Lincoln's Log

Dave Roberson appears to be an impressive guy: MIT grad, aeronautic engineer with serious NASA chops, and a science fiction writer to boot. Dave sounds like a guy I wouldn’t mind sidling up to at a Greenwich cocktail party and pick his copious brain about a variety of topics. What is unclear to me is whether Dave knows anything about secondary education in the United States. Yet Dave, as chairman of the Greenwich Democratic Town Committee, is going to have a powerful voice in determining who sits on the Board of Education in Greenwich.

Ditto for John Raben Jr., another nice guy as far as I can tell from his profile on the Republican Town Committee web site. His J.P. Morgan resume may cause some to pause, but, hey, those of us in the newspaper industry aren’t exactly in a position to be throwing rocks these days.

All I know about Greenwich schools is what I read in the newspapers, and my experience from some reasonably terrifying days as a parent of a matriculating student. Neither one of these qualifications makes me a good candidate for deciding who should be on the school board.

And yet, we have these people – a cozy cabal of politically connected local denizens – who think they do. Isn’t it odd that the election to decide arguably the most important governing body in Greenwich – the Board of Education – is left to the whim and self-interest of a small group of citizens called the Democratic and Republican town committees?

Here is how it works in Greenwich: We have eight school board seats, staggered so that two seats come up for re-election every two years. Here is the best part: the DTC and RTC each come up with an undisputed candidate so both seats are uncontested. There is a secret Skull-and-Bones sort of handshake and everyone is happy that there will be no straying from the farm for another two years – no loudmouth one-off, hard-to-control pain-in-the-butt.

Stepford Wives? Welcome to the Stepford School Board.

And because the school board is assured there is no one on it that represents the constituency most in need of representation in Greenwich – the fast growing Hispanic students – we have the perfect storm that has led to Greenwich being compared to the public school systems in Bridgeport and New Haven.

The Greenwich Time had a terrific editorial on the issue today, calling the current system unacceptable, especially in light of the declining reputation of the Greenwich schools under the current school board.

Click here for article

We can’t have it both ways. If we want the school board to be a puppet of our elected politicians, let’s just do away with the charade of an “election.” Let’s adopt the Mike Bloomberg solution, which, by the way, has elevated New York City schools to some impressive highs. Let’s just have the first selectman appoint the superintendent and do away with the school board.

Let’s not have an un-democratic process and pretend we’re a democracy.

And who knows, Peter Tesei may surprise us. Maybe he’ll appoint the new harbormaster to be superintendent. At least we won’t be rudderless. That I can guarantee.

You don’t often see a swimsuit model in a photo shoot coming off the dock at OGYC (Old Greenwich Yacht Club), but there they were when former OGYC Commodore John Ehlers and I disembarked from the launch Pride on Saturday. Of course I could not resist inquiring into the particulars.

The photographer is Kristina Vartuli of Stamford who has a studio in Greenwich. The model is Neabell Diaz of New York. The makeup artist is Elise Brennan of New York. They were taking advantage of an usually dry day to build their respective portfolios.

After what seemed like eternity, construction of the sidewalk at one of the busiest corners in town – Shore Road and Sound Beach Avenue – finally appears to be nearing completion. Not sure why the town felt the expense was necessary to create the numerous crosswalks on Sound Beach Avenue or the stone wall at the corner …

A Lincoln Log devotee wrote to ask why the remodeling of the Innis Arden cottage at Greenwich Point had to occur at the height of beach season. Apparently the fence and the blue tarp, the dug up foundation and the dumpsters, violate the sensibilities of some regulars. Having just endured a two-year tear-down next door in Riverside, I have lost total perspective. I noticed the fence when I drove by on my way to OGYC (Old Greenwich Yacht Club), but it didn’t totally register. What is your view? Do you care?

A total of 19 single family houses were sold in Greenwich in May, compared with 21 in April, for an average price of $1,987,944, compared with $1,988,295, according to data compiled by William Raveis company.

Click here for data

Inventory has exploded, with more than 800 units on the market compared with 600 in December. The sales-to-list-price ratio which had been moving up four strong months in a row took a slight decline from April to May.

The market is still pretty soft. Let’s hope for better numbers in June.

Local congressman Jim Himes’s hyper-kinetic tweets are a treat.

Here are some recent ones:

On the typically delayed shuttle NYC-DC
2:36 PM Jun 8th from mobile web
Lieberman and Dodd aboard too, so 43% of CT delegation now stuck on tarmac.
2:39 PM Jun 8th from mobile web

Strange world. Gave keynote at Harvard Club dinner at Darien Country Club. It was there that an angry drunk nearly took a swing at me.
7:19 AM May 28th from web

Arrived in CT to find a home invasion happened across street. Seems no one hurt. Police everywhere and jumpy given history in CT.
2:27 PM May 22nd from web

Dropped by Lincoln Memorial last night around 11pm after Kennedy Center gig. There is no place like it. Sacred.
4:12 PM May 14th from web

Was at 1st Rose Garden ceremony just now to honor Teacher of the Year Tony Mullen from Greenwich. Education front and center, as it must be!
3:44 PM Apr 28th from web

White House bound to congratulate UCONN women with Hoops Player in-chief
12:26 PM Apr 27th from mobile web
After the formalities, the President took the UCONN women to the bball court to shoot baskets. Probably a first.
4:12 PM Apr 27th from web

Nine years ago, when I moved here from Boston for professional reasons, friends touted Greenwich because they said it had a good school system.

It certainly rang true with my expectations of the brand – that one of the wealthiest communities on earth should have an above-average school district.

Unfortunately, an above-average school district is exactly what Greenwich is. My fear now is that we’re on a slippery slope to becoming “average.”

Somewhere the last four years, the Board of Education lost its way, fumbling critical decisions whose ramifications will last for many years, like the rusting carcass of an abandoned car. The biggest fumble, of course, was the naming of Betty Sternberg, the state bureaucrat who was unable to engender any leadership qualities, to the post of school superintendent. Sternberg leaves us with a tattered system and schools on the wane in virtually every ranking across the state.

Click here for one ranking

If the schools had shown measurable progress in the basics – reading, ‘riting and ‘rithmatic – I might have overlooked the numerous other fiascos by Sternberg or the board – the botched transition of Hamilton School, dribbling away the opportunity to turn the historic Havermayer Building into a town performing arts center, the petty and vindictive public rebuke of a principal over a birthday cupcake incident (whether to allow in school them or not) and many others.

Under Sternberg, Greenwich High School and Central Middle School were cited by the state for not making adequate progress in the last school year. Central did not reach achievement targets in reading and math for economically disadvantaged students and students with disabilities. At GHS, students with disabilities did not reach achievement targets in reading and math, and Hispanic and economically disadvantaged students did not meet the target in math. They were among 408 public schools – 40 percent – cited by the state. Many of those schools are in Hartford, New Haven and Bridgeport.

Now comes a critical time – and opportunity – to replace four of the eight current BOE members. I shudder when the incumbent members cite their “experience” as they seek reappointment. Yikes! This is experience we don’t need. We don’t need any more pecuniary finance types. Let them run the BET. We need passionate, outspoken board members who are driven to make our schools the premier public education system in the nation and who will work with the new superintendent to develop a mutually respectful pact with our teachers to work in the best interest of our children – all of our children and not just the privileged few.

Click here for Greenwich Time article

Last week, the Wall Street Journal published a fascinating front page article about Montgomery County Public Schools’ use of “real-time” data – test scores, grades – to identify problems and speed up interventions with lagging performers. Teachers armed with Palm Pilots get the data and immediately pounce on problem students.This innovation narrowed the achievement gap and enabled more students to take and succeed in rigorous AP classes, prompting U.S. Secretary of Education Arne Duncan to say that MCPS is a “model in using data to spur improvement.”

Click here for article

In five years, the percentage of African American fifth graders who scored “proficient” or better in reading tests increased from 58 percent to In 85 percent. The number for Hispanic students on reading tests improved from 53 percent to 85 percent.

Montgomery County is not alone. New York City recently announced similar results in math scores among minorities as reported in the New York Times.

Click here for article

Montgomery County is a massive school district – the nation’s 16th largest – with 139,000 students. (Connecticut’s largest, Hartford, has 23,000 students. Greenwich has about 9,000.) Nearly 23 percent of the students in MC are African Americans and 15.2 percent are Hispanic. Its visionary superintendent, Jerry Weast, took a bold step when he started in 1999 by forecasting a crisis with two divergent districts – one white and wealthy and one poor, black and latino. He called them green zones and red zones and proceeded to focus on the red zones. The improvement since has been dramatic and stunning.

The biggest lesson from this and the message to our next school board is that when you lift the bottom, you lift all boats. Sternberg came here with the promise to do that but it turned out to be the false bravado of a politician.

In addition to the broadly improved scores, four of MC’s high schools were recently cited by Newsweek Magazine as being in the Top 100 public high schools in the United States. Walt Whitman High School is legendary and ranks consistently high – among the so-called “exam” schools like Boston Latin and Yonkers High. Where’s GHS on the Newsweek list? No. 709.

At this stage I can’t imagine anyone on the current Greenwich BOE with the vision nor the drive to push us to be the best. Nor do I sense a commitment to achieve excellence. We get only apologias and equivocations – and hand-wringing about our “diversity problem.” We have factotums when we need leaders.

The Republican and Democratic town committees – in selecting candidates for the next school board – need to reach deep into their inner souls and select board members we can be proud of for many, many years to come. This is one of those crossroads of time for our schools. I can’t think of a more important issue for Greenwich.