School innovation plans raise many questions By Carol Strupczewski

Innovation schools or autonomous schools present, in my opinion, many questions that have not been discussed, at least at the presentations I attended. Last year I attended two meetings of small autonomous schools supporters United Interfaith Action regarding this educational concept. During one of those the meetings, children put on skits promoting these small innovation schools in which everyone would know each other, class size would be smaller, teachers could give individual attention, etc.

This, in my opinion, left the audience with the impression that these innovation or autonomous schools will be the end-all-to-be-all answer; however, in my mind there are many unanswered questions. Several things that were never mentioned during the meetings were: student absenteeism, poor study habits, lack of discipline, not paying attention, etc. How will the innovation or autonomous schools address these problems?

At the regular December meeting of the New Bedford School Committee, which I attended and re-watched, the agenda item for "Innovation School Prospectus" was presented and discussed. Prior to the taking up of this agenda item, several individuals in favor of innovation schools spoke during the public comment section. One of the speakers was a child attending an elementary school in New Bedford. He mentioned that he was in favor of these small autonomous schools, as there will be a small number of students in the school, more individual attention and parents can be involved in the educational process.

According to the report by the state Department of Elementary and Secondary Education, May 2011, the report listed the following enrollments: Dunbar which hadn't closed when the report was done, had 105 students, Kempton 125, Rodman 145, Hathaway 162, to name a few. I also noticed that there are several elementary schools with enrollments less than 250 students. One of my questions is: "Don't we currently have these small neighborhood schools in New Bedford?" The next question is: "If this is such a great idea, why did members of the School Committee, the superintendent and mayor approve of building larger elementary schools?"

Here are more questions I have regarding the creation of small autonomous neighborhood schools as presented by Dr. Lawrence Finnerty and Marlene Pollock:


Who will be the overseer of the innovation school?
What will be the total costs? Are there any hidden cost?
Who will appoint the principal?
Who will decide on the curriculum?
How will the teaching staff be chosen?
Where will the funding be derived, will it be taken out of the regular school department budget as is the funding for the Global Learning Charter School, and who will monitor the funds?
How will students be chosen, will the student enrollment be assigned by the neighborhood or will it be district-wide? If district-wide, what will be the anticipate cost for busing?
What happens if students decide to bail out? Where will they go and will others be allowed to transfer into the innovation school?
Will the teachers, staff and students have a longer school day and year? If so, what will be the added cost?
Will paraprofessionals be assigned to these schools?
If the innovation school is within another school, will there be more than one principal for that school, how will they be able to keep track of MCAS, and will the innovation school be assigned its own name?
Will the faculty have the protection of the union?

Our newly elected school officials have challenging work ahead in dealing with many issues in our schools. Everyone who will be working on this proposal needs to carefully weigh the pros and cons of this prospectus.

One of the important points that everyone needs to keep in mind is that it is ultimately the student — yes "the student" and not the size of a building — who must step up to the challenges of academic success. As I written previously, students must prepare themselves for their future by studying, seeking extra help when deemed necessary, and be in school daily and on time. Parents should be fully involved in their child's education and have a good working relationship with their child's teacher. This concept has been and will always be in place in the New Bedford Public Schools, and I rather doubt it will change.

A point of information to everyone, I am on the Superintendent's Roundtable, sit on the Environmental Curriculum committee, and have been attending all school meetings for several years and very seldom see members of the UIA or Education Roundtable in attendance. To fully understand the many positives and challenges taking place in our schools, one should regularly attend these meetings.

As I stated in the beginning, there are many questions that need to be researched and answered before the school department embarks on this voyage.