her daughter Colleen, have done a wonderful job of providing both UPK and child care services to the families of Springville since 1975.

Even if you’re not in education a simple google search “Does early intervention make a difference?” will result in 109,000,000 links to articles supporting early childhood education. The research is abundant and rich.

We KNOW, we have ALWAYS known, that early childhood education makes a huge difference in the lives of our children. I would argue it can be the most significant year of a child’s formal school life in which we can make enormous gains in learning and capacity that will impact the child for life.  

The accomplishment of which I am most proud in my career as a school leader is the implementation of full day UPK in Randolph for our neediest students. All I did was say “yes” to Dr. Mary Rockey when she asked if she could start a SCIS (special class in an integrated setting) pre-kindergarten classroom for the children of that district. Mary rightfully advocated that bringing in our neediest children and connecting them to our providers at an earlier age would help us make important gains at a crucial time in brain development. That small rural school district now supports two SCIS classrooms and UPK half day for the other families who choose to participate. The growth I personally saw children make, through early intervention, was one of the most rewarding experiences of my career. And I did nothing as a leader but say yes to an administrator with an idea. Because it’s a special education program, the funding was rich and the local share was supported by the Randolph BOE members who also saw the importance of early intervention.

And yet we still have a competitive grant structure that leads to inadequate and uneven funding gained IF a school district has someone equipped at filing for a competitive grant OR wants to pay an outside entity to do so AND which grant funding they go after AND if they meet the criteria for the award.

We need our state senators and assembly members to support fully funding UPK in every district as they fund the rest of our K-12 school systems. Governor Cuomo heralds how much he’s done to support UPK to great applause in his state of the state address each year.  I wonder if it’s actually a great way for Governor Cuomo to over-estimate his expenditures, saying that he’s dedicating a huge amount of money to UPK that doesn’t end up being awarded. I don’t pretend to understand his reasons for heralding the importance of UPK and then continuing an unfair, uneven and inequitable means of funding it.

We also need local districts to make decisions when budgeting to support early intervention through full day true UNIVERSAL pre-kindergarten for every family who chooses to send their children to our programs and we need to provide transportation. We have to push for fully funded UPK for all 4 year olds.  How do we not when we know that this is perhaps the most critical year in a child’s learning?

Change, real systemic change, in public education. When we’ve had BIG CHANGE, we’ve pushed back and said that it didn’t work because of rushed implementation or uneven implementation or a failure to prepare adequately or a lack of resources. Maybe it’s because I’m in the last decade of my career, but I’m becoming impatient. I want to make a significant difference in the lives of our students. I want their learning experiences to be tailored to who they are as learners not who we were when I attended school in the seventies.

It takes FOREVER for something to change in public education. I worry that we are now slowing down the implementation of any NYS initiative because of the push back of the past five years.  And I worry that we’re not really “preparing” for these changes. From my perspective it just seems to mean being given more time before we “have to do something”.  Are we preparing or putting off?

Take computer based testing as an example.

The NYS Education Department has been preparing us for computer based assessments for a couple of years now. And districts are looking at piloting “computer based” assessments between now and 2020; some have started already. Why the slow roll out? To allow districts to prepare for it.

When we talk about computer based assessments in our district, we’re talking about using technology to support learning through adaptive testing and diagnostic instruction that’s tailored for every child’s learning path. A significant tool for teachers to better understand individual students. It’s like using the coolest apps on your smart phone to do things better, faster, more efficiently, more personalized.

When the state is talking about computer based assessments for the NYS tests, they’re talking about replacing the paper/pencil assessments with something that’s on a computer. This won’t transform learning for a child, it will still be a summative check and it will be a tool, much as it is now, to see how we’re doing as a system as compared to other school systems. It’s like using your smart phone to make a phone call.

That ^^^^ is not enough. The argument is that we have to implement this substitution of paper/pencil tests so that we’re ready to use adaptive testing. Cripe. I’ll be dead by the time we get to adaptive testing and personalizing learning through diagnostic instruction for every child in this state.

We’ve been using adaptive testing and diagnostic instruction in the districts I’ve worked in since 2011. There are likely districts that have done so far longer than we have. It’s the right way to use assessments and technology, in formative ways throughout the school year to improve our instruction for every child. We have the ability to do things well, to target the expenditures in our school budgets in the right ways. We can use technology and curriculum (like Dreambox and iReady and PEG Writing and Zulama and check out the product reviews at EdSurge for hundreds more ) to redefine learning.

We are going to work hard to be sure that our students in Springville are using technology and assessments in ways that transform their learning. Not just as a substitute.

Dr. Ruben R. Puentedura developed the SAMR model over a decade ago.   And in NYS we’re just getting to the first level, substitution, in 2020.  That’s the best we can do?

Every year we employ preferred “building” substitute teachers. A preferred building substitute teacher teaches on a daily, itinerant basis when students are in attendance. What a great opportunity for someone who’s recently graduated or hasn’t yet obtained a teaching position!

If you are a NYSED certified teacher and would be interested in a position in which you substitute every day in one of our buildings (the same building every day),  please submit your application to the Personnel Clerk, SGI CSD, 307 Newman Street, Springville, New York 14141. Complete the application for instructional personnel, available under the Employment Opportunities link at www.springvillegi.org. The salary is $110 per day for our preferred building subs which is higher than our daily substitute certified teacher rate of $95/$90 daily substitute non-certified teacher substitute rate.

Applications are due as soon as possible and we will work to have our preferred building substitutes identified for BOE consideration at the Monday, September 12 BOE meeting.

We accept regular substitute applications for all positions throughout the school year. Please consider applying to substitute at SGI!

Springville-Griffith Institute Central School District is an equal opportunity employer.

Residents will soon be receiving a “Save the Date” postcard in the mail with important dates regarding our upcoming September 27, 2016 Capital Project Vote. The public hearing will be September 20, 2016 at 7:00 pm in the HS Library.

You can also expect our school calendar, which was beautifully created by District Clerk Kathy Tucker, in the mail as soon as this weekend or next week. An electronic copy of this calendar will also be linked on the district website.

Our district newsletter, The Bulletin, will be delivered to residents soon after school begins. The Bulletin includes a four page insert with information on the finalized capital project proposal. I will also post the components of that insert here for residents who prefer to read their news on line.

Good communication is important to us. We want to listen as well as we are sharing information. Remember that we are available via email, for a phone conversation or a visit–I can be reached at 592-3230. Hope to see everyone at our many events this fall!

At the August 8, 2016 BOE meeting, we were pleased to appoint Mr. Christopher Scarpine as the new SES Principal. Mr. Scarpine has been the Middle School Assistant Principal for the Lake Shore Evans-Brant CSD since April, 2014. Prior to that he was an SES classroom teacher of grades 3, 4, and 5 from 2005-2014. Chris brings a great set of leadership skills to his principalship and we can’t wait for him to get started!

We are hopeful that Mr. Scarpine can begin prior to the start of the school year but must also be respectful of the needs of his current district. On August 15, 2016, Ms. Marcole Feuz and Mrs. Kathy Townsend will transition to their new roles as Colden Elementary Principal and Principal for Special Programs. To help facilitate a successful transition for all, Ms. Rochelle Sarikey, Director of Special Education who is located in SES, has offered to lead SES for the weeks in between principals. Thank you Ms. Sarikey!

We are delighted to welcome Chris Scarpine back to SGI as the Springville Elementary School Principal! Congratulations Mr. Scarpine.

We are excited to bring back the Bulletin, our SGI newsletter! Given this week’s unfortunate closure of our local newspaper, the Springville Journal, it’s fortuitous that we have been planning this for the last few months.

Attention all SGI employees: If you have an article of interest to our school community that you would like to see published in our district newsletter, please submit the article and applicable photos to Laurie Pfeffer in our district office. You can email Laurie at lpfeffer@springvillegi.org.

We are planning seven issues to be published and mailed during the 2016-17 school year. The deadline for our first issue is August 5, 2016.

This saying is adapted from “To a Mouse”, by Robert Burns and it clearly applies to our hiring process as outlined for our SES Principal position. Today is the closing date and I was astonished to receive only a few applications. I thought we’d gotten everything right: identified our process, invited participants on the interview committee, all set to go for 8/8 BOE Approval, communicated the process to our school community here. The best-laid plans, right?

As I studied the applications I started to think “why are our only applicants from Springville?” And why did we receive so many applications for SMS and SHS Principal and so few for this position? Which turned into the question asked of District Clerk Kathy Tucker, “are we sure the Buffalo News ran our ad as submitted?”

And here’s where it goes awry. The Buffalo News did not run our ad. They are now– our SES Principal position will be advertised in print and on their website for the next week at no additional charge to the district. This means we are moving our closing date to next Tuesday, July 26. 

So, Help Still Wanted, Amazing Principal Candidates Please Apply! And for our local candidates who applied, hang on–you’re in the mix.  The new interview process will be as follows:

Round #1 Screening Interviews: Wednesday, July 27, 2016, beginning at 8:00 am.

Round #2 with a Committee including a representative from each union and 3-4 SES teachers: Monday, August 1, 2016, beginning at 8:30 am.

Round #3 Final Interview with me and a BOE member from the Personnel Committee, Thursday, August 4, 2016, beginning at 8:30 am.

This should still afford us the time to have our new SES Principal selected and BOE appointed at our next BOE meeting on August 8, 2016.