Of course tiny local businesses don't provide health insurance. But these small businesses are not owned by multimillionaires like John Schnatter (who lives in a 45,000 square foot house with a 40+ car garage) who donate hundreds of thousands of dollars to political action committees to try and defeat universal healthcare in this country. The cost of providing healthcare to Schnatters full-time employees would come to about 11-14 cents per pizza. That's apparently too much for Papa John's shareholders, so Schnatter has said he'll have to cut staff to absorb the cost. Then he backtracked on that and merely stated that he'll pass the cost onto consumers to protect his shareholders. As a consumer, I would gladly pay 14 cents more to know that the person making my pizza can take his daughter to the doctor when she's sick, but hey, I won't be buying my pizza at Papa John's anyway. View Comment

I hope Glenbrook residents continue to patronize our locally-owned small-business pizza restaurants--Hope, Pappa's, and Nick's--and don't give their money to a multi-millionaire business owner who won't consider giving his employees health insurance. View Comment

Right but the people who run those hedge funds live in Darien and Greenwich, and they already have fireworks. View Comment

Eric, It "nags you" whether the child would have been saved had he not been good at basketball? Allow me to put the nagging to rest. No, he would not have been saved, and neither are all the rest of the kids who still go to that New Haven school. It's nice to hear about a kid who improved his chances in life, but it would be nicer to read about what's being done to help the rest of the kids who don't want to have to live with gangs at their schools. I'm sure there are more. View Comment

You've got to admit, though, it was silly to plan them for that night. Why not Friday? Is there some overtime issue with Friday? If that's the case, why not say so? Sure, they start at 8:15, end by 8:45, but the traffic getting out of the area will be tough and people probably won't get home until 9:30 at best. I'm all for celebrating (what are we celebrating, exactly?) but this seems like a poorly planned, too-little, too-late, apology for missing the 4th of July. View Comment

What more do the doubters need, I wonder? Study after study, town after town, and educators from all the middle schools in Stamford want to give this initiative enough time to demonstrate success. Cashmom is completely wrong when she says that working hard will allow you to compete and succeed. This is school, not the business world. Every child has to learn what is in the curriculum, whether that child is competitive, or not. The problem with tracking is that it didn't give every child a chance to succeed. Rather, because of someone's assumption of the child's "ability" based on some sort of testing that may or may not have been indicative of what the child is really capable of, children were placed into groups that became virtual ghettos with no chance of advancement. Anyone who thinks that with "flexible grouping" kids will be able to move up and down as the need arises, is kidding himself. If the upper groups are truly moving faster/doing more, how will a child from the lower group be able to catch up if he does move? And what will be the criteria for moving up, or down? How often will children be evaluated to move? Will it be grades that determine a move, or standardized test scores? Do the teachers and administrators really have time to be looking at every child, every week/month/whatever and deciding what group would be best at that moment? In your opinion, Cashmom, it sounds as though you're just fine that those kids who don't "work hard to compete and inovate [sic]" will not learn what they need to know in order to graduate. This might be fine for you, but it's not fine with the state and federal governments, who want 100% of schoolchildren to be performing at or above goal by 2014. Anyway, since when is school about student innovation? It's about learning what is in the curriculum. It's harder for some kids and it's easier for some others...that doesn't mean that they should be segregated. The new middle school initiative abandons the low expectations that went along with the lower groups, and allows ALL children to learn what's in our curriculum--not just the ones who did well on their CMTs. I'm excited about it, and believe we should stick with it. View Comment

tbuzzeo, That would require that our government and population recognized that the problem with school achievement is poverty, rather than "those people who just don't care about education." Clearly, here is a poor woman who DOES care about education--she just can't get a good one for her child in her own district. Or that's her perception. Time after time it has been shown that the poor are bringing test scores down. Not because these parents don't care about helping their students, but rather because they don't have the resources that more advantaged parents have, including command of the language, time to help, money for tutors, books, etc. The countries who score so much better than the US on school tests don't have smarter kids than we do (our wealthy kids often do better than theirs, when separated out) but they have FAR LESS POVERTY than we do. Address the poverty and you'll address the achievement in our schools. Pretend that it's not there, and you see what you get. View Comment

I'm not even going to bother commenting on the Advocate website, which is full of Starr-haters (and, it seems, people who don't even have children in the school system) but this public school parent will be sorry to see him go. Previous Superintendents talked a very good game, got hired, and then did nothing but collect a paycheck. Starr put into place some very positive initiatives to increase equity among the schools, give them all a true common curriculum and standards, and examined the real problem of how tracking ghettoized the poor--finally. The grouping/tracking thing and the redistricting thing that many people opposed, were necessary and courageous. You can disagree with them, but at least he had a concept and went for it. And no, I'm not his wife, or his brother. I don't even know him. I, and many people like me, will miss Starr, but we're pleased that at least he got out before he was fired. Best of luck! View Comment

Wow, that was a dumb article. Could the headline be any more misleading? View Comment

Try to ask your child's teacher (at the parent-teacher conference is a good time) what she might like to have for her classroom and buy that for her. It might be a book she needs, or a replacement game that her kids love, or even 10 boxes of tissues. View Comment

The charter should not be changed. The Boards need to keep some balance, whether the mayor is a Democrat or a Republican. Was Pavia unaware of the charter when he presented his picks for this board? Makes you wonder. View Comment

I realize that it's clown school, and I know a limp wrist when I see one. Runway model...good try. I also wonder why, when anyone complains about anything, they are told to "relax." Believe me, I'm perfectly relaxed. I had a very good friend in the clown school with you, and she had a great time there. I saw you at the parade, and all the clowns did a great job. I'm sure you're a wonderful person, and I did enjoy the parade. I just think the limp-wristed "runway model" did not belong on your site. That's all. Thanks for listening. View Comment

It's disturbing that the clip you chose to post on your site has your reporter acting out an offensive stereotype of a gay man. I'm sure you got some other footage that you could have included in place of it, and I would like you to consider taking it down. I can only hope that Mr.Lupton is not going to choose to use this "act" as his clown persona in the parade. Our gay youth have to endure enough without seeing adults, who should know better, perpetuating ancient stereotypes. View Comment