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Sandy Reshapes Ridgefield Public Schools Calendar

The Ridgefield Board of Education on Monday approved revisions to the 2012-2013 school calendar in order to make up for the six days of school lost due to Hurricane Sandy.

 

The good news is the April school break in Ridgefield so far remains intact.

The bad news is students will be in school later in June.

The Board of Education on Monday approved revisions to the 2012-2013 school calendar in order to make up for the six days of school lost due to Hurricane Sandy, which tore through the region on Oct. 29.

As per the revised calendar, the last day of school is now June 19 — four school days later than the originally-scheduled last day on June 13.

In addition a staff development day scheduled for Feb. 19 is now a full day for students.

The sixth day was made up when students attended a full day of school on the Veteran's Day holiday on Nov. 12.

During Monday's board meeting Karen Dewing, director of school personnel, explained that on Nov. 5 — nearly a week after Hurricane Sandy blew through town — the school staff reported to work, however the schools remained closed to students because many bus routes were still impassable.

As a result, "we decided to use [Nov. 5] as a professional development day," Dewing said, adding that this stroke of foresight is what enabled the professional development day scheduled for Feb. 19 to be used as a full day for students, without the loss of a development day.

Dewing said in the event the district needs to use an additional "snow day," the calendar will be extended and the last day of school will become June 20.

If the district needs to use two additional "snow days," with the second one coming prior to Feb. 1, she said, then a professional development day on April 1 will become a full day for students.

Dewing said the staff development day will be rescheduled for the end of the school year, in the event April 1 is used as a school day.

Dewing said the school administration would consider adding more days to the end of the school year should more than two additional "snow days" be needed.

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Civil War re-enactors from Company A of the 11th Connecticut Volunteers.
Lisa Buchman (Editor) May 17, 2013 at 11:20 am
This looks so great, thanks Elise! Just curious what are the age ranges of participants—do anyRead More local teens re-enact? Thanks for posting this as an announcement, if you also post it to our calendar, it will stay there until the day of the event. Just click on events at the top of the page. Thanks!
Richard Hastings May 8, 2013 at 03:39 pm
Dear Mr. Gladstone: Your comments provide for a great way of starting or continuing a discussion andRead More for that I am thankful. The fact which you cited provides for a compelling argument to further your position on "tort reform" regarding how medical malpractice awards have allegedly been steadily increasing, however it is contrary to the information provided to us by the United States government. The U.S Department of Heath and Human Services recently published its statistical findings which indicate that medical malpractice awards have steadily decreased over the past 11 years. (http://www.npdb-hipdb.hrsa.gov/servlet/DataTablesByStateServlet?selectedTab=Tabular&stateCode=US&tableNum=Table1) Further, according to the Institute of Medicine, preventive preventable medical errors kill almost 100,000 Americans every year and injure countless others. In fact, if the Centers For Disease Control were to include preventable medical errors as a category, it would be the sixth leading cause of death in America. One might surmise from this data that we have an epidemic of medical malpractice cases but not medical malpractice lawsuits. I would suggest that investigating ways to prevent these medical errors might provide for a more holistic solution to this systemic problem.
Porter Gladstone III May 6, 2013 at 05:03 pm
Im thinking of writing a book called "parasites, medical malpractice lawyers and theRead More exaggerations of claims." Or maybe "crash course--why personal injury lawyers are ruining this country." Medical malpractice awards have increased at a rate of roughly 12% per year for the last 40 years. When we are aghast at the cost of soaring college costs just consider that at this rate, the cost of Yale tuition would be 115,000 a year, as opposed to 43k. And remember we are all appalled at how fast that has risen. A crash course in how all of this parasitical work, costs all of us so dearly when we pay our taxes (medicare/medicaid) or insurance company.