Spring and early summer 2020 have been a great challenge for everyone, Girl Scouts included, but local troops have found ways to adapt to the new reality of soc...
The Newtown Bee’s “Get To Know” series features a look at local buildings. Is there a building you would like to “get to know?” E-mail eliza@thebee.com with...
HARTFORD — The Connecticut Insurance Department seeks public comment at an informational public meeting on the rate proposals filed by Aetna, Anthem Health Plan...
William Craig Decker, 49, passed away unexpectedly at his home in Sandy Hook on Tuesday, August 25.
He was predeceased by his father, Donald W. Decker, and is s...
Some flowers are meant for picking and others are meant for picking a path for a stroll among them. Those would be sunflowers. Castle Hill Farm, 1 Sugar Lane, f...
What are newtownbee.com readers reading? Each week we compile a list of the most read posts published to our site. Here is a roundup of the week’s top five post...
With great sorrow we share that David Ferris, Sr, of Woodbury, passed away peacefully at his home on Tuesday, August 25, from complications of ALS. He was 71 ye...
To the Editor:
For over 30 years, the Newtown Lions have raffled off a vintage Mustang. The event has become a staple of our region. While many ticket buyers jo...
To the Editor:
CT newspapers have widely reported that Republican leadership were aware back in the April/May timeframe of video evidence of their candidate for...
To the Editor:
Eversource’s statement for August tells me my electric usage for this August was the same as August of last year and the bar chart shows it the s...
Unfortunately as voter turnout continues to decline the chances of it increasing also decline. The LC and BOF already know that the budget will be approved by virtue of the low turnout so why try to make smart decisions? The so-called referendum is essentially just a rubber stamp. They will continue to increase the budget by 2-5% every year because it's low enough to not cause a pushback under the cover of "inflation" and "maintaining the schools." Sending the budget to vote with 9% turnout is meaningless and a waste of resources on April 23rd.
I have seen Mr. Pisani repeatedly assert in the pages of the Bee that Newtown schools are "testing at a failing 64.9%". I'd be curious if he could elaborate on this statistic, as I have been unable to verify it independently. Which test exactly is our school system failing? How do our schools compare to other towns? How does our score compare to historical measures? It's very hard to draw conclusions from a single data point, so here are a few more data points to think about for context: Newtown is consistently ranked among the top 20 school districts in CT by the US News and World Report and Niche, which consider a range of performance metrics in their rankings; on average, Newtown students perform similar to, if not better than, students in neighboring school districts on standardized math and reading tests; the only data point on the CT Department of Education District Report Card where Newtown "fails" -- that is, falls behind the state average -- is access to art instruction. I'm glad the council member has acknowledged in this letter what taxpayers in high-performing (and high-spending) school districts like Darien, New Canaan, and Westport already know: "School funding does impact student achievement." Please keep that in mind when you vote this week!