By Keith M. Phaneuf

East Hartford — Gov. Ned Lamont today announced a plan to invest $300 million in private and public dollars in Connecticut’s schools — a plan centered on a $100 million contribution from hedge fund giant Ray Dalio’s philanthropic foundation.

Barbara Dalio at the podium today. (CLICK TO ENLARGE) CTMirror.org photo

State government will match the Dalio Foundation’s $100 million donation over the next five years, and work with that group to raise yet another $100 million from other philanthropic groups, Lamont said. The funds will be focused on communities with a high poverty rate and a high concentration of youth.

“I love public education. I’m always humbled and inspired by everything you do,” Barbara Dalio, who leads the foundation, told hundreds of students, teachers and administrators gathered at East Hartford High School to announce the contribution. “You are amazing.”

Ray Dalio, who heads the world’s largest hedge fund, Bridgewater Associates of Westport, said he grew up in a “lower-middle class” household and was fortunate “to have parents and teachers who cared for me.”

By Jarret Liotta

Team Westport 2019 Winning Essays

The intensity, heartbreak, and subtle ignorance of “microaggressions” were passionately and visually highlighted tonight as the four finalists in this year’s TEAM Westport Teen Diversity Essay Contest shared their work.

Finalist from Staples High School include (l-r), Angela Ji, 17, Olivia Sarno, 16, Chet Ellis, 17, and Daniel Boccardo, 18. (CLICK TO ENLARGE) Jarret Liotta for WestportNow.com

Gasps and breathless attention met the powerful words of four Staples High School students at Saugatuck Congregational Church as they read about their personal experiences, respectively, dealing with issues their treatment and mistreatment as part of their race, ethnicity and identity.

The annual competition was sponsored by TEAM Westport, the town’s official diversity committee. Created in 2003, TEAM stands for Together Effectively Achieving Multiculturalism.

“I think Westport as a whole isn’t the most diverse place overall,” said Olivia Sarno, 16, who appreciated the chance to bring light to the issues facing many students.

By Jarret Liotta

The Westport Board of Education (BOE) remains far from deciding what changes — if any — regarding building utilization and redistricting it intends to approve following last September’s health-related closure of Coleytown Middle School (CMS).

Anthony Buono, assistant superintendent of teaching and learning, said after Monday night’s meeting he is “definitely not” going to put his hat in for consideration for the superintendent of schools position. (CLICK TO ENLARGE) Jarret Liotta for WestportNow.com

Monday night the board unanimously sanctioned a list of general upgrades to CMS, which it hopes the CMS Building Committee can incorporate into its renovation project as the town works to get the school back in operation by August 2020.

The board remains stymied, however, over whether redistricting should take place to balance the elementary schools and/or the middle schools, or whether the CMS building might even best serve the town as a sixth grade “academy.”

With a new superintendent of schools officially needed by July 1 to replace Colleen Palmer — who is out indefinitely on a family leave — some BOE members said there were already enough issues facing them without having to implement an entirely new school configuration.

By Jarret Liotta

The Westport Board of Education on Monday will consider the future of the now shuttered Coleytown Middle School (CMS) and how best to configure it in Westport’s school system.

Range of options up for discussion. (CLICK TO ENLARGE) Dave Matlow for WestportNow.com

With an eye to getting it back online at the earliest in September 2020 at a cost that could exceed $20 million, educators are looking at a range of options.

A draft report published in advance of the Monday meeting says one option to best balance the current sixth through eight grade model is to redistrict approximately 120 students from Long Lots School (LLS) and 19 from Kings Highway School (KHS).

Two ways to avoid any redistricting would be to create a townwide grade six academy at CMS or a townwide grade five-six school.

By Kathleen Megan

Gov. Ned Lamont’s two key education bills — including one intended to push school districts toward regionalization — were approved by a legislative committee Friday, but with a few notable changes.

Members of the Education Committee eliminated the governor’s proposal to have municipalities chip in on teacher pensions and scrapped a plan to require homeschoolers to register in their school districts.

The votes, which went largely along party lines, were on House Bill 7150 — an act implementing the governor’s budget — and Senate Bill 874, the controversial bill that includes what some view as punitive steps to push school districts toward regionalization. The latter bill also would have established a commission charged with creating a plan for redistricting.

Last week, the Lamont administration changed language in Bill No. 874 making it more palatable to many by removing every reference to “redistricting” and “consolidation” and by empowering the commission to make only recommendations.

Four days after Schools Superintendent Colleen Palmer informed the Board of Education she would be absent to attend a family emergency, the board today told parents about her absence and said she would be gone “until further notice.”

Board of Education Chair Mark Mathias and Schools Superintendent Colleen Palmer at the March 18 board meeting. (CLICK TO ENLARGE) Jarret Liotta for WestportNow.com

By today, most parents were already aware of the development through news reports and social media posts.

In an email to parents signed by Chair Mark Mathias and six other board members, the board said:

“Late Thursday evening, Dr. Colleen Palmer notified the Board of Education that she would travel out of the area to attend to a family medical emergency.