Where is the vision in the school board’s long range plan proposal? How is it going to propel the Milford School District into the top 50, 25 or 10 in the state? The answer is there is no vision and the goal is cost savings not making the Milford School district one of the best in the state.
According to the website schooldigger.com the Milford School District ranking is 88th out of the 164 school districts in the state. Our high schools, according to this same website, slipped 10 positions each in the data. Yet we have one of the highest costs per student in the state.
All of this is managed by three people who are being paid on par with the top ranked school districts in the state. By the way the top six wage earners in the City of Milford are school district employees.
To make matters worse we have given them merit increases for their stellar performance in this time period. I believe Dr. Feser was given a 2.5% raise to push her total compensation to the highest in the city — $205,101 per year. Has anyone ever received a raise for doing below average work for going backwards in performance? Again 88 out of 164 and the high schools have slid backward 10 positions in her tenure.
Folks we are paying a lot of money for a subpar product.
Another disturbing bit of data tied to the lack of vision and accountability. In reviewing the CT State Department of Education data for school performance in 2012-2013 based on the CMTs I found that of the 13 schools in Milford there were 12 ranked as transitioning and only one ranked as progressing. There were no schools ranked as excelling and fortunately none ranked as review, focus or turnaround. The one school ranked as progressing is Harborside Middle School. Isn’t this the school we want to shutter?
If something is sort of working why break it?
Fellow residents my proposal is simple. Do nothing until the leadership on the Board of Education can present a makes-sense logical plan which will explain how closing schools, shuffling kids, creating overcrowding will move the Milford School District into the top 25 in the state in five years.
If the $750K a year we save gets us to the top 25 then I am all for it, but there should be serious consequences to the people who present, enact and manage the plan should it not come to fruition in the five-year time line.
If I can find a site like schooldigger.com by Googling it you might think that potential home owners might see the same thing. Makes you wonder why the enrollment is declining, the house prices are stagnate, which will of course negatively impact tax revenue, which means the BOE will scramble for more funds and probably in two years time present the case to shutter more schools.
John E Schuler