Quality Education

Public education is a right that ALL people should have the opportunity to receive.

What makes that quality education happen is providing the STUDENTS the resources that they need to succeed.

Over the past few years, the topics regarding education have run the gamut from building Rogers High School, to regionalization, to test scores, absenteeism, and most recently the layoffs of teachers.

Rogers High School

I graduated from Rogers High School in 1992, following in the footsteps of my dad and many of our family members before us. My siblings and their children also went to and graduated from Rogers……I come from a family of proud Rogers Vikings, and I was blessed with the opportunity to go to Rogers at a time when Newport was more of a community, and was resident and student focused.

Over the years Newport has become a vacation destination, the “IT place to be”. And why not, it’s a beautiful city with amazing things to offer. However, the greatest collateral damage in that pursuit has been our schools, our teachers, and our students.

And why have our students suffered?

They rarely put first!

It’s embarrassing to see that our teachers and students don’t have the resources that they need to succeed while the rest of Newport, the vacation destination parts of Newport, flourish.

What do we have now? We’re seeing a City Council that isn’t providing the support that the School Committee or School Building Committee needs so that the teachers and students have the resources THEY need to thrive.

Instead, the most recent conversations are an attempt to delay completing the new Rogers High School. The time to bicker over funding, and over dirt piles is long past.

Am I happy about how much it is costing to build the school? No. But I also understand, from working on Construction Contracts, when I worked for the Facilities, Engineering, and Acquisition Division at Naval Station Newport, that you don’t truly know what a construction project will cost to fix until you start the demolition and see how much damage there is and how much work needs to be completed.

Do I think that the School Building Committee had all of the resources that they needed to succeed? No, I do not. I feel as though the Rhode Island Department of Education unintentionally set them up to fail but not providing them all of the direction, training, and resources that they needed to handle such a large project.

And am I concerned about the resident and environmental impacts that the dirt pile will have? Yes. As I was concerned with the dirt pile that was created in the North End when the “Road to Nowhere” was built and the dirt piles that currently reside in the North End skate park or the dirt piles over on Naval Station. However, I trust that the Rhode Island Department of Environmental Management have done their due diligence ensuring our safety.

At this point in the process, that is all a “lessons learned” conversation to have AFTER the school has been built. Those are conversations to have on how to avoid those issues on future developments not in the middle of construction.

Yes, our education system has multiple issues that need to be addressed but there seems to be little conversations happening about remedies to these issues and how to help the teachers and students succeed.

Instead, the most recent conversations are absorbed in the delay in completing the new Rogers High School. There seems to be a different topic brought up each week questioning the completion of this school. And the time to have had those conversations, to discuss certain issues, to bring concerns to the table were PRIOR to the demolition of the school.

We are past the point of having discussions of what ifs, and what should have been done. We are at the point of Just FINISH Building the School!!!

The students need a school. They need a school that they can be proud of. They need a school that isn’t leaking, that isn’t falling apart. They need a school that they can thrive in, feel safe in. They need a school that they can learn in and not have their learning process be hindered by rats running around or ceilings falling down.

It is time to put the students FIRST and BUILD THE SCHOOL!!

Regionalization

When regionalization was on the table, I supported the concept of regionalization in the traditional sense of uniting two schools into one school. I did not support how regionalization was being proposed on the 2022 ballot. We heard about regional school and joint finance committees, economic benefits, and “potential” offerings for Newport and Middletown.

We didn’t hear about a detailed educational plan on the academic benefits, if the proposed regionalization would decrease the dropout rate, and how would it benefit the ratio of students per teacher. It also appeared that some of the offerings by both districts, such as the anti-bullying program, had not been included on the “potential” offerings list.

The process appeared to have been rushed to the November 2022 ballot without adequate information on the benefits to the students. In addition, it appeared to have been rushed due to the economic benefits that Newport MIGHT see.

It also concerned me that the biggest stakeholders in this process, THE STUDENTS, were not being consulted on what that version of regionalization meant for THEM. Their futures were going to be impacted by that decision and it was irresponsible to move forward with a process that, the way it was proposed, would not benefit the STUDENTS.  

Test Scores, Absenteeism, and Teachers

At the time that the budget was up for discussion, many Councilors kept bringing up the subject of the dwindling student test scores. It was embarrassing in more ways than one for Council to basically imply “Show me an increase in test scores, and we’ll show you the money.”

Various conversations were had during Council meetings between Council and the School Committee but the one robust conversation that we didn’t hear was why are the test scores so poor. Did an increase post-COVID in absenteeism play a role? And why was there an increase in absenteeism? What was being done to address it?

The right questions weren’t asked, and the right questions weren’t asked of the right stakeholders in the process……THE STUDENTS.

Back to test scores. When I went to Rogers I was an average students with test scores that were on the lower end of average…..and there were a variety of issues that contributed to that. However, my Advisor told me that due to my test scores I wasn’t college material and should consider another path. I was one of the few lucky ones that did not listen to that advice and went on to not only graduate from college, but went on to receive my Masters in Business Administration and my Doctorate in Industrial/Organizational Psychology (with honors).

Are test scores important? To an extent. Do they adequately determine a student’s intellect and capabilities? No. Should we put more pressure on our students to get better test scores so that our city looks better to the rest of the state? Absolutely NOT.

Should we do better to get our students the resources that they need to succeed? Should we do better to make sure that our teachers are trained and have the resources that THEY need to help our students succeed? And should we be having MORE conversations with the students directly to ensure that they will be able to thrive in and have opportunities to go to college and succeed professionally after high school?

YES, YES, and YES!! 

We NEED to be a city that is more student focused, that provides the teachers with the right tools that they need, and a city in which the Council and School Committee can support each other and work together for a common goal…..the success of the STUDENTS!!