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Monday, September 19, 2011

LSC report: Bennett-Shedd is on probation...

I learned this at yesterday's LSC meeting. The new principal - Ms. Roberta Fields - is making it her goal to get the school off of probation. For the most part it's based on the school's ISAT scores and CPS expect 100% improvement by 2014. She did note the school board merely raises the ante on what they expect and 100% improvement does seem quite unreasonable to me.

It was also noted that some of the students who took the test were special need. In earlier LSC meetings it was noted that they test the special needs students at the same level as their peers at their proper grade level. Unfortunately how can you compete with say seventh graders if you're mental capacity is only on say the 2nd grade level. It is hoped that now that the special needs students are exposed to the materials of general education students they may do better on the test the next time around.

Also enrollment has dropped this year. Bennett-Shedd has 482 students for this year while last year they had 560 students. Principal Fields noted that the decline in enrollment was due to charter schools although CPS is experiencing a decline in enrollment citywide. At Shedd School there are only 15 kindergartners.

Also the LSC talked about the issue of a longer school day. The individual members didn't appear to take a stand on this issue one way or another but a reasonable concern is over child safety especially when the students don't get out of school until it's dark. It's not just about the classes but the extra-curriculars and also concern about those whose parents aren't able to pick them up from school.

Also I got a new handbook at the meeting. It's not important to me necessarily since I'm neither a student nor am I a parent of a Bennett-Shedd student. However I would like to share some scans of this handbook in the near future.

Future reference if you ever want to attend a Bennett-Shedd LSC meeting they will be held on the 2nd Wednesday at 4:30 every month. Unless otherwise noted and they will announce future meeting dates at the meetings. May want to give the school itself a call if you want to find out when the next LSC is. Refer to the About page here on this blog