Mill of the month #2

Windham Textile & History Museum

Museum presents:

MILL of the Month Program

Are you intrigued and interested in the rich and prodigious industrial history of Eastern Connecticut? Here is your opportunity to get your monthly dose of mill sites and villages.

March 23, at 10 am, it will feature the the Holland Silk Mills,
We will meet at the Museum. Cost: $8. per person.
(program and walk)

Future tours include study of small buildings and magnificent structures, water and steam powered factories, textiles and other products, mill reuse and preservation issues and much more. And of course there will be fascinating stories of both famous and ordinary people who lived and worked through the decades of our great industrial past.

Field trips are held on the last Saturday of the month at 10 a.m. OR 4 p.m. Please pay attention to time changes. Registration suggested by calling 860-456-2178. Each program lasts approximately 1.5 to 2 hours. A passport will be issued to participants for $5 Each fieldtrip is $8. Attend 8 trips (get 8 stamps in your passport) and your admission to Lowell National Historic Park is free. ( does not include transportation. Programs held rain or shine. Please dress accordingly.

For more information contact Bev York, museum education, at 860-456-2178

Or visit the Mill Museum Website: http://www.millmuseum.org/

Future Programs

Sat. May 25 - 4 p.m. Stafford Springs with Jamie Furness

Sat. June 22 - 4 p.m. Hall Mill, South Willington

Sat. July 27 - 4 p.m. Merrow and Eagleville, Mansfield

Sat. Aug. 24 - 4 p.m. Gurleyville Gristmill,

Joshua’s Trust, Mansfield

Sat. Sept. 28 - 10 a.m. Taftville, Norwich,

Historian Dale Plummer

Sat. Oct. 26  - 10 a.m. Smith & Winchester, South Windham

Sat. Nov. 23 - 10 a.m. Kirby Mill, Mansfield Hollow

interior tour with Sam Shrifrin

Sat. Dec. 28 - 10 a.m. leave Willimantic at 9.a.m. Boott Mill

Lowell National Historic Park, Mass.

Windham's Music Education Taking A Hit

A fund raiser for Windham's  and music programs will take place at Willimantic Brewing Company Wednesday, March 13th, 6-9 pm. Come out, meet your neighbors and concerned citizen and rally for  Windham students.  Windham High's music program needs our financial support to help maintain and grow the program. 

FILL-anthropic - www.facebook.com/FILLanthropic

There is little doubt that terrific failures have been made in the Windham Public Schools over the last 20 years. If you want to trace it be my guest. This has been in no little fault due to the Board of Education. Unbelievably, though generally good, and rarely punctual, the people on this Board have systematically, made decisions to the Deficit of our children and our community and therefor our economy. This is mostly shocking to me personally because I have known members prior to their election, yet somehow getting on that board perplexes their ability to make rationale decisions any longer. For some magical reason I cannot comprehend we have allowed these people to take a once really vibrant exciting educational community and turn it into ... I don't even know what, but it's mediocre in general, perhaps even at best. The one good man they had they allowed their lovely and well spoken superintendent to fire. You'rewelcome Coventry! I mean, I believe that Ana Ortiz is a quite good soldier, but we need a General. Even just a one star general, but a general non-the-less. Every decision of consequence that she has made about which I have been aware, she made wrong, and your property value is suffering because of it.

The charter should just eliminate the Board of Ed and make the Superintendent run for office. Is that legal? Someone check it out;-)

But if nothing else: Give these children Great Music. How often are you playing Mozart at home? Or Bach or Chopin? How about Kander and Ebb, or Andy Williams, or the Andrew Sisters and Bing Crosby and Jazz. How often do children even just sit and listen to music, let alone perform it? In Windham, it's ten minutes less a week than mandated by the state. How is this possible? I honestly can tell you it is because until fairly recently, no one really gave a s**t. Oh, it's music, who cares, just cut it? We need more jock straps. And everyone would agree, of course, to geting more jockstraps, our boys can't pummel the crap out of each other unless their boys are fitted properly. So, just cut music. Just get rid of it. And they did. No joke here folks. Your Board of Education just did just that. They just simply eliminated music. These jokers, with few exceptions, have got to go.
The buzz of technology is all about us, it is all consuming and overwhelming. Hearing music, reading music, feeling music helps keep us alive. Even the remotest monks have music. Music is a universal language. You can go into any bar in Germany, or Peru and say, hey...Elvis Presley! You will immediately have friends. Run in and yell GO PATRIOTS! and see what happens.

The children of this community deserve to learn about music. Even if they're awful at it and tone deaf and can't hold a note in a bucket made of glass, expose them to it. They will always be thankful.

Music, grows the brain. It's good for you. It's been proven highly beneficial.

Why aren't we fighting for it in our schools?

Wait. I know why...we're too busy fighting to put more guns in our schools instead. Riiiggghhhhtttt.

David Fenn

Windham Center

After the STEM Academy, what is the future?

Principal González, who knows every student by name, greets them as they
come to school. He also mandates that teachers stand outside their classrooms and greet children
as they come through the halls.

An Update:

Since windhamweek ran a November 2011 story, educational miracles have happened at Middle School 223 in the Bronx NY. Test scores have improved six fold, studens are learning and going on to high school. From one of the poorest performing schools in the New york City system MS 223 has reinvented itself and has become an award winning middle school. The renamed  Lab School of Finance and Technology offers a "Robust Art and Music Program." 

With the opening of the  Barrows STEM Academy what will happen when 400 of the brightest students and a proportional number of "great" teachers move from Windham's existing schools to the new STEM Academy?
Will the "cream students and great teachers" be skimmed off to Tuckie Rd. leaving Windham Schools educationally weaker or will these school mimic Middle School 223?

WEDNESDAY, Nov 9, 2011

Education: After The Magnet School

No, it won't be a money maker nor will it break even but it will provide a greater return on investment with higher test scores and a narrowing of the achievement gap.

We have  seen rendering of our new Magnet School  and heard of its potential  for success.  If The State Board of Education fulfills its financial promises and the local board complies with the states contractual obligations The Magnet School should give Windham its greatest educational lift since the invention of the blackboard.  But what will the new school's influence be on Windham's existing schools.  450 students and a proportional number of teachers will move from  their existing schools leaving those schools vastly different.
Will the "cream students and great teachers" be skimmed off to Tuckie Rd. leaving Windham Schools an educational wasteland?

New York City hosts a magnet  or charter school on nearly every block of its deprived neighborhoods.  MS 223, a holdover school located in  the Bronx has endured the ever-growing number of charter schools, often privately subsidized and rarely bound by union rules, that have been unleashed on the city. These alternative schools constantly  skim off the neighborhood’s more ambitious, motivated families. And every year, as failing schools are shut down in New York   MS 223 must accept a steady stream of children with poor intellectual habits and little family support.

Ramon Gonzales, 223's CEO and his young cadre of   enthusiastic teachers have managed to keep the school above water while gathering awards and placing MS 223 one of the best middle schools in New York City.  But will the dream continue, is it sustainable?  The New York Times' Johnathan Mahler writes of the daily trials at Middle School 223, its Principal, the staff and students. 

The Fragile Success of School Reform in the Bronx

MS223, The Bronx 

Magnet school introductory meeting

WILLIMANTIC — It was standing-room only at Windham Middle School Tuesday night, where parents and guardians flocked to hear what the Charles H. Barrows STEM Academy is about — and how to get their children in.

District officials say the school, slated to open this fall, will not only provide an opportunity to the 600 students — who will, at build out, attend each year — but to the district as a whole.

Up to 300 students will be enrolled for the 201314 school year.

The school is being billed as the most state-ofthe- art school facility in eastern Connecticut and its success has a lot riding on it.

Windham Board of Education Chairman Murphy Sewall said the science, technology, engineering and mathematics school is going to “raise the bar” across the district.

“This is an opportunity to pull the entire district along,” said Sewall of a district that has struggled with financial and demographic challenges for years. “ This is going to be a special school, but it’s not going to be an elite school.”

Well before the publicized start time for Tuesday’s open house, a long line formed down the hallway with parents looking to pick up, or submit, an application Friday’s deadline for in-district applicants.

Barrows Principal Jeff Wihbey, exhibiting the same unfettered enthusiasm he’s expressed since being chosen for the job last year, was thrilled with the turnout.

“My excitement for this school is beyond belief, and to see so many people here just adds to it,” he said.

With the finishing touches afoot, the anticipation thickened.

“We’re getting ready for lift off,” said Wihbey of the Tuckie Road school, which is reportedly almost 80 percent complete.

District officials expect to have the building officially turned over to them by Aug. 8.

Meanwhile, they have been working on curriculum development, outreach, marketing and hiring.

Sewall said he was pleased to see such a large turnout, because there had been concern that — despite a multi-pronged outreach effort — not all (Parents, Page 4)
Parents, students flock to STEM open house

(Continued from Page 1)

parents in the district had heard about the school.

Tuesday’s open house was the first of several planned with anoth­er to be scheduled in Mansfield in the near future. The deadline for out- of- district applicants is March 29.

Apply and hope

With the selection process strictly a blind lottery conducted by EastConn — the region’s edu­cational services center — all par­ents and guardians can really do is file their applications and hope.

And while there was plenty of that going around Tuesday, it wasn’t just among the parents.

Students eyeing spots in the upper grades were also cross­ing their fingers for a chance to attend the new school.

Nyla Urso- Serrano, 10, who now attends North Windham School, said she believes the STEM school could offer just the sort of educational challenges she’s looking for.

“I’m not that good at science, so I want to learn more about it,” said Urso-Serrano.

Hers is a sentiment shared by leaders across the country, who say the United States needs to bet­ter prepare its youth for the tech­nological and science- oriented world that awaits them as adults.

“In order to have our children be competitive in this global economy we really have to step it up,” said Wihbey, addressing the crowd.

The school’s curriculum team is hard at work making sure what the school has to offer does just that.

“When kids walk out of school every day, I want them rubbing their heads saying ‘I’m tired,’” said Wihbey.

A hands-on approach in a school — complete with labs, a weather station, wind and hydro turbines, solar cells, gardens, aquariums and ecosystems — promises to lead them in the right direction.

Affiliations with the Connecticut Science Center in Hartford and area universities will bolster the academic setting.

Teachers hired

Wihbey isn’t pulling any punch­es when it comes to hiring the teaching staff.

The hiring process is well under way and Wihbey said he’s making it perfectly clear that loving work­ing with kids isn’t enough.

Anyone who wants to be hired must convince him of their com­mitment to student success.

So far, he said, so good.

“We’ve got a strong core of teacher leaders,” said Wihbey. “Everybody we’ve hired has been a ‘teacher of the year’ somewhere else.”

Among them is Nicole Bay, who has taught in the district for 10 years and has a passion for the sciences.

Bay will be the fifth- and sixth­grade team leader and said she can’t wait.

“As this evolved and came to fruition, I knew that it was where I needed to be,” said Bay, who was also on the school building committee.

Bay is not alone.

Amanda Carchidi of Willimantic was there with her 5-year-old son, Skyler Curtiss.

Although the child was more interested in the large bubbles being produced at one of two hands- on scientific demonstra­tions in the school’s auditorium, mom was on a fact-finding mis­sion even though her mind was made up.

Even before the presentation, Carchidi said she knew enough about the school to know she wanted to get her son in because she believed it would be a good fit for his learning style.“ I think they learn mostly through projects,” she said. “He’s very hands on.”

The hands-on learning process is designed to immerse students into the learning environment, partly in hopes it will help the district keep its pledge that all stu­dents in the magnet school will be reading at grade level by the time they reach the fourth-grade.

It’s expected all students will take algebra or geometry by the seventh-grade and students will begin to learn Chinese in the first-grade.

“ It’s stuff that sets them up for success down the road,” said Wihbey.

And it all starts in the fall when the classroom doors will open to kindergarten through second­grade and fifth- and sixth-grade students.

Third- and seventh-grade will be admitted in the 2014-15 school year and pre- K, fourth- and eighth-grade will be admitted the subsequent year.

Pre-K and kindergarten pupils will have their own wing and a school uniform will separate the lower grades from upper grades by color.

Lottery anticipated

A lottery process will deter­mine who attends the school, with a greater percentage of open­ings reserved for students from Windham/ Willimantic and the remainder open to students out­side the district.

Were the district not to fill those out- of- district slots, its magnet school status, and the additional per- student state funding that comes with it, could be at risk.

Once the lotteries are conducted in March for applicants within the district and April for those outside the district, families will be notified.

Those whose names are drawn will have two weeks to make a decision.

But for some, that decision is already a no-brainer.

Madison Anderson, 10, who attends North Windham School, could barely contain her excite­ment before the presentation and was beaming from ear to ear as she left.

“I’m excited (about the chance) to start a new school ... to have a chance to actually go there,” said Anderson.

News that students would be issued an iPad to do their home­work on was just icing on the cake.

Superintendent Ana Ortiz said some 150 applications had already been submitted, not including the ones being filled out on the spot Tuesday.

Others who attended the open house were planning ahead.

Tina Hayes of Windham Center said her child won’t be starting school until the 2014-15 school year, but she wanted to find out when her first opportunity was to apply.

“ I do like the curriculum, I think it’s a great way to start,” said Hayes. “The whole hands-on thing. I think it’s a great educa­tion.”

Tuesday’s crowd was a demo­graphic melting pot, illustrating one of the driving forces behind the magnet school concept.

Willimantic resident Eddie Crespo said he hopes the area’s somewhat unsavory reputation won’t dissuade parents from other towns.

“I hope it doesn’t discourage them from applying because I think it’s a really great thing,” said Crespo. “It’s diversity. That’s what the real world’s all about.”For more information, contact Wihbey at ( 860) 465- 2610, e­mail jwihbey@windham.12.ct.us or visit www.windham.k12.ct.us/ STEM.

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Eastern, CSU System: Resentment Boils Over

Top faculty at state colleges: 'Dangerous signs ... we are being downgraded'

By Jacqueline Rabe Thomas

Long-simmering resentment on the part of a group of distinguished professors at the four Connecticut State Universities toward the University of Connecticut has boiled over in a letter to state officials blasting what they say is the latest example of inequity -- a proposal by the governor to increase funding to UConn.

All 12 "CSU Professors" -- the highest designation faculty at Central, Eastern, Southern and Western Connecticut state universities can receive -- co-signed a three-page letter Thursday in which they complain that CSU faculty is paid 30 percent less than professors at UConn, while being required to teach twice as many classes. Read More

How D.C.'s Public Schools Are Wooing New Families

DC Public Schools and public Charters increase by 5%

JENNIFER COMEY
Atlantic Cities

It is good news indeed that the number of students enrolled in traditional DC Public Schools and public charter schools increased by 5 percent between October 2011 and October 2012, the fourth consecutive annual increase. Those familiar with the District know that the sizeable public charter sector—second only to New Orleans—played a significant role. Read On

20 yrs ago top Democrates voted for the other way on gun control

Sen. Donald Williams, and Lt. Gov. Nancy Wyman

by Christine Stuart | Feb 25, 2013 
Conn News Junkie

Two of the state’s most vocal Democrats in the ongoing discussion of gun control legislation found themselves on the other side of the issue during a similar debate in 1993 — a period during which gang violence was at its peak.

Records show that Sen. President Donald Williams, who was then a freshman state Senator, and Lt. Gov. Nancy Wyman, then the state Representative from Tolland, both voted against Connecticut’s first assault weapons ban. Continue

Hometown students get half price tuition

University of New Haven Launches “Charge into the Future” Program Featuring Half-Tuition Scholarships for West Haven High School Graduates

February 28, 2013 News No Comments

The University of New Haven today announced a partnership with West Haven Public Schools that will provide half-tuition scholarships to high school seniors as well as college preparation programs for middle school and high school students.

The partnership, called the “Charge into the Future” program, will provide a half-tuition scholarship for any student graduating from West Haven High School who is admitted as a full-time student to UNH beginning next fall.

Read More