Japanese Language Program Maintained For September

The Clarkstown School Board pre-empted the several dozen supporters of the district’s Japanese Language Program at Tuesday’s meeting, by voting early on to maintain it.  When the first speaker got up to talk about the program, newly elected Board President Mike Aglialoro told him the trustees had been discussing it and asked him to hold his comments temporarily.

Aglialoro said the board members planned to make a recommendation to reinstate Japanese for the sixth grade for the 2013-2014 school year and ask the superintendent to review the entire program and make recommendations. The motion passed to maintain Japanese for the coming school year.

Conor Mooney, who had spoken at the June meeting about the benefits he gained from learning Japanese, thanked the board members for their vote. Mooney spent two years in Japan teaching English to Japanese students and said he was only able to do that because of Clarkstown’s offering of the language.

“I wish to thank you all for what it has given,” said the Clarkstown resident.

Karen Roselle, Felix Festa Middle School’s foreign language department chair, expressed gratitude for the program’s reinstatement. One parent spoke about how the threatened elimination of the program had motivated students to do what they could to keep it as part of the curriculum. She urged the board to keep the lines of communication open as they went through the evaluation process.