Community Corner

Week in Review: County Executive Visits FLHS, Chamber Sponsors 3-On-3

A weekly roundup of some of the top local news stories this week on Fort Lee Patch.

Bergen County Executive Kathleen Donovan gave a brief presentation to the senior class at Fort Lee High School Tuesday about the privilege and importance of voting and the positive impact of civil service on the community.

“You are the new leaders,” Donovan told the students. “You have to believe in yourself.” (read article)

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Find out what's happening in Fort Leewith free, real-time updates from Patch.

After months of planning by event coordinator Margaret Maclay, and countless hours of preparation from a number of volunteers, the Fort Lee Chamber of Commerce hosted their first ever 3-on-3 basketball tournament  Saturday.

With the recent economic downturn that has affected the High School’s Academy of Finance, the Chamber of Commerce looked to do anything they could to help.

Find out what's happening in Fort Leewith free, real-time updates from Patch.

So before the tournament began, MaClay and the Chamber of Commerce donated $1,000 to the Academy of Finance as well as a paid internship for one of the students this upcoming summer.

The tournament champions were a team called Harry James. The runners up were Bergen Chiropractic Team #2 and coming in third was Marantha Grace. (read article)

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Starting in September, the Fort Lee School District will start using a new district-wide student information system that will enable administrators, teachers and parents to more effectively monitor students. It’s also going to save the school district money.

Assistant Superintendent Steven Engravalle estimates Power School will save the district $12,000 annually in licensing fees alone over Genesis, the current system, which the district has been using for about the past 11 years. (read article)

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The Jewish Community Center of Fort Lee hosted its annual Purim carnival for children of Fort Lee’s Jewish community Sunday in the early afternoon. organized the event and welcomed neighboring synagogue communities to the celebration. (read article)

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The Fort Lee Board of Education voted last week to renew and expand its partnership with Bloomfield College on a program that brings teachers from South Korea to Fort Lee schools for six-month stays to be mentored by Fort Lee teachers in an American classroom setting. The Total Immersion Course for Korean English Teachers (TICKET) program, now in its third year, will expand to the spring of this school year and continue for the 2011-2012 school year.

Through the TICKET program, English teachers from Korea partner with and are mentored by Fort Lee teachers, learning classroom management and parent outreach and communication skills and teaching techniques they can take back to Korea with them and employ in their own classrooms. They also act as second teachers in Fort Lee classrooms, working with students directly and providing extra support to the teachers and students they work with. (read article)

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Joanne Hayes, whose artwork is on display at the Fort Lee Library this month, blends elements of fairy-tale fantasy with realistic portraits for a dreamlike effect: a girl lounges inside a pumpkin; the head of Poseidon rises from the sea; dolls preside over a nostalgic still life of a piggy bank and ballet slipper, staring. Hayes’s drawings and sculpture use a wide variety of media, from charcoal to ceramics to cloth, adding to the playful mood of her body of work. She is a young artist, having recently graduated from the School of Visual Arts (SVA) in Manhattan with a degree in illustration. (read article)

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With Fort Lee Board of Education elections coming up soon—April 27 to be exact—voters now know in what order the six candidates vying for three seats on the board will appear on the ballot. They should also be aware that if they can’t make it to the polls on voting day—or simply don’t want to—they can vote by mail.

Meanwhile, late last week, ballot selection and candidate order for the Fort Lee BOE election was chosen at 255 Whiteman St., and undecided voters who would like to learn more about the six candidates and how they stand on issues of importance to the district will have plenty of chances in the coming weeks, with several candidates’ forums planned. (read article)

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And a long-standing request by the borough of Woodcliff Lake Fire Department to borrow a seldom-used piece of equipment owned by the Fort Lee Fire Department may finally meet with the borough’s approval.

The “mobile cascade system” is a fire department vehicle obtained by an Office of Emergency Management grant in 2004, according to Borough Administrator Peggy Thomas, and Woodcliff Lake would like to borrow the vehicle on a long-term basis. (read article)

The week in review appears every Sunday on Fort Lee Patch.


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