Hewlett-Woodmere superintendent discusses district issues

We are back and better than ever could have been the title of the superintendent’s roundtable hosted by the Center for Adult Life Enrichment on the campus of Hewlett High School in Hewlett with Hewlett-Woodmere School District Superintendent Ralph Marino Jr. on Aug. 25.

Sitting at a card table in the front of the big meeting room, Marino answered questions for nearly 45 minutes on an assortment of issues, less than a week before the district began a new school year.

With the State Education Department following the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s guidance, Marino said that the 2022-2023 school year that started for his district on Aug. 31, will look and feel more like pre-Covid 2019.“This puts us back to where they were in 2019,” he said. “I’m very, very excited.”

Marino noted that the high school hosted a Freshmen Focus day on Aug. 24 and roughly 200 ninth-graders attended, sat with their friends and received an introduction to their next level of schooling. There are 975 students enrolled in Hewlett High, he said.

For the youngest Hewlett-Woodmere students, it will be the first school year for full day Pre-K at the Franklin Early Childhood Center. Marino said 115 students are enrolled in the district’s new program, which he said, “ties in nicely with the philosophy of the school.”

Task force reports on both the 10-period high school day and the district’s proposed Princeton Plan are expected in November, Marino said. Eliminating the 10-period was originally discussed at a November 2021 board meeting as part of other cost-cutting measures, including paring elective courses. “It’s a work in progress,” Marino said.

The district’s Princeton Plan would move all second and third grade classes to one school and fourth and fifth grades to another. Currently, there are two elementary schools — Hewlett and Ogden — that houses second through fifth grade.

The concept is to organize school districts based on grade levels rather than where people live in the community. It is named for the New Jersey suburb that desegregated its schools in 1948, six years before the Supreme Court’s Brown v. Board of Education decision.

In 2015, the Lawrence School District implemented its version of the Princeton Plan. At the time board officials said it would aid in aligning teaching with state mandates and it is fiscally responsible.
When asked about offering college-level and Advanced Placement classes, Marino said that courses will be offered every other year to offset costs and their college ties with Syracuse, Hofstra and others remain intact.

Longtime Five Towns resident Ellen Margolin sits on the district’s Curriculum Committee, records the minutes for the high school’s Parent-Teacher group and has grandchildren attending Hewlett-Woodmere schools.

“I like to show the superintendent my support, I like to hear the latest things that I might have missed along the way,” Margolin said in explaining why she attended the roundtable.

A shortage of school bus drivers continues to be an issue, however Marino said that with the two bus companies the district is contracted with — Guardian and Independent Coach — the district is in better shape. In tandem with that, he noted the district is not facing a shortage of teachers. “There were not a lot vacancies,” he said. “We filled the positions.”

CALE Executive Director Lee Gerardi said that the reasons behind having the superintendent roundtable are twofold. “We all are kept informed,” she said, “and CALE wishes to show appreciation for our valued relationship we have with Hewlett-Woodmere High School.”