From the desk of the superintendent: Too few doing too much
One more surprise to me as I learn more about Shelter Island School is the reality that some of our students are involved in everything while too many of them are doing little or nothing beyond attending school. For a few, even coming to school regularly is beyond their current capacities.
Recently one junior told his guidance counselor that with sports, the school musical and homework, he was up past 1 a.m. each night that week catching up.
On the other hand an Island resident in the video production field had asked me to offer one or two student volunteers the opportunity to intern on a project to produce a video for the 10K Shelter Island Run Committee.Neither our technology teacher nor our Guidance Counselor could find a student for that. They explained to me that our active students are over-committed and our other students are unwilling to participate in school or community-related activities.
Shelter Island School has a “no-cut” policy. Clearly, the athletic teams need every “body” they can keep healthy on the field or the court. It gives kids a chance to pursue every dream they have for stardom. On the other hand, it denies them the reality check that other students get earlier in their lives that they need to make choices, they need to cope with failure and they need to respect that others have talents they may not have.
The dilemma I see is that those students — too many — who withdraw from the whole range of non-classroom school experiences also tend not to do well in their classroom work. One student told his math teacher that the only math he needed to know was enough to bill his future customers in his father’s business.
He probably wasn’t thinking even of keeping the family’s business books, payroll, tax records, etc. He certainly wasn’t considering life off this Island.
At a time when New York State is seriously considering increasing its academic requirements for a high school diploma — four years of high school math; four years of high school science; new passing grades of 75 or 80 percent on Regents exams — we struggle to get more than our top quartile into the advanced academic courses that many other schools fill with a majority of their students.
The underlying question is whether this school and community expects us to prepare most/all of our students to be competitive with the graduates of Long Island and Metro New York, in terms of college placements and competitive careers, or is our mission limited to preparing the next generation for work on Shelter Island?
The School Mission Statement — Engage, Explore, Empower — has one of seven bullets refer to “knowledgeable and literate readers, writers, mathematicians and scientists.” If it isn’t the most essential part of the mission, I question how we get to “creative and analytical thinkers” and to “skilled and successful workers and consumers.”
News and Notes
Congratulations to our girls’ varsity basketball team on their successful season.
Tickets for the high school musical “Zombie Prom” (April 7, 8, 9 and 10) will be available on school days, at the front desk in the lobby of the school from 8:10 a.m. – 3 p.m.
The Board of Education is moving toward completion of their superintendent search process and plans to make an appointment in April.
The School Budget for 2011-12 is in the final stages of board review (4/4 workshop, 4/11 adoption date) for the May 17th public vote on the budget, several bond resolutions and for three board positions. Details to follow.
Results of the second Communities That Care (CTC) Student Survey will be released soon. The committee thanks parents and students who participated in the project.
