Board Members Letter to Parents

Dear Parents:

We are very proud of the educational programs our district has to offer the students of the Middletown community. We are also proud of the fact that we continue to improve.

You as parents, have much to do with the progress of our students. Your involvement in the educational process is critical to the success of your children. We must all work together to ensure that our students take advantage of all the educational opportunities available to them.

Children cannot succeed if they are not in school. We need you, as parents, to make sure that your children have good attendance records.

Our teachers and administrators will do their best to see that the learning needs in the classroom are met.

We will provide the best facilities possible within our financial means so that our students will have an appropriate learning environment.

There are many challenges that lie before us. But, by working together, we will see even greater results in the educational achievements of our students. together we will make a difference. Education is everyone's business.

Sincerely,

	Greg Tyus, President gtyus@middletowncityschools.com
	Katie McNeil, Vice President kmcneil@middletowncityschools.com
	Marcia Andrew, Member mandrew@middletowncityschools.com
	Chris Fiora, Member cfiora@middletowncityschools.com
	John Sauter, Member jsauter@middletowncityschools.com

This letter is fine and the content makes sense. It is a nice delicate letter to the parents, targeting the parents who don't care if their child is in school or not. IMO, those parents, if habitual, need to be hauled into court, pay a fine, and if it continues, jailed. They'll have a hard time holding on to their job (if they have a job) in jail. Perhaps the threat of jail time and job loss would be enough to change their behavior. Otherwise, the letter states that they are "proud of the fact that we continue to improve". That's nice, but the current (and previous boards) have been saying that same thing for years with no appreciable, notable improvement that would make the average person stand up and take notice. It may be improvement to them, but, at best, it is at a snail's pace and is costing alot of taxpayer money to get it done. For me, it is not "improving" fast enough for the money spent. As for the new schools- it has been documented many times that new schools don't necessarily equate to better learning. There are school districts that accomplish excellent results with older facilities. Nice letter but same old message that, to date, isn't working.

Is it really about kids missing school and not learning or more about "your kid needs to be here so we can get X-amount of dollars from the state"??