Category Archives: Belmont

Oct 06 NO comments
Belmont, Belmont High School, Belmont Public Schools, Education, Massachusetts, Proposition 2 1/2, School Committee, Warrant Committee, budget, events, schools, taxes

Upcoming events: Community Dialog and state budget talk

HOUSE WAYS AND MEANS CHAIR CHARLES MURPHY VISITING BELMONT
State Representative Will Brownsberger and the Belmont Citizen Herald are hosting an evening discussion with House Ways and Means and Chairman Charles Murphy on Tuesday, October 13 at 7PM in the Selectmen’s Room in Belmont Town Hall.  This will be a great opportunity to get an inside perspective on the state budget situation, which many analysts predict will be even worse next year than it has been this year.  The discussion will be informal and allow ample opportunity for questions and answers.
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Tuesday, October 27, 2009.
YOU ARE INVITED!
COMMUNITY DIALOGUE
Belmont Public  Schools
Field House at Belmont High School
4:30 PM – 8:00 PM
The Community Dialogue is an opportunity for all townspeople to help guide the future planning efforts of the Belmont Public Schools. Community members, students, parents, teachers and school staff, civic and business leaders, and elected officials will be encouraged to sponsor and participate in dialogues.  Dialogues are self-directed and focused on topics of educational and organizational importance to Belmont.
For more information or to RSVP, call 617-993-5401

Hey all. Apologies for a long hiatus on posting to B2. I wanted to write this evening to inform the B2 readership about two important events to put on your calendars. The first is a very important opportunity to discuss (and help shape) the future of our public schools at a community dialog hosted by the Belmont Public Schools on October 27 at the Field House at Belmont High School. The entire community is invited to participate in this: parents, school administration and staff, civic and business leaders and elected officials. There’s a great presentation from Superintendent Entwistle  available on the BPS Web site that explains the program. In short: participants will take part in both some directed “big topic” discussions on issues important to the future of our public schools, and then in short (50 minute) self-directed dialogs on educational and organizational topics suggested by participants themselves. This isn’t some empty “team building” exercise — the output of these sessions will be operationalized by the BPS leadership team and will help inform an 18 month improvement plan adopted by the School Department.

Take part in a Community Dialog on the future of the Public Schools

Take part in a Community Dialog on the future of the Public Schools

The dialog runs from 4:30 to 8:30 pm on the 27th, with a short break for dinner at around 5:00pm. The first Session begins at 5:35 pm.  and the second at 6:30 pm.  You must RSVP for the Dialog to attend. Call 617-993-5401 or by sending an e-mail to Cathy Grant - CGrant (at) belmont.k12.ma.us!!

The second event is an opportunity to speak with Massachusetts House Ways and Means Chairman Charlie Murphy. He’ll be dropping in to Belmont on October 13 for a conversation with residents at 7:00pm in the Selectmen’s room in Belmont Town Hall. Murphy will be accompanied by State Representative Will Brownsberger. The Belmont Citizen Herald and Brownsberger are co-sponsoring the discussion, which is sure to hit on the State’s precarious finances and the impact that will likely have on local aide to Belmont and other towns.

Sep 28 NO comments
Belmont, Belmont World Film, Habitat, One Book One Belmont, composting, environment, events, farmers market

One Book, One Belmont: Wrapping up an exciting year

On September 9, 2009, the Belmont Public Library launched the second year of the One Book, One Belmont program with Animal, Vegetable, Miracle: A Year of Food Life, written by best-selling author Barbara Kingsolver, husband Steven L. Hopp, and daughter Camille Kingsolver. The book chronicles the family’s move to a farm in rural Virginia and the succeeding year in which they committed to eating only food grown on their farm or bought locally. The One Book, One Belmont program began last year with Three Cups of Tea: One Man’s Mission to Promote Peace . . . One School at a Time. The program’s success included 800 people attending an author event at Belmont High School.

Beginning in Seattle in 1998, One Book, One Read programs seek to connect readers across entire communities by reading the same book. Since then One Book, One Read programs have stretched across the United States, from Alabama through Wyoming. Different communities can also read the same book, and this year just in Massachusetts, Groton, Northampton, and Williamstown have also selected Animal, Vegetable, Miracle.

The One Book, One Belmont program follows the goals of other One Book, One Read programs to build community and to promote reading. In 2009, the One Book, One Belmont program also celebrates the town’s 150th anniversary with a book reflecting Belmont’s agricultural history. “From 1859 to the mid-twentieth century,” the Belmont Public Library writes, “Belmont was a town of farms, dotted with greenhouses full of flowers, fields bursting with fruits and vegetables, and pastures grazed by the first Holstein cattle imported to the United States.”

Continuing until October 8th, One Book, One Belmont has featured an array of events with more to come:  a composting workshop on Sept. 30 at the Habitat Wildlife Sanctuary at 3:00, 3:45 and 4:30 (ages 5 and up), a screening of  HomeGrown, a documentary presented by Belmont World Film on October 5, and a One Book One Belmont Day at the Farmer’s Market on October 8 with guest chef appearances at 2:00 PM, 3:00PM and 4:00PM.  More details about One Book, One Belmont—including event details—are available on the One Book, One Belmont Web site.

When the blue Belmont Public Library One Book, One Belmont banners come down around town after October 8th, you will know that the planning committee will soon be meeting again once a month to review titles for next year’s book.

Sep 25 NO comments
Belmont, Belmont Public Schools, New Wellington, Wellington Elementary, schools

Updated Wellington plans available online

I jumped the gun a couple weeks back, posting some site plans for artist’s illustrations for the design of our new Wellington Elementary School before they were fully baked. The folks over on the Wellington Building Committee asked me to give them time to get up to date plans online via their own Web site, which they have now done.

Wellington School Site Plan - Now Available Online

Wellington School Site Plan - Now Available Online

The new site plan, as well as detailed plans for the ground floor and second floor of the new school are available in PDF format. There are also pictures available of the scale model of the completed school, which is currently on display at the Wellington library. Check them out!

Sep 21 NO comments
Belmont, Belmont Public Schools, School Committee, events, schools

The New School of School Committee

A note to the community that tomorrow (Tuesday) evening at 7:30 in the Chenery Middle School Community Room, the School Committee will be holding the first of a series of School Committee Workshops. These are a new format for Belmont School Committee and are intended to provide a different forum to discuss big picture issues, questions or concerns that face our schools (and our community). The agenda for tomorrow evening’s meeting is posted on the BPS Web site here. I’m really excited about the new Workshop format, as it creates an opportunity for a more open-ended dialog with the community about our shared values and priorities than is possible given the amount of important regular business that fills up most School Committee meetings. There will be a number of these throughout the year focused on different topics.

I hope you’ll take the time to come out to tomorrow night’s meeting at the Community Room at CMS and/or tune in and watch!  I hope to see you tomorrow evening.

Sep 14 NO comments
Belmont, Belmont Public Schools, Massachusetts, Wellington Elementary, schools, traffic and parking

Summit on Wellington traffic, safety issues Wednesday

As planning for the construction of a new Wellington Elementary moves forward, the architects, Wellington Building Committee, town and community members have been working hard to balance the needs of the school community with those of the surrounding neighborhood, as well as meet guidelines for safety, state mandates and so on. Needless to say, this isn’t always easy (in the same way that, say, three dimensional chess isn’t easy).

One area of discussion and concern with preliminary plans for the new school is around the impact of the new building on parking and drop-off/pick up space. Some Wellington neighbors have voiced concerns about traffic on adjoining streets, and fire and public safety officials want to make sure that the new school will be easily accessible by emergency vehicles in the event of …well…an emergency. Needless to say, there are also State mandates and codes that the building must conform to. While the Wellington Building Committee is responsible for many of the design decisions affecting the construction of the new school, many of the traffic issues fall outside of the group’s realm of responsibility.

Now an important meeting has been called to help address the concerns of neighbors and get all the responsible parties in the room to discuss the issues at hand. The meeting will take place on Wednesday, September 16 at 7:30 PM in the Board of Selectmen’s room at Town Hall. The meeting was called by Pat Brusch, Vice Chair of the WBC and Chair of the Permanent Building Committee and will involve members from the Planning Board, the Traffic Advisory Committee, the Board of Selectmen, the School Committee, Wellington PTO, the WBC and the Fire Chief, Police Chief, and Building Inspector.

There has been a lot of inaccurate or incomplete information floating around about the Wellington project. Some of that is due to the slow trickle of information from the WBC that’s been released to the public. Some of it is due to concerns from those involved in planning the new school that  information that’s released before it is in its absolutely final form just leads to confusion, misplaced concerns and other distractions.

One thing’s clear: more and more open lines of communications between all of the many parties involved will help clear the air and alleviate tension. So if you’re a neighbor, Wellington Parent or simply a concerned citizen and want to have your voice heard on this important issue, make a note of the meeting date and time. We’ll see you there!

Sep 07 NO comments
Belmont, Belmont Public Schools, Department of Education, President Obama, School Committee, politics, schools

Obama’s radical message to kids? Dream big. Study hard. Don’t quit!

You could probably spread blame around over the media circus that’s become President Obama’s televised speech to school children. The speech is scheduled for tomorrow at Noon, EST and its full text is now available online here.

Our President, Barack Hussein Obama

Our President, Barack Hussein Obama

Let’s start with the blame due the Obama White House. I guess they might be blamed for not anticipating the attack from far right wing talk show hosts over a plan to speak directly to school children. After all, critics who blithely throw around terms like “Nazi,” “holocaust” and baby “death panels” (thank you Sarah Palin) when describing a plan to make health insurance universal in this country could hardly be expected to miss the opportunity to mine a 1:1 with impressionable children for all the nefarious and dark implications imagineable.

Then there was the self-inflicted wound caused by Obama’s Dept. of Education, which published on its Web site some suggested ideas for lessons or in-class activities to accompany the speech. One was to have children write a letter to themselves about ways they could “help the President.” That’s an unartful phrase, for sure, but we all kind of see what they’re shooting for — well except for Glenn Beck, Rush Limbaugh and Michelle Malkin who took the phrase, put it in President Obama’s mouth and ran with it for all it was worth. The “help the President” line turned out to be perfect, allowing Mr. Obama’s vocal opponents to press their two most effective lines of attack: that he’s a shallow celebrity and that he’s a crypto Communist interested in indoctrinating all those unwilling or unable to see the Black Helicopters hovering just above his head. Let’s face it: Beck, Limbaugh and crew aren’t  ”pundits” so much as provocateurs — their role since January has not been to color the news, but to get people angry, make dark and portentious sounding predictions about the coming revolution (Socialist, that is). If it takes lying and distortions to do it, so be it.

The debate on the airwaves has permeated local communities across the country. In Colorado, a good friend of mine  had to opt his second grader “in” to the Obama speech after parents, scared by what they were hearing on Fox and conservative radio, pressured the local school administration. Even here in Massachusetts, the issue has prompted racorous debate. I’m on a listserv for State School Committees, where there’s been a heated debate, replete with charged references to the Third Reich and accusations of racism that invoke Boston’s shameful history of segregation and race riots. The rancor doesn’t reflect well on either side, frankly. And, as is so often is the case in brush ups like this, the needs or opinions of the school children in question have been pushed to the side — the better to clear space for the grown ups to fight.

As is so often is the case in brush ups like this, the needs or opinions of the school children in question have been pushed to the side — the better to clear space for the grown ups to fight.

Here in Belmont, a community listserv has had an active, though much more level headed debate, with many supporting the address, but some residents expressing reservations about the notion of speech to children that could, in theory, contain political arguments. Its worth noting that Democrats have made similar arguments when the issue was a Republican president (Reagan, the first President Bush) addressing school age children.

Fortunately, our Superintendent has taken what I think is an entirely prudent and thoughtful approach to tomorrow’s speech. In a notice published on Thursday, Superintendent Entwistle indicated that he has spoken with the principals of our public schools, encouraged them to make the speech available, both live and recorded. Beyond that, principals and teachers will make the call about whether the speech and accompanying lesson plans work for their class and their students. That sounds just about right to me.

Being charitable: I think there’s just something about the notion of the words of politicians being piped into classrooms that just smacks many folks in this country as authoritarian and un-American. That’s OK — except when it makes us clam our ears shut to a message that we really might benefit from hearing. It’s also worth noting that the United States has, in the past, required and tolerated much more overt expressions of leader worship. My wife, who grew up in Sudbury in the 1970s, recalls being given a picture of President Gerald Ford to keep in her desk at school (or, perhaps, hang on her wall at home). I can’t even imagine the blowback should the White House suggest that students be given pictures of President Obama to keep, but I’d imagine the persons of Adolf Hitler, Joseph Stalin and Hugo Chavez would feature prominently in the overheated rhetoric.

It’s worth noting that the United States has, in the past, required and tolerated much more overt expressions of leader worship. My wife, who grew up in Sudbury in the 1970s, recalls being given a picture of President Gerald Ford to keep in her desk at school.

Hopefully the release of the text of President Obama’s speech (and former First Lady Laura Bush’s endorsement of it) will put the debate to rest. Far from enlisting school kids to help him fight with legislators on Capitol Hill, Mr. Obama uses his own personal story of struggle, hard knocks and stellar achievement to deliver a message that I’d like to think even today’s polarized politicians can rally around: the need for school children to  have hope for their futures, to reject the illusory world of shallow celebrity and easy money, to work hard, study and never give up, despite odds that may be stacked against them. Here are a few excerpts:

“I know that sometimes, you get the sense from TV that you can be rich and successful without any hard work — that your ticket to success is through rapping or basketball or being a reality TV star,” Obama will tell children.
Chances are, you’re not going to be any of those things…the truth is, being successful is hard. You won’t love every subject you study. You won’t click with every teacher. Not every homework assignment will seem completely relevant to your life right this minute. And you won’t necessarily succeed at everything the first time you try.

“That’s OK.  Some of the most successful people in the world are the ones who’ve had the most failures…you can’t let your failures define you – you have to let them teach you. You have to let them show you what to do differently next time. If you get in trouble, that doesn’t mean you’re a troublemaker, it means you need to try harder to behave. If you get a bad grade, that doesn’t mean you’re stupid, it just means you need to spend more time studying.

“No one’s born being good at things, you become good at things through hard work. You’re not a varsity athlete the first time you play a new sport. You don’t hit every note the first time you sing a song. You’ve got to practice. It’s the same with your schoolwork. You might have to do a math problem a few times before you get it right, or read something a few times before you understand it, or do a few drafts of a paper before it’s good enough to hand in.”

In short, President Obama’s message isn’t Socialism – its humanism. More than that, and in the great tradition of American thought, its an optimistic message: a story of hope and redemption and second chances. That should be a message we can all agree with.