The Garden City School Board discussed and heard a wide range of topics at the Feb. 28 regular meeting, ranging from a report on the bond project, to comments on the budget parameters to the need for a JV B lacrosse team.

Charles Palagonia, the owner's representative for the bond project on the schools, gave his monthly update on the progress of the project. He noted that since the last meeting, "We've progressed quite a bit on the school construction."

The work that is currently going on is at the elementary schools, with the rear portion of the gymnasium at Stewart School being excavated in order to put an appendage on that building. Also at Stewart, he explained that they are currently working on removing the brick from the portion of the building that will have four classrooms added, in order to salvage that brick for the new wall. The workers took advantage of the winter recess to do the abatement of the rear walls and ceiling for the new wing that will be attached to that section. There is also brick work being done at the third area where an appendage will be added to the building.

With all the work being done at Stewart, Palagonia noted that the safety of the children was their utmost concern. In order to ensure their safety, many meetings have been held with the children in order to promote safety. In these meetings the children have been shown films on safety and were asked for their input, which Palagonia described as being very helpful. He added that he has spoken with the police commissioner and some of the police officers who have surveyed the grounds in order to make sure the sites are safe.

At Stratford they have now started excavating the rear portion where the new library and cafeteria will be located, they are continuing to do electrical work to upgrade the systems and construction has begun on a prototype classroom, which will have the new ceilings and lighting and will be the example for the other classrooms.

Palagonia noted that the drawings for the primary schools are still at the State Education Department and they are waiting for SED's comments to come back to the district so they can be incorporated into the documents before the project is put out to bid.

With regard to the middle and high schools, explained Palagonia, they are still holding focus meetings and are having schematic documentation and drawings developed based upon the comments generated at the focus meetings.

Following the presentation on the bond, Superintendent of Schools, Dr. Stephen Leitman took some time to speak about some other things happening in the schools. He mentioned an article that recently appeared in Newsday, in which Garden City Schools were listed among those with the best Internet home pages on Long Island. He stated that there are presently web pages for Stratford and Stewart Schools, the middle school and the high school, SEPTA, the board of education and the athletics department. Many of the district's teachers also have home pages where they can list the homework required or projects the students are working on. Leitman said he expected the administration's page to be completed shortly. "Even though we've been on it, we feel we're just beginning to move forward on the web page," said the superintendent.

Leitman also spoke about a partnership the district was planning with the Teacher's College. According to the superintendent this partnership will help the district move forward in staff development, running a graduate school program and technology. Through this partnership, interns from the Teacher's College will come to work in the Garden City Schools and will help develop courses for the schools. Leitman added, "We also plan to involve ourselves with the Teacher's College as far as administration training and be a center for Long Island in that area. As was said at previous school board meetings, the idea of hiring teachers as well as administrators is something we have to do proactively and this is becoming more and more difficult and by us partnering with a university such as Teacher's College, we hope we'll receive some of the best candidates we can possibly get."

Following the superintendent's report, Board Trustee John Klupka announced the formation of an Ad Hoc Technology Committee which will address the technological needs at each of the schools. Each school will have someone directing the needs for that particular school and members of the community will serve on the committee. Klupka will be the advisor of that committee. Board President Linda Leone noted that announcements had been made in the local papers about the formation of this committee and residents were invited to submit résumés and letters of intent. The board, led by Klupka reviewed all the candidates before making their final selections.

The board presented the public with an opportunity to discuss budget parameters, and Leone noted that this opportunity would be provided for residents throughout the month of March as the board begins to prepare the budget. Joseph Calamari and Mort Yuter took this opportunity to discuss what they would like to see included in the budget for the coming year.

Calamari discussed the need for an enhanced gifted program, stating, "It seems to me that the gifted children should be given much more care and understanding and opportunity to learn than they are being given." Calamari also expressed the belief that the district should look into starting students with foreign languages earlier, possibly kindergarten or first grade rather than fifth or sixth grade. He noted that young children are sponges and this ability to absorb information at an early age should be taken advantage of. "You've got to teach kids language young and early and keep doing it."

Yuter spoke about the need for teacher recruitment and discussed the possibility of raising the starting salary for teachers rather than just giving across the board increases, thus attracting new teachers to the district. He then went on to discuss the idea of six day a week and all year round schooling. With the new standard from the state, said Yuter, this idea that was once scoffed at may now become a necessity because some students may not be able to reach the new standards in the current amount of time provided.

Following the discussion on the budget, a group of juniors and seniors from the high school spoke about one of the guidance counselors at the high school who would be coming up for tenure next year. The students stressed their belief that because this counselor goes the extra mile, not only for his advisees but for all the students he should be given tenure. Several parents also voiced their support for this guidance counselor. Leone thanked the students for their interest and explained that they are not able to comment on employment issues.

The longest discussion of the evening revolved around the request for a JV B lacrosse team. One parent raised the issue, noting that 49 children had signed up for JV lacrosse, which means that 20-25 children would not make the team. In doing research this parent discovered that there are presently several JV B teams and in making inquiries further found that it was not too late for a JV B lacrosse team to be started for this year. He added that he spoke with some other parents and told the board that if they would not finance the team this group of parents would be willing to fund the team as a gift to the school.

Much discussion followed about the need for additional teams, with one of the high school seniors telling the board that they should really look into creating more teams because just as the classes were getting crowded as more students entering the various grade levels, so are the teams. "There is a larger issue behind this, it is not just one particular sport," said the student. "You have to look at the big picture here."

The board listened to these requests and ideas but noted that the problem with accepting the funding as a gift for this year's team is that the board would then be required to continue to fund this team in future years. It was also noted that many other teams had been requested for this year as well and it put the board in a difficult position because they were not able to offer all these teams this late in the year. Normally the decision about the number of teams are made the previous year during the budget process. Leone said "There is willingness on our part to look at the big picture, at the same time balancing the fact that you are presenting a need right now that you'd like an answer to."

Leitman added, "Right now I am in the process of working with the staff to prepare the budget for the 2000-2001 school year, beginning July 1 and we are incorporating and certainly considering the fact that there are going to be larger numbers of students in many of the different classes in the middle school and high school and that additional activities might have to be added for the next school year." With regard to the request for the JV B team, Leitman explained that he has shared some information with the board of education and there were some requests for additional information before a decision could be reached.