The local school board is trying once to cover their exposed behinds and close schools to make ends meet: since my school is recommended for closure, I have a dog in this fight and I sicced it on the school board today:
Let me add my voice to those who are disappointed in the choices of proposed school closings. I am dismayed that this is necessary at all, but I am angry at the choice of Daniel Bagley Elementary as a candidate for closure.
I’m not all convinced the Board sees these schools as communities of learning and caring people, with dedicated staff and parent volunteers all coming together for the good of all our children. Our school community has a small building but a growing population: by your own measurements, we are a highly requested school by parents who have taken the time to visit us and get to know us.
But your own criteria show our building as too small for our student population, based on the presence of two portable classrooms. If you had taken the time to get to know us, you would know those are not classrooms but used exclusively by the Boys & Girls Club for before and after school activities. That’s not overflow, that’s inclusion and community involvement. You should come in our building, see our classrooms, get a sense of how we make the best of this old but charming building.
Is the quality of our programs part of the selection process? As parents, knowing how strong our educational experience is, we have been considering how to expand our offerings to a 6th grade to complete our Montessori experience. We have offered a two track Montessori and Contemporary program in our school for 5 years now, and it has been a huge success for the children and the school. Enrollment is up, parental involvement is up, and the two programs strengthen each other every year. Why wasn’t our Montessori program mentioned? If you were to close it down, I can guarantee you’ll have some more empty seats to be worried about as parents look for private school opportunities.
Our free and reduced lunch population is in the 30 percent range, which is below the district average but high for the North End. And those kids learn better in our school. Come visit some time: you don’t know what you’re missing.
Our population has doubled over the past 5 years but PTA fundraising totals have quadrupled: does that sound like a struggling community that needs to be broken up and re-assigned? Our afterschool programs, managed and staffed by volunteers and local community members, has grown from 0 to multiple programs every afternoon. We offer Spanish, Dance, Yoga, Kickball, Science, and Chess with some of them offered more than once per week and all with waiting lists.
In short, over the past five years, under the strong but nurturing leadership of Birgit McShane, we have transformed a struggling school to a dynamic and growing community, with an emphasis on involvement and high standards. In that time, we have built strong neighborhood involvement, local business support, partnerships with local faith communities, all with a sense of inclusion and mutual respect.
This is the model school, the one you should be holding up as a blueprint for the others. Breaking up this community sends a message that no matter how hard people work on making a supportive environment for their kids and investing in their neighborhood school, the efforts don’t mean anything. I don’t think that’s what you want.
Mark Twain has the last word on this, perhaps: God made the Idiot for practice, and then He made the School Board.
So we fight.