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The New York State Education
Department recently acknowledged what those
familiar with the Burton Street Elementary School
have known for a long, long time; that the school
is among the best in the state.
The state education department
recognized that fact last month when it announced
that the school had been named one of the state's
Blue Ribbon Elementary schools. The award is
noteworthy on many counts, not the least of which
is the fact that only seven were named across the
entire state and Cazenovia is the only recipient
this side of Poughkeepsie.
Burton Street School Principal
Susan Gorton said she was thrilled with the award.
"It validates everything we have known here for a
long time," she said. "It makes a public statement
about the quality of programs here and the quality
of the faculty and staff at Burton Street.
"
Mrs. Gorton said the process of
applying for the Blue Ribbon Award began in June
when she received the application. From there a
committee, consisting of faculty members, school
administrators, and a school board representative,
began charting their course and preparing the
application. The committee met each week during the
summer finalizing the application before sending it
off in the fall.
The application required
information about a variety of areas including
student performance but also student focus and
support, co-curricular activities, school
organization and culture, faculty development and
leadership, and school/community/family
partnerships. While requirements for the
application limited it to 40 pages, Mrs. Gorton
said the amount of data collected by the different
subcommittees could have filled many times
more.
She said the application
provided an opportunity for herself and the school
faculty to do a self-assessment and look at what
has worked well and what things could possibly be
improved. In addition, the application process
necessitated looking at applications from other
schools and drawing from their experiences and
programs.
"It's important to note that
many of the programs we do at Burton Street have
been going on for a long time and long before I
came here," she said. "A good example is the third
grade speech night program. That has become an
annual tradition and has been going here for at
least 15 years. We have added new things, like the
No Put Downs Program and our Good Sports Program
but one program is no more important than the
other. What we learned from our application was
that there isn't just one area where we were so far
ahead of others. When you take all the things we do
here and put them together, it makes for a pretty
impressive package. You could call the application
a very big brag book."
The application contained eight
sections plus a section on special education. Of
those different sections, the Cazenovia application
received an exemplary score on six.
Mrs. Gorton said one of the more
satisfying lessons learned during the application
process was how many educationally valuable things
faculty do without even thinking about it. "I can't
begin to count the number of times we would be
discussing some part of the application and a
committee member would tell another faculty person
that they were already doing this or that and the
teacher would say something like 'You're right. I
never thought about it like that."
While the Blue Ribbon Award has
been received the work does not stop there. At some
point this spring representatives from the U.S.
Department of Education will visit the school to
validate the application.
"We really need to keep the
application alive," Mrs. Gorton said. "Every
faculty member received a copy of the application
so they know the value of what they are doing every
day."
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