Board of Education - Contact (District Clerk):  631-9404

Mimi Godwin, President
Paul Rode, Vice President
Sheila J.Conklin, Trustee
Craig Laub, Trustee
Vincent Nadile, Trustee
B. Joseph Lillis, Trustee
Katharine M. Swibold, Trustee

Email the Board @ boe@tufsd.org

Message from the Board President

DISTRICT GOALS FOR 2009-2010

The Board of Education and the Superintendent of Schools worked together this past summer to develop a set of goals for the 2009-2010 school year that reflect both a short term and a long term perspective.  Clearly, the impact of current economic conditions on the capacity of our school district to continue supporting existing programs and services for students is a critical issue.  In order to ensure that the district is operating as efficiently as possible, we will be conducting an economic sustainability analysis that will examine all of our instructional and non-instructional programs and services in cost/benefit terms.  The results will be used as a framework for developing a fiscally responsible budget proposal for the 2010-11 school year. 

A related goal will be to explore the possibility of consolidating our elementary school programs into three buildings by closing one of our single-grade buildings.  With the move of the 6^th grade from our Washington Irving School to the Middle School, it would be at least theoretically possible to move the third grade from Morse School to Washington Irving and the first grade from John Paulding to Morse School.  We need to take a serious look at the pros and cons of such a consolidation.

Several goals address current programs and services.  This year represents the culmination of several years of planning for the transition of the 6^th grade to the middle school and the full implementation of a redesigned middle school program.  We will be reviewing all aspects of the middle school program to ensure that the new model is operating successfully.  Several years ago, we made a commitment to expand our foreign language program from a grades 5-12 program to a grades K-12 program.  This year we will evaluate the effectiveness of the redesigned K-8 sequence.  We will also continue to expand parent access, via our website, to information about their children that is contained in our student information management system.

A high quality school system can only remain that way if it maintains a commitment to keeping an eye on the future.  Technology has created opportunities to provide virtual teaching and learning models that can be delivered more efficiently or that offer options not currently available to students.  We will be looking at successful models in other school districts to determine their potential applicability in our district.  We will also be developing and adopting a new multi-year technology plan that will guide us in making decisions about how best to use technology to support teaching and learning in our school district over the next three years.  In the area of school facilities, we have identified some energy conservation measures that can be financed through energy savings and will be moving ahead with a plan to initiate those measures.  Finally, we will be launching a long range planning initiative that will lead to development of an updated mission statement and a framework for developing a forward looking strategic plan.  The superintendent has described this initiative in greater detail in his article for this newsletter edition.

Our progress in addressing these goals will be reported at school board meetings throughout the year.  All of our meetings are recorded for viewing on cable channel 77 and we encourage you to follow along as we tackle this challenging mix of short term and long term goals.  As always, our school board members welcome your comments and suggestions throughout the school year in advancing our shared goal of providing an outstanding educational experience for the children of our community.