Community Matters

The following Community Matters post, “Signed, Sealed and Delivered … Radnor Twp School District & Teachers Union Ink 3-year Contract with Salary Increase … Is there handwriting on the wall for T/E Teachers?”  is from March 23, 2011. A year ago, the Radnor Township School District signed a 3-year contract with their teachers union( RTEA) [...]

Filed under: Easttown Township, Radnor Townsip, Tredyffrin Easttown School District, Tredyffrin Township | 45 Comments »

As a bit of history for those that are new readers to Community Matters. When I started this journey 2-1/2 years ago, it was without a personal agenda except to engage the community on important issues and to encourage greater transparency from our elected officials. Transparency implies openness, communication, and accountability; a metaphorical extension of [...]

Filed under: Tredyffrin Township | 55 Comments »

With channel 6 ABC news cameras rolling and with a standing room crowd, Tredyffrin-Eastttown School Board held its monthly school board meeting last night. Passion, commitment, support, devotion … adjectives that describe the steady stream of District students who spoke on behalf of their teachers at last night’s school board meeting.  Waiting for hours for [...]

Filed under: Tredyffrin Township | 61 Comments »

Opening a door that most school districts would prefer to keep closed. Teacher contract negotiations have traditionally been cloaked in secrecy. In my perfect world of transparency, school districts would open the teacher contract talks to the public. Letting the sunlight shine on the negotiations, parents, taxpayers and employees would benefit by seeing the open [...]

Filed under: Tredyffrin Township | 36 Comments »

The Tredyffrin Easttown School District School Board is contending with decreased local revenue, higher health insurance costs, increased contributions to the state pension fund, and diminished state and federal revenue. These problems do not make TESD unique; school boards across Pennsylvania are facing the same issues. To suggest that Pennsylvania school districts are challenged by [...]

Filed under: Tredyffrin Township | 24 Comments »

Monday night was the Board of Supervisors Meeting and TESD Budget meeting.  I attended the BOS meeting and will offer a few thoughts in a later post.  Ray Clarke attended the school district meeting and offered his opinion on the evening which I provide below. In reviewing Ray’s notes, I was pleased that it appears [...]

Filed under: Tredyffrin Township | 96 Comments »

Last week, the Pittsburgh Business Times published their 2012 Guide of Western Pennsylvania Schools, which lists the school district rankings for the Pittsburgh area and the entire state of Pennsylvania. The newspaper analyzed all the school districts’ performance based on the Pennsylvania System of School Assessment (PSSA) Exam results. According to their website, the formula [...]

Filed under: Tredyffrin Township | 8 Comments »

I attended this week’s Finance Committee meeting for the school district.  As we are all acutely aware, TESD is facing major budget challenges like every other school district in the state.  The challenge for School Board directors is what strategies to impose to meet the demands of the budget crisis.  Over the next few years, [...]

Filed under: Tredyffrin Township | 3 Comments »

Has this winter left you suffering from cabin fever and a need to get outside for some fresh air?  There’s a perfect opportunity this Saturday, April 14 to help the community and celebrate the end of winter! The Open Land Conservancy of Chester County will be holding its last Vine Day of the season on Saturday at George Lorimer Preserve, 9 [...]

Filed under: Tredyffrin Township | 4 Comments »

The American Red Cross is a humanitarian organization led by volunteers and provides relief to victims of disasters and helps people prevent, prepare for, and responds to emergencies.  The Red Cross is not a government agency – all assistance is provided free of charge.  Red Cross assistance is made possible through the generosity of people [...]

Filed under: Tredyffrin Township | 2 Comments »