School Officials Thank Martin for Six Years on School Committee

Martin chose not to run for re-election this year.

Last Thursday, Easton School Committee chairwoman Jane Martin participated in her last meeting as a member of the board. Martin, who has been a member of the committee for six years, decided not to run for re-election in Tuesday's town election. School officials thanked Martin for her hard work for the district during her tenure and wished her the best. “I suspect most people are not aware of how extensive the role of chair is for the school committee, at least our school committee,” said Caroline O'Neil. “There are of course those basic obligations, facilitating lots of meetings, co-signing contracts with the superintendent, representing the committee at various events both official and unofficial community-type things," O'Neil said. “…

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Easton School Committee Approves $35 Million FY '14 Operating Budget

The largely across-the-board level funding of the budget from this year to the next leaves little room for new initiatives within the district.

The Easton School Committee voted to approve a FY '14 operating budget of $35,093,471 at their meeting Thursday night. The budget represents a 4.04% increase from the current year to next year, an increase of $1,362,000. According to officials, the majority of the bump is largely due contractual increases and increases in the cost of special education. “We have major concern with substantial increase in cost of special education due to out of district tuitions and associated transportation costs,” said Superintendent Michael Green. To cover those costs the district added $350,000 to the budget. An admitted estimate that they are hoping would be enough. “This budget reflects an increase of $350,000 to help meet those costs. And I just want …

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School Officials Thank MacLeod For Three Years in Easton

Assistant Superintendent Cathy MacLeod will become the superintendent in Hopkinton.

Easton Assistant Superintendent Cathy MacLeod officially announced to the Easton School Committee last week that she would resign at the end of the school year. MacLeod, who has been a member of Easton's administrative staff since 2010, was selected as Hopkinton's newest Superintendent. "The opportunity to learn as much as I have working with the school committee and working with the superintendent.." she said. "It’s just been a fabulous, fabulous almost three years." School Committee member Caroline O'Neill reminisced about hiring MacLeod in 2010. "We really didn’t make much of a secret about how enthusiastic we were," she said. "Fortunately [Superintendent Michael] Green and the other people involved in the process had the same take I …

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Easton School Officials Analyze MCAS Scores

While scores were good, officials agree that they could always be improved.

  Easton School Officials agreed last week that while the district's MCAS scores are positive, there is still room for improvement. "Scores throughout the district are consistent with last year and well above state averages in most cases," Easton Superintendent Michael Green told the School Committee last week. "Administrators are working with faculty to analyze the results." Assistant Superintendent Cathy MacLeod said educators need to focus on two areas in particular: moving more students from the "proficient" to the "advanced" cateorgy, and decreasing students who fall into the "needs improvement" or "warning" cateogry. "We ‘re doing well," she said. "We're continuing to do well, but our numbers in advanced and our numbers in proficient…

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Easton School Committee Discusses IPad Pilot Progam

A technology advisory group would oversee technology usefulness in schools

Easton Public School offiicals are looking to see how effective iPads could be in classroom learning. The Easton School Committee is discussing a pilot program that would test the devices' usefulness. "The fear is that we don’t want to purchase a number of iPads to go out to teachers and for it to be a toy and not enriching the students' learning," Easton Public Schools System Technician Peter Twiraga told the Easton School Committee during a workshop Friday afternoon. "Really what we wanted to do is establish this pilot program and have backup for it. We want to have them provide the lessons they’re going to be doing with the iPad and show how they’ve done it without the iPad in the past, and compare it to iPad usage." Twiraga and …

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School Committee Approves 4.23 Percent Increase in Operating Budget

The budget would fund two additional positions to the High School while eliminating three Elementary School positions.

The Easton School Committee voted unanimously Thursday night to approve an operating budget for the 2012-2013 school year in the amount of $33,731,471. The budget represents a 4.23 percent, or $1,367,929, increase from last year's $32,363,542 budget. Superintendent Dr. Michael Green said that certain challenges came with constructing this year's budget - particularly the loss of Federal Jobs money funding Special Education programs, which ran out and left the School Department with a $500,000 deficit. "That $500,000 loss is huge for us," School Committee member Donna Abelli said. "But, I think we’re managing well." The School Department will restore a position in the Oliver Ames High School social studies department that was lost last year…

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Matthews Looks Forward to New Role as OA Athletic Director

OA's future Athletic Director appeared before the Easton School Committee last week.

  Oliver Ames Principal Wes Paul was at last Thursday's Easton School Committee meeting to introduce his new athletic director, Bill Matthews, who will begin at the start of the 2012-2013 school year. Matthews, who is a former NFL and USFL linebacker, said he had already begun the process of meeting people, and he was excited to get started. "I’m really looking forward to the opportunity," he said. "I’ve had the opportunity to meet some folks and start to begin the process." Matthews said he hadn't considered applying for the position until he saw the position open. Current OA AD Jim Von Euw announced his resignation earlier this year. His eight year reign as the AD will end after this school year. "All of a sudden the wheels started to …

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School Committee Approves Full-Day Option for Kindergarten

Kindergarten will be restructured in Easton Public Schools next year.

  The Easton School Committee approved, 4-1, a proposal by the Early Childhood Committee to restructure Easton's kindergarten program to include a full-day option beginning next fall. The restructuring will eliminate Easton's current Kindergarten Extended Day (KED) program: a tuition-based program that provides academic enrichment after the free half-day program. The tuition-free half-day will continue and KED teacher positions will become kindergarten positions. The full-day program will cost $3,500, the same cost as KED. Early Childhood Committee co-chairs Dr. Theresa Davenport and Parkview School Principal Chris Getchell said the new structure will include theme-based, interdisciplinary learning from KED that "is so engaging and …

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Easton School Committee Approves Interim Concussion Policy

Students and Parents in Grades 6-12 will undergo concussion training.

  The Easton School Committee unanimously approved an interim concussion policy last week that would require all student athletes in grades 6 through 12 and their parents to undergo training before participating in sports or marching band competitions. Easton submitted the interim policy to the state, which required a policy to be in place by January. Superintendent Michael Green said the it was a "boiler plate policy" that many districts have been using. A final plan will be worked on and handed in by March, he said. Green said many of the policies passed in the interim policy were already in place for the Easton school district. "They’re required to do it now and they have been doing it," he said. "Much of this we have had in place for a…

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The View From Here

The Camel: A Horse Designed By A Committee!

The columnist responds to the actions of the Easton School Committee and what he sees as diminishing standards and expectations for our children.

Education is a shared commitment between dedicated teachers, motivated students and enthusiastic parents with high expectations. ~ Bob Beauprez  Okay, let me see if I have this straight. According to an article on Nov. 4 in Easton Patch, the Easton School Committee, in its collective wisdom, has appointed an exploratory committee to look into the impact of changing start times for Easton Public Schools.  This action, as stated in the article, was prompted by concerns that high school kids learning capabilities may be adversely impacted by the fact that they may not be getting enough sleep.  Okay, that makes sense. It’s fairly obvious that lack of sleep affects most of us unfavorably. I understand that completely. But does it really …

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