Cavendish school concerns rise to top at GM board meeting

By Shawn Cunningham
© 2023 Telegraph Publishing LLC

The agenda for last Thursday’s Green Mountain Unified School District board meeting looked pretty tame compared to recent meetings but, as it unfolded, the board’s discussion was described by some in terms of “animosity” and by others in terms of “intensity” and passion. The difference depended on where you sit – or more to the point – where you live. Especially for Cavendish.

The discussion of what’s next for Cavendish Town Elementary began with the monthly report by outgoing CTES Principal Amy Bohren. Noting that the student population in Cavendish is falling while the town has a substantial number of senior citizens and second homeowners who don’t send children to the school, Bohren wrote that class sizes are routinely only seven to nine students.

Bohren suggested an organizational model for the 2023-24 school year with a kindergarten and four multi-age classrooms. Those would be:

• Grades 1 & 2 with 15 students and one teacher;
• Grades 3 & 4 with 20 students and two teachers and
• Grades 5 & 6 with 20 students and two teachers.

In the future, CTES is looking to teacher attrition to end up with the four classrooms with one teacher each, which will bring down the operating cost of the school. 

Board member Dennis Reilly, who represents Cavendish, asked how that could be fiscally responsible, and said, “My only concern is that we’re taking 15 to 20 kids and we’re having two teachers making almost $100,000 each to teach them … that’s a lot of money to teach 15 to 20 kids. Am I being fair to the taxpayers of my town?” It was not clear whether that figure included benefits.

“When we think about ‘right sizing’ our classrooms, we think about doing it over a period of time and not by ‘pink slipping’ teachers but by attrition,” said Two Rivers Supervisory Union Superintendent Lauren Fierman. “Given that we are not sure how we are going to remodel things, to let some of our best teachers go when we are talking about restructuring doesn’t seem like a good plan to me.”

“I understand the rationale, but from a business prospective, that’s a lot of money,” said Reilly.

Cavendish representative Steve Perani agreed with Fierman, saying that the teachers have invested their careers at Cavendish and it would be inappropriate to reduce staffing now.

Kate Lamphere, also of Cavendish, urged the school district to communicate what’s going on to families in her town saying there’s “a lot of concern, curiosity and unrest in Cavendish right now.”

When asked by Reilly how the teachers are taking the change, Bohren paused for a moment, then said that now that they have had some time to process it and to give their feedback, they “are accepting it and moving forward.” She said the changes need to be made as respectfully as possible but that it’s not easy and not perfect.

Bohren said that teachers understand that the school needs to be solvent. She noted that in the past, the school population was larger but that you can’t keep doing the same things with 60 students that you did with 120.

Nor was it the end of discussion about Cavendish.

School Restructuring Committee structure under fire

When chairman Deb Brown introduced her assignments to board committees, she pointed to the establishment of two new committees: Community Outreach and School Restructuring. Brown explained that the latter would “conceptualize all possible scenarios to best use our buildings and research and develop the pros and cons of each and then make a presentation to the board and communities.”

Perani replied when Fierman had spoken about this school restructuring process, she had recommended meetings of the whole 11-member board. “This (four-person) committee comes as a surprise to me,” said Perani, adding that he would like to sit on the restructuring committee.

Brown said that the committee meetings would be open to the public. Perani objected to the structure, saying, “Cavendish will be disproportionately affected by the change.”

“You don’t know that,” replied Brown.

Perani said that when Fierman spoke about restructuring it was “Cavendish, Cavendish, Cavendish” and if their town is the lynchpin of the effort, there should be more representation for Cavendish on the committee.

But Brown said she would like to keep it to four members and see how it goes.

Reilly referred to the number of phone calls, emails and daily conversations he has had about the restructuring in Cavendish.

Lamphere suggested that it would be better if the entire board meet to establish a district-wide vision for utilizing the schools, and then have the committee do its work.

Referring to the ongoing debate about the mascot and Chieftain name, Perani said this rises to that level of civic engagement, calling it “irresponsible not to invite all the members and the public to participate.”

Perani moved that the whole board work on the question of restructuring and Reilly seconded.

Lamphere said that Cavendish residents have a lack of trust in the process and believe they are being left out. She implied that the committee assignments reinforces that.

Baltimore representative Adrienne Williams said she was not comfortable with the tone of the discussion and asked if there would be this level of animosity at every meeting when the board talks about this topic.

“I want to be sure it’s not going to be an acrimonious conversation every time because that’s not going to get us anywhere quickly,” said Williams.

Lamphere said, “The energy that’s coming out of me is not animosity or anything other than intensity because the people of Cavendish are very worried about this and I feel an obligation to represent them.”

Reilly noted that he had received no calls regarding the mascot controversy, which he said people in Cavendish think is silly. “But,” he said, “they are worried about” the school restructuring.

Chester representative Josh Schroeder said he was not sensing animosity, adding, “What we’ve got here is a passionate group of board members that want to collaborate and I’m in full support of that.”

When the board voted to have the full board on the School Restructuring Committee, the tally was five in favor to four against. Brown cast a nay vote and the tie vote killed the motion.

The first meeting of the four-member Restructuring Committee has not yet been scheduled, according to the TRSU website on Tuesday April 25.

Andover resident weighs in on Green Mountain mascot name

Andover resident Mike Groner said he was glad that he was commenting toward the end of the meeting so he could see how many things the board has to deal with. That said, he urged the board to resolve the mascot issue and move on.

Groner, who says he has three school-age children, added that he is concerned that not abiding by Act 153, which seeks to eliminate discriminatory mascot images and names, might endanger their access to playing high school sports. He added that it was people who don’t go to school at GM who seem to be keeping the topic alive.

Groner, who works for the Department of Corrections, noted that some in his workplace had seen the “thin gray line” flag as a symbol of support for corrections officers. But when a few employees of color had expressed discomfort with the symbol,  it was replaced — within two months — by a less divisive symbol. Groner then pointed to the full plate of issues before the school board and urged them to quickly resolve the mascot issue.