By Jarret Liotta
A fun and emotional celebration for the Westport school district’s outgoing educators tonight contrasted with some poignant emotional statements made later regarding the “injustice” of the current GPA system at Staples High School.
Adele Cutrali-Valovich, retiring orchestra director at Staples High School, asks the Board of Education tonight to turn its STEM initiative into a STEAM initiative by adding Art. (CLICK TO ENLARGE) Jarret Liotta for WestportNow.com
The system awards smaller numbers for students in B- and C-level courses and omits other areas of concentration outside the five major academics entirely.
There were 21 school employees acknowledged in a ceremony at the start of tonight’s Board of Education meeting, with 431 total years of public education service to their credit.
Outgoing Chairman Michael Gordon was also honored.
Laughter and tears mingled.
“I have seen my work, not as a job, but as a labor of love and I will miss all my children,” said Adele Cutrali-Valovich, Staples’ orchestra director, who had 35 years of service.
Meanwhile, since a presentation by Staples’ Principal James D’Amico last week about proposed changes to the GPA system sparked dozens of complaints from parents, implementation was rolled back a year so it would only impact the incoming class of ’22.
“The current weighting system really promotes a lot of bad and harmful narratives inside Staples High School,” said Daniel Heaphy, a social studies teacher at Staples (CLICK TO ENLARGE) Jarret Liotta for WestportNow.com
“We are really behind the times in terms of looking at this issue … We want to catch up,” Superintendent of Schools Colleen Palmer said.
Several board members, however, are not strongly in favor of the plan, acknowledging complaints they’d received that more discussion is needed before it moves forward.
“There hasn’t been much opportunity for this to be thought through,” said board member Elaine Whitney.
“I wish that we had time to vet this even more,” said fellow board member Karen Kleine said.
While administrators acknowledged timing the announcement could have been handled better, D’Amico said the matter had been in discussion for at least 10 years.
“To me, it’s a wrong and to me it’s never too soon to change that,” he said, noting ironically that incoming freshmen who are taking honors courses next year will actually receive a “bump” in their GPA if this change is implemented.
“When we look at the weighting, our top students are still going to get into the top schools … so I am not concerned about (the impact on) college admissions,” Palmer said.
Several members of the public shared their support for the change, including Daniel Heaphy, a social studies teacher at Staples who teaches both advanced placement and B-level courses.
“The current weighting system really promotes a lot of bad and harmful narratives inside Staples High School,” he said.
Despite teachers guiding some students into B-level courses and assuring them that, for all intents and purposes, they’re just as worthwhile, under the current GPA system the numbers are not reflective of that.
“We put a number on their work that devalues them,” he said. “We put a number on their work that makes us liars. And they know we’re liars.”
“There is a stigma to being a B-level student,” said parent Marjorie Almansi, who has children taking different ranges of classes.
“The system as it stands now completely discriminates against my boys in B,” she said, noting that even if they receive all A’s, they’re still only able to obtain a 3.67.
“There’s a lot of kids in the middle (and) our children deserve a chance to excel just like the other kids,” said parent Jill Dillon, who also serves as co-president of the Kings Highway School PTA.
She noted that the most vocal opponents do not necessarily represent the largest number of students, most of whom fall into the average range.
“To tackle issues like this is why I wanted this job,” D’Amico said.
“To me I’m really not going for dramatic effect when I say it’s injustice … and that we ought to fix it as soon as we can,” he said.
“We all acknowledge the timing is off a little bit (but) what I believe they are trying to do is the right thing,” Palmer said.
“The board will look forward to continuing discussions,” said Gordon, who bid an emotional farewell to colleagues earlier.
He is resigning from the board after six and a half years because of work commitments.
