Assistant Superintendent Proclaims
"ENGLISH IS THE OFFICIAL LANGUAGE"

By Stewart Lilker.

On Wednesday, September 5, 2001, the Freeport School Board met for a special meeting to appoint the District-wide Safety Committee, a committee that most other school boards in the state had already appointed last year. NYS law and the Project Save timeline called for all NY State School Boards to appoint the committee between November 2000 and January 2001.

Dr. Anthony Ciaglia, the number two person in the district and the Assistant Superintendent of Curriculum, was unofficially charged with the district wide implementation of the Project SAVE School Safety Plan. The exact date of Ciaglia’s appointment was never made public and as of August 8, 2001, was not in the district minutes. In fact, as of August 8, 2001, not one word regarding Project Save or the Student Code of Conduct has appeared in the district’s minutes.

Nine months after the Board was required to appoint the District-wide Safety Committee, it finally appointed one during a Special Board meeting held on September 5, 2001. Neither the District Clerk, the Superintendent or the Board saw fit to announce the agenda to the public before the meeting. (Edited transcript of the September 5, 2001 Board meeting.)

The Freeport School District is approximately 48% Latino. With the public hearing looming only a few days away, your reporter asked the Board to postpone the public hearing to give the Spanish readers a chance to become informed and participate.

Newly elected board member Mike Raab asked Ciaglia if there was "any state mandate" that required that the Code be made available in Spanish.

Ciaglia proclaimed, "No sir. English is the official language." Neither the Board, nor the Superintendent, took exception to the Assistant Superintendent’s remark.

For years, Freeport has touted their bilingual program, claiming that it would bring people together.

Eloy Yndigoyen, former board candidate and a Latino community leader, told FNYN, "It is unfortunate for the Spanish community that the Freeport School District still continues with the same practices, which are not inclusive. It is just unfair. The Board is dragging its feet. The information should be made available to those that do not speak English."

On the afternoons of September 5th, 6th and 7th, many of the students in Freeport High School came home with an English only notice, stating that he Board of Education had already "adopted" the Code of Conduct and submitted it to New York State as "required by law."

On September 6th, at a PTA Council meeting, it was reported to FNYN by a parent, that Superintendent of Schools, Dr. Eric Eversley, responding to a question regarding why the District-wide Safety committee was not appointed until the night before, told the assembly, "‘For some reason it wasn’t done the correct way and that’s why they had to do it again last night.’" It was clear from both the Board meeting of August 31st and September 5th that Eversley refused to explain to the council the real reason. 

On Friday morning, September 7th, your reporter received a fax from former PTA Co-president, Stephanie Cieslik. It was the notice, which explained to the students and parents that the Student Code of Conduct had already been adopted by the Board and submitted to New York State.

FNYN faxed a copy of this to Superintendent Eversley, along with a letter asking that the public hearing be postponed, due to the misinformation distributed by the district. A courtesy copy was also faxed to Board member Cattano and State Senator Fuschillo. Cattano and Fuschillo never responded.

On Friday afternoon at 2 p.m., FNYN went to the district administration building to acquire copies of letters that were reportedly going to be distributed to all the students in the High School. In a brief phone conversation with Asst. Supt. Ciaglia, he said, "Letters in both English and Spanish, explaining the mistake, were going to be mailed to the homes of the students from the Junior High School and the High School." Ciaglia further explained, "The grade school students will be backpacking the information home with them."

The copies of the letters revealed that they were in both English and Spanish. The district, in keeping with their contention that "English is the official language," never mentioned to the parents that the Project Save information was available in Spanish, although they finally did invite the parents to attend the public hearing scheduled for September 12th.

At 4:30 this afternoon, Superintendent Eversley faxed a letter to me expressing his gratitude for being alerted to the situation and explained, "We are taking steps to clarify this for our families who may have received it." Eversley also explained that "It is the Board’s intention to continue with the public hearing scheduled for Wednesday, September 12th.