USA > Massachusetts > Essex County > Swampscott > Town annual report of Swampscott 1962 > Part 8
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The band itself, directed by Mr. Ham- mond, engaged in a busy year, playing at games and joining in concerts with Lynn, Wellesley, and Winchester schools, and participating in the Massachusetts Music Educators' programs, as well as at the Swampscott Memorial Day observances. It also made a singularly fine impression as feature of the evening at the New Ocean House May convention of the Massachusetts Association of School Com- mittees, an occasion when Mr. Matthew Mazur of the Lynn Public Schools very obligingly took over as guest director during the illness of Mr. Hammond.
On another occasion at that same con- vention of school committeemen, the hit of the evening was scored by the High School Dramatic Club, under the direc- tion of Mr. Harold Power of the High School faculty in a cutting from Ruth Gordon comedy success Years Ago. Per- forming with no stage setting and a bare minimum of properties, the cast held for forty minutes the attention of a dinner-time audience that filled the main banquet room at the New Ocean House. The same selection, with the same cast, won top honors at the Drama Fes- tival conducted in Cambridge during April by the Massachusetts High School Drama Guild and was one of two selected for performance that month at the State Drama Festival in Boston.
Faculty Committees Conduct Appraisals
Four groups of faculty members car- ried out evaluations of separate but re- lated facets of our system and, in sum- mary of their findings and recommenda- tions, submitted professionally thorough
and competent reports. These were al- ways candid and often critical of existing practice. They have all proved valuable guides for School Committee action. They cover the following:
(1) Gifted Children
One of the four committees examined the needs of gifted children within our system and the desirability of special programs for them. As a point of de- parture, it drew upon the work of an earlier committee carried out in 1959. It then went on to review and summarize current literature about the training of these boys and girls, to investigate pro- grams in other communities, and to evaluate the resources of Swampscott.
In its final report, the group recom- mended against the immediate formation in our system of special classes for the gifted except, possibly on the secondary level. One of the final paragraphs reads:
We feel, unanimously, that our present program of instruction in the elementary schools in Swamp- scott provides such a wide range of enrichment and experiential activi- ties within the framework of the regular classroom that the gifted child is well provided for. The cali- bre of the work-study projects, units, and outside work done by the very good and the average students compares favorably with the work done by classes of gifted children in the communities we have studied. In addition to our school work, the children live here in a prestige com- munity where opportunities for extra curricular and enrichment ac- tivities are not only unlimited but also enjoyed by a great number. Not only does the home provide these opportunities, but the very nature of the town with its active churches and social groups behooves a student to participate in order to maintain status. A general cry for our stu- dents at this age level is to delimit the pressures, not add to them!
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(2) Social Studies
Another group, comprising teachers from elementary and junior and senior high schools, undertook an assessment of our entire social studies program. Its approach, as the June, 1962, report stated, was "to start at the junior high level and fan out in both directions."
Final recommendations will be made in March of 1963. The report of last June was of progress to that date. It had these things, however, to say about our Swampscott program:
Too much time is spent in grades one and two on the same general topics, particularly since the estab- lishment of kindergartens which de- velop social studies topics. Children at kindergarten and grade one levels are interested in and able to handle more advanced skills and content. Children of grades two and three can handle more advanced social studies than is presently being taught, particularly in Swampscott. We have, therefore, recommended a program that pushes many of the usual topics to lower level and al- lows for a less congested program at certain grade levels, which have been greatly overburdened, particularly at the junior high school.
After meeting with representatives of many different textbook houses, the com- mittee concluded that in all probability it would find no one series of standard- ized texts to satisfy the needs of the Swampscott program. "We should rather," the interim report stated, "de- velop a continuum in social studies which will fit a program we devise than ac- cept a series of texts which demands the adapting of our program to the phi- losophy reflected in a publisher's set of books."
In the past four months of the present school year, therefore, the social studies committee has been devising the twelve-
year continuum that it will recommend in March and reviewing texts and ma- terials it feels will best serve the pro- gram.
(3) Testing
Another group of teachers and prin- cipals, working with Mrs. Mary Cooper, director of guidance, reviewed our pres- ent system of standardized, objective tests as it operates throughout the schools. The project at its outset had the advantage of background materials Mrs. Cooper in the months preceding had assembled for it: testing programs re- ceived from superintendents in more than fifty communities; evaluative test review sheets which our own elementary teachers and principals had filled out in appraisal of Swampscott's existing pro- gram; and specimen copies of intelligence and achievement tests solicited from pub- lishers.
Mrs. Cooper's final report incorporated these points:
In summation, the committee recommended that the practice of giving Ability Tests in Grades 1, 3, 6, 9 and 11 be continued and that tests of Achievement be given each year in Grades 1 through 8. Read- ing Tests are to be given in Grades 9, 10 and 11, the scores to be shared with all teachers of instruction con- cerned with the development of reading skills. Tests in particular areas for diagnosis and counseling are to be given at the discretion of the guidance director and counselors. Each member of the committee evaluated the tests finally chosen for the new testing program on the basis of the criteria on the attached Evaluation Sheet. The Metropolitan Battery of Achievement Tests was chosen for Grades 1 through 8, based on the factors of 1) suita- bility, 2) test continuity and score comparison, 3) reliability, 4) valid- ity, and 5) adequacy - recent re- vision of incorporated material.
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The final selection of Intelligence Tests will be the work of the com- mittee this year. Decision was de- layed, awaiting the completion by publishers of the revision of certain of the ability tests.
The immediate result of this project is that a new alignment of tests has been scheduled for the present school year. In October the Metropolitan Achievement tests were given; staff re- action to the success of these is now under study by Mrs. Cooper and the testing committee.
Reading teachers, who worked with the testing committee, recommended that an in-service course for Swampscott teachers explore the over-all picture of developmental reading and its goals from kindergarten through grade 12. Mrs. Marjorie Berg, of the High School, and Miss Nance Marquette, of the Shaw Junior High, have submitted proposals for such a course. Our 1963 budget makes provision for underwriting tuition fees of Swampscott teachers who register for and successfully complete it.
(4) In-service Training
It has long been the requirement that Swampscott teachers, with certain ex- ceptions for age and experience, be required to earn the equivalent of five academic credits every three years. In 1961-62 a committee of faculty mem- bers re-examined the existing policy, seeking to clarify and improve it. In consequence of this committee's recom- mendations, requirements were in some instances tightened, in others relaxed.
These cardinal features now appear in the revised policy, as adopted by the School Committee on September 26, 1962.
a. Continuation of the requirement of five credits in each three-year period, except for teachers who have passed their fiftieth birthday and have had twenty-five years of teaching experi-
ence, or have earned thirty hours of credit beyond the Master's Degree.
b. The condition that courses must be passed with a grade of at least B minus and taken at accredited col- leges and universities.
c. The acceptability, for a maximum of two of the five credits, of certain approved professional activities that are not otherwise rewarded.
d. Fifty per cent reimbursement of the tuition cost of any three-credit course taken in satisfaction of this policy.
Supplementary Programs Attract Fresh Interest
Now in its sixth year - its second under the direction of Mr. Harold Power - the Adult or Continuing Education evening program this year provided ele- mentary Russian, typewriting, furniture refinishing, vocabulary development, drawing and painting, clothing, food, rug braiding, rug hooking, and knitting and crocheting. After the start of the new year, in response to many requests, two new courses will be offered, one in modern mathematics and one in invest- ments.
A Summer Workshop program for pupils, with Hadley Principal Richard Bath as its 1962 director, began its third year of operation with 203 registrations -thirty more than in 1961 and seventy- three more than in 1960. Courses on the secondary school level included typewrit- ing, improvement of study skills, con- versational French, reading, mathematics, and art. Classes for elementary grade pu- pils, offered for the first time this year, covered field science, arithmetic, reading, art, theatre, and French. Questionnaires filled out by the boys and girls enrolled reflected their conviction that the pro- gram had helped and interested them and should be continued, with a wider range of offering, in the summer of 1963.
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A third program deserves comment and praise, that of the American Field Service, which for the second consecu- tive year brought foreign students to study at Swampscott High School. In the fall of 1960, Miss Cibele Nogueira arrived from Brazil and spent her senior year here. This last September, the school had two guest students from abroad, Miss Susan Bucknell of England and Andrew Wezeye of Uganda. The Swamp- scott chapter of the American Field Service, with its president, Mr. Ralph Earle of the High School faculty, is thus carrying out a venture that has high potential not only for enrichment of our own pupils and of their overseas visitors, but also for international good will and understanding.
Professional Advancement Plan Enters First Year
The Swampscott Professional Advance- ment Plan, adopted by the School Com- mittee in November of 1961 after a town-wide salary study committee gave a year and a half to its formulation, went into effect in September of 1962. Last spring the Committee and the ad- ministration published a sixteen-page booklet that set forth the working de- tails of the plan and invited all teachers who had been in the system for at least one year to participate.
Thirty-six responded (exclusive of de- partment heads, supervisors, and guid- ance counsellors for whom special sched- ules of increments and evaluating pro- cedures are now under consideration), thus volunteering for evaluation of their work during the 1962-63 school year by department heads, principals, and the superintendent and the assistant superin- tendent. Those selected will be assigned, as Career Teachers, to key roles in cur- riculum development, in-service training programs, and other professional activi- ties within the system. As long as they continue to rank as Career Teachers, in terms of standard position analysis, they
may receive incentive salary increments of $200 to $400 per year, up to a maxi- mum of $1600 beyond the top step of the salary schedule.
As the program advances into its first year, difficult questions arise - the in- evitable "bugs" that plague most ven- tures at their outset. For example, should department heads, who must play major roles in evaluating other teachers under the plan, be themselves included in the program? Should the plan include guid- ance counselors, whose work may not perhaps yield to the same analysis and appraisal that fits a classroom teacher's performance? To help answer these and similarly demanding questions, the School Committee has set up an advisory group -Mr. Philip Stafford representing the Committee itself, Mr. Francis Chiary the teachers, and Mr. Philip Jenkin the su- perintendent's office. Designated as a Review Council, these three hold fre- quent meetings to consider problems that arise in connection with the Professional Advancement Plan and then submit their recommendations for School Committee approval.
I should like to comment at this point that the plan appeals to me as one of the most promising of its type that I have seen. I am enthusiastic about its future. Its success, however, will depend not only on the good will with which teachers accept it, and upon the fair- minded and objective accuracy with which we who must make the hard judg- ments carry out our appraisals, but also and, quite equally, upon the financial soundness, in comparison with schedules in communities similar to Swampscott, of our basic salary schedule. I cannot stress this last point too heavily. De- pressed salary scales have wrecked many otherwise well-conceived plans of the so-called merit type.
Faculty Shows Small Increase
Our teaching and administrative staff now stands at four more than it did a
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year ago, reflecting expanded programs of instruction at the elementary and junior high levels and increased enroll- ments at the High School.
Seventeen new teachers joined Swamp- scott faculties at the start of the current school year. They averaged 32.2 years in age and 5.5 years in experience. Nine of them hold Master's Degrees - from Boston College, Boston State College, Bowdoin, Boston University, Radcliffe, Simmons, Wesleyan, and the University of California at Berkeley. All hold Bachelor's Degree's: four from Boston University and one each from Boston College, New England College, Pem- broke, Queens, Salem State, San Fran- cisco, Simmons, Suffolk, Tufts, Univer- sity of Connecticut, University of New Hampshire, University of North Caro- lina, and Williams. Three have studied or taught in foreign countries. Here in Swampscott they undertook positions as follows:
High School
Miss Nancy Benson, French Mr. Verne Bixby, science (dept. head) Mrs. Miriam Dodge, business
Mr. Roger Hooper, mathematics (dept. head)
Mr. Eloy Reese, English and social studies
Mr. Norman Rosenthal, social studies Mrs. Bonnie Wiegand, home economics
Junior High
Miss Hope Brown, library Mrs. Patricia Corcoran, English Mr. John Donohue, science Mr. William Gillis, science Mr. Bruce Grinnell, social studies Mr. David Kontoff, instrumental music
Mrs. Claire Pelletier, French Miss Carole Simmons, English
Clarke
Mrs. Patricia Caruso, third grade
Hadley
Mr. James Johnston, fifth grade
Four teachers already in the system were transferred to other buildings of other levels:
Mr. Richard Call from Shaw, special class, to High School, special class Mrs. Margaret Condon from Stanley, grade four, to Machon, grade four Mrs. Meredith Eickelberger from Had- ley, reading, to Clarke, grade one Mrs. Priscilla Moulton from Shaw, library, to Hadley, library
Two others returned from leaves of absence to resume their former positions:
Mrs. Elsa Hopkins, Hadley, reading
Mrs. Gloria Maifeld, elementary music
Mr. Richard Stevenson, social studies teacher, was given a one-year appoint- ment as assistant to the High School principal and assigned also to share with Principal Mclaughlin in 1962-63 the work of the chairmanship of the social studies department.
Mr. Philip Jenkin, formerly adminis- trative assistant to the superintendent of schools, became acting superintendent on July 1, 1961, and continued in this capacity until August 1, 1962. He then became assistant superintendent.
Two Retire
Two High School department heads retired from positions with which they had been long and valuably identified: Miss Marjorie White, as head of the mathematics department since 1927; Mr. Enos Held, as head of the science de- partment since 1947. Both, in the years before they left, had introduced impor- tant new materials and methods and pro- vided the impetus that today makes pos- sible our growth and acceleration in these two fields.
Mrs. Dorothy Bondelevitch, Hadley fifth grade teacher, was granted leave of absence for the current school year. Mrs. Eva Ladge, Hadley second grade, who
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took leave in 1961-62 to teach in Ger- many, requested and received an exten- sion through 1962-63.
Miss Anne Haugen completed her one- year assignment in replacement of Mrs. Gloria Maifeld, teacher of vocal music in the elementary grades.
Ten teachers submitted resignations: High School
Miss Margaret O'Riordan, business Miss Eileen Soper, French Mrs. Mary Strain, home economics
Junior High
Miss Barbara Bell, English Miss Kay Norling, English Mr. Philip Reddy, science Mr. Gerald Robinson, social studies Mrs. Ethel Schultz, science
Clarke
Mrs. Judith Pilkington, third grade Mrs. Nancy Pocharsky, first grade
Mrs. Barbara Wilson ended her substi- tution at Machon School for Mrs. Joan Devlin, who formally withdrew from her position at the expiration of her leave of absence. In November, Mrs. Sandra Shulkin finished as special class substitute at Stanley when Miss Bernice Chaletzky returned from extended sick leave that began in March.
Changes Occur Also in Non-teaching Staff
The entire community was saddened on the 11th of April by the death of Dr. Harry Lowd, who had been one of the school physicians for thirty-four years and a resident of Swampscott for sixty. He has been greatly missed by the many who knew and respected him.
It was the recommendation of the two other school physicians, Dr. Bicknell and Dr. Bessom, that a successor to Dr. Lowd not be appointed but that, instead, a part-time assistant be assigned to Mrs.
Amy Burk, school nurse; that Mrs. Burk be relieved of her duties as attendance officer; and that their own annual com- pensation for serving the schools be re- duced from $400.00 to the purely nomi- nal sum of $100.00. The School Com- mittee accepted the doctors' offer to serve at a lower stipend and also their other recommendations, subsequently naming Mrs. Ruth Turner as half-time assistant to Mrs. Burk and Mr. Alfred Frazier as attendance officer.
In other changes, Mrs. Bessie Heggie retired in December after more than seventeen years as the junior high school secretary and Mrs. Ruth Leary, who had been employed in 1959, resigned as cafe- teria helper at the Shaw School. Mrs. Heggie has been succeeded by Mrs. Marion Dwyer, transferred from the High School office. Mrs. Irene Townsend, formerly assisting Mrs. Dwyer at the High School, has now taken over her full responsibilities in that office.
School Committee Year Is Busy
During 1962 the School Committee held thirty-eight meetings, twenty-eight more than the regular sessions required by its by-laws.
It also doubled as the High School Building Committee and in this capacity held twenty-two meetings, seven of these distinct from School Committee sessions. Thus the members gathered together on a total of forty-five separate occasions. Mr. George Chadwell served also on the Machon building committee and so met on other and frequent occasions with that group.
Mr. Theodore Sargent completed his year in office as president of the Na- tional School Boards Association.
Other meetings attended by Swamp- scott committeemen included the New England School Development Council's meeting at the Harvard Club in Boston .on March 30 and the three-day conven- tion of the Massachusetts Association of
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School Committees at the New Ocean House in May.
Mr. Walter Forbes did not stand for re-election in 1962 and was succeeded in March by Mr. Philip Stafford, who had previously served as School Committee member in the years preceding World War II. In the Committee's reorganiza- tion Mr. Buckland became chairman and Mr. Sargent vice-chairman.
Enrollments Still Climb At High School
October 1st figures showed a High
School enrollment of 668, in contrast to 609 a year ago and 556 in 1960. The trend is still up: 188 senior and post- graduates will be followed by the present 250 in the ninth, 255 in the tenth, and 225 in the eleventh grades. The School Building Assistance Commission projec- tions of 722 by the fall of 1963, level- ing off thereafter to about 700, promise once again to be close to absolute ac- curacy. The addition to the building, . with its opening set for this com- ing September, will be with us none too soon.
Pupils Enrolled - October 1962
Grades
K
1
2
3
4
5
6 60
Sp
Total
Clarke
64
52
45
48
54
61
384
Hadley
47
50
55
57
55
54
50
368
Machon
27
31
41
29
40
27
31
226
Stanley
45
55
66
5 8
64
72
59
14
433
183
188
207
192
213
214
200
14
1411
Grade 7
Grade 8
Grade 9
Shaw Jr. High
223
237
250
710
Grade 10
Grade 12
P.G.
High School
255
Grade 11 225
183
5 668
2789
These figures reveal a system-wide in- crease over 1961 of nineteen pupils. The High School has fifty-nine more than a year ago. Shaw Junior High enrollments declined by 16, elementary enrollments by 24.
It is my considered opinion that Swampscott can have a school system with few peers in the Commonwealth once it is willing to underwrite its aspira- tions with a commensurate share of its ability. The town's effort on behalf of youth has not always reflected its privi- leged position among the "have" com- munities in one of the more able states. Swampscott has consistently maintained a respected educational positon with rela- tive financial ease, whereas a slightly in-
creased effort could make our system a truly great one.
In Conclusion
In these final lines of this report I should like to express to the members of the School Committee and to the people of this community my very sincerest thanks for the gracious and warm- hearted welcome extended to my family and to me. We are especially grateful for the reception given in our honor by the School Committee and the P.T.A. Council at the Shaw Junior High School on November 1st and attended by the many staff and townspeople who voiced, as fellow workers and neighbors, their good wishes and kind words of welcome.
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I wish to acknowledge my apprecia- tion of Mr. Philip A. Jenkin, who has for more than a year carried the double responsibility of superintendent and as- sistant superintendent, who led the sys- tem through the tragedy of Dr. Forrest's death, the planning period for the high school addition, and the orientation of a new superintendent. It is indeed a tribute to Mr. Jenkin that the Swampscott schools did not lose their effectiveness during this period of emergency and manpower shortage.
A special thank you goes to Miss Ger- trude Donlon, secretary to the superin- tendent, and to Mrs. Jane Pinard, secre- tary to the assistant superintendent, who
have shared without visible complaint my load, my headaches, and my impatience; and who have thereby transformed what could have been a critical experience into a rewarding venture.
The impressions I have gained from these first four very pleasant months in Swampscott could not be better or more encouraging. To you of the School Com- mittee, and to those people whom you represent, I am deeply indebted and most thankful.
Respectfully yours,
Charles L. Whitcomb Superintendent of Schools
FINANCIAL STATEMENT
Appropriation
$1,295,417.00
Transfer
2,575.56
Total
$1,297,992.75
Expenditures :
Salaries
$1,109,502.61
Office Expense
15,941.33
Travel Expense
1,731.77
Building Expense
68,898.03
Insurance
1,800.00
Miscellaneous
92,943.72
Out-of-State Travel
1,956.65
Federal-aided Projects
4,991.86
1,297,765.97
Balance at Close of Year
226.78
Receipts Deposited with Town Treasurer:
State Aid, General School Fund
72,877.00
State Aid, Special Services
11,508.00
State Aid, Vocational Schools
830.00
Tuition Received:
Summer School Fees
4,077.00
Adult Education Fees
1,156.00
Other Receipts
450.00
90,898.00
Net Cost to Town
$1,206,867.97
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PUBLIC LIBRARY TRUSTEES
GEORGE W. HOWE, Chairman
ANDREW R. LINSCOTT
RUTH M. BARRY, Secretary
EDITH N. SNOW, Librarian
In 1962 we requested a grant of money from the Commonwealth avail- able for qualified free public libraries under legislation passed several years ago. The amount allotted to us by the State Board of Library Commissioners was $3323.50. We inserted an article in the Warrant at the Annual Town Meeting of 1962 asking the Town to direct the Town Treasurer to hold this money for our library purposes. The article was unanimously adopted. Unfortunately when the money arrived in July the Town Treasurer informed us that the Director of Accounts of the Common- wealth of Massachusetts had advised him not to hand over the money to the Library. We asked the Town Counsel for an opinion. He rendered one on July 10, 1962 informing us that in his opinion the money should be turned over to the Library. The wording of the Statute un- der which the money is made available to libraries has caused confusion, but some towns have received the amount due them. The Town Treasurer and the Director of Accounts of the Common- wealth disagreed with the Town Counsel. We did not get the money.
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