To the editor:
I urge all Westport voters, regardless of political affiliation, to vote for Lee Goldstein, Neil Phillips and write-in candidate Jill Dillon for Westport’s Board of Education.
In particular, I urge all Republicans to take a look at the candidates in both parties. The Republicans in this race are not “mainstream” Republicans. They are parroting a national agenda.
Jamie Fitzgerald hasn’t been to one BoE meeting in her eight years in town. She is unknown to a sitting Republican BoE member — meaning she hasn’t even written in one letter or shown any interest in our schools until now.
Camilo Riano, on the other hand, is well known to the BoE and to anyone attending or watching the meetings. He regularly attacks the BoE, our teachers, our administration and our superintendent. He’s sued the town twice, called our superintendent a groomer, and regularly calls them fascists and indoctrinators.
Regardless of your political affiliation, I can’t imagine this is who you would want to protect the excellence of our school system.
One of their fundamental claims is that this liberal movement in favor of SEL and DEI is 1) a new movement and 2) is or will negatively impact our schools. These are both factually incorrect.
First , this focus on the whole student is not new. Westport public schools have been utilizing SEL programs like RULER for many years. My son was in K in SES in 2015 and RULER was part of the program then. RULER was developed by Yale in 2005. As stated in the link below, the benefits for students is a better school climate, increased emotional intelligence, decreased anxiety and depression, reduced likelihood of bullying, and better leadership skills and attention. Teachers have better relationships with students, less burnout and better relationships with administrators. They also feel more positive about teaching. All of those are good things.
In the insane world we live in today why would we not want to help our children as the whole beings they are. As one educator said to me, SEL has always been there as a good teacher is focused on the whole child in front of them.
Second, our schools are excellent and have not steered away from an academic focus as these claims would have you believe. They are not declining, and if they would have because of this focus it would have been evident by now. In the Niche ranking attached, Staples High School is No. 2 in the state, CMS and BMS are ranked No. 1 and No. 3 and ALL five of our elementary schools are in the top 10 — out of 618 schools.
In fact, one could argue just the opposite. We have taken a holistic approach and its served us very well. THIS is what our schools are about — academic excellence and focus on the whole child. There has been no movement away from academia and toward teaching children subjects that are inappropriate for schools. Our stellar teachers and administrators are not indoctrinating and grooming our children. The argument is factually incorrect and unsurprisingly sounds exactly like the national movements we’ve seen elsewhere.
We have three excellent candidates in Lee, Neil and Jill who have proven track records of positive impacts on our schools. Our rankings speak for themselves, our students’ and staff’s achievements speak for themselves.
Please support Lee , Neil and Jill and keep excellence in our schools and extremism out. Please stand up for our children and our teachers and school administrators.
Lauren MacNeill
Westport
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“Intelligent, thoughtful problem solvers”
To the editor:
Please cast your vote on Nov. 7 for Lee Goldstein, Neil Phillips and write-in candidate Jill Dillon for Board of Education.
All elections are important. This election is critical.
As a former educator, parent of two graduates of Westport public schools and grandparent of three current students in the Westport public schools, I am a close observer of the BOE.
Lee Goldstein and Neil Phillips are intelligent, thoughtful problem solvers and they are dedicated to our students and every aspect of their well being.
During their time on the BOE, both Lee and Neil have always kept the welfare of Westport’s students at the heart of their decision making. Their opponents have implied that only they care about academic achievement. If you know Lee and Neil, you know how ridiculous that implication is and how important a strong academic program is to Lee and Neil. We are fortunate that they provide leadership that emphasizes the academic success as well as the emotional well being of our children. Consideration of the needs of the whole child is what makes an excellent school system a stellar school system.
Jill Dillon also deserves your vote. She has served as president of the PTA at Kings Highway as well as Coleytown Middle School. It takes courage and great concern for one to jump into a campaign at this point as a write in candidate. Jill is an excellent candidate who cares about our students and our schools.
Please vote for Goldstein and Phillips and write in Jill Dillon on Nov. 7.
Liz Blasko
Westport
If this “RULER” program is so successful why are half the students “persistently sad” ( Goldsteins words). Jamie Fitzgerald and Camilo Riano said that they believe academic achievement should be the focus of education, not “woke” ideologies that many parents object to and many more would if they knew more about them. The pandemic and the home computer based learning that was occurring at that time opened many parents eyes to reality. DEI is dividing people along racial lines, teaching kids to hate their ” systemically racist country” and normalizing abnormal sexual behavior. Other than that I’m sure it’s fine. As for the SEL component, pronoun and microaggression policing is the order of the day. Wow, I wonder how they would do with some macroaggression like Israeli kids are dealing with right now. I think we all know., not well.
What is “abnormal sexual behavior”? Please let us know soon. Tomorrow is Saturday night!
Homosexual behavior is abnormal by definition as it is not the norm in nature. This is really simple Tom though apparently upsetting to you.
“ The American Academy of Pediatrics advises lesbian, gay, gynandromorphophilic, and bisexual teenagers struggling with their sexuality: “You are normal. Homosexuality is not a mental disorder. All of the major medical organizations, including The American Psychiatric Association, The American Psychological Association, and the American Academy of Pediatrics agree that homosexuality is not an illness or disorder, but a form of sexual expression. No one knows what causes a person to be gay, bisexual, or straight. There probably are a number of factors. Some may be biological. Others may be psychological. The reasons can vary from one person to another. The fact is, you do not choose to be gay, bisexual, or straight.”
But please don’t pick on me… take it up with Wikipedia and the LGBTQ2 folks who live, pay taxes, vote, contribute to and function normally in Westport.
Let’s just take a deep breath Werner and think about what you just said. “No one knows what causes a person to be gay, bisexuality or straight”. That is correct but beside the point. I don’t care who tells you it’s normal, it is not. If it were, it would be what most people do sexually and clearly that is not the case. Homosexual people seem to have a need for affirmation and approbation from the heterosexual majority and via a very loud ,angry, activist strategy have managed to bully schools, corporations, etc into the current dysfunctional situation we find ourselves.
I’m not upset. I love watching you step in it!
I take no pleasure out of stepping on (not in)your dreams of normalcy. However, the truth should not be subjugated to false assertions. Live whatever life you want to live but stop trying to force society to lie to you to make you feel better. The truth shall set you free (and the rest of us free from the pronoun police).
What a disappointing and sad comment to read on-line.
Cheer up Robert, you just do you and you’ll be fine, I’m sure!
This is who supports Camilo and Jamie!
Says it ALL!
This woman. sharon, does not think homosexuality is ok!
Did you hear that Dorie and Rob? Do you support Sharon one of your constituents?
Stephanie, are you on any medication? I really think you are about to have a stroke with your hysterical responses to anything with which you disagree. That is, anything not extreme far left. It’s ok with me if you or anyone else is homosexual. Where did I say it’s not ok? I may or may not think its ok but how I feel about it is not what we are talking about. What we are talking about is the fact that strenuous lobbying from the homosexual community has gone way too far. It started out as a demand for tolerance went on to acceptance, then celebration and now we are well along the way to indoctrination and nothing less will be acceptable That is what is going on in the schools and it needs to stop.
As a Republican I have to say Sharon you make the most persuasive case as to why Equity and DEI is important to continue in our schools.
You should probably change parties Robert, because the tenets of Republican party do not comport with leftist, commie ideologies like DEI. By the way the E in DEI stands for Equity, no need to repeat it.
Thanks for the suggestion Sharon.
But I am pretty good thanks.
I am a Republican and NOT going anywhere.
I am hopeful that two BOE candidates don’t share the views you have personally highlighted in this comments section.
Not an attack on you, but just highlighting where we disagree.
Sharon, Thank you for showing exactly what we want to keep out of our schools – intolerance, ignorance , anger and extremism.
That half of children may be persistently sad was not something made up by Lee Goldstein, she was quoting a town study.
Perhaps they are sad because we are raising them in a society where half our government cares more about the rights of the NRA than the right of our children to go to school without being killed. Or because some think its ok to tell them they are abnormal if they love someone of the same gender.
Because you don’t have kids in the schools and you seem to only want to listen to the right wing extremists, I will assure you that the Westport schools have NOT moved away from academic rigor. That’s false. And good teachers have always cared about the whole student before there were names like RULER and SEL.
This is about our BoE election in Westport – we are not going to let you and the Republican “candidates” take over the narrative with this rightwing propaganda against DEI and SEL.
One more time, if half the kids in school are “persistently sad” that would indicate that your policies are not working. Thrilled to hear about the academic rigor. Now just stick with that and get rid of the SEL, DEI, RULER. The way you do that is to vote for Jamie Fitzgerald and Camilo Riano.