“THE WRSC [WRSD COMMITTEE] IS A DISASTER OF EPIC PROPORTIONS.” IT DIDN’T KNOW THAT PHONICS HAD BEEN ELIMINATED FROM THE CURRICULUM??? NOW READING LEVELS ARE AT MINUS THREE GRADES

As a Paxton reader of this Blog wrote last week, “The WRSC [WRSD Committee] is a disaster of epic proportions.” SEE previous Blog post on the ‘SECRET’ 4 February 2025 meeting involving the WRSD Committee, the WRSD Superintendent, and officials representing the 5 WRSD towns.

The fact that the WRSD Committee is and has been stupid, detached, incompetent, and dishonest is illustrated by the 14 February 2025 email sent by Sterling WRSD Committee member Linda Woodland to a Sterling voter who asked about the WRSD’s switch to a ‘new’ curriculum.

“Dear Ms. ______,

Thank you for reaching out. I too would like the Sterling FinCom meetings to be recorded and broadcast. The meeting on February 27th at 6:30pm is open to the public. It will be at the Media Center at WRHS, and should be recorded and broadcast. I will double check that to be sure, but please know that the public is welcome to attend. I can’t answer all of your questions, but I can provide some history to the curriculum choice that was discussed at the meeting we both attended.

Before my time on the committee, Dr. McCall’s administration selected Fontas & Pinnell (F&P) for the elementary ELA curriculum. It was purchased, I believe, around 2016 and first implemented for Kindergarteners for the 2017-2018 school year. Teachers were trained in it one grade-level per year while using the previous curriculum (I believe it was Fundations), and then implemented Fontas & Pinnell the next year. It took a very long time to unroll from grade to grade. From what I understand, many other districts were adopting F&P around the same time, too.

Sometime around 2020-2022, F&P curriculum was identified as an incomplete curriculum for teaching to read. The big problem is that it does not teach phonics, but rather encourages kids to guess at words. This method can work for some kids, but not nearly enough. Many school districts across MA were using this curriculum, and so this is a widespread problem with ELA instruction. WRSD is not alone in facing this problem. Now, DESE implemented a new method of rating curriculum, and created a standard for earning the label “High Quality Instructional Materials”. They also created grants to help districts to dump F&P and select a different curriculum that meets these new standards. WRSD received such a grant sometime in FY23 or FY24 for researching and selecting new curriculum, and now teachers are using the new ELA curriculum for K-5 students. So far it looks like a big improvement, but testing the results is still in early stages.

From what I understand, Dr. McCall’s administration selected and implemented the curriculum without formally requesting a vote from the School Committee, however I do not know exactly how that happened. I began on the committee in 2019, and this curriculum change was in 2015 or 2016. Typically a school committee is asked to approve major curriculum changes that are selected by the administration, but does not make the actual selection. The current administration has begun a curriculum selection process that involves information from DESE and significant involvement of teachers and principals, to put curriculum under a microscope before it’s selected. I do not know how Dr. McCall’s administration selected the curriculum before this, and none of the administrators from Central Office from that time are still employed by the district (emphasis added).

Best,

Linda”

SO phonics was eliminated from the WRSD curriculum in or about 2017-2018 and the WRSD Committee didn’t realize until 2020-2022 that WRSD kids were not learning to read properly BECAUSE phonics was omitted from the F&P curriculum. BRILLIANT ENGAGEMENT ON THEIR PART.

Ms. Woodland indicates that previous WRSD Superintendent McCall, who retired after it came to light that he had overspent the authorized WRSD budget by $1.6 million a couple years ago, “selected and implemented the [F&P] curriculum without formally requesting a vote from the School Committee.”

WELL, that’s BULLSHIT. The F&P curriculum, the one without phonics, “was purchased… around 2016” according Ms. Woodland. NOTHING can be purchased by the WRSD without authorized representatives of the WRSD Committee first signing a written spending authorization called a “Warrant.” Spending Warrants are approved by vote of the ENTIRE WRSD Committee.

SEE Mass.Gen.Laws Ch. 71, Sec. 16A—

https://malegislature.gov/Laws/GeneralLaws/PartI/TitleXII/Chapter71/Section16a

SO the WRSD Committee knew damned well in 2016 that the F&P curriculum was purchased and would be implemented. They just didn’t care enough to find out what was in it, or what wasn’t in it.

The WRSD Committee is the WRSD’s governing body. IT controls the Superintendent and the curriculum, NOT THE OTHER WAY AROUND.

Mass.Gen.Laws Ch. 71, Sec. 37 provides:

“The school committee in each city and town and each regional school district shall have the power to select and to terminate the superintendent, shall review and approve budgets for public education in the district, and shall establish educational goals and policies for the schools in the district consistent with the requirements of law and statewide goals and standards established by the board of education. The school committee in each city, town and regional school district may select a superintendent jointly with other school committees and the superintendent shall serve as the superintendent of all of the districts that selected him (emphasis added).”

It is clear then that the WRSD Committee is and has been so detached and incompetent that it has abdicated its duty to oversee and control Superintendents and has abdicated its duty to oversee and implement an effective curriculum.

Due to the WRSD Committee’s stupidity, detachment, dereliction of statutory duty, and utter incompetence WRSD students are now reading at three (3) grade levels below where they should be.

As a matter of FACT the WRSD Committee authorized and paid for the F&P curriculum that omitted phonics, an essential tool for FIRST AND SECOND GRADERS to learn vowel sounds in order to sound out spelled words.

Phonics is not rocket science and has been an essential learning tool for MANY decades.

SEE  https://thisreadingmama.com/k-2-phonics-skills-list-printable/

The WRSD Committee can try to evade blame for the current WRSD reading level disaster by pointing the finger at long-gone Superintendent McCall, but under Massachusetts law the responsibility for that disaster lies ENTIRELY WITH THEM.

Tired of funding WRSD institutional bloat, dishonesty, and incompetence??? Then start forcing needed changes by voting down the WRSD’s bloated 2025-2026 budget request during this year’s Annual Town Meeting.

J.G.