Newtown Resident—

State Education Official Honored

For Public Service

By Larissa Lytwyn

George Coleman has a passion for education that runs deep.

While attending Columbia University’s Teachers’ College to acquire his degree in education and later advanced certification in educational administration, the 20-year Newtown resident said he saw “firsthand the difficulty students in those urban schools faced.”

 He recalled that an estimated “30 percent failure rate” existed among would-be high school graduates and said he related to those students on a personal level.

“I have dedicated my career to helping those students achieve,” he said. “Their ability to having confidence in themselves is key to their being successful.”

Today, Mr Coleman serves as associate commissioner of the Connecticut State Department of Education’s Division of Teaching and Learning Programs and Services.

He was recently honored with a Public Service Award from Connecticut Voices for Children, a New Haven-based education advocacy group.

The organization’s president, Shelley Geballe, said that Mr Coleman was chosen for the award because of his unwavering dedication to “all children’s success in education and in life.”

From 1999 to 2003, Mr Coleman served as president of the Connecticut state chapter of United Way.

During that time, Ms Geballe, an attorney and lecturer at Yale University School of Medicine’s Department of Epidemiology and Public Health, served on the Connecticut United Way’s board of directors.

“Mr Coleman served during a time of change and transition,” Ms Geballe said. “We had just finished developing Infoline, and Mr Coleman was an integral part of the success of that project.”

Infoline is a comprehensive, free-of-charge, 24-hour referral service and crisis hotline accessed in Connecticut by dialing 211.

“Now, the Infoline concept has gone nationally,” said Ms Geballe. “It has proven to be a very easy to use, very successful way for people all over the state to get the help they need, whether they are suffering from domestic conflicts or struggling with substance abuse.”

Mr Coleman, continued Ms Geballe, “really brought Infoline to the forefront of public consciousness. Getting the word out to the media was important, and Mr Coleman helped orchestrate that.”

He was also a major part, she said, of encouraging parental empowerment.

“Reaching out to families is key in education,” said Mr Coleman. “It is at times very difficult, when families are fragmented or initially resistant. But you just have to keep trying.”

Prior to his current position as associate commissioner and prior post as United Way president, Mr Coleman had a 30-year career in teaching and administration at “all [grade] levels,” he said, from preschool and kindergarten to college.

Currently, he is a part-time faculty member of Western Connecticut State University’s History department.

He also is a chairperson of the Scholarship Committee of the Danbury-based Hord Foundation, a nonprofit founded in 1993 to, according to its mission statement, “promote education and enhance career opportunities of young minority people by providing postsecondary school and other financial assistance.”

“Danbury has a lot of resources for aspiring teachers, including a proximity to New York,” Mr Coleman said.

He noted how much he enjoyed working with young educators-in-training and emphasized the continual need for motivated, young teachers truly committed to making a difference.

He next discussed his three-part vision for young students’ educational success.

First, he said, parents and guardians, many with fairly limited formal education, need help.

“Navigating today’s educational system can be difficult, and they need support,” he said. Parents could be reached through school open houses, parent/teacher conferences — whatever it takes. 

Also, “What we need to do,” continued Mr Coleman, “is cultivate a sense of continuous, lifelong learning. This is a value that both parents and their children can connect to.”

Second, Mr Coleman touched on the necessity of hiring quality teachers who truly care about their children’s holistic, not just academic, welfare.

This has a direct bearing on Mr Coleman’s next and final assertion that students must be “physically and emotionally well enough to succeed.”

“There has been a fascinating amount of research recently into the connection between a child’s physical health and their academic success,” said Mr Coleman. “I think it is really something that needs to be explored further, and I trust it will in the years ahead.”

With parental support, strong learning values, and the pursuit of physical and emotional well-being, students have the power to experience immense success educationally and beyond.

Mr Coleman was, however, quick to note that these three items were not all that easy to achieve.

There are many obstacles to children having the best educational experience they can have, he said, obstacles that are not likely to disappear completely anytime soon.

“The best we can do is keep working to support our children,” he said, citing the additional value of after school extracurricular and study programs, “and then, they can have the confidence to achieve.”