DARIEN, IL – A Darien area school board member criticized a petition last year that described Hinsdale Central and South high schools as “very different” and discouraged efforts to completely equalize course offerings.
Liz Mitha, a Darien-based Cass School District 63 board member, spoke about the petition at last week’s Hinsdale High School District 86 board meeting.
Mitha said the petition insinuated that South’s students were less intelligent and capable than their Central peers.
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“This language is derisive and demeaning to South families and frankly incorrect,” Mitha said.
She said two of the main feeder schools for Hinsdale South are Darien’s Cass Junior High and Burr Ridge’s Gower Middle School.
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The average eighth-grader at either of those two schools qualifies for Central’s honors classes, including World History Honors, Mitha said.
“Let me repeat that: The average student at Cass and Gower would be an honors student at Central,” Mitha said.
The larger and wealthier Central has long offered a greater course selection than South.
At a board meeting last October, Central residents Sinead Duffy, Andrew Catton and Kim Notaro read what they said was a petition by Hinsdale Central students and collaborated on with their South counterparts. Duffy is a board member for Hinsdale School District 181.
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“The staff, students and administration at Central are very different from South,” the petition said. “Trying to completely align the Hinsdale South and Hinsdale Central curriculum is not the right way to aim for it, as each campus is very different with student bodies who have very different needs.”
At last week’s board meeting, Notaro spoke out about ways to equalize course offerings, which is known as “alignment” in school jargon. She was among those pushing for the introduction of World History Honors at South.
In an interview Tuesday, Notaro, who has attended board meetings for years, said she and the others read a petition written by students. She said they were showing their commitment to students and that the community should celebrate when South and Central students collaborate on such projects.
“It was not my petition,” Notaro said.
She also said she supported alignment as long as the process uplifts both campuses.
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