It’s a pretty quiet day in the office when there’s a snow day. When I started this work over a decade ago, I received a phone call from our local veterinarian, Dr. Inkley, on such a day. My snow day call probably wasn’t 100% necessary–that’s how those calls go sometimes.Weather can be fickle. Dr. Inkley said,

Kim, when you close school and it’s not needed, I lose all of my employees for the day. Most of them are working moms who then have to take the day off to care for their kids. Please keep that in mind when you make the call.

I’ve had John’s words in my mind for every snow day call since. No, I’m certainly not going to have school if we shouldn’t but there isn’t always a clear cut answer. I understand that my decision to cancel school has to be about student safety first and foremost. There are other consequences to the decision. In every district there are children who are safer, warmer, and yes, better fed, at school than at home. Time off from school is a stressful event for those children. Calling a snow day means 4 am calls to the transportation supervisor who’s calling all nine of our highway superintendents to seek their input, studying the weather forecasts and talking to colleagues in other districts. It’s not as simple as it seems.

On Thursday, February 27, 2020, I called a snow day. Then I easily drove to and from the school through one portion of our large 161 square mile district. I was thinking about all of these things and I posted a tweet. Then the internet, and my life, blew up for about 12 hours.

My tweet: “Where, exactly, did this blizzard hit? Because I’m really regretting my decision to close schools. When the NWS and the news talk blizzard and huge snowfall, I can’t ignore that. I’m sorry to every working parent who had to take off a day from work for childcare.”

IF you know me, you know that I often post questions, use ThoughtExchange, and ask our school community for feedback. I genuinely felt regret that my decision, which from my drive through one part of our district seemed unnecessary, may have inconvenienced our families. If, for one moment, readers could read the tweet without whatever attitude they may have inferred on Thursday, they perhaps would just read it as it is. I wanted to know where the snow hit. What I expected from the tweet and what I got were two very different things.

A few students did tell me about the weather at their homes. But what ensued after this tweet was so disproportionate that I’m still astonished by it. Quickly I had a request from the Buffalo News and Channel 2 for an interview which I did via phone. People then started contacting me via direct message on Twitter, which is not something I use regularly, nor do I use Facebook messenger. I’m available and accountable to our district residents and families through email, telephone calls, and in person meetings. I then received a message and took a call from a Channel 7 reporter who told me she was passing me to her colleague. I said, “great, please give her my number.”

I could see my phone blowing up. I was doing something else and could not attend to it.  I briefly changed my Twitter account to private because I was alarmed that my profile and background pictures included my grandson and they were being shared in really negative ways, on the news, and in retweets. I was mortified that his beautiful face was being shared far and wide. Over 100 new people, many without any Twitter profile of substance, started following me. I went into a meeting and was unable to tend to the calls/messages/tweets for two hours.

At some point a reporter at Channel 7, who I’m guessing had a sense of urgency for a story, sent her own tweet,

Interesting. It looks like @kimberlymoritz chose to speak with only certain media outlets today before setting her account to private and ignoring our calls after she said she would do a phone interview with me.

The hatred, judgment and condemnation that were directed at me via tweets, direct messaging, emails and phone calls were unbelievable. People called for my termination. Our BOE president received an email directly calling for that termination. I was called a MORON, an IDIOT, a poor leader, horrible, suggestions of drinking on the job, and asked if I have kids. There were hundreds of comments and retweets. It seemed everyone had something to say.

It was awful. I kept thinking, “all of the work that I’ve done over a 30 year career, the programs I’ve started, the support I’ve given to employees and other leaders, the countless decisions I’ve made on behalf of our students and families, the love that I’ve shown, and my professional reputation is reduced to this?”

Over one tweet? People far and wide decided to extrapolate, infer, imagine or make up all sorts of things about that one tweet. I wrote it so I know what I was thinking and intending.  I was leading as I have for 20 years, from a place of honesty and transparency. I was self reflecting and taking responsibility for what may have been a poor decision on my part.

What did these people, who don’t know me or my work, get out of this? They had to take the time to comment in vicious ways. And this isn’t just me–this is happening to leaders in every aspect of our society and to, really, anyone who puts themselves out there at all. I’m asking what the HATERS (as one student called them) get out of it? And what is our response? Should I have responded to, argued with, or defended myself on every comment? Who has the mental energy or time for that? A few people who do know me entered the fray and quickly became exasperated by it.

No one wants to bring on a media maelstrom. However I’m glad that it happened to me and not to a member of our administrative team. I’m grateful for the countless positive, supportive messages, texts, emails and tweets supporting me.

I would have been really hurt about this earlier in my career where now I just feel concerned about where we are in the world that anyone can use social media to yell horrible things at anyone else. I’m worried about the personal attacks. I’m wondering what happened to appropriate civil discourse.

We had our Erie 2 BOCES school superintendents meeting yesterday. A colleague said the most important thing of this whole event to me:

Imagine what our kids feel like when they’re attacked on social media like this.

I believe in public accountability, especially for public employees. I have a responsibility to our students, families and taxpayers. This public scrutiny and disparagement is something altogether beyond that and it leaves me wondering.

What does this mean for our future? Who among us will want to step up, to take a risk, to be courageous as they face this kind of scrutiny? Who will want to lead? 

We recently conducted a ThoughtExchange where we asked our SGI employees and students to answer the following question:

What ideas do you have about the physical improvements that you think we should make to our schools, fields, and facilities? And what do you wish or dream we could have here at Springville?

Believe it or not, it’s time for us to start planning the next capital project. It takes a couple of years to plan a project so as we begin to do so, I wanted to hear from our employees and students. The project we are concluding this year has many items that the architect and engineers identified as “need to do” items–rooftops, parking lot repaving and boilers. There isn’t a lot in this project that really touches classrooms and learning spaces.

For the next project, we want to consider all of our student spaces and what we can do to enhance our learning environment. As our school administrators work on walk throughs in our buildings and our architect considers our Building Condition Survey, the employees and students told us what they notice every day at SGI. You can read the Top Thoughts report here. 

As promised, we will carefully consider all suggestions. Given our parameters around cost–we plan for the next project to have a minimal impact on taxpayers–there are items in the Exchange that we will attempt to do in house, items that will definitely be considered in the planning of the next project, and items that are unrealistic.

Participants top thoughts (meaning they received the highest rank from other participants) included:

• air conditioning
• bathroom updates
• lighting upgrades
• locker replacement
• kitchen equipment updates
• flexible seating options

The first five of those items are definitely things we can analyze for the next project. I’m glad that so many teachers are thinking about ways to change up their classroom seating for more project based learning. Furniture isn’t something that’s aided within a capital project unless it’s to outfit a new space. We work hard to maximize the aidable part of a project so this means we’ll develop a line item in the budget to pay for new seating as we’re able to do so, just as Mr. Bialasik did out of the HS budget for the library at SHS.

I do care what you think–just as the many comments about the quality of the food we served last year helped us to know we should move forward with a BOE initiative to bring our food service in house, these thoughts will impact our next project. Thank you to everyone who participated.

If you’re a community member and have noticed something that needs to be improved, let me know! You may leave a comment here or email me at kmoritz@springvillegi.org.

As one of our BOE members so aptly put it at our BOE meeting in Colden on Tuesday night, declining enrollment at Colden Elementary has been the “elephant in the room” for years. In the four years I’ve been in Springville, I’ve had several people say to me “when are you going to close Colden?” It seems that everyone has an opinion about what we should do.

However, we can’t make decisions based on people’s opinions alone and definitely not when the topic is a polarizing one. If you don’t already know, Colden Elementary is a beloved part of the Colden community. It’s a great little school with wonderful educators, a new principal and many families who are committed to keeping their K-5 children there. The building itself is an asset, one that we’ve invested in over the years. It’s also a school with declining enrollment when our other K-5 building, Springville Elementary, has increased enrollment.

Here’s a quick view of the enrollment stats:

                2015-16      2016-17      2017-18      2018-19      2019-20

Colden Elementary                 189                   194               177                 160                131

Springville Elementary          539                  538                557                555                557

As I said in this blog post from over a year ago, it’s my responsibility as the superintendent to study all areas of our school operations. We are going to develop a plan moving forward for Colden Elementary School. I don’t know yet what that plan will be but it needs to be based on a deep study of our enrollment trends, what’s best for kids, financial considerations, and the impact on the district as a whole. I want to know that our BOE members can answer the question “why don’t you close Colden Elementary?” with solid reasons of why we decided to keep the building open OR have a clear plan for if and when we reach a tipping point in enrollment where it’s in the best interest of all of our students to attend SES. 

The BOE members developed a list of questions for further consideration and study throughout the rest of this school year.

1. What would be the reason to close Colden? Is there actually a significant cost savings?
2. What would be done with the building upon closure and what would be our options?
3. Can we conduct a study to help answer questions and provide clear information on costs and benefits associated with maintaining things as they are, reconfiguration options, closure?
4. Enrollment Number—is there an enrollment number in which it is financially irresponsible to maintain two K-5 elementary schools?
5. Educational Experience—how does it differ for a student who’s in a small group at CES for 6 years? Is there a limit when a small school is just too small to offer enough diversity and opportunity for our students?

6. School Choice—could we allow families to choose to send children to CES or SES, using parent transportation or central pick up point(s)?

7. Boundary lines within district-if we adjusted the boundary line, could we more evenly distribute enrollment between the two elementary schools? Consideration given to families with students at both CES and SES during transitional period.
8. Reconfiguration of grade levels-are there any possibilities that work for all families district-wide and are good for kids?
9. What impact does a closure have on student travel times? Costs to transportation? Should we reconsider one bus run/start and end times for all buildings?

10. If we make changes to district lines or configuration at our elementary schools, how is the rest of the district, in particular the SMS, impacted?

As we move forward with a study at the Board of Education level, we will share information publicly and welcome community input. I know that this is an emotional topic for many people–any time we have conversations about those topics that affect our children people respond passionately. I hope that our dialogue can be respectful and show consideration for everyone involved.

How does a new recreation path behind Springville Middle and Elementary Schools sound? Our PE and Health teachers developed the idea and presented it to me early this school year. Their proposed path goes around our current soccer fields, over by the Bus Garage and behind our Elementary School. I’ve seen our students running this path through the grass because my office looks out on the soccer fields. What a valuable resource for our students during the school day and our community in the afternoons and evening!

Doing any level of construction or upgrading to our buildings and grounds gets complicated quickly due to all of the rules and laws that we need to follow. But with a little creativity we found a way to include this recreation path in our current capital project and it’s going to be constructed this year.

Although all of the work being done in our current capital project is important, much of it is relatively boring. Yes, we’re saving energy with LED lighting and more efficient boilers. No one is driving through massive potholes in our parking lots or walking over crumbling sidewalks. What is great about this recreation path is that it’s something tangible that our students and taxpayers can use daily (at least when there isn’t 2 feet of snow in Western New York!).

This will be an 8 foot wide, 8 inches deep crushed stone and limestone path that will be perfect for walking and biking. The recreation path will narrow to 5 feet in a few spots as it is designed to have NO IMPACT on the existing athletic fields already located behind SMS/SES. Consider the opportunity to bring your child to this walkway to learn how to ride his or her bike! The bike/walk path will be less than one mile in circumference but will be marked to show the mile for our students in PE classes. Erie 2 BOCES has a lending locker so that our teachers can borrow equipment for students to use on the recreation path. Parents and community members can join our students, perhaps our Cross Country athletes, in using this path in the evenings.

Our teachers who initiated the idea are planning to pursue grant funding so that they can install fitness stations along the path.  Look for more information about the bike/walk path in the newsletter and on my blog at kimberlymoritz.com.

I am pleased to announce that the SGI BOE approved Miss Brooke Adams as the new Principal of Colden Elementary School at last night’s BOE meeting. We had 35 applicants for the position, with seven outstanding finalists. Miss Adams will start at Colden Elementary on November 4, 2019. You may see her at CES prior to her official start date as Interim Principal Kevin Munro’s last day is November 1, 2019. We will want the two principals to have an opportunity to work together prior to Kevin’s departure.

Miss Adams comes to Springville-Griffith Institute from Southwestern Central School where she has gained valuable administrative experience as the K-12 Assistant Principal for three years.

Prior to becoming an administrator, Miss Adams was a history teacher for a number of years. She cites the tight-knit community and involved families as what makes her most excited about joining CES and the entire Springville team.

Miss Adams prioritizes relationship building to help her to be successful as an administrator. She wants to build a positive relationship with each teacher, student and family at Colden Elementary. She emphasizes the growth mindset and showing students that mistakes are okay as long as you learn from them. She brings a positive energy and wants to empower others to help make each day a good day. Miss Adams also looks forward to learning from everyone at SGI.

Miss Adams grew up in a rural community, on a dairy farm and is excited to stay in a rural community with strong values. When she isn’t at school, Miss Adams is an avid runner and loves to travel. She has combined these two passions by completing the World Marathon Majors, running in six of the largest and most renowned marathons in the world in Berlin, London, Tokyo, Boston, Chicago and New York City. Maybe she’ll consider running with Coach Russell and our amazing SGI Cross Country team at the end of her day as CES Principal?

Please join me in welcoming Miss Adams to SGI!

District residents will notice the amount of construction that occurred this past summer and continues through the next school year. We’re winding down on our main capital project that was voted on in 2016. That work will be completed in the next few months and final cost reports filed with NYS by June, 2020.

At the same time, the P-TECH collaboration with Erie 2 BOCES and Alfred State continues in the old District Office on Newman. Residents may remember that this project is a P-TECH Academy which will house a full curriculum for area students in grades 9-12 to post graduate obtaining a Regents diploma and an Associates degree from Alfred State University. Read here and here for the original articles regarding this project as it was presented to our SGI voters. There is NO IMPACT to our SGI local taxpayers for the P-TECH Academy capital project. The fact that we moved the district offices out of a separate building and into a school actually helps the budget. When we have a building without students, no state aid is generated on that building as it is for capital project work in a school building.

These two capital projects have NOT affected the school tax bill that taxpayers have received recently. Our tax levy, the 20.2% portion of the budget paid for by our taxpayers, increased by 2.51%, as was the tax cap and was approved by the voters in May.

If your taxes went up in your town by more than the 2.51% that’s a combination of your equalization rate or assessment changes. Neither of which do we, as a school district, control. The equalization rates over 9 towns and 2 counties in the SGI school district range from 98% in East Otto to 14.75% in Yorkshire. I understand that Colden, as an example, has an equalization rate that dropped 3 percentage points and is at 37% of true value. Please contact your town assessor with questions about the equalization rates and assessments.