The only way to make any progress on any issues in our towns.(the mendhams and chesters) ie taxes ,school boards,merging police departments....vote out the current mayors and town councils,send a message loud and clear that we are all fed up. For those of you in the Borough ,you can meet your representatives twice a month on Mondays at the Mendham Pub.....a violation of the Sunshine Laws ,but who cares......

In the the last 8 ears the Mendham Township K-8 school system has had 10 different superintendents. Since CBS has come on the scene in the last year, the West Morris District has had 2. I think it is rather obvious that no one wants to work here. I don't blame them. People like Charlene and Jamie Button don't bring talent to a district; they repel it.

@Charlene go back under your rock . You are just pissed Basking Ridge is better

Charlene only provides a link to the metrics used because she knows no one will spend the time really reading it, but never mentions the inconvenient fact that US News used IB OR AP exams (whichever a school had the most of), NOT BOTH which negatively impacts any rankings for the West Morris district. CBS founder Jamie Button's only way to turn a resounding success into a failure...lie.

Please go away with your nonsense "CBS". You are dividing the towns when we should be working together to make our schools more effective! You got your pound of flesh and then some and hey, your school ranked higher than ours - whoopee for you!

Divide and conquer thats Ms Arringtons stance. She wants to always cause discontent . She must some how make money off of it. I would like to meet her supporters if any .

if Bobby Joe is correct and I assume he is, then all of the BOE members would know this also. This being the case, why would Jamie Button continue to attempt to discredit his own school district by lying to the public? He has already lied to the public and to his constituents by claiming that he was promised funding for a study by Commissioner of Education. How much longer are the good people of Mendham Township going to tolerate this behavior?

Great conversation, as usual, everyone. We'll be at tonight's meeting with the mayors and representatives from the area's school boards (http://patch.com/A-tgld) to find out who will be named chair and vice chair for a new committee that will study what should be done with the regional district.

Who's going to be there with us?

Jason- Great conversation as usual? This is nothing more than one directional mud slinging.

Yes Barbara from your girl Charlene.

Barbara, the blog and some of the responding posts (like Jeffco) bring up one position and other posts take a different position. Have we really gotten to the point where we are criticizing Jason's compliments? Come on! Its pie night!

If we put our heads together and study the issues thoroughly, we can work together to improve the education of the students and do it in the most cost effective and efficient way. Let's hear each other with an open mind and a kind heart.
Marilyn

Well well....NEWSWEEK has just published its own report. WMM doesn't fare so badly in this one. http://www.thedailybeast.com/newsweek/2012/05/20/america-s-best-high-schools.html

it's NOT about 'rank' it's about education and where the kids GO ... seriously are we stuck in the 80s and 90s where it's all about the 'name'?
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get over yourselves!
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the HS here have some serious issues! LESS then 10% of the kids are getting educated as they need to be! if IB is not meeting the needs of the MAJORITY of kids dump it and go AP! Trust me, college would prefer to see a kid with 10 AP classes then an IB 'certificate' at a school that offers an IB degree (or didn't the HS tell you that?)
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colleges want to see the kids take the 'most academic rigorous classes offered' so certificates don't cut it!
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oh, and the schools don't need to 'break up' then need to UNIFY! the schools should have ONE set of requirements, etc... each school is run independent of the other that just drives up taxes and serves no one... the idea is to merge resources.. that is what colleges are doing!

I am new to this discussion - just looked at the Newsweek rankings.
WMM went from 143 to 291. WMC went from 220 to 226.
How fair / meaningful are these rankings? How concerned should future WMM parents be? (we are still 5 years away from high school). Is this a trend or a blip?

http://www.thedailybeast.com/newsweek/2012/05/20/america-s-best-high-schools.html

you are correct Barbie. remember in 2006 when Money Mag ranked Hackettstown one of the best towns in the country.

The schools were ranked on the % of kids who graduate, the % of kids accepted to a 2 or 4 year college, the number of AP or IB tests given per students in the school, the average SAT scores, average ACT scores, and average AP or IB score (not sure how they do this given the different grading scales?).

So for Mendham HS - at 98% graduation rate, we could certainly look at who those 2% are and get them special attention if they don't already get it - or their parents haven't sought it.

At 0.5 AP or IB tests per student taken - we could certainly try to get more kids to take these tests by encouraging them to enroll in Honors/AP/IB classes if their parents haven't done so. Teachers already offer kids a pass on their finals if they take an AP test. Why don't more do it?

At 93% accepted to a 2 or 4 year college, we could encourage those 7% who have not been accepted, or do not plan to attend, to make sure they apply to CCM which takes all comers if their parents haven't done so, so we can get a higher score.

We could encourage kids to do more studying for their SAT and ACT tests, in case their parents haven't done so - or encourage their parents to pay for prep classes.

We could make the IB and AP review sessions offered to students mandatory, in case their parents haven't encouraged them to attend. The district already pays for these sessions - it's up to the kids to show up.

If you sense that I think that parents can play the biggest role in getting more kids to take higher level classes at Mendham and raising our ranking, you're right.

Parents, any thoughts?

Step number one for the Chester's to fix any problem is to become just Chester Township and the same goes for the Mendham's as well. There are no longer two separate towns in either case. Combine the towns along with everyhing else, e.g. PD's, DPW's, etc...