Category: Atlanticville Opinion

  • Abbott report card: mixed results thus far

    Standardized scores are below average, but drop-out, college-bound rates improve BY CHRISTINE VARNO Staff Writer BY CHRISTINE VARNOStaff Writer CHRISKELLY staff The new Long Branch Middle School is being built on the same site as the new high school on Indiana Avenue. With all the money the state spends in its Abbott school districts, how…

  • Obituaries

    Sandra Lee Brown Slonski Mrs. Slonski, 62, of Hazlet, died Jan. 11 at Riverview Medical Center, Red Bank, following a lengthy battle with cancer. Born in Cinnaminson, she resided in Long Branch and Philadelphia before moving to Hazlet 35 years ago. Mrs. Slonski was a homemaker. She was a communicant of St. Benedict’s Roman Catholic…

  • Abbott funds bought lots of bricks and mortar

    Funding also helped attract top teachers, paid for computers BY CHRISTINE VARNO Staff Writer BY CHRISTINE VARNOStaff Writer PHOTOSBY CHRISKELLYstaff Contruction of the new $59.7 million Long Branch High SChool is slated to be completed in time for the 2006-07 school year. What has Abbott school district funding purchased in Long Branch? According to Long…

  • County information director to retire

    On Feb. 1, I will have retired from my position as the director of public information with Monmouth County. I want to thank those of you who were most cooperative and supportive in helping me over the years bring the messages of the Monmouth County Board of Chosen Freeholders to the public. Also, I want…

  • Court decisions aimed to provide equal education

    BY CHRISTINE VARNO Staff Writer BY CHRISTINE VARNOStaff Writer Long Branch Schools Superintendent Joseph M. Ferraina The Abbott school district program was created with the best of intentions. Abbott districts are the product of 13 Abbott v. Burke decisions by the New Jersey Supreme Court that identified school districts as “poorer urban districts” created to…

  • State should consider takeover of utility

    The sight of Jersey Central Power and Light (JCP&L) employees picketing for weeks in the cold is disturbing. At least they have a union (for now, anyway). Years of corporate attacks leave only 7.9 percent of employees in private industry in unions in the United States. Why is it that employees of a supposedly regulated…

  • Funding alone can’t bridge educational divide

    The 31 Abbott districts As for the success of Abbott districts like Long Branch, he said the jury is still out. The intent behind the court decisions that created the state’s Abbott school districts was simple: put the poorest urban school districts in the state on an equal educational footing with all other districts. The…

  • New year, challenges for school construction

    A new year is always a time to look ahead to new possibilities. A new year is also a time to look back at the progress and accomplishments of previous years. At the New Jersey Schools Construction Corp. (SCC), we are looking ahead to a new year full of possibilities. Thousands of New Jersey schoolchildren…

  • Social Security, Medicare need to be top priorities

    Election Day 2004 — the highest proportion of the voting population turned out since 1968, more than 120 million votes were cast. The president and congressional candidates talked on important issues affecting all Americans: Social Security, Medicare reforms, the economy, the war in Iraq, Afghanistan and terrorism. The election is over; we now need the…