2005 - 2006 Annual Reports

Social Justice Task Force

The Social Justice Task Force has been meeting regularly this year to consider ways we can be active participants and good citizens in our respective churches, communities and families.

Public Education

One of our long-standing interests has been the status of public education in New Hampshire.  This year, we discussed with the Director of Special Education in Derry the changes in the public school approach to special education, the inception of classes for pre-schoolers and kindergarteners within the public schools for special needs children, and the resources available to parents and special needs children through the schools.

Public Kindergarten in New Hampshire

As an outgrowth of that discussion, we met with Mary Ellen Hannon, Assistant Superintendent of the Derry Schools, to become informed about the status of public kindergarten in the seventeen New Hampshire communities that do not yet provide such classes for their youngsters.  Joining that discussion, we invited directors of several private kindergartens, notably Kathy Gallagher of Nutfield School and Karen Wilson, who runs a private pre-school from her home in East Derry.  We are following the efforts of the Kindergarten Study Committee appointed by the Derry School Board and will try to stay informed about the efforts of other southern NH towns to incorporate public kindergarten into their school systems.  It is disturbing to members of the Task Force that all seventeen of the school districts in the country that do not provide public kindergarten are located in New Hampshire, most of them right here in our back yards.

“Values Discussions”

In the late fall, the Task Force began a discussion of “values” with an attempt to define what the term means.  We discussed in broad terms what one means by “Family Values”, “Community Values”, “Moral Values”, “Patriotic Values” and “Christian Values”.  We referenced several attempts by contemporary philosophers and prominent commentators to define these terms.  As an outgrowth of these discussions, we undertook a five-part discussion group to meet Sunday mornings before church to consider what we mean, and what we value when we use such terms as “Family Values” (a discussion led by Lee and Charlotte DeBell), what we value and what we mean when we talk of “Community Values”, (a discussion led by Margie Ives), what we mean when we reference the values of our founding fathers, such as separation of church and state, what should be the foreign policies of the United States and how values have changed through two hundred years of democracy (a discussion led by Mark Wiseman),  and the moral and religious values as defined and implied by our church and our “brand” of Christianity, (a discussion led by Pastor Alice Ling). Finally, we had a round-robin reconsideration of what our five part series had provoked that merits further discussion, study and action.

Purpose of the Task Force

Our purpose in the Social Justice Task Force is to inform ourselves about the many-faceted concerns and responsibilities of those striving to be good citizens in a complex, modern world.  The age-old question, “Am I my brother’s keeper?” and “Can I love my neighbor as myself?” certainly provoke myriad responses.  We invite any who are interested to join our group and help us define as well as implement social justice however we can.

Meetings

We meet the second Thursday of the month at 10:00 am in the A/B classroom.

Members of the Task Force: