New Teachers Are Looking Forward To The School Year

By Larissa Lytwyn

In spite of their varied educational backgrounds, experiences, and ages, Newtown Public Schools’ 32 new teachers, according to Superintendent of Schools Evan Pitkoff, share a crucial similarity: their marked promise to be the best teachers possible for Newtown students.

Orientation runs August 14 through August 20, just days before the first day of school for most of the district, August 27. The new instructors, teaching subjects including physical education, mathematics, art, chemistry, and elementary education, will be introduced to longtime faculty and administration and will get a chance to familiarize themselves with their new schools.

“I was really impressed by the community feeling here,” said Newtown High School chemistry teacher Mary Kay Porter. “I’ve had a lot of different experiences living and teaching in Fairfield County. I’ve heard a lot of great things about Newtown [schools].” Ms Porter, a Milford resident, is currently looking for rental housing in Newtown. “It would be great to stay in Newtown during the week,” she said, “avoiding the long commute.”

Sean Tierney, a New Milford resident, will be teaching mathematics at Newtown High School this year. “I wanted to work somewhere close to, but not in, where I live,” he said. Mr Tierney said he was impressed with Newtown’s comprehensive school system, where, he explained, he will be able to teach more than “just pre-algebra.” Mr Tierney, who has taught in numerous districts, including Redding, New Milford, and Torrington, said he has also coached a number of sports, including golf, lacrosse, soccer, and basketball.

“It’s very rare to have a school system conduct a program this comprehensive,” noted Larry Chivcarello, a new math teacher in Newtown High School. Mr Chivcarello, a Watertown resident, has had 27 years of experience teaching at high schools in Beacon Falls, Litchfield County, and, for 19 years, Woodbury. He said his attraction to Newtown was based on a desire to further develop professionally.

“Some schools will primarily hire less experienced teachers, because they don’t command as high a salary as more experienced ones,” he said. “But Newtown seems to really take experience into account. It really becomes about the quality of the teacher, more so than salary concerns or anything else!”

Mr Chivcarello, who has spent past summers teaching accelerated secondary education math programs, has also had experience on committees that design orientation program, including A Guide to the BEST Program for Beginning Teachers and the curricula used by Newtown Public Schools.

“It’s very wide-ranging,” said Mr Chivcarello. As soon as new teachers are hired, they are immediately inundated with instructional tapes, texts, and other materials illustrating Newtown Public Schools’ educational district models. Introduced, then, to the topics to be discussed during orientation, the program allows incoming teachers be mentored by older, more established faculty, for up to two years. They also have the chance to interact with other new instructors throughout the district. One activity required the tables to be resituated, as Assistant Superintendent of Schools Alice Jackson said, like “sun rays.” Teachers paired up and got to know each other’s names, schools, subjects, numbers of years teaching, and “one interesting thing” about them.

“It’s very important to get to know each other,” said Dr Pitkoff. He laughed, explaining the tradition of high school principals blaming unruly freshmen on the faults of middle school principals, who, in turn, point the finger of blame toward elementary school principals, and so on. “We are part of our own little community — and a larger community,” he said. “Through your years here, you may be working with each other on different committees and projects. It’s important to iron out the gaps. ”

Dr Pitkoff praised the potential that each new teacher possessed, that contracts were offered to him or her because of their “immense potential” to be exemplary teachers. “It’s wonderful to see the diversity of experience here,” Dr Pitkoff said. “Some of you have your bachelors’, some of you have your doctorates, some of you just graduated in May, some of you have been teaching for years. Our children can benefit from the variety of your experiences, rather than just one ‘type’ of teacher.”

Kristina Santoro, a graduate of Assumption College in Wooster, Mass., has interned and substituted for kindergarten classes at Sandy Hook School. She said she is thrilled at the prospect of working, for the first time, in her very own Sandy Hook School classroom. “It’s great, too, that I already know a lot of the families,” she said. “I’m really looking forward to the year.”

Courtney Martin, a graduate of the University of Connecticut in Storrs, said she began her elementary education career in Tolland. She said she wanted to teach in Newtown because it was closer to her family in Danbury. Like Ms Santoro, she said she was looking forward to the year. “It’s all very exciting!” she said. Ms Martin will also be teaching at Sandy Hook School.

Dr Pitkoff said, “I would rather get a substitute — and you know, I hate the substitution system — to fill in for a subject rather than have a teacher who was less than the best Newtown could possibly have. I’d rather wait, because, ultimately, the right person will come along.” He told the group that all of them, evidently, were the best teachers the town could ever have.

“We are all peers here,” said Ms Jackson. “We all just have different roles.”