Newton Public School District

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The Newton Public School District is a comprehensive community public school district serving students in kindergarten through twelfth grade from Newton, in Sussex County, New Jersey, United States. The district has an enrollment of a little over 1,700 students spread over the elementary, middle and high school. The enrollment also includes high school students from Andover Borough and Andover and Green townships, who attend the high school as part of sending/receiving relationships.^[1]

Despite its District Factor Group, Newton has been considered the top school district in Sussex County, registering the highest test scores in the county.^{[citation needed]}

1 Schools
2 Administration
3 Teachers' contract
4 References
5 External links

[edit] Schools

Schools in the district (with 2005-06 enrollment data from the National Center for Education Statistics^[2]) are:

Merriam Avenue School, serves 541 students in grades K-5.
- Steve Rivlin, Principal
- Karen Perez, Vice Principal
Halsted Street Middle School serves 300 students in grades 6 through 8.
- Martin Fleming, Principal
- Kurt Weaver, Vice Principal
Newton High School serves 901 students grades 9-12.
- James Tasker, Principal
- Nicole Georghalli, Vice Principal
- Kurt Walton, Vice Principal
- Robert Melillo, Dean of Students

[edit] Administration

Mark Miller - Superintendent. Miller is also a former employee of the Newton Public Schools. He was once the assistant principal at Newton High School.
Donna Snyder - Business Administrator/Board Secretary

[edit] Teachers' contract

The teachers of the Newton Public School District and their union, the Newton Education Association, are currently in the process of negotiating new contracts with the Newton Board of Education, the old contract having expired as of June 30, 2007, with the previous contract's terms extended by agreement. Union representatives cited salary and health insurance as the main issues in the dispute, with the district proposing that teachers pay some of the costs of health insurance premiums. State mediators were scheduled to begin mediation between the two sides in January 2008.^[3]

Teachers have staged two public demonstrations, a march from the high school to the Board of Education meeting in December and informational picketing at district schools in January.^[3]

Guy Schultz, a technology teacher at Newton High School for the past nine years, was indefinitely suspended after the district was notified that Schultz did not have proper certification. The district has stated that the teaching credentials of all teachers had been reviewed over the past year and that they had been notified on January 31, 2008 that Schultz lacked the appropriate credentials to teach technology courses. Schultz was the teacher's union representative for Newton High School, and his dismissal was criticized by the union as illegal. Schultz was to be officially fired at the NBoE meeting on February 12; however, Schultz has since been rehired as an Agricultural Science teacher until he acquires the correct credentials.^[4]