October 25 a sixth grade student enrolled in the Alice Costello School \”School Choice Program\” was removed from the school for disciplinary reasons. The student had a list of names of classmates that he wanted to harm. Included on the list was the name of a teacher. The list was brought to the attention of Dr. John Kellmayer, superintendent of the Brooklawn School District. Dr. Kellmayer contacted the police who in turn contacted the Camden County Prosecutors Office. After interviewing the child the authorities determine there was no credible threat. see story

Since the article was posted on ClearysNoteBook there have been a number of comments about the incident. As a result I contacted Dr. Kellmayer to ask for clarification on some of the remarks. Below is that interview.

Question– What happen to the student involved in the incident?

Answer– The student who was involved in the incident was a School Choice student and has been dismissed from the school.

Question-How many Brooklawn students are School Choice students?

Answer– About 25% of the Brooklawn school population is composed of School Choice students

Question-Would you give me the percentage of school choice students enrolled in the district and where they come from?

Answer-Of the school choice population, about 50% comes from Gloucester City, 25% from Camden City, and the other 25% from numerous communities, including Woodbury, Runnemede, Washington Twp., Westville, West Deptford, Mt. Ephraim, and Bellmawr.

Question-What percentage of the budget comes from School Choice Aide?

Answer– About 26% of the school district budget comes from the School Choice aide.

Question-Would you breakdown how School Choice students perform academically compared to Brooklawn students?

Answer-The most recent analysis of School Choice versus Brooklawn students indicated that academically, the School Choice students slightly outperform the Brooklawn students, the School Choice students have a slightly better attendance, the School Choice students are more likely to be late, and there is little difference in behavior (based on the number and severity of discipline referrals) between the School Choice and the Brooklawn students.

Question-If the School Choice Program was eliminated in the Brooklawn School District what would happen?

Answer– without the School Choice students, many teaching positions would be eliminated, class size would significantly increase, and local property taxes would significantly increase.

author-Bill Cleary

November 2nd, 2007 (8 hours ago) by Ian ·  

This week

The UConn Huskies will host the Rutgers Scarlet Knights on Saturday night at 7:15 PM at Rentschler Field.

Here are the rosters for the Huskies and the Scarlet Knights.

The Line/Prediction

According to Yahoo Sports Odds, UConn is favored by 2 points. The over/under is 46 points.

My prediction is UConn 31 Rutgers 21

Tickets

As of the time of this post, the game is a sellout.

Tickets to game, if available, may be purchased through Ticketmaster. You can check the availability here.

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