10/4 BOE Planning Committee Meeting Agenda

This is the first BOE Planning meeting for the 2011-2012 school year. Will post details for each item on the agenda after the meeting. If you cannot make this meeting and have questions for the committee, please send them to me and I will present them at the meeting.

9/28 Technology Committee Agenda

Committee Members:

Steve Carroll

Peter Talbot

Patti Flynn-Harris

Tony Perugini

Ramona Burkey

Arnett Talbot

9/15 BOE Business Meeting Agenda

BOE Business is scheduled for tomorrow night 7:30pm in Town Council chambers. I unfortunately will not be attending the meeting as I'm helping with a Starlight Children's Foundation special event in NY tomorrow night. BOE Meeting agenda:

Technology Committee Meeting Tonight @ 7pm

TC Chairman Tim Slocum has establish a Technology Committee with the goal of identifying issues and coming up with some strategic recommendations, benchmarks, etc. so the council and the BOE can get a better handle on the issues and set priorities going forward. I think this is a great proactive approach in setting a strategic plan for our technology infrastructure. The committee is made up of a cross-functional body of members including

Peter Talbot, Tony Perugini, Steve Carroll, Patti Flynn-Harris, Tim Slocum as well as various members from town departments. The committee's first meeting is schedule for this evening.

2011-2012 Enrollment Up 137 Students

During last week's BOE meeting, Superintendent Florio reviewed the Opening of School and shared an enrollment presentation with us breaking down the enrollment by School/Class. Surprisingly, enrollment is up 137 sutdents over 2010-2011.

When asked about the discrepency between the state projected 4,668 and the actual 4,805 Dr. Florio responded that this was certainly and anomoly but this may be the start of a trend. Dr. Florio pointed to the CHS enrollment to help explain what's going on:

Dr. Florio explained that of the 59 new students at CHS this year, 36 came from public schools in other towns and countries. The remaining 26 came from private schools some which are existing Cheshire residents. Florio mentioned that similar trends were found at our other schools and may be economically driven around more affordable housing prices and rising costs of private schools in a down economy.

Chapman School, which has been seeing declining enrollment over the last few years, is up 22 students this year. The concern for parents is class size at Chapman, specifically Grade 3. Last year, Grade 3 averaged 15 students per class. This year, there is 1 less Grade 3 class with the remaining classes averaging 24 students.

Doolittle is most surprising with an increase of 38 students this year which has directly impacted Grade 1:

At least one parent raised concerns about the size of Grade 1 to Dr. Florio and wanted to know why the Administration let this happen. Dr. Florio's response was that as good as the projections from Hartford have been recently, everyone was caught off-guard with the enrollment at Doolittle last week. Apparently, we have some new residents that moved into the Doolittle district over the summer months. Suffice it to say, parents with children in Grade 1 are concerned and would like to know what the administration can do about it. I'm certain this topic will be addressed at the Doolittle PTA Meeting on 9/13 and BOE Business Meeting on 9/15.

For the complete presentation including class size breakdown and Strategic Plan, click here.



Town Assisting with Irene Cleanup 9/6

Thanks to RTC Chairman Adam Grippo for sending out this reminder. The Town of Cheshire will be assisting residents with removal of branches downed on their properties by Hurricane Irene. Residents are asked to leave the branches curbside, without obstructing the roadway, by the morning of September 6, 2011.

• Branches less than five inches in diameter will be chipped and the chips will be removed.
• Branches and logs over five inches in diameter will be cut into approximately 18 inch logs and left at curbside for firewood for use by residents.  
• Town staff will not go onto private property to retrieve or cut branches.  
• Public Works crews will make only one pass through town, and will not return for debris that were not place curbside prior to their collection.  
• This program is expected to take at least ten days.  Residents can also dispose of this storm-related brush and tree material at the designated drop off areas at Mixville Park parking lot on Notch Road and the Quinnipiac Park parking lot on Cheshire Street at any time until September 14, 2011.  
• This program is restricted to storm-related woody debris only.  
• The Town will not accept loose leaves, yard clippings or trimmings, or any other lumber, garbage, non-woody storm debris or bulky items for collection or drop off.