Garwood Board of Ed candidate seeks your support!

To my fellow Garwood residents, as we head to the polls on November 6th, Garwood has some big decisions to make. Not only at the municipal level, but at the education level as well. You will be able to cast 3 votes for the Garwood Board of Education. My name is Ralph Trentacosta and I am looking for your support for one of those votes. I am the father of 4 young children. My three oldest are currently enrolled in Lincoln School, a fifth grader, a first grader and a kindergartner.

Recently I had an opportunity to interact with some of you in a “Meet and Greet” forum along with the other 4 candidates. Our time was limited to answer the questions, so I’d like to take this opportunity to address in further details some of the issues we face in Garwood schools.

One of the more common challenges the school faces is community outreach and how do we improve on that. To start addressing this, one of my goals will be to launch an official Garwood Schools Facebook group. Although there are several grade-level groups as well as an unofficial Lincoln School Families Facebook page, there is no official school representation on these groups. Email is the current preferred way of communication, but I believe email is quickly becoming an outdated communication mechanism and we must adjust to the changing world. Another community outreach fix I’d like to implement is a “back-to-school” ice cream social in September. We can use the time for students to get re-acclimated with school and meet their new teachers and parents can interact with the school administrators, board members and of course meet their children’s teachers. I’d like to expand on a new idea that started last year and that is to have round table discussions between the parents and the BOE. I was able to attend last year’s round table as a kindergarten parent. I’d like to expand it to other grades as I found it very beneficial as a parent to interact to the school administrators outside of a board of education meeting.

Another topic surrounding our district is the concern of the towns expected population growth and how the school will be prepared for the new students both physically and financially. The school cannot depend on new tax dollars to help fund these students as there are no new tax dollars coming into the school system from these housing complexes as they are being developed through a PILOT (Payment In Lieu Of Taxes) program. The number of students and what grades they will be enrolled in is still in question as these units are not yet built let alone filled. Either way, the board of education needs to be ready for it when it happens. We need to start communicating now with the town officials to make sure the school is prepared for any future students from these complexes. You can expect me to reach out to our elected town officials to make sure we are on the right track before years end!

As far as funding goes, currently, Garwood operates and maintains the Washington School on the corner of East St and Beech Ave. at this time the YMCA of Westfield rents that space from Garwood School District to operate a private preschool. For the amount of money we make off the deal versus what it cost us to keep the building operational, we need to review that deal to make sure that Garwood’s School districts’ best interest is being put forward.

To keep our kids excited about attending schools I’d like to look to expand some after school activities. I’d think students would be interested in such activities as a drama club where they can work to put on a show at the end of the year. Work with our current technology department to develop a live streaming club where students learn how to live stream events and we would be able to utilize these skills to stream school functions and events such as board and PTA meetings. That would tie back to community outreach. Something else to consider, bring back a printed school newsletter. When I attended school, we had a school newspaper that was handed out each month. I found it not only interesting to read but also contributing to it. I’d like to bring this concept to Lincoln School.

As you can see, the years ahead or Garwood Schools will be some of the most challenging in quite some time. I believe the community is encouraged and energized to see the school be a great success. We just need to make sure those on the board share that same passion and this is why I am asking for your support in column 1 on November 6th.

Thank you,

Ralph Trentacosta, Garwood Board of Education candidate.