At the last School Committee meeting, concerns were raised regarding the disparity in numbers in terms of the amount of students that will be attending Pilgrim and Toll Gate in the fall, both of …
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At the last School Committee meeting, concerns were raised regarding the disparity in numbers in terms of the amount of students that will be attending Pilgrim and Toll Gate in the fall, both of which will see their enrollment numbers increase as Warwick Vets students will be split between the two schools following the consolidation of Vets, which will become a super junior high school for students from Aldrich and Gorton, both of which will close.
Celeste Mullane, a parent of three children that will all attend Pilgrim next year, fears Pilgrim will be overpopulated and understaffed, as she said Pilgrim’s population is projected to be 1,547 while Toll Gate’s is projected to be 1,169. In terms of building capacity, Pilgrim would be at 87 percent and Toll Gate would be at 70 percent, which she argues is out of line with the 85 percent recommendation by long-term planning consultant Symmes Maini & McKee Associates (SMMA).
Mullane said this would cause problems for students at Pilgrim, especially the more than 300 seniors who will have to complete senior projects with only one graduation by proficiency (GBP) coordinator at the school available to help them.
During an interview Friday, Superintendent Philip Thornton addressed these concerns, saying he doesn’t feel Pilgrim will be overpopulated or understaffed.
“We have good class sizes. We are staffed adequately, and we’ll also have an assistant principal of teaching and learning,” he said.
Thornton said the traditional role of a vice principal is for discipline, but the vice principal of teaching and learning will act to improve instructional practice by working with teachers and teams of teachers day to day and being in classrooms to assist with curriculum and instruction.
“GBP can come into play,” he said, adding that the new teaching and learning assistant principal at Pilgrim, Fred Schweitzer, is currently a GBP coordinator, so he already has experience working with students and their projects.
Mullane said her daughter was concerned there would be only one coordinator for the 325 Pilgrim seniors and wanted to know if more coordinators would be added, so she posted the question to the consolidation website and received a response saying it would be just the one, although the assistant principal of teaching and learning would also be available to assist students, which Mullane said was unacceptable.
“If we find we are short [of staff], we can adjust accordingly,” Thornton said. “We have the staff and space available if we need to add.”
Thornton said there was a reduction of 49.5 FTEs [full-time equivalents] in the budget, which resulted in 64 people being laid off, as some were part-time [two part-time teachers represents 1 FTE], but there have been callbacks, such as hiring six math interventionists, and the department continues to bring teachers back as needed.
In terms of why there will be more students at Pilgrim than at Toll Gate, as opposed to more of an even split between the two schools, Thornton said it was a result of Pilgrim being a larger building as well as wanting to keep the feeder school patterns intact as much as possible.
Currently, students from Francis, Holden, Holliman, Hoxsie, Norwood, and Wyman elementary schools attend Aldrich then Pilgrim; students from Cedar Hill, Greenwood, Robertson, and Wickes attend Winman then Toll Gate; and students from Lippitt, Oakland Beach, Park, Sherman, and Warwick Neck attend Gorton then Vets.
Following consolidation, students from Francis, Holden, Holliman, Hoxsie, Norwood, and Wyman will go to Warwick Vets Junior High then Pilgrim. Of the five elementary schools in the Vets feeder area, students from Oakland Beach, Sherman, and Warwick Neck will also go to Vets then Pilgrim. Park students will go to Winman then Toll Gate, along with students from Cedar Hill, Greenwood, Robertson, and Wickes.
“We want to keep the feeder patterns intact, as much as we can, and we were able to do that, with the exception of Lippitt,” Thornton said, adding that Lippitt students will go to Vets then Toll Gate.
“Pilgrim can receive and maintain more students because it’s a larger building,” he said. “Pilgrim has a bigger footprint than Toll Gate, as far as capacity, but I think we’ll see the Pilgrim numbers dropping as time goes on.”
With the optimum capacity number being 85 percent, Thornton said having Pilgrim at 85 and Toll Gate at 76 is a good ratio, considering the size of the buildings.
As of Friday, Thornton said the current number of students enrolled at Pilgrim for next year is approximately 1,545, but that number is fluid and will continue to change as enrollment figures are finalized and some students that are supposed to go to Pilgrim from Vets have already requested to be transferred to Toll Gate.
“We have already approved 35 or 36 requests to go from Pilgrim to Toll Gate,” he said.
Thornton said the district also sees a decrease in population due to students leaving to attend private schools.
“Every year, we see 5 percent of students dropping from junior high to high school, as students go to private schools like Hendricken and La Salle,” he said.
Thornton said when Toll Gate becomes the home school for all students involved in programs at the Warwick Area Career and Technology Center (WACTC), which is located on the Toll Gate campus, in the 2017-18 school year; an additional 100 students will transfer from Pilgrim to Toll Gate.
“We found that transportation from Pilgrim to the career and tech center has resulted in the loss of seven instructional days over the course of the school year,” said Sara Monaco, coordinator of Response to Intervention and federal programs.
In an effort to cut down on lost instructional time, Thornton said the School Committee voted last winter to have Toll Gate become the home school for all career and tech center students starting in 2017-18.
“But we’re getting requests now for students to go there,” Thornton said, adding that they may do so as long as they provide their own transportation. “Some of the pathways start as early as freshman year, going from middle school to the tech center, which will pull more kids toward Toll Gate.”
Thornton said the child care program at Pilgrim would remain there and students in that program would stay at Pilgrim.
During the interview, Thornton and Monaco ran through a sample schedule build with a Beacon reporter to show that class sizes are being kept low and there’s enough staff to adequately handle the projected schedules.
“Scheduling is a fluid process,” Thornton said. “We schedule with the best interest of students in mind and we’ll act accordingly and work all summer.”
Thornton said the maximum amount of students allowed in a class by contract is 28, but his goal for max class sizes is 25, and in many cases he says classes are running below that.
Monaco said in terms of classes that are 24 students or less, Winman is currently at 92 percent and Vets is at 90 percent.
Thornton said there have even been cases where larger classes are split into multiple sections to keep numbers down.
“We had a large English class at Toll Gate of 28 kids, so we made two sections instead of one,” he said as an example.
Monaco said as schedules are developed, if it looks like a larger class can be split into smaller sections, that data is brought before Thornton for approval.
“Dr. Thornton has been involved in the process to make sure we have what’s needed to schedule efficiently,” she said.
Thornton said his staff is “hyper-focused” on scheduling.
“Our mission is to develop good schedules for students,” he said. “Tentative schedules were passed out to teachers at the job fair and we’ll continue to tweak them as we go through the summer.”
Monaco said the department is a good place for this time of year in terms of scheduling.
“School-based teams have been working on schedules for months and they are the ones that know the buildings best,” she said.
Thornton invited anyone with questions or concerns to call his office and arrange an appointment to come in and see the schedule run for themselves. Thornton can be reached at 734-3100 and his secretary, Catherine Bonang, can be reached at 734-3101.
6 comments on this item Please log in to comment by clicking here
richardcorrente
During the first years of the consolidation there will be issues of overcrowding and under crowding that, I believe, will level themselves off in the long run. The much greater problem, in my view, is teachers that don't have a contract. Can you imagine how they must feel. Last month 65 of their co-workers were unceremoniously and un-caringly, laid off with the first to go having over ten years of seniority. Ten years on the job and you're still not secure? That is appalling. That is gut-wrenching. And today, they are expected to work, and give it their all, with no guarantee that they will have a job tomorrow??!? That is totally unacceptable! The teachers are willing to sit down and negotiate. The School Committee is NOT! That is the biggest insult in Warwick history. (and we have all seen a lot of "insults"). Here is what I think should happen. The teachers should go into a room with the School Committee and the door be locked until SOME agreement is reached. I know that sounds a little too radical (and I'm sure there are laws against it) but the taxpayers have paid too much for the total lack of solutions the School Committee has delivered to us so far.
If it's any consolation to the School Committee members, my other plan had to do with a huge vat of hot tar and a giant bag of feathers and a sign that says "Which one of you b/@#^*# wants to go first?", but I think that one is a bit too much.
The bottom line is the teachers deserve our support and respect. The School Committee deserves our complete disrespect.
I am standing with the teachers on this one and I believe you should too. It's time to hug a teacher!
Richard Corrente
Democrat for Mayor
Tuesday, June 21, 2016 Report this
Imhere
Thorton is blowing smoke just long enough until he can move on the next check in another school district. As the leader of "The Cover Up Crew" Phil Thorton has caused mayhem in Warwick and especially at Norwood Elementary, but he couldn't do it alone he had his "trusty" side kick Lynn Dambruch and John Gannon who's hands were tied through the cover up at Norwood. Him and his accomplices have been publicly shamed for the actions at Norwood on The Hummel Report and also has been on wpro 630 am. The gigs up Thorton take responsibility for yours and your "crews" actions.
Tuesday, June 21, 2016 Report this
SOS822
I am not sure why Dr. Thorton is referencing a contract that he clearly does not feel he needs to follow. The contract does allow for up to 28 students in a class, but students with IEP's count as 1.5 or 2.0 students towards the total. This allows for manageable class sizes, adequate special education support, and allows for an overall better learning environment for ALL students. I am glad that Thorton has a "goal for max class sizes of 25" but those classes are disproportionately full of special education students. This is complete spin and absolutely paints a different picture than the reality of the classes that are currently scheduled. This is a complete misrepresentation of the facts.
Tuesday, June 21, 2016 Report this
smh
Oh Phil, Phil, Phil....having met you once and having attended the Orientation at Pilgrim where the new principal and the new vp of teaching and learning both effectively admitted that the 2016-2017 academic year will be a crap shoot, I find your words laughable.
Is there a course entitled "Bafflers of BS" that the Warwick School Administration and School Committee Members attended and received an "A" in?
This whole "consolidation" is a travesty. You should all be ashamed of yourselves.
Wednesday, June 22, 2016 Report this
smh
Mr. Corrente,
The only way to affect change with regard to the School Committee is for the citizens of Warwick to wake up and VOTE these repugnant individuals out! Unless and until we do that, we are in for more of the same.
Wednesday, June 22, 2016 Report this
wwkvoter
Before Thornton arrived, the school committee voted to close some schools due wasteful under-utilization. He is implementing what the voters, through their school committee that they elected, decided. Most comments at that time was that consolidation was long overdue because there are so fewer students today in Warwick (and still dropping). As to Corrente's comment about working without "security" of a contract, I have worked virtually my entire adult life with no "contract"! And been through many layoffs. That's called real life. There is an issue I agree with the teachers on, even though Warwick's counting special needs learners as 1.5 or 2 for purposes of class size is fairly unique, I agree with doing that. When special needs students are to be mainstreamed, then those classes should have less students so that every learner gets the attention they need. I'm not a teacher but thats the way it seems to me. As a voter I would ask everyone to please try and make the system work, for all of us and for the kids. Let's give the new superintendent and the school committee a chance here.
Wednesday, June 22, 2016 Report this