COMMON CORE DEBATE

Formal Presentations By Teachers, Hebert

Critical Of Governor’s Proposed Reforms

COOPERSTOWN – This evening’s Cooperstown Central school board meeting moved from the library to the middle/high school cafeteria to accommodate the largest turnout of teachers and parents so far – 120 or more – since concerns arose locally two weeks ago about Governor Cuomo’s proposed Common Core reforms.

The 7 p.m. meeting began with presentations, by teacher association president Ann Olmstead, Sandra Bliss, a retired teacher who listed long affiliations with NYSUT, and local teachers, but also by Superintendent of Schools C.J. Hebert, who delivered the segment calling for an end to the state’s Gap Elimination Adjustment (GEA), ongoing since 2009, which reduced state aid by almost $600,000 this year alone.

During the public comment period, parent Kim Jastremski, who has been a leading voice of concern, asked the school board to correct two points made in information sent home to parents.

One, that the March 27 deadline for parents to advice CCS administrators if they don’t plan to have their children take Common Core tests next month is simply for the district’s convenience: Parents can opt their children out up to the day of the test, she said.  Two, that parents have a right to prevent their children from taking the test, both by regulation and the Constitution, Jastremski said, to applause.

It also surfaced that teachers are circulating a petition calling for the elimination of the executive principal position, created two years ago to bring firepower to the school board’s efforts to vigorous implement the Common Core, and effort that led to Cooperstown Elementary’s designation as a “Reward School” last summer, placing it among the top 20 percent of schools in the state.

The next meeting to come out of Common Core concern is a community forum on issues surrounding the upcoming tests, hosted by the school board at 6:30 p.m. next Tuesday in the elementary school cafeteria.