Mother Has High Praise For Chester Schools

Editor,

When we received a phone call that our daughter, Jessica King, was offered a role with the National Tour of BILLY ELLIOT we were thrown off guard a little.

One of our biggest concerns was her education. How would she keep up with the rest of her class? What would happen when she returned during breaks from the show and came home? How would she transition back into the classroom once she finished her contract? How would she still learn Chinese?

BILLY ELLIOT employs On Location Education which is the nation’s premier educational consulting service for young performers. Their staff warned us that not all school districts were cooperative and that we may need to seek alternative methods.

We sat down and met with Mr. Robert Mullen, school principal at Black River Middle School just days before school was to begin. Our fears were eliminated and we were given the fullest support possible. Mr. Mullen consulted with superintendent Dr. Christina Vanwoert who echoed her full support on the matter.

All of the teachers worked diligently to get textbooks ready, curriculum/materials ready. Jessica was able to attend school the very first day Sept. 6 and left on a flight that very afternoon to join the tour.

Black River is already using online technology in many forms to communicate assignments and notifications to it’s students. This made it much easier to facilitate a solution for Jessica’s situation.

The care, understanding and sincere commitment of the entire Chester School system has allowed Jessica to experience this amazing opportunity and continue to be on par with her classmates.

Jodi Conaty

Chester Township