By Kim Meslin
The program, created by Malverne High School's director of pupil personnel, Thedra McCrae, was proposed to the school board in September as a way to provide a more structured and stable learning environment for suspended middle- and high-school students and a safer setting for the teachers.
The school's current tutoring program requires teachers from several different subject areas to tutor suspended students at their homes in the presence of an adult, and often no adult is home, so the teacher is forced to leave, said McCrae. It also requires four or five teachers to accommodate one child's educational program, she said.
The school district would save roughly $25,000 a year by implementing Twilight School, said Malverne Superintendent Dr. Anthony Pecorale. According to recent figures, it costs the school district an average of $76,000 to home-tutor suspended students and those who are homebound due to illness. Under the new program, students who are suspended from school for three to five days would attend classes given after school between 3 p.m. and 6 p.m. at either Howard T. Herber Middle school or Malverne High School.
The program will begin sometime after Thanksgiving and will be in full swing by Christmas, said Pecorale. At-home tutoring will still be provided to students who are ill, he said. The program will be administered by McCrae with the assistance of administrative interns, though McCrae will not be at the school each day until 6 p.m.
Some residents expressed concerns about the absence of an administrator during Twilight School's hours of operation. "I don't think it's a good idea to leave interns in charge of a program with high-school students or junior-high-school students and not have a state-certified administrator who is responsible and oversees interns," said West Hempstead resident Brenda Murphy. "I was an administrator of a city school, and we had problems where the police and ambulance had to be called, and you need someone who is the responsible party. I really don't think that should be on the shoulders of interns."
High School Principal Glenda Good responded that she is at the school until at least 5 p.m. every day, and if she's not, then McCrae or another administrator will be present. If not, there will be one across the street at the middle school, said Pecorale. Security guards will continue to be present after school as well.
Questions about security
A recent incident at Howard T. Herber Middle School sparked a debate among parents about the security at the high school and middle school. A Malverne resident and mother of three, Susanne St. John, said that she had to break up a fight involving a number of children while she was dropping her daughter off for school one morning.
"I was the one who broke up the incident that day, because there were no adults where they should be," said St. John. "This boy was dragged into the field by two other children and followed by at least eight more ... and beaten up. I had to go flying out of the car to get the kids off this one child. No one was were they belonged that day in lines of security ... We hire outside security -- what are they doing? What are we paying them for?"
Pecorale admitted that there was no security present where there should have been, and after the meeting, said that the security guard who was missing from his post that morning has been dismissed.
Middle School Principal Joseph Donoghue added that the school is dealing with issues of bullying and violence. "We got a grant for a program called the Bully Program, and we had a gang- intervention speaker come and speak at the school," he said. "The children are no longer allowed outside, and they meet in the auditorium in the morning until further notice. When they can behave themselves and learn to do the right thing, they'll be able to go outside again."
Other parents raised concerns about security, specifically entry doors into the schools that are supposed to be locked but are left unlocked, and a lack of security after schools hours. There are six security guards at the high school, or about one guard per 100 students.
Principal Good said that overall, the kids are good, and the security allows them 10 or 15 minutes after school to talk to their friends before instructing them to leave, and the kids listen. Good said she also watches the halls after school every day and helps to clear the students out, and that there have been no incidents.
But Malverne resident Diane Saulters said that security at the high school is overly friendly with the students, and she has complained about it before.
Karen Aker, a Board of Education member, agreed. "I, as a mom, did not like the way [security] looks at our students," said Aker. "The day I was here in particular it was totally inappropriate. It was not professional -- the way the gentleman looked at a student made me uncomfortable. Things have got to change here."
The Malverne School District pays about $200,000 a year for security, said Pecorale. An outside company provides security guards, and the company is hired through a bidding process. Last May a company called International Security won the contract. There are four security guards in the middle school and six in the high school.
Pecorale said he recently had a meeting with the security company, and it has authorized the school to release its phone number to parents, so that if they want to make a complaint or report an incident, they can call the company directly. The parent can remain anonymous and the complaint will be recorded and looked into. The phone number is (212) 481-3778.
"By and large, I think that [security is] doing a good job, but sometimes something happens," Pecorale said.
