A Voice and a Choice for Connecticut: Governor Weicker Unveils Plan for Quality, Integrated Schools

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LoweLL P. WEICKER JR. 1k 

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STATE OF CONNECTICUT 2 (% 

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HARTFORD. CONNECTICUT X 

06106 

CONTACT: Avice Meehan (0) 566-4840 EMBARGOED FOR DELIVERY 

(h) 521-2428 12 NOON, Jan. 6, 1992 

Tom Murphy (o) 566-8792 
(h) 287-1545 

A VOICE AND A CHOICE FOR CONNECTICUT: 
GOVERNOR WEICKER UNVEILS PLAN FOR QUALITY, INTEGRATED SCHOOLS 

Governor Lowell P. Weicker Jr. today announced a sweeping 
program to provide a quality and integrated learning experience for 
all Connecticut public schoolchildren. 

Governor Weicker's program requires that key decisions 
about the future of Connecticut schools be made at the local and 

regional level to ensure flexibility and to encourage communities to 
cooperate with each other in developing workable plans. 

"The racial and economic isolation in Connecticut's school 
system is indisputable," Governor Weicker said in a speech before 
the General Assembly on the opening day of the 1993 legislative 
session. 

"Whether this segregation came about through the chance of 
historical boundaries or economic forces beyond the control of the 
state or whether it came about through private decisions or in spite 
of the best educational efforts of the state, what matters is that 
it is here and that it must be dealt with," he continued. 

Fundamental to the plan outlined by Governor Weicker is the 
belief that planning for the creation of quality, integrated schools 
must begin within individual communities. The plan lays out an 
ambitious timetable that starts the process in July 1993 and 
requires communities to begin meeting on a regional basis by late 
this fall. 

"This process gives the communities of Connecticut a voice 
and a choice. I am confident we will not let the moment escape," he 
said. 

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2. Planning would begin at the local level. Governor 
Weicker has proposed that individual communities begin July 1 to 
consider ways they can contribute to creating quality and integrated 
schools in their region. Participants will include the board of 
education chairman, school superintendent, administrators, teachers, 
parents and town officials, including the mayor or first selectman 
and any other group the community wants to involve. 

3. By the end of November 1993, communities in all six 
regions must begin meeting to develop a five-year plan for 
submission to the State Board of Education. Plans must be submitted 
to the board by July 1994 for review and approval. All communities 
will be expected to participate in developing the regional plan. 

Public hearings are an integral part of this phase. 

PLAN CONTENTS : 
  

Each of the six regions will be expected to devise a 
five-year plan that fits with the individual circumstances and needs 
of their communities. For example, one region may consider 
interdistrict magnet schools while others may focus on school choice 
or on the development of regional schools. 

Governor Weicker's proposal maintains local school district 
boundaries, although some regions may conclude that combining 
resources makes sense. 

Each plan will be expected to address specific issues that 
include the following: 

l. Program: Development of multi-cultural curriculum; grade 
organization; special needs programs, including bilingual, special 
education and the gifted; school calendar; school safety; 
construction and renovation of school buildings. 

2. Staff: Recruitment and retention of minority teachers 
and staff; training; contract issues. 

3. Finance: Fiscal authority for programs, school 
construction and renovation; governance. 

4. Integration: Evidence that progress is being made in 
reducing the racial and economic isolation of all students on a 
school-by-school, region-wide basis. 

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A VOICE AND A CHOICE FOR CONNECTICUT: 
CREATING QUALITY AND INTEGRATED SCHOOLS 

  

Connecticut has long sought to integrate its public schools 
and to ensure equity in the classroom. Progress has been made, but 
it has been too little and too slow. 

That is why the Weicker Administration is proposing a 
program that will engage every community in Connecticut in the 
development of regional plans to establish quality and integrated 
schools. Rather than watching the dreams of our children "dry up 
like a raisin in the sun" -- to use the words of Langston Hughes -- 
we can use our power to give them the breadth of educational 
opportunity that is each child's birthright. 

The Weicker Administration proposal provides Connecticut 
communities with "a voice and a choice" in determining the future of 
their schools. Legislation to implement this program will be 
submitted to the General Assembly in February. 

GOALS 
  

Each of the 166 school districts in Connecticut must come 
together to plan and implement a program that will move toward 
improving achievement levels of our students and end both the racial 
and economic isolation that now exists in our schools. 

Under a timetable proposed by the Weicker Administration, 
individual school districts and communities will begin in September 
1995 to implement a regional five-year plan. Each region's unique 
five-year plan will establish goals for reducing isolation, 
promoting cross-cultural understanding and establishing a quality 
and integrated educational experience for all students. 

Over the five-year period, school districts in the region 
will begin reflecting the racial makeup of the region-wide student 
population within limits that will be established in conjunction 
with the planning process. 

PLANNING PROCESS 
  

l. The Weicker Administration proposes a geographical 
configuration of six regions (map attached) that will permit local 
districts to retain control over fiscal, programmatic and personnel 
operations of their district while encouraging existing 
collaborative efforts. 

The regions are largely consistent with the six current 
Regional Educational Service Centers and also mesh with the 
reorganization of state human service programs mandated by the 
General Assembly. This approach will directly link -- for the first 
time -- educational and social services for children. Under the 
Governor's plan, the state Department of Education will provide 
technical assistance at all stages of the process and planning funds 
and staff support at the regional level. 

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Governor Weicker urged the legislature to consider 
carefully his proposals and to act swiftly in addressing the needs 
of Connecticut's children. The Governor noted that Connecticut's 
educational system faces a legal challenge in Sheff vs. O'Neill, a 
lawsuit brought on behalf of 19 Hartford-area schoolchildren. 

"It is not my intention to handicap the result of Sheff vs. 
O'Neill. Either way the court decides, there will be no winner. If 
the decision is for the plaintiffs, the courts, in the absence of 
any initiative by us, will run the schools of Connecticut and the 
children lose. If the decision is for the defendant, in the absence 
of any initiative by us, the children lose," the Governor said. 

"A school system created by you, by local school boards, by 
the executive branch, will work better than the divinings of one or 
more jurists no matter how knowledgeable or sensitive those 
individuals might be," he continued. 

Governor Weicker's plan is based on a geographical 
configuration of six regions consistent with the six regions for 
human service delivery mandated by the General Assembly as part of 
the reorganization of state government. The regions also build on 
existing interdistrict efforts, most of which are linked to the six 
Regional Educational Service Centers. 

Over a five-year period, beginning in September 1995, each 
region will be responsible for moving all of its schools toward 
racial balance to reflect region-wide school demographics. Since the 
number of minority students differs from region to region, each 
group of communities would be expected to develop an approach that 
reflects their needs and resources. 

Each regional five-year plan -- which would require 
approval from the State Board of Education -- would be comprehensive 
in nature, addressing issues ranging from curriculum and staffing, 
to fiscal authority and governance. 

Legislation to implement the Governor's initiative will be 
submitted to the General Assembly in early February. 

Governor Weicker's initiative was developed in consultation 
with the Commissioner of Education, Vincent Ferrandino and builds on 
work by the state Board of Education, which has focused on the 
issues of racial and economic isolation for many years. The Governor 
met Wednesday with members of the state Board of Education before 
making his announcement. 

A succession of reports issued over the past five years has 
provided stark evidence of the differences between "the two 

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Connecticuts " -- one affluent, white and suburban; the other, poor, 
minority and urban. 

"Today, despite all good intentions, there are two 
Connecticuts when it comes to the education of our children, 
Connecticuts separated by racial and economic divisions," the 
Governor told legislators. "There is a Connecticut of promise, as 
seen in its suburbs, and a Connecticut of despair as seen in its 
poverty-stricken cities." 

Governor Weicker noted that 80 percent of Connecticut's 
minority students live in only 18 school districts -- Hartford 
public schools have a minority enrollment of 93 percent, while 
Bridgeport's minority enrollment is 86 percent and New Haven's is 82 
percent. At the other extreme, 136 of Connecticut's 166 school 
districts have minority enrollments below 10 percent while 98 
districts have a minority enrollment of less than 5 percent. 

Statewide, minority enrollment is 25.7 percent. 

Poor children are also clustered in Connecticut's cities in 
overwhelming proportions. Today, for example, 19 percent of all 
elementary schoolchildren qualify for the federal school lunch 
program of free and reduced-price meals. In Hartford, 63 percent of 
all students receive this assistance; in Bridgeport, 62 percent of 
all children and in New Haven, 49 percent. 

Furthermore, the Strategic School Profile reports, issued 
for the first time in 1992, show that considerable disparities exist 
among racial groups and between wealthy and poor communities in 
terms of academic performance and achievement. 

Urban schools did not perform as well as the state average 
on all measures of performance, including state mastery tests, 
physical fitness and the Scholastic Aptitude Test. Students from the 
affluent suburbs out-performed the state average on all measures of 
performance. 

In December 1990, the report of the Governor's Commission 
on Quality and Integrated Education made sweeping recommendations to 
move Connecticut's public school system toward providing all of its 
students with a quality and integrated learning environment. 

The Governor's proposals are consistent with that report, 
which called for development of magnet schools, expansion of 
interdistrict cooperative programs, creation of regions organized 
around the existing Regional Educational Service Centers and greater 
investment in such areas as preventive health care. 

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. The commission noted in its report that "the majority of 
Connecticut's students are isolated from daily educational contact 
with students of other races and ethnic groups. It is time for all 
of us to break down the barriers that remain in our school 
districts, in our communities, in our schools and classrooms and in 
our hearts." 

Governor Weicker, in concluding his speech, noted that 
Connecticut began addressing the issue of the equitable financing of 
public school education more than 20 years ago. Today, he said, the 
state faces yet another challenge. 

"In the wake of the Horton vs. Meskill decision, we were 
able to adopt a fairer way of financing our schools," the Governor 
said. "Today, we can take the necessary second step to providing an 
equal educational experience by providing our students with a 
quality, integrated education. It would be a salutary achievement 
for government to do in 1993 by legislative and executive action 
what 20 years ago was left to a court." 

  

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