The Valley Patriot publisher Tom Duggan hosted Arlin Santiago on the Paying Attention! Television Program earlier this month. Santiago is the “Educational Stability Specialist” for the Lawrence Public Schools. She appeared on the program to talk about what the schools are doing to help foster children and homeless children who are students in the […]
By: Amy Berard – March, 2016 According to the most recent data available from the Massachusetts Department of Education, teacher retention rates vary from one Merrimack Valley district to the next. Methuen boasts a teacher retention rate of 93.3%. However, their principal retention rate is 50%. 96.6% of educators and 97.7% of administrators in Methuen […]
PAYING ATTENTION! ON-LINE EXTRA On the day of the Challenger explosion I was teaching at the Henry K. Oliver School in Lawrence. Having lost my first bid for school committee at 18 years old, I had been offered a position as a substitute teacher and oddly enough, made a permanent substitute almost immediately […]
By: Amy Berard – November, 2015 1. How often is the SpEd (Special Education) teacher in the inclusion classroom? At an IEP meeting, parents will be notified if their child is in an inclusion class. A class is labeled as an inclusion class when a SpEd teacher is pushing in to provide extra support for […]
By: Amy Berard – August, 2015 I am one of the 59 Lawrence teachers whose contract was not renewed this year. Recently, on June 11, you reported on this. I would like to share with you and possibly your readers my experience teaching within the Lawrence Public School District. I have taught in Lawrence at […]
By: Tom Duggan -June, 2015 A fired guidance counselor in the Lawrence Public Schools, Brenda Sudol-Kirwin, won an arbitration hearing against the schools in August of 2013, for sick leave for injuries she incurred while working in the schools. But Kirwin says the issue is not over and wanted to go public about the abuse […]
Tom Duggan, May, 2015 The friends and family of a child murdered in 1985 have privately raised nearly $4,000 for a headstone, 30 years after the murder of Michelle Pimentel in 1985. Pimentel’s friends and family raised the money in less than one week after appearing on 980WCAP’s Paying Attention Radio program to tell their […]
The friends and family of a child murdered in 1985 are desperately trying to raise money for her headstone 30 years later. By: Tom Duggan – 4-26-14 In 1985 a middle school student at the Kane Jr. High School in Lawrence was brutally stabbed to death by her step father after she came forward to school […]
This is part II of Valley Patriot publisher Tom Duggan’s interview with Lawrence State Receiver for the Lawrence Public Schools who took over and replaced the school committee nearly three years ago. Jeff Riley interview PART 1 Here DUGGAN: What are your thoughts on the teacher’s union. RILEY: There’s this huge fight in the […]
By: Tom Duggan, August 30, 2014 Doris Rodriguez is in a three way primary race for the Democrat nomination for State Senate against failed state Representative Barbara L’Italian and Lawrence School Committeeman Pavel Payano. Rodriguez appeared on the Paying Attention Radio program for a debate but L’Italian and Payano refused to be int eh same room with […]
By: Peter Larocque – February 2014 You probably have heard of some movies titles like, “The Return of Batman” or “Superman Returns”, well just like these, State Senator Barry Finegold has returned! You may be asking where he went. I do not know the answer to that but what I do know is that for […]
October, 2013 – Valley Patriot Publisher Tom Duggan sat down with Lawrence Superintendent/Receiver Jeff Riley of the Lawrence Public Schools for a one on one interview. Riley was appointed Receiver of the Lawrence Public Schools by the Massachusetts Department of Education after an 81 page report detailed the lack of leadership of the Lantigua […]
LAWRENCE- Today Myra Ortiz launched her campaign for Lawrence School Committee District A. Ortiz a mother of two and resident of the city for 13 years decided less than a week ago that she could not sit idly by while no one stepped up to give her and her neighbors a voice on the Lawrence […]
Commission Cites Impounded Report that Deems Sunskis “not appropriate for prosecution.” The Massachusetts Ethics Commission says they cannot prove that Al Sinskis violated G.L. c. 268A, the conflict of interest law, by paying kickbacks on three occasions to Lawrence Public School (“LPS”) employees to obtain LPS contracts. One of the contracts involved the alleged fraudulent sale of […]
VALLEY PATRIOT EDITORIAL MAY, 2013 The corruption and the fleecing of the state taxpayers by Lawrence officials is staggering, and we believe the biggest scandal going on in the state. Yet the media and elected “leaders” on Beacon Hill continually look the other way. At issue: Jeff Riley is the state appointed receiver in […]