44.0°,
Mostly Cloudy A visit from a Regent
Roger Tilles tours Baldwin schools
The Baldwin School District was on display last week as Roger Tilles, a member of the New York State Board of Regents, toured classrooms in Baldwin High School and read to a class at Meadow Elementary School.
Tilles began his tour, accompanied by Superintendent Dr. Shari Camhi and high school administrators, in the BHS med-tech classroom, which is part of the district’s Career Academy that gives students real-world experience in a variety of subjects.
Students, adorned in lab coats, took Tilles and a group of underclassmen through a series of experiments they’ve been working on. Each of the presenting students, like juniors Chad Henry and Teeran Singh, explained and demonstrated how they conduct their research.
From there, Tilles headed to a robotics class where students were hard at work putting together their newest robots. Students in the class were working in pairs and competing against their classmates to build the best robot. A competition is in the works that will settle which pair’s robot is best.
Tilles said he was impressed with the Career Academy classrooms he toured and noted that not many districts in the state have this type of program. He called Baldwin’s Career Academy “the wave of the future.”
“They’re learning their regular courses through careers and that makes so much more sense,” Tilles said. “When kids learn from something relevant they learn much better and it sticks with them.”
Band students, under the direction of Scott Dunn and Kimberly Roof, warmed up with some music scales and rehearsed for an upcoming performance later this month at the appropriately named Tilles Center, on the LIU Post campus. Tilles then headed into the auditorium where the orchestra was rehearsing a piece and took a seat on the outskirts of the stage to get a close-up look at the young musicians.
“The music programs here are strong,” Tilles said. “I was impressed with the level of competency there.”
Deepak Marwah, secondary supervisor for fine and performing arts, said Tilles’ presence has been felt in Baldwin through his work with the Long Island Arts Alliance, which recognized two Baldwin students for their artistic achievements this year. “We were happy to show Mr. Tilles how the arts are celebrated at Baldwin,” Marwah said.
His tour concluded at Meadow, where Tilles read aloud to elementary-age students. Reading to kids, he said, is one of his favorite things to do. “This is the fun part of the job,” he said.
