By Eishna Ranganathan
News Editor
On Nov. 16 the second breakfast with the superintendent for the 2013-2014 school year was held in Maple Point Middle School’s board room with a total of 14 people in attendance. The meeting lasted two hours long, from 9 a.m. to 11 a.m. Those in attendance included parents of the Neshaminy community, NFT teachers and Robert Copeland’s secretary and the superintendent himself.
Issues within the district were discussed as well as upcoming programs the district will host. On Dec. 7 Neshaminy will introduce Saturday Academics for high-schoolers, where students can be tutored on Saturdays for additional help in their core subjects. Depending on the program’s success, Neshaminy may expand it to middle schools as well.
The prospect of full day kindergarten was mentioned by Copeland based on educational testing studies conducted around the country. And it is possible that in upcoming years the district will have academies at the high school for students to specialize in areas like math and science or visual and performing arts.
Any student engaging in the academy and succeeding would gain recognition of this on their transcript and diploma.
The reason behind why the Family and Consumer Science classes were taken away from the middle school were mentioned.
“The district wanted to enhance its language arts program so the sixth graders now have drama, the seventh graders have public speaking, and the eighth graders have study skills classes,” Copeland said. “It always seems that the media covers only the negative aspects of slashing FCS, but never the reasoning behind it.”
A major examination of teacher effectiveness occurred sparked by a Parent University study mentioned. An attendee said how teachers should not make excuses about low achieving students, rather inspire them to want to learn.
Copeland than talked about how the teacher hiring process was recently revamped. Beyond the interview, potential teachers now need to be able to present a sample lesson and explain the same mathematic, scientific or historic concept in various ways in order to make sure they are tailored to students with different types of learning abilities.
The idea of comparing Neshaminy’s education standards to local colleges was talked to make sure an “A” paper here is an “A” paper there.
A participant offered the idea of sending a batch of eighth graders’ papers to a freshman teacher who teaches honors classes so she can grade them and make sure there is no immense rigor gap. These little measures are thought to make the district’s education higher quality.
The breakfasts are held monthly in a nonchalant environment. There is no formal sign-in sheet or agenda to be met. Anyone is welcome to come and provide commentary. It is during these meeting on which small thoughts can be implemented into big ideas that shape Neshaminy’s education foundation.
