Quieting CRICKETS For Good

Spared, or so it was thought in March, the Mystic Middle School multiage looping program CRICKETS is being cut after all. But not because of the conflict with Common Core education standards, which call for grade specific curricula, but the program will end because the teachers have chosen different teaching posts.

In February and March, parents protested the elimination of the 5th- and 6th-grade looping programs (Pfish and Otters at Pawcatuck Middle and May-Junes at Mystic Middle). 

Administrators said the programs did not align with the state's new Common Core educational standards. At the time, the Board of Education voted to spare the 6th- and 7th-grade Crickets program. 

Last week, parents were told the program was going to end. Patch reached out to a number of CRICKETS parents for comment.

Janice Lamb’s daughter Hannah is “very upset” the program is ending.

Lamb said her daughter was one of the many CRICKETS and other looping program kids that “stayed up late and coordinated a speech” for the public hearings by the BOE on the looping programs this winter. At the final forum, more than 100 showed up to demonstrate support for the programs.

“They really felt like they made a case, presented it, demonstrated leadership, and won.  They when they decided discontinue the program this week, due to the teachers being provided other opportunities, she felt like her world was rocked,” Lamb said. “Being in CRICKETS was something she was very proud of, and now she will go back to being just like everyone one else.”

Lamb said the program “greatly challenged her academically” and helped to make MMS “really a great school.”

She said the “lack of clearly defined structure and project based work drove the kids to think outside the box, be creative work to exceed expectations.”

Including the recent science project ‘Rock Concert,’ where CRICKET students performed karaoke turning songs into odes to geodes.  

Lamb listed a number of other Cricket projects that distinguished it: including a student-filmed movie trailer based on a book they read, a class trip to New York City where they participated in learning a song and a dance for the Broadway show Spiderman, Turn Off The Dark then went to see the show; a robotic competition and others.

Lamb said her daughter “bonded closely with many classmates, in both sixth and seventh grade, while working closely with them on these projects,” Lamb said. “We are saddened by the loss of this program.”