South Orangetown Central School District
160 Van Wyck Road • Blauvelt, NY  10913 • (845)680-1050 • Fax (845)680-1900

Dr. Ken Mitchell, Ed.D.
Superintendent of Schools

kmitchell@socsd.org
(845) 680-1050

Dear Parents:

Welcome to the 2008-09 school year! While the start of school and Labor Day signal the end of summer, it is also a time of renewal and optimism for a new school year that provides the potential for fresh and transformative learning experiences.

As South Orangetown Central School District’s incoming Superintendent of Schools, I am looking forward to getting to know more about the excellent work of staff and students. While this is difficult to do during the summer, I have been gathering information from administrators, teachers, and others about the ways in which staff have been and will be preparing for their work with students.

Teaching and Learning Initiatives

From various meetings, I have learned that this is an active professional staff that is engaged in an ongoing effort to develop their instructional skills, create an exceptional curriculum for our students, and assess current programs and practices to support student learning. A sample of such initiatives includes the following for 2008-09:

Math (K-12) Tri-states Review – A visiting team of educators from high performing districts in the New York Metropolitan area will be visiting our schools and classrooms to examine teacher and student work in the area of K-12 mathematics instruction and student performance. The team will be examining three questions:

• To what extent does each grade have a core curriculum that is cohesive and coherent? 
• To what extent is there continuity of transition from grade to grade?
• To what extent are we pre assessing and differentiating to provide rigor and support for all students in math K-12?

NYS Math Curriculum Revisions – In response to changes at the State level, TZHS math teachers will continue their work to transition to the newly mandated state curriculum

Technology – The district’s teachers and students will be benefiting from the installation of over forty new Smartboards that will transform instruction by assisting teachers in their efforts to create interactive and engaging learning experiences. In addition, the district’s staff will be identifying ways to ensure that our technology integration remains current and innovative. Forty teachers attended summer training sessions to acquire the skills to use the equipment

Project Lead the Way – The district will continue its implementation of a program that combines the disciplines of math, science, and technology to prepare many of our students for careers in engineering, the sciences, mathematics, and other related fields.

Student Performance Data – At various levels of the organization, teacher teams will be gathering and analyzing data about student performance in response to assessments. Such work will examine student progress across the grade levels as well as performance within a particular grade level. Teachers will use this data to identify curricular gaps and patterns that reflect student needs.

Literacy – Staff will be involved in professional development and curriculum work to enhance instruction in student literacy – reading and writing.

More information about this work and other initiatives will be presented throughout the school year.

Preparing Our Students for the Future

Our district’s emphasis on the aforementioned reflects our stated priority to ensure that South Orangetown’s students, our future citizens and leaders, are equipped with the knowledge and skills to be successful and resourceful in a highly complex and competitive global economy. With the rate and volume of changes that our society has witnessed over the past few decades, it is difficult to accurately predict what it is that our students will be required to know and be able to do to succeed in a workplace that is likely to be greatly transformed from the one that currently exists. Therefore, it is essential that their learning includes experiences that provide both foundational skills and knowledge as well as opportunities for them to be innovative and creative.

America faces many challenges in the years ahead. There are many unanswered and daunting questions that will likely confront our children when it is their time to lead. Here are but a few examples:

• What are ways in which we can conserve our energy in order to reduce costs and be more responsive to an increasingly fragile environment?
• What are alternative energies that will help us address our energy problems?
• How will the United States be able to compete in a global economy in which our population is significantly smaller than such nations as China and India where their educational systems are emphasizing the content and skills to prepare their students for work with the advancing technologies of the 21st century?
• How can technology and science help us to reduce the extent of poverty and health issues both here and across the globe? 
• How can we ensure that the United States can continue to play a role as a world leader in technology innovation?

While we may not be able to resolve questions such as these in the classroom, our students will certainly be required to address these challenges and many other issues when they have completed their education. Our future as a country and as members of a global community will be contingent upon the success of our graduates; hence, it imperative for all that we provide them with a robust foundation that includes curricular flexibility and challenges that will prepare them to be creators and innovators who are ready to tackle life’s challenges.

Unity through Diversity

After I was appointed back in January and during my first month in the district this summer, I have observed that while there is a great deal of pride in the community about the quality of the schools, there are many opinions and a great deal of passion about the ways in which the schools can maintain and even enhance their excellence.

At first glance one might see these varying and often contradictory opinions as impediments to making progress. However, the diversity of thinking provides us with an opportunity to unify our beliefs and priorities around a few well-focused and commonly agreed-upon areas. Where and why we dissent provides us with an opportunity to hear varying and often extreme points of view that might cause us to loosen our own firmly-held beliefs. As previously stated, all of us would agree that we want our children to be flexible thinkers, able and willing to hear and even consider contrary points of view.

One of my priorities will be to work with the Board of Education, administrators, teachers, and other constituent groups to identify agreed-upon areas around which we will be able to marshal our time, resources, and efforts to systemically address that which needs the most attention at this time. Such an approach is dependent upon an objective review of evidence that we will be collecting from a variety of sources rather than in reaction to views of minority voices.

It is hoped that in the end, all voices will be heard in our efforts to unify our work in concert with the richness that diverse opinions can provide if well-channeled. Such an approach will provide our students with a community model that is founded on respect, decorum, and unity. If we can do that well, together we will have provided our students with perhaps their greatest lesson.

I wish you all great happiness, success, and health to all students, teachers, and district families as you begin the 2008-09 school year.

Sincerely,

Ken Mitchell, Ed.D. Superintendent of Schools

Tappan Zee High School    South Orangetown Middle School    Cottage Lane Elementary School

Tappan Zee Elementary School    William O. Schaefer Elementary School    Early Childhood Program