Facilitator: Heidi Krantz
1. Anne Volmer called the meeting to order at 6:30 pm. She introduced the panelists for the evening: Eric Oberg Chair of the Albany School Board, Noel Ford, School administrator and teacher and Tom Levett, headmaster at St. Johnsbury Academy.
2. Panel Presentation: Each panelist responded to a series of questions. In general the questions dealt with the pros and cons of tuitioning in of students and the pros and cons of considering alternative educational models. (Note the following is intended as a brief overview of key points. It is not comprehensive or a verbatim transcript. Important points may have been left out or stated in a way that differs from intent.)
Tom Lovett, Principal St. Johnsbury Academy
Mr. Lovett described the programs at the Academy and efforts made to facilitate and support students who tuition in from a distance. He mentioned the importance of a student advisor, equal access to services and programs for all students, the value of the low class size (average of 11 students) and the high educational background of Academy teachers. He noted that 90% of students proceed to some type of after graduation training and 80% go to college. As a measure of the Academy’s ability to handle the transition process he noted that students come from 45 towns in Vermont, from 20 states and 20 countries. With respect to funding, the parent is responsible for payment and in most cases the Town reimburses the parent. The current tuition rate is $13,875. With respect to parental involvement it is true that the closer the parent the easier it is to stay involved. However, he noted that distance does not seem to deter parental involvement in the case of special events. Studies indicate that long bus rides (in excess of 30 minutes) appear to have a negative effect particularly in the case of lower income students. However, there are creative ways to put together car-pooling arrangements and many parents actually value this time spent with their children. With respect to the large assortment of extra-curricula activities (from public speaking to knitting) a considerable effort is made to insure that students from a distance have equal access. With respect to Athletics, the Academy is a Division I school which has benefits and disadvantages. For the excellent athlete it provides the opportunity to compete at a high level but for others it may be difficult to get on a varsity team
Eric Oberg, Chair Albany School Board
The Albany School was built in 1981 and serves K-8. Enrollment is currently 85 students, down from 110. The School appears to have a relatively high ratio of special education students. Most of the Albany students go on to Lake Region. With respect to tuitioning out, Mr. Oberg felt this was beneficial for Albany since it enhances social development, gives students access to programs and resources not otherwise available and is financially beneficial for the Town. The lack of an Albany High School does not appear to hurt the social and cultural cohesion of the Town. With respect to the timing of transition, by 8th grade most students are ready to move on. With respect to a Charter School, Mr. Oberg did not feel that Albany residents would support an initiative of this sort and that they would prefer to stick with a Union School. The key for small rural schools is to get the kids out of the small community into a larger school setting where they can open up and meet new people.
Noel Ford, former Administrator
Mr. Ford began by discussing the pros and cons of a small versus large schools. A large school can provide more programs, more opportunities and experience in functioning in a complex social structure. Schools that attract tuitioned students are able to augment their programs with the funds that this provides. But some students do much better in a small school and thrive in an environment where there is less competition, strong community involvement and a higher level of parental support and involvement. Small schools encourage much more face to face interaction between the parent and the school. Parental oversight and accountability may be more difficult to ensure in a large school.
Regardless of the organizational pros and cons, the “magic is in the classroom”. It is in the classroom where the educational transformation occurs regardless of whether the institution is large or small. This means that it is the quality of the teacher more than anything else that counts. In a related vein, Mr. Ford stressed the critical importance of early pre-Kindergarten schooling and the importance of allocating resources for this purpose.
There does not appear to be a great deal of research on the pros and cons of tuitioning out of students. However there is a good deal of research that is available on the pros and cons of small schools and Mr. Ford cited the work of Mary Raywid.
Mr. Ford stressed that the Craftsbury Academy had a wonderful opportunity to be entrepenurial and reinvent itself building on its unique history, identity and strengths. He felt that the school could undertake a re-design that would capitalize on these assets. Possibilities include increased reliance on local resources and talented and experienced people who live in the Craftsbury community, the design of an academic program focused on the needs of the gifted and talented, the design of a tri-semester program, experimentation with a different scheduling models that would reflect recent research on optimal learning conditions for young students, the design of a “3:2” program that accelerates high school and links with the first 2 years in college. The challenge is build on unique local attributes to design a program with a comparative advantage that will attract students.
With respect to size, Mr. Ford stressed that the current school 9-12 enrollment is simply too small to be sustainable. It is essential to increase enrollment to a critical mass of from 120 to 200 in order to offer the range of programs and resources needed by students and in order to have a reasonable cost structure that does not impose an excessive burden on the Town.
Other points made during this presentation include: the importance of rehabilitating the gymnasium, the observation that charter school work best in large urban areas and may not succeed in rural areas, the high quality of nearby technical centers (but a caution regarding the value of imbedded credits).
3. Question Period (The following points emerged. Again, this overview is not designed to represent a comprehensive description of all of the points that were made.)
Discussion: key points
The Academy has roughly 50 k-12 students. In Mr. Ford’s view this is too small to be financially viable.
If you can design a unique, high quality program then students will come. However: it is essential to think “outside the box”, come up with a unique approach rooted in the special attributes of the community, have high quality AP courses and excellent teachers
Demographic predictions may be too pessimistic given the excellent quality of life that Vermont offers. The population base may in fact increase. The projected growth in Newport is a good example.
The current US education model is simply too expensive. It is important to seriously explore the “on line” school model. However, this does require excellent high-speed internet access. Electronics will shape the future of education in America.
The “3:2” program involves 3 years of high school followed by 2 years of college. There is also a “4:1” program that might be explored.
It would be possible to put together a model based on the Advanced Placement skills approach.
It is essential to establish a system that requires teacher accountability with the capacity to terminate for poor performance.
The meeting adjourned at 8:00 PM. The next Stakeholder meeting will be on April 8 at 6:30 pm. At that meeting research groups 1, 2, 3 and 4 will present their results (details of groups were provided in an earlier post, see below).
