Lesson Plan

Parental involvement, bilingual education top member's list

As a new member of the Boston School Committee, Angel Amy-Moreno said three of his top priorities will be to focus on improving MCAS scores among minorities, especially bilingual students; to ensure bilingual-education programs work; and to increase parental involvement in the school system.

Amy-Moreno, a father of three who lives in Jamaica Plain, said if students are to succeed parents must be involved. “How are we going to strategize to get parents involved in the school system, especially African-American and Latino parents?” One way may be to create incentives to entice parents, he said. For example, parents can be offered sessions on how they can help their children with homework or given gift certificates to bookstores to promote reading, Amy-Moreno said.

“Everybody on the committee, the mayor included, want the schools to be more parent-friendly. . . Often when you go to a school you might not get that welcome. That’s something we need to work at,” he said.

As for bilingual education, school officials need “to make sure if we really want to have a bilingual program then it should be a program where children are exposed to two languages and when they finish they are able to read, write, and speak the two languages,” said Amy-Moreno, who speaks Spanish, French, Italian, and a little Portuguese.

Chairman and professor of social sciences at Roxbury Community College, Amy-Moreno was appointed by Mayor Thomas M. Menino and sworn in Monday. The mayor also reappointed Marchelle Raynor from Roxbury. Raynor is a social service mental-health supervisor at the Gertrude E. Townsend Head Start program in Dorchester and was first appointed in 1998.

The committee governs and sets policy for more than 125 Boston public schools. Commuters wooed

A career in education might just be a subway or bus ride away.

At least that’s what officials with the state Department of Education are hoping with a new recruitment campaign targeting commuters.

More than 200 posters have been put up on the Red, Orange, and Green line subway cars and buses to recruit teachers for public schools. The green, black, and white posters show a picture of a signing bonus recipient teaching and ask, “Could this be you?”

The program for new teachers offers a $20,000 signing bonus. Last year, more than 800 candidates applied and 59 were chosen to receive bonuses.

The program is aimed at current college seniors, recent college graduates and midcareer professionals, especially those in the fields of math, science, and foreign language.

For more information about the signing bonus program, visit the Web site at www.doe.mass.edu. The deadline for applications this year is Feb. 2. High-tech fairs

How do you make computers work faster? How do viruses affect computers? And, how do images get displayed on monitors? Those are some of the questions high school students will be answering at computer fairs next week in Waltham and Concord.

At the fairs, students who are part of the Youth Tech Entrepreneurs program will showcase their technology exhibits and lead others through topics they have been researching.

The Youth Tech program gives students marketable technology skills and then allows them to teach others. It also prepares high school students for leadership and educational achievement by helping them develop and demonstrate academic, entrepreneurial, and technical skills.

The fairs will be from 2:30 to 4:30 p.m. Jan. 11 in the Concord-Carlisle High School library and from 2:30 to 4:30 p.m. Jan. 13 in the Waltham High School cafeteria. The public is invited. Tuition surprise

In an era of skyrocketing college tuition, students at Williams College will get a nice surprise when they open their tuition bill.

For the first time in 46 years, the small liberal arts school in Williamstown will not be increasing tuition. The annual cost, including tuition, room and board, is $31,520 and will remain the same, according to president Carl Voyt.

Strong returns on investments and alumni contributions have helped the college keep tuition the same in the coming academic year. There are about 2,000 students at the college. The town borders New York and Vermont. Acting chancellor named

Board of Higher Education officials yesterday said Vice Chancellor Judith Gill will be named acting chancellor pending board approval. Gill, an experienced administrator, will temporarily replace Chancellor Stanley Z. Koplik, who died on Monday of complications following intestinal surgery. See obituary on Page B8. MCAS QUESTION OF THE WEEK

Lesson Plan will regularly print one question from the 1999 MCAS test for students and parents to use for practice. This week’s question is from the mathematics portion of the Grade 8 exam.

Q. The area of square A is 4 square units. The sides of square B are twice as long as the sides of square A. What is the area of square B?

A) 8 square units

B) 64 square units

C) 32 square units

D) 16 square units

Answer appears at the end of this column.

MCAS answer: D

If you have an education issue you want aired or thoughts on the state of education, write to Lesson Plan, The Boston Globe, PO Box 2378, Boston, MA 02107-2378, or send e-mail to educate. . .globe.com.



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