Hartford Courant: Courtney Goes Back To School

By STEPHANIE SUMMERS, January 11, 2008

Having visited two dozen school districts in his congressional district, U.S. Rep. Joe Courtney still had something to learn Wednesday from fourth-graders in Willington.

Superintendent of Schools Dave Harding wanted Courtney to see Hall Memorial School's pervasive use of an interactive online technology called Smart Board.

"I was absolutely floored at how well it does work," Courtney, D-2nd District, said later Wednesday.

The fourth-graders were learning to tell time, with almost full accuracy, he said.

"Watching them go up to the Smart Board, they were a lot more fearless than I would have been," Courtney said.

In his freshman term, Courtney has been assigned to the House Education and Labor Committee and the Higher Education Subcommittee. Courtney is the first 2nd District congressman to serve on the committee since World War II, his office staff said, at a time of great change in educational policy and spiraling college costs.

He is visiting as many of the 64 school districts in his eastern Connecticut district as he can during his first term. He has made stops at Rockville, Tolland and Vernon high schools and the three vocational technical schools, including Grasso Tech in Groton, on Tuesday.

He called an English as a second language class in a Norwich grade school an "eye-opener," as the teacher worked with Chinese, Laotian and Haitian students, who Courtney said were struggling with social fluency, let alone the English fluency required for state testing.

His House committee is deep into work on reauthorizing the No Child Left Behind program and is introducing positive changes in the latest 1,500-page draft, including more technology in the schools, he said.

"Going to the Willington school and seeing it in action is impressive, and it's really valuable to me in terms of what the committee is working on," he said.

Besides Grasso Tech, Courtney visited Mystic Middle School on Tuesday. Today, he plans to visit New London High School.