This past Saturday, a steady flow of parents and children from across our community gathered to cheer on the Mamaroneck High School boys and girls lacrosse teams, and to see for themselves the renovations that have taken place at Memorial Field. One of the most visible elements of the makeover was a banner, prominently displayed above a rock wall in the northeast corner of the field, emblazoned with the words "Tiger Pride."
Let's forget for a moment that it's lions, not tigers, that travel in a pride. A group of tigers is called an ambush, according to the prevailing authority on such things, the
Book of Saint Albans. Originally printed back in 1486,
The Book of Hunting, Hawking and Blasing of Arms (as it's also known) is the go-to text for such things as collective nouns: a bloat of hippos, a murder of crows, and the ever-popular barrel of monkeys.
Five hundred and thirty-three years of precedent notwithstanding, pride is the right word for our community of Tigers of all stripes. As the conversation in our District takes its annual turn toward the School Budget, that sign is an important reminder that there's much to be proud of in our schools -- which are the reason most of us moved here in the first place.
A school budget is a financial expression of a district's educational plan. Its principles and its priorities are demonstrated by how it chooses to spend its money. The same applies to our community of voters, who have shown in recent years what matters most through overwhelming support for our District's educational plan. And for good reason.
When our superintendent, Dr. Robert Shaps, introduced his proposed budget to the Board of Education last month, he spoke first about several of our District's defining
Points of Pride, which extended to areas both curricular and cultural.
There is much to be celebrated about our schools, both within the walls of our buildings (like the opening of the International Library at Hommocks or the expansion of our Dos Caminos Kindergarten-through-5th grade dual-language program into the middle
school next year) and beyond our district's borders (like Mamaroneck High School freshmen winning the junior division at the Harvard Debate Tournament or the many Original Science Research students who won awards at the Westchester-Rockland Junior Science and Humanities Symposium). It's the unique experiences, like the PACE 3 students who directed performances by 2nd-graders from Mamaroneck Avenue School, and the everyday ones. Our District has adopted the reduction of food waste in our cafeterias as a core principle, and its groundbreaking work in the area of Social and Emotional Learning will be observed and studied by a team of educators visiting from the Tri-State Consortium next week.
At Tuesday night's Board of Education study session (7:00 p.m. in the MHS Tiered Classroom), you will hear discussion of the District's ongoing work in addressing the vital issues of diversity and inclusiveness -- challenging conversations that are going on in public school systems everywhere and across society. Our District continues its ongoing examination of our curriculum, attempting
to ensure that all perspectives are included in classroom reading materials and that conditions are created that foster respectful discussions in diverse classrooms. Mamaroneck is at the forefront in adopting New York State's Culturally Responsive-Sustaining Education framework, and our work with Social Studies specialist, April Francis, will continue.
Our identity -- Six Schools, One Community, One Mission -- is spelled out front and center on the
District's website, which remains a valued resource for the most accurate and up-to-date information about our schools and the education plan behind
the recommended 2019-2020 School Budget. We encourage you to know before you vote, and to participate in the conversation that will continue at every Board meeting and at every school's PTA general membership meetings this month.
We are, if nothing else, a community of committed parents -- so much so that if Saint Albans were alive today and lived in our District, he surely would be inspired to coin a new collective noun in his book's next reboot: a commitment of parents. A distinction we all can take pride in.
