As the President of the Elmont Elementary School District and a member of the board of the Sewanhaka High School District, I appreciated the interest shown by Newsday (June 27, 2004 article titled "The hope of the suburbs") for Elmont High School, one of Sewanhaka district's five high schools, and the Elmont Elementary School District.
I share in their enthusiasm for the accomplishments of Elmont High School and its principal Al Harper. I also appreciated their understanding of the outstanding job that educators from the elementary school district do in preparing students on their way to the high school. In this sense, no one can heap excessive praise on the educational leadership and vision of the Elmont Elementary School District Board and their superintendent, Dr. Maria Palandra. With resources available on a per pupil basis that are less than those of nearly if not all school districts of Long Island, we have made our preK-6 school district one of the best in Long Island.
There are several comments I want to make. Our record in terms of student achievement across the elementary school district makes us proud, especially considering that we use as a yardstick the whole of Long Island and not only its minority districts. This is the benchmark for which we aim, and the benchmark by which we want to be judged.
The Elmont Elementary School District board and superintendent have been striving to change mind-sets, a paradigm shift if you will, as to what constitutes academic performance. The results are a clearly defined set of criteria to define the "educated child" and co-incidentally, significant test score improvements. The article acknowledges appropriately, how effectively we "feed" Elmont High. Our commitment to excellence however extends also to the other high school of Sewanhaka that our students "feed into": Sewanhaka High School. The recent departure of the superintendent at the high school district allows, for the first time in more than twenty years, an opportunity for the leadership of the high school district to commit itself to high expectations for all students.
Another point. The article says that there is a spread of wealth when communities within the Sewanhaka school district "richer" than Elmont vote their budgets, since their approval de facto results in a redistribution of resources for education to the benefit of Elmont-based students. This is not exact, since one should keep in mind the far greater percentage of state aid that Elmont generates for the Sewanhaka High School District. This, in turn, going back to the previous point made, should prompt the leadership of Sewanhaka to distribute more equitably resources to the two high schools, Elmont and Sewanhaka, that in any case receive less than the three other high schools in the district in terms of overall resources.
In my capacity as a board member, I will work with Dr. Williams to help achieve at the high school district results reflective of the hard work conducted at the four component elementary districts. I look forward to Elmont students (both Elmont Memorial and Sewanhaka High School) doing well because of the efforts of the entire district. Elmont Memorial, like many minority schools and school districts, is doing well in spite of historical and contemporary obstacles thrown in it path.
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