Herricks board gives, takes grants

Richard Tedesco

The Herricks Board of Education accepted an $11,000 grant from the Asia Society at its Thursday night meeting last week and announced the award of Herricks Community Fund grants of nearly the same amount to district teachers for new educational programs and program enhancements.

Herricks Superintendent of Schools John Bierwirth said Herricks was one of 22 school districts to receive a grant from the Asia Society to support students taking Chinese language classes through its Confucius Classrooms program.

“It reaffirms our relationship with the Asia Society,” Bierwirth said.

Asia Society’s Confucius Classrooms offers online Chinese language programs for American students. It also links each American school district with a Chinese counterpart to enable exchanges between students and joint projects.

Shortly after school board members voted unanimously to accept the Asia Society grant, they also gave unanimous approval to 11 mini-grants to district teachers who proposed innovative projects for the 2012-13 school year.

The mini-grants are approved by a committee that includes Deirdre Hayes, Herricks assistant superintendent for instruction; Community Fund board members Brian Hassan and Greg Grandelli, and Jane Morales, president of the Herricks Teachers Association.

The grants included two in Robotics – $1,220 to the Herricks Middle School Robotics program and its instructor, Daniel Gilliam; and $750 to the Herricks Robotics Team and its advisor, Michael Tortoriello, both for equipment. A third middle school project, introducing E-Readers to the school library, drew $1,000.

A reading program for various elementary grade levels drew and a kindergarten curriculum program each drew grants of more than $500.

The Herricks Community Fund will also provide a grant of $854 to support the existing Wildlife Nature Walk & Gardens program at Herricks Pond for science students in the Center Street School.

All of the other grants were committed to high school programs, including $2,010 for Linovo ThinkPads and $896 for IPads for the high school library. The English Scholars program drew $750 while the ongoing Agricultural Project at the high school, with students raising herbs and vegetables for the high school cafeteria, drew $1,000.

Bierwirth reminded district residents that the school board would be presenting a list of $3 million in proposed 2013-14 budget cuts at its Jan. 24 meeting. The proposed cuts from existing programs and staff as a first step toward cutting as much as $3.2 million to keep next year’s budget within the parameters of the state-mandated tax cap.

Bierwirth said in recent meetings he’s had with admissions directors at various colleges, their records indicated that Herricks student generally turn in strong academic performances. Bierwirth attributed that to the approach taken in high school curriculum, which requires students to make their own course choices.

“We make you make decisions,” he said to high school students at the meeting. “It’s good to see you rise to the occasion. They’re impressed with Herricks students.

In other developments:

• Bierwirth said the school board is in the process of making recommendations to tighten school district security procedures.

“It’s not going to come all at once. We’ve already made some changes,” he said. “It’s in the nature of the times.”

He said the new procedure of requiring all visitors to district schools to present identification and sign in to the building is “unfortunate” but he hoped it would just be accepted as “a fact of life.”

• The school district approved a school allergist, Dr. Paul Lang, at a rate of $40 per hour to consult as needed with students in the district.         

“We have to have someone on call. We have more students with allergies,” Bierwirth said, adding that typically the district needs to summon an allergy specialist to one of the schools twice annually.  

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