Kids Go Green for Spirit Day at Greenacres
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The Greenacres Elementary School community celebrated Spirit Day by dressing in green from head to toe on Friday May 8. They didn't stop there, but also dialed up the green factor by wearing hairpieces, accessories, and anything else that is or could be made green. Students participated in crafts, races and contests, all organized by the PTA.
Teenage Drinking - Ban It or Tolerate It?
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"For every prohibition you create, you also create an underground" --Jello Biafra, Dead Kennedys
Our teenagers are growing up in a culture of alcohol consumption. With the legal drinking age of 21, binge drinking prior to going out for the night has become the norm, in my town beginning as early as in ninth grade. As one who dislikes both the taste of alcohol and the loss of control associated with inebriation, I personally have difficulty understanding this teen obsession; I suspect it is a combination of wanting to fit in with one's peers, rebellion and incomplete myelination of the evolving brain. While certainly not all teenagers consume alcohol, a great number of parents whose mantra is "not my child" are nothing short of delusional; a recent study reports that 86% of our youth admit to trying alcohol prior to age 21.
I allow – no, I tolerate my teenage children's alcohol consumption. While I make it clear to them that I am not condoning their drinking and that it is, in fact, illegal outside of our home, I have made a "one drink" deal with them; they can have one alcoholic beverage as long as they are not driving. This contract also includes a discussion of the myriad risks associated with drinking, and the statement that I prefer they opt out.
I suggest to them the alternative of drinking non-alcoholic beverages out of the ever-popular, alcohol-indicative red plastic solo cup, (mis)leading other teens to assume that alcohol is contained within. Having once (long, long ago) been a teenager myself, I understand the potentially overwhelming peer pressure experienced by a group whose main objective is often to conform. Truly, one would hope that our children have the inner strength to resist negative peer group influences, but let us not deceive ourselves – clearly that is frequently not the situation, as our town ambulances make regular excursions to the emergency room to deliver dangerously impaired high schoolers. My community is not alone in its transgressions; studies report that nearly 200,000 underage drinkers are seen in emergency rooms across the United States each year.
Has my approach been a success? I attended a tenth grade parent meeting, organized by the local high school and moderated by a trained counselor. I was clearly the exception surrounded by a majority who espoused that we must maintain zero tolerance for alcohol use by our children. With my one-drink approach, I have been able to maintain open lines of communication with my own tenth grader by reaching this agreed upon compromise. She feels comfortable confiding in me both her actions and those of her counterparts; as such, I knew which parent group members had offspring who drank regularly, while they vehemently disagreed with me and staunchly declared that prohibition was the only option.
I did not pay a return visit to that circle, and yes, I feel confident that mine was and is an infinitely more effective approach. It is said that "knowledge is power," and safety is of paramount importance – my children do not hide their activities, legal or illegal, from me, leaving me poised to help them, if need be.
Alcohol was not presented as the "holy grail" in our home. When adults had a glass (or in my case, a taste) of wine, our children were allowed as well. Our hope was that we could demystify alcohol, and when our daughters and son went to college, they would be less likely to become uncontrollably immersed in the pervasive drinking culture. I believe we have succeeded; our children are emerging from their teen years relatively unscathed, in contrast to several of their friends. Not long ago, I received a 1 a.m. phone call from my then 17-year-old college freshman daughter who accompanied her unconscious friend and EMS to the emergency room after this friend, out with others indulged/overindulged in alcohol for the first time. It became incumbent upon my terrified, (sober) daughter not only to call 911, but also to telephone her friend's parents and ask them to travel to the hospital to make necessary medical decisions for their daughter. I was later told that my child's friend's parents were of the zero tolerance belief, and they were ultimately told their daughter unknowingly consumed alcohol when her drink was spiked. The deficiency in honest family communication was perpetuated.
Is my way the only way? I do not believe so – each young adult and each family dynamic is different, and what works for one cannot necessarily be generalized. I am, however, confident that one must take a frank, unbiased look at one's children, with whom it is imperative we have meaningful, direct and ongoing dialogue. As parents, we need to look at the greater framework in which our youth exist and understand the roles that immaturity and peer pressure may play.
Statistics support that the "not my child" view is disproportionately incorrect – when it comes to teenage drinking, it is much more likely to be your child than not. It is my opinion that this self-delusional perspective, in combination with an inflexible zero tolerance policy, prevents candid discourse and may endanger one's child. And so, I defend my choice to sit with my children as we all enjoy a glass (or sip) of wine.
this article originally appeared on the parenting blog, Grown and Flown.
Test or Opt-Out: The Discussion Continues
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The battle over mandated state testing and teacher evaluations continued this week in the schools, the State Assembly and on television.
According to Lynne Shain, Scarsdale's Assistant Superintendent, 110 children in the Scarsdale School District opted out of the tests as of Tuesday, April 14th. That's just under 5% of the 2,238 students in grades 3-8. In order to comply with the state mandate, 95% of district children are required to take the test. So if another two students opt out, the district will fall below the targeted number.
In other news, State Assemblywoman Amy Paulin and 15 of her peers in the Assembly sent a letter dated April 13, 2015 to Chancellor Merryl Tisch and the Board of Regents asking them to use their power to recognize the uniqueness of each school district and to give individual school districts flexibility in designing their own teacher evaluation plans. The legislators advocate for allowing local principals and administrators to observe district teachers and minimize the use of independent evaluators. According to the letter, standardized test results should be given less weight in teacher evaluations and districts should be given the "flexibility of choosing from a broad variety of assessment measures that are aligned to existing classroom and school best practices." The letter is shown below.
Chancellor of the Board of Regents Merryl Tisch and Diane Ravitch, author of The Death and 
Life of the Great American School System appeared on Chris Hayes' show on MSNBC on Tuesday night to discuss their positions on this controversial issue. Tisch said the tests were intended to give parents "a snapshot of their child's performance in relation to their peers," and said the tests were "diagnostics to inform instruction and curriculum development." She claimed that the tests were not designed to be used as tools to evaluate teachers, saying "If we had not linked the evaluation of teachers to the testing I think more kids would be showing up for testing. Kids have gotten caught up in a labor dispute between the teachers union and the Governor and our kids are paying the price."
Ravitch said that kids are over-tested and that "Kids in third grade are taking 8 hours of tests – more than the bar exam." She added, "No test results are given to the schools – just the scores.... There is no instructional gain and no diagnostic value."
Watch the segment on MSNBC here:
Here is the letter sent by Assemblywoman Amy Paulin and her colleagues:
Chancellor Merryl H. Tisch
and Members of the Board of Regents
89 Washington Avenue
Albany, New York 12234
Dear Chancellor Tisch and Members of the Board of Regents:
Communities, educators and elected officials share the same goal of high quality instruction, appropriate accountability measures, and evaluation processes and instruments. We believe that the key to a successful evaluation system lies in the ability of individual districts to tailor their evaluation plans to the unique profile of the district. A one-size-fits-all approach to teacher evaluation ignores the differences that truly exist among districts across the state. All of our students and teachers are shortchanged when we force our districts to operate as if these differences do not exist.
We believe that the recently enacted 2015-16 state budget gives the Regents the power to develop an evaluation system that will allow school leaders, with appropriate oversight, to implement teacher evaluation plans that address the uniqueness of each district. In addition, the recently enacted budget gives the Regents the opportunity to analyze the role of student testing in a teacher evaluation system. Therefore, it is critical that this evaluation system be developed thoroughly and thoughtfully. If there are specifics that need to be addressed legislatively, please let us know.
Education Law Section 207 -- Legislative power -- gives the Board of Regents the power to establish rules for carrying into effect the laws and policies of the state. Education Law also grants the Commissioner the authority to promulgate teacher evaluation regulations that recognize the unique profile of a district, i.e., its diversity and level of student performance based on quantifiable goals such as student growth, graduation rates and college readiness. In our opinion, the recently enacted 2015-16 state budget grants the Regents authority to allow flexibility for the implementation of teacher evaluation plans that use varied evaluation measures and weights, depending on the grade level, subject area or individual teacher. It also now requires the Board of Regents to call on practitioners and experts in the field of education, economics and psychometrics to assist in the implementation of a differentiated evaluation system that will truly improve teaching and learning in New York State. In fact, the enacted budget includes $1 million for this purpose.
Under the newly enacted law, the districts now have an additional option and requirement as to who can conduct teacher observations. We believe that using principals or other trained administrators is the more effective method of teacher evaluation and should be given the highest priority. Regarding an independent evaluator, the law gives the Regents broad discretion to determine what percentage of a teacher's observation will be done by an independent evaluator. We believe districts will be better served if independent evaluators are used minimally as is currently done in NYC where they are used for ineffective teachers. For instance, one way to use independent evaluators effectively would be to use them as validators, to authenticate scores to ensure consistency across districts, grade levels and subject areas.
The cost of using independent evaluators is another factor that you must consider. The cost to the districts is either in money, if they must pay for a trained independent evaluator from outside the district, or time if the evaluator is from within the district. This money is better spent on reducing class size or maintaining a full array of courses. In order to provide flexibility, the Regents should exercise the authority to define a school by its BEDS code even if it shares space within a building with other district schools, i.e., elementary, middle and high school. Defining a school by its BEDS code will give smaller districts the same advantage as larger districts to use an independent evaluator from within the district which will save money and more closely align its evaluation plan to the districts' educational goals.
Student performance is the other area where differentiation is critical. We believe the law offers the flexibility to allow districts to decide what proportion of a teacher's evaluation should be decided by standardized tests, observations and locally selected measures. We recommend that in order to be equal to all teachers, districts be allowed to give the state standardized tests less weight, which is only fair given that the use of state standardized tests targets some teachers and not others. It is important too, that the Regents recognize that for special education teachers, greater weight should be placed on observations due to the diversity of the learning needs of their students. Moreover, special needs students struggle with standardized tests, which is why a variety of student assessments, such as portfolios, should be used to a far greater extent for these students.
Most importantly, the law now requires that annual evaluation systems "shall consist of multiple measures" for student performance. "Multiple measures" means using more than one. If a district chooses only option one – one test – then, in order to abide by the law, the same test must be given over a period of years, with several cohorts of students. If schools choose to add the second component, we ask that you allow them the flexibility of choosing from a broad variety of assessment measures that are aligned to existing classroom and school best practices and take into consideration testing reduction as is required in the law. Using tests wisely over time and encouraging the use of a variety of assessments will help reduce test stress and test anxiety for teachers and students.
Ignoring the differences between school districts disavows the state's ability to put the resources and attention where it is most needed. We urge you to utilize the flexibility that the law grants you, both through the promulgation of regulations and within the newly enacted budget, to allow districts a greater level of self-determination in the implementation of a teacher evaluation system. To ignore this opportunity is an injustice to the students, educators, parents and taxpayers of New York State.
Sincerely,
Members of Assembly
Greenacres Students Weave a Plastic Bag Mandala
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Greenacres students found a unique way to honor the earth by contributing used plastic bags to a "Plastic Bag Mandala" created by artist Gala Narezo. The mandala is part of her exhibit called "Awake and Aware: Creatively Transforming Behaviors and the World." It is a participatory project created to engage the public in dialogue around the environmental harm caused by plastic bags. The Plastic Bag Mandala has been travelling around and at each stop the public is invited to bring their used plastic bags and weave them into the mandala while pledging to use reusable bags in the future. It is now visiting Greenacres Elementary School as part of its Earth Day celebration.
A mandala is a circle contained within a square. It is a form that represents the universe as well as how our minds and the earth are connected. Narezo's work is designed to demonstrate that we are all connected and play a part in each others' future well-being, and by thinking about how we can waste less, we can help the earth.
Here are a few facts about the environmental effect of plastic bags:
- A plastic bag can take up to 20 years to degrade.
- Plastic bags are the most common form of garbage polluting our seas.
- Plastic bags are eaten and choked on by fish, whales, sea turtles and bird, who mistakenly think that they are food.
- The average American uses 330 plastic bags a year.
- Globally one million plastic bags are used every minute.
- The average total amount of time a plastic bag is used for is 12 minutes.
You can reduce your use of plastic bags by bringing reusable bags to stores and recycling the ones you have at home.
Scouts Race Handmade Cars in the Pinewood Derby
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The Pinewood Derby is a highlight of the year for Scarsdale Cub Scout Pack 440 and scouts around the country. Held by each pack, the derby is a series of races in which scouts race small cars that they make out of wooden blocks. Winners go on to face top finishers from neighboring packs in the district. The derby originated in 1953 in Manhattan Beach, California, by a father of a scout whose son was too young to compete in the Soapbox Derby races. It is estimated that in the intervening years, cub scouts have produced over 100 million cars. There are no engines or batteries involved - the cars rely solely on gravity to operate.
This year's top winners at Pack 440's March 22nd Pinewood Derby were:
Tigers:
1st Place Matthew Glassman
2nd Place Ryan de Dianous
3rd Place Zachary Gfeller
Wolves:
1st Place Kirwan King
2nd Place Daniel Hwang
3rd Place Hadden Gennarelli
Bears:
1st Place Janghee Lee
2nd Place Brendan Tang
3rd Place Jayden Tang
Webelos I:
1st Place Eshan Agarwal
2nd Place Alexander Hwang
3rd Place Haochen Liu
Webelos II:
1st Place James Mandras
2nd Place Jeremy Ng
3rd Place Kenny Xu
In the design category, in first, second and third place, the winners were: William Lemerond, Kyle Pidedjian, and Harry Cullen, respectively.
Boys who did not receive trophies were awarded medals of participation. 
Cubmaster Woody Crouch noted, "Truth be told, it's not so much about making the car or winning a prize, but about working on a project with your parent or another adult. While it's not always easy, it is a truly rewarding experience."
Text and Photos by Midori Im.
