Riverhead Central School District

Comments by Riverhead school board member Laurie Downs about crimes against students caused a stir at a downtown civic meeting Saturday, but police records do not back up her allegations. She later said she is fearful of violent Latino gangs she said are in the area.

The Riverhead school district’s '23-'24 budget proposal includes an increase of more than $4.2 million for general classroom teaching, instruction and support, Assistant Superintendent for Business Rodney Asse said at Tuesday’s school board meeting.

The Riverhead Central School District had a good year financially in its 2021-2022 fiscal year, with actual revenues coming in higher than budgeted and spending less than budgeted, according to the district’s annual external audit. 

An agreement has been reached between the town, LIPA, Suffolk County and the town’s school and fire districts to collect what is likely more than $10 million of payments-in-lieu-of-taxes, also known as PILOTs, for LIPA-owned properties in Riverhead.

There's a makerspace in each of Riverhead's seven school buildings now — workshop-like environments where students tinker, create, invent and build things, developing skills in STEM fields.

Riverhead Central School District has been sued by two parents for requiring students to wear masks in schools after a Nassau judge last January ruled the State Health Department’s mask mandate “null, void and unenforceable as a matter of law.” The ruling never took effect due to an appellate court stay pending the state's appeal and was later made moot when the state lifted the mandate after the winter COVID surge subsided.

"I don't think this is fair, to weight a three-hour exam the same as 10 weeks of instruction," school district Trustee Christopher Dorr said. Including the Regents exam score in a final course grade could lower the grade and hurt a student's chance for scholarships, he said. The district will form a committee to review the board policy,

Members of Heather's Helpers, formed in memory of school social worker Heather Jablonsky helped create and distribute 50 Thanksgiving baskets to families of Pulaski Street School.

Students at Riverhead High School raised their concerns about the lack of after school bus transportation and the building’s overcrowded hallways to the Board of Education during its meeting yesterday.

The Riverhead school district has settled a lawsuit brought by the parent of a Pulaski Street School student who claimed she witnessed the school principal and a teacher engaged in “a sexually inappropriate act” in the school’s orchestra room in November 2019.