We were very disappointed with Goshen Center School. It should be a great school. The town provides ample funding. Student-teacher ratio is low. School facilities are adequate. Few (if any) students come from a disadvantaged background. And yet the school is awful. We removed our children from this school. They were not learning to read well. They could not write well. They had trouble spelling three- and four-letter words. By fifth grade, their level of math instruction was two years behind where it should have been. They were required to produce very little written work and never took a written exam. They were required to learn absolutely nothing. They started every day sitting on the floor in a group meeting, and they spent their days shuffling from one group assignment to the next. Our children failed to develop a good work ethic, as individual effort was seldom encouraged and never rewarded. We found Goshen teachers to be hostile and inaccessible. Fearful that teachers and administrators would retaliate against their children, dissatisfied parents were afraid to speak up. It’s a shame because Goshen is traditionally a happy place. Six or seven years ago, test scores were decent, and the district ranked in the state’s top one-third. Today, the district ranks 94th out of 164 (in the bottom 43%). Goshen’s CMT scores did tick up last year (in 2013), only after teachers coached students outside regular school hours. In spite of this organized effort to ""cheat"" the test, Goshen ranked only 243rd out of 514 elementary schools statewide, meaning that Goshen’s academic ranking is significantly lower than nearby Harwinton (110), North Canaan (117), and Bethlehem (151). Goshen’s poor showing is due, in our opinion, to inferior teachers charged with implementing low-quality programs of instruction. We doubt that key instructional programs are designed to conform to state standards (the math program, in particular). Parents (those who are able) are leaving the district; the student population is shrinking. We believe that Goshen will continue to spiral downward unless the school board intervenes, takes dissatisfied parents seriously, and performs a thorough “house cleaning.”
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