Nov. 5, 2008
School Board Discusses Budget Worries, Hears
Positive Audit Report
Ellen Gilbert
Anxiety about money was the pervasive theme
at last week’s Princeton Regional Board of Education meeting.
President Alan Hegedus began by observing that awareness of
“taxpayers under duress” and a state government that is less
likely to support municipalities will weigh heavily on the
board’s budget preparation process this year.
A November 11 school board workshop is intended to begin budget
planning discussions “not just for the coming year,” said Mr.
Hegedus, but with an eye toward taking “systemic action” that
will improve the process over the next several years. The public
is encouraged to attend the meeting, which will begin at 7 p.m.
in the Valley Road building.
A positive note was struck on Tuesday
evening with Scott Clelland’s audit report on the district. Mr.
Clelland, Wiis & Company’s partner in charge of public sector
services, said that he found “nothing to lose sleep over” in
Princeton Regional School’s (PRS) financial records for last
year, rendering a “clean opinion,” and the judgment that the
district is in “very good” financial shape. The district
received a certificate of excellence for financial reporting for
the 11th year in a row. Mr. Clelland noted that the recent spate
of State regulations regarding accountability (“we’re looking at
$20 items”) has made the auditing process more difficult.
Superintendent Judy Wilson attributed the success of the process
on PRS’s side to Business Administrator’s Stephanie Kennedy’s
“hour-to-hour” vigilance about these changes. The board voted
unanimously to accept the report.
Ms. Wilson also reported that the
Princeton Education Foundation had obtained a $20,000 grant from
the Concordia Foundation to support PRS’s Mathematics Residency
Program, which instructs kindergarten through fifth grade
teachers on how to implement a new math curriculum. “Many
hundreds of students and many faculty will benefit from this
fabulous award,” she commented.
Board member Josh Leinsdorf began his
report on recent Finance Committee activities by observing that
“everybody’s in trouble.” He reiterated Mr. Hegedus’s comments
about beginning the budget planning process in the context of
financial challenges to both the private and public sector.
The district’s effort to close the
achievement gap between white and minority students will be the
focus of the next Minority Education Committee meeting on
November 17, when Ms. Wilson and other district administrators
will respond to questions prepared by the committee earlier this
summer. Chair Tim Quinn reported that the committee would
reconvene at a special follow-up meeting on November 24, to
discuss the results.
The next board meeting will be Wednesday,
November 25, at 8 p.m. in the John Witherspoon Middle School
cafeteria.
THE
PRINCETON PACKET
Institute
gives $100,000 for sciences in Princeton school district
Tuesday, April 8, 2008
By Katie Wagner, Staff Writer
The Institute for Advanced Study has pledged $100,000 to the
Princeton Education Foundation to support the sciences in the
Princeton Regional School District.
”We hope to use the money to really push for expanded
creative inquiry and research in science for grades K through
12,” said Judy Wilson, the district’s superintendent..jpg)
The foundation will be receiving the $100,000 in $25,000
installments over the next four years and has already received
the first $25,000 from the institute, according to foundation
board member Jane Sheehan.
Princeton High School’s new biology wing is to be named the
IAS Biology Hallway to honor the institute for its generosity,
according to a statement from the foundation.
The Institute for Advanced Study is one of the world’s
leading centers for theoretical research and intellectual
inquiry. The education foundation’s mission is to support
educational excellence in the Princeton Regional School District
by encouraging community, corporate and charitable contributions
to support public education.
The gift resulted from the foundation requesting the
institute provide funding to enhance the district’s goals in the
sciences, according to Anne Burns, a foundation board member.
”The Princeton Education Foundation is very grateful to the
Institute of Advanced Study for this generous donation to the
Princeton Regional Schools” Ms. Burns said. “We look forward to
a partnership with them and to exploring other opportunities and
that our student scientists may take advantage of the wonderful
resources the institute provides to this community.
”I think it’s a wonderful beginning of what we hope to be a
very fruitful relationship.”
Christine Ferrara, a spokeswoman for Institute for Advanced
Study, responded to inquiries about the donation in an e-mail.
”As a long-standing member of the Princeton community, the
Institute for Advanced Study values the quality and caliber of
education in the regional schools,” Ms. Ferrara said. “The
Institute is proud to be associated with the biology floor of
the Princeton High School, and with the opportunities for
students to learn about exciting scientific developments that
are changing our understanding of the basic processes of life
and will be impacting our lives in the decades to come.”
A ribbon cutting of the hallway will be held 10:30 a.m.
Monday.
This is not the first time the institute has donated money to
a school in the Princeton Regional School District. The
institute has also provided funding to Littlebrook Elementary
School, according to Ms. Ferrara.
____________________________________________________
PHS greenhouse dedicated to memory of John Toscano
(Princeton) - For 27 years, John Toscano shared his love and
knowledge of flowers and plants with students at Princeton High
School. As the founder of the horticulture program at PHS, he
opened another field of science to many students.  After his
death last year, his daughters looked for a fitting memorial to
their father and with the help of the Princeton Education
Foundation, they found it - sponsoring the new rooftop
greenhouse at Princeton High School.
On Friday, February 1st, the Princeton Education Foundation and
the Toscano daughters, Sallie, Judith Bobletz and Nancie
Saraceni hosted the dedication of the greenhouse in the memory
of John Toscano. Almost 40 people attended the ceremony
including retired PHS teachers and former students of Mr.
Toscano as well as Holly Holcombe, PEF president and Shari
Powell, PEF
New PHS Rooftop Greenhouse
vice president for development.
"This is a wonderful way to
remember our father and the work he loved as well as provide
support and encouragement to the next generation of horticulture
students," said Sallie Toscano. "As a PHS graduate myself, it
feels good to give back to my alma mater in this way. I am
grateful to the Princeton Education Foundation for providing
this opportunity and to all those who have contributed to make
this happen."
Business donors included: Hannah & Mason Restaurant, Kube Pak,
Tony's Garden Market, and Sieck/Wright Roses.
Ms. Toscano now runs her father's farm in Cranbury and last
summer had a PHS student intern there. She serves as an advisor
to the Princeton High School horticulture club and is raising
funds to offer a scholarship for a graduating senior in her
father's name. For more information on the Mr. T. scholarship
fund please visit www.MrTHorticultureFund.com
"We are thrilled to be able to provide this kind of funding
opportunity," said Shari Powell of PEF. "This gift is truly a
win-win situation. This is the perfect partnership with donors
who contribute time, talent and treasure."
Princeton Education Foundation is a non-profit 501c3
organization committed to supporting excellence in the Princeton
Regional Schools. For more information on the foundation,
funding opportunities and other ways you become involved, please
go to our website, www.pefnj.org <http://www.pefnj.org
<http://www.pefnj.org>
>
_______________________________________________________________________
January, 2008
“The Definition of Wellness”: PHS
Fitness Center Opens
Ellen Gilbert
Noting that it
would have been easy to say “change the vending machines” in
response to demands for a healthier environment, Princeton Regional
Schools (PRS) Superintendent Judy Wilson lauded the opening of the
new Princeton High School (PHS) Fitness Center at a ribbon-cutting
ceremony on Friday as the community’s answer to the question, “What
does fitness mean?”
Ms. Wilson described the effort that led to the new
center as a “model of excellence,” in which agencies, corporations,
and private donors collaborated to
“make it happen.” The Princeton Education Foundation (PEF), an
organization that encourages private philanthropy to enhance public
education for students at all levels in Princeton, spearheaded the
effort. In her opening comments, Honorary Campaign Chair Lesley
Bush, a 1965 graduate of PHS who won the Olympic Gold Medal for
platform diving in 1964, noted that “there aren’t many other high
schools in the area who have gotten this much help.”
The facility, which Ms. Bush described as “a
magnificent fitness center,” boasts 26 new pieces of
state-of-the-art exercise equipment in a large, spanking-new room.
PRS Athletic Department Director John Miranda reported that it is
being used “morning, noon, and night.” In addition to PRS students,
district employees may use the room after 6:30 p.m.
Nathaniel Hyman, a student at
Community
Park School, delights in his chance to wear
Olympic Gold, courtesy of Lesley Bush
.jpg) Ms.
Bush, who has remained in the Princeton area teaching seventh-grade
science, emphasized the importance of the facility not only to
“great athletes,” but to the ordinary student who wants to make a
lifetime commitment to physical fitness. She observed that if a
facility like the new center had been available when she was in
training as a diver, “Maybe I wouldn’t have a bad back and neck
today.”
Dr. Tracey Orleans and Mr. John Govea of the Robert
Wood Johnson Foundation were
Princeton Regional Schools
Superintendent Judy
Wilson, Olympic gold medal winner and Fitness
Center
Campaign Honorary Chair, Lesley Bush
and
PHS Athletic Director John Miranda
among the PEF members, contributors, administrators, athletes,
teachers, and students in attendance at the Friday night
celebration. Of the $93,000 raised so far by PEF, the Foundation
donated $25,000 for staff training and low-cost after-school
programs to be held in the new center.
Lesley Bush, Michael Mostoller, president of the Princeton Regional
Board of Education
and Bob James, president of the Friends
of
Princeton Athletics
__________________________________________
Wednesday December 26, 2007
Review of 2007:
Princeton Education Foundation
The Princeton Education Foundation
(PEF) saw results from its “Take a Seat” fundraising campaign when
Princeton High School’s Spectacle Theatre Company staged a
high-fashion-inspired “Wizard of Oz” in the Princeton Performing
Arts Center in March. The staging of the beloved family classic was
intended as a big “thank you” to the Princeton Regional Schools
community — the PTO, Princeton Education Foundation, and Board of
Education.
Following the “Take a Seat” success, PEF turned its
attention to raising $100,000 for equipment for the high school’s
Fitness Center, which opened in the school’s old 1958 gym. The
center is being used not only by the school’s 1300-plus student body
but by the district’s staff. It is also hoped that is will open for
use by the community-at-large during after school hours in the near
future.
Princeton High
School
It was a year of accolades for
Princeton High School. In February, the School Report Card from the
New Jersey Department of Education showed PHS maintaining its
position as one of the state’s best performing high schools. It
ranked in second place, behind Millburn Senior High in Essex County,
with a total SAT score of 1770 out of a possible 2400 points.
Millburn had a score of 1864. The statewide average was 1478 points.
Similar good news followed in November when PHS
received gold medal status in the US News and World Report’s first
ever ranking of America’s Best High Schools. The school was also
recognized for excellence by the Wall Street Journal in its review
of the top high schools sending students to a selection of Ivy
League Colleges.
________________________
Newly-renovated
PHS library
-
opening celebration: October 12th 2007
With the help of PHS librarian
Arlene Sinding and the PHS PTO, PEF co-sponsored the opening
celebration for the newly-renovated PHS library and media center.
This campaign has raised over $8,000 to sponsor new books for the
library, which had a depleted budget due to moving expenses.
Click here to read
more.
_________________________
Princeton Education Foundation-
Archived Newsletters
Spring 2006
Winter 2006
|
PEF
NEWS
