I am writing in appreciation of Superintendent David Aderhold’s efforts to serve the social and emotional needs of the “Whole Child.” I am the founder of a movement called Take Back Childhood whose mission is to support common-sense measures to address the toxic culture of hyper-competitiveness and stress in WW-P schools.
I have attended the past several school board meetings and have heard many parents voice their concerns about the proposed changes to the A&E math program. Many of these parents have stated that they moved to the area because of the schools. I, too, moved to West Windsor for the schools. I moved here in 1997 because of the community’s diversity and the community’s commitment to excellent education. I stayed here and have volunteered hundreds of hours of my time to the district in the service of administrators who have embraced the WW-P mission of educating the “Whole Child, Every Child.”
In the spirit of “Whole Child” education, our current administration has bravely taken concrete steps to address the mental health crisis facing the children of our district. I was shocked to learn that the district had to refer 120 students for psychological evaluation last year, and that 40 of those students were ultimately hospitalized. Can anyone blame the administration for its passionate effort to acknowledge the emotional needs of our students?
Consider the very recent suicide clusters among students at UPenn and MIT, and among high school students in the Palo Alto, California area. Palo Alto students live in the shadow of Stanford, just as our students live in the shadow of Princeton. Parents, teachers, and school administrators in Palo Alto are going through a serious period of self-reflection regarding the pressures facing their students.
Tragedies like this are often followed by collective hand-wringing, and affected communities are haunted by the question: “Did we miss the warning signs?” Can anyone blame our administration for taking proactive steps to ameliorate a mental health crisis before we become another Palo Alto?
While there has recently been a visible and vocal force of opposition from a small group within our school community, I would like to call attention to the large number of parents over the last decade who have expressed frustration that the administration has not done enough to minimize unnecessary sources of stress for the kids in our district. These parents are often the ones who volunteer countless hours of their time to enhance the student experience for our children. These parents have been begging administrators to confront the “Race to Nowhere” climate head-on.
I urge the administration and school board not to bow to the demands of a recently organized protest. Please stand firm and continue the process of improving the programs and the learning environment of our district.
Catherine Foley
Hawthorne Drive, West Windsor
Editor’s note: Foley is a leader of the “Take Back Childhood” group.
I fully support the superintendent’s commitment to examine and adopt best practices for educating all children in our district. I admire the risks that our superintendent is taking to ensure that we as a community focus on the social and emotional health of all our children while providing a dynamic, educational environment that encourages academic rigor, curiosity, and a life-long desire for learning.
I encourage the entire Board of Education to also support Dr. Aderhold as we begin the community-wide dialogue on what it means to be “successful” and openly discuss mental health issues without stigmatization.
The board’s support of Dr. Aderhold will be critical as the community and the district move forward together on these issues.
As George Scott said in his district-wide presentation to WW-P parents on November 12, “It’s not too late. It is never too late.” The district and community have the opportunity to affect positive change in the lives of our youth. We must act now.
Brandi Hebert
Please allow me to express my unequivocal support for the current movement to reduce student stress in our schools, both as a parent and as a Rutgers professor.
I am proud to be a member of a school district that is putting the needs of our children first in this way. The demands on our students’ time and attention have indeed reached unacceptable levels, and this is not a matter of opinion; study after study demonstrate the value of “down-time” for the developing mind and its ability to return the next day to the task of learning.
I eagerly await the next piece of the puzzle, and hope fervently for a revised homework policy that allows our children to better recoup from their busy school day in the afternoon and evening. We are burning them out.
I can tell you what burn-out looks like from the post-high-school viewpoint. It is real and it is not pretty. Many students look for exactly what actions lead to grades, ever worried about “what shows up” instead of actually thinking deeply about topics. This is not true across the board, of course, but I see increasing signs that students have to find ways to “get through” their assignments instead of being able to embrace the chance to learn and think.
I applaud our school administration for being a leader in the change that surely will eventually come to many schools, to return learning to a more joyful process and make it less about getting through or getting ahead. In psychology we identify the difference between intrinsic (doing for its own sake) and extrinsic (doing for a goal like a grade) motivation, and we know that true accomplishment almost exclusively comes from intrinsic motivation.
I have heard some say that our children will be at a disadvantage if they are not pressed into high-pressure environments (such as final exams) in middle and high school. I find this argument to be flawed. If you force a child to do something before he or she is developmentally ready, the child may succeed eventually, but will spend untold more hours of stress and concentration in the learning. An older child will pick up the same skill in a matter of weeks. It is the same with skills like test-taking: when they are grown, they will have the ability to prioritize, organize, and review lots of high-level material and pass exams like the CPA or the Bar. They do not need to start working on those skills at age 14 (or earlier).
High-pressure schools will find themselves on the wrong side of history, and I commend our superintendent for having the courage to say enough is enough.
Terri Kurtzberg Horowitz
Associate Professor, Management and Global Business
Rutgers University
I just want to send a brief word in support of the board’s measures to dial down stress, to examine and adopt best practices for educating the “whole child” regardless of age or ability, and for dedicating resources to educate our children and community about maintaining a healthier life-balance with regard to academics and other life pursuits.
Nothing is more important than the future of our children. We must shift our focus from seeing our kids as test scores to seeing them as whole human beings.
Debra Wolosky
West Windsor
