School board needs to acquire mathematician

I would like to recommend to the members of the Shore Regional High School Board of Education that they acquire a member who majored in mathematics — or perhaps they should just check to see if their superintendent/principal Leonard Schnappauf majored in math.

When speaking about current suspensions, Mr. S. observed, "There wasn’t much difference" when comparing the current 14 with last year’s 11.

Later in his testimony, Mr. S. declined to give comparative figures for five or 10 years ago, saying that would be unfair because the school was so small at that time. Ten years ago it had 550 students, while today it has 700, he noted. According to my calculations, the difference between 11 and 14 is 27.3 percent.

The difference between 700 and 550 happens to also be 27.3 percent. Percentages will frequently tell you much more than what just numbers do.

If I were on the school board, I believe that my advice to Mr. S. would be: "You provide the numbers, I’ll make my own comparisons. Thank you."

Another question I’d like to ask Mr. S. is how does a monthly suspension rate of two percent compare with other schools in the area?

John Toohey

Red Bank