Politics & Government

Newly Elected BOE Members Issue List of Topics

John Vorous and Laura Roche, two recently elected to the Board of Education issue list of topics they believe should be addressed as soon as possible.

Newly seated Board of Education member John Vorous brought up a list of topics he and fellow member Laura Roche believe need to be addressed as soon as possible during a segment of the board's Tuesday meeting usually reserved for "Communications."

The topics need to be reviewed, in some cases, reconsidered, and discussed in public "all in an effort to earn back public trust in the Board of Education," said Vorous, who along with Roche and Cody McCubbin were elected to their first term on the education board in November.

Tuesday was the first public meeting of the newly seated board. During that same meeting, .

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The list of topics, which he and Roche, the board's newly elected vice chairman collaborated on, was in no particular order, Vorous told board members.

  • hire
  • Budget transfer policy
  • Special education
  • Legal fees spent
  • Teacher evaluation policy
  • Superintendent evaluation policy
  • Newtown International Center for Education (Chinese program)
  • Reed School
  • Professional Learning Communities time spent and agenda for professional development
  • Curriculum planning agenda
  • Informational Board of Education Calendar dates
  • Bullying policies for the new bus contract
  • GATES program for gifted students and district goals
  • Full-day kindergarten

In some cases, Vorous appeared to be in support of the program, such as NICE, but believed the district needed to do a better job of explaining the goals and particulars of the program to the public.

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In other cases, such as the hiring of a public relations firm to help with communication with the public, Vorous said he was opposed to the hiring decision.

Later in the meeting, newly elected Board of Education chairman Debbie Leidlein said that her plan would be to use the next meeting to review the goals for the board and set up action steps for meeting those goals, including forming subcommittees to further investigate.

Clarification: The Newtown International Center for Education was referred to as the "Chinese program" during portions of Tuesday's meeting although the partnership with schools in China only is one part of the program, according to Newtown school officials.


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