After attending the meeting at Our Lady of Guadalupe at St. James Church in NB last night, I was very dismayed to find that the two so-called "innovation" schools that are proposed simply aren't all that innovative. The two "design teams" each presented their cases, touting mission and vision statements, which while nice sounding, simply weren't all that different from any other mission or vision statements found anywhere else. Anyone can promise anything -- it doesn't really make it happen.
Two of the city's schools would be affected by the development of the two schools with wonderful names (Esperanza School of Language and Culture & Renaissance Community School for the Arts) -- Roosevelt Middle School, and Gomes Elementary. What these design teams want is to move into our schools, co-locating and taking over the very resources that are already in use at the schools. For instance, it was stated last night in their power point presentation that the "dual immersion" innovation school would consist of 50% ELL students and 50% English-speaking students in grades K-8 (two classes per grade) taking up residence at Roosevelt Middle School. Why? Because as they reported, Roosevelt has all this extra space that they are not using, and that the population of ELL students is concentrated in the South End of NB. Wrong and well, wrong. I work at Roosevelt, and I can honestly say that we DO NOT have 18 classrooms to give up; in fact, nearly all of our classrooms are full at this time with approximately 850 students per year attending. To install an innovation school in this location would certainly mean displacing the students who already have the right to be there in their neighborhood middle school and having them double up in classroom sizes of over 35 students in order to "make room" for all these extra students who will have smaller class sizes. Also, although RMS houses the SEI population for the middle schools in the city at this time, the majority of those students live in the North End of the city and are bused in each day. So why isn't this school being placed at Normandin Middle School in the North End? Hmmm.
In addition, they would be siphoning off our resources of workers such as custodians and cafeteria workers, as well as utilizing the bathrooms, gymnasium, nurse's office, etc. This means double work and less pverall space, including office space for those already working at Roosevelt. Not to mention that they would be placing K-2 students with much older students in 6-8 grade which research has shown is not developmentally helpful (which is why we have junior high and middle schools in the first place). Parents and teachers need to stand up and say NO to this ridiculous proposal.
The same goes for Gomes school. This is a school that the "innovative dream team" claimed had an issue with having many students who are at-risk for dropping out. Well, why not help those students rather than taking all of their current resources and re-routing them elsewhere? The reality is that small autonomous schools DO NOT take in ALL students. They pick and choose those students not requiring more extensive Special Ed services, or those that do not have a history of disciplinary issues. And if by some chance they take under their wing a SPED student that doesn't work out, they have IEP meetings geared toward moving that child out of their building. Where do they go? Back to their neighborhood public school, who welcomes them back AND provides them with the services they need. They claim that they will NOT ever expel any students, force them to leave their wonderful little art school, and keep them through all grades K-5. They stated that they would do everything in their power to forge and maintain relationships with parents. Wonderful, but not necessarily realistic. Small autonomous schools? Hardly not. If they are so autonomous, why can't they provide their own buildings, resources and supplies and leave ours alone?
17 comments:
The S-T left out a key detail in Tuesday's article about the Esperanza School. It would be housed at Roosevelt.
The faculties of Gomes and Roosevelt will have the opportunity to vote on the proposals. I urge them to watch the video at the link below to see the evidence of how destructive it is to have a charter move into your building. Let's be truthful. An "innovation school" is really a charter school.
http://vimeo.com/41994760#at=0
I did not see parents with school age children at the UIA meeting last night. Most of the audience were seniors. Where are all these parents? I notice that Charis did not mention about the poor attendance or medium age of the audience.
Maybe if Scott Lang hadn't mentioned numerous times that roosevelt was way below capacity when he wanted to place Taylor school there this idea now would not have gotten this far.
The more I read the more I think "Have they lost their minds"?
I must agree with the awesome post!
I sat there and listened and so many important issues were not addressed.But,then again, maybe that was the whole point.
Teachers have been making similar "innovative" recommendations for years and we've always been told there is no money. It's always about money. I don't see why if they can come up with money for these small autonomous schools then why can't they come up with money for whole school initiatives? Dividing a school seems destructive. Why can't all of Gomes school be an arts focused school that includes help from the community?
I read the standard times article but couldn't find any details on the proposal. Are there details or is the Uia making it up as they go along?
Is the Coalition for Social Justice a pro-union group?
In response to several of the blogger's posts, it is correct that there were no parents with school age children attending the UIA's "public" forum on Monday night. The audience indeed consisted mainly of older adults (probably UIA supporters who stacked the audience). Three school committee members were in attendance though (Dr. Fletcher, Ms. Pollock, and Mr. Livramento) along with Joe Lopes, Councilor of Ward 6 and Justin Braga. Also, at the end of the presentations, there was no Q & A session with the audience so that those with concerns could pose questions publicly to those in attendance which would have (hopefully) fostered a stimulating discussion. Instead, the members of the audience were directed to head to the back of the room to ask questions privately of the design teams. But the UIA made sure that they videotaped the entire presentation (minus any questions asked) which will probably be shown ASAP on cable access television!
The whole issue with RMS being reported as being "below capacity" appears to have been perpetuated further by former school committee member Jill Ussach. She went on cable access television when running for re-election and actually mentioned this issue as a way to show her constituents how on top of things she was!
I agree with the blogger who is wondering why we can't funnel money into saving our own public schools as they are. Why do we have to jump on the bandwagon of every "new and so-called improved" idea that comes down the pike rather than carefully choosing options after much research and development? Everything in NB seems to be a band-aid approach that is NOT proactive, but reactive in nature.
Please take the advice of the first blogger and check out this 67 minute video which is sure to open your eyes about these small, autonomous schools that promise a lot, but take a great deal more without serving everyone.
For the blogger who asked where the details were, you need to attend one of the UIA's "informational" presentations and view their power point presentations. They don't really want all of that information to get out to the public...people might begin to ask all the right questions. FYI, the next UIA "Action for Education" meeting will be held at the Our Lady of the Assumption Church, 47 S. 6th St., on July 30 at 7:00 pm. I'm hoping that many of our members will attend and fight back against these proposals. (BTW, it was mentioned during their meeting that this was to be a rally session.)
I don't know if the Coalition for Social Justice considers themselves pro-union or not, but my sneaking suspicion is that they are not.
As for the poster who asked "Have they lost their minds?" The answer is simply "Yes."
I believe in political action and I believe in democracy. However, I am concerned that the priority of the UIA throughout has been the political manipulation of school comm, media, and public opinion.
In the current discussions on innovation schools logistics, budgets, state regulatory approval, and longer term sustainability have languished while great ideas and great promises have been made.
How ironic that an association of hundreds of professional educators is being criticized for not engaging with fantasy proposals. Great ideas and great promises can be hard to counter and well staged PR actions and rallies can leave a false impression of progress. If the media and political groups that style themselves as community based were really a coalition for social justice they would not hold such a low bar for experimentation with our schools.
Of course, if our less mannerly bloggers would favor this professional analysis over their ignorant insults, we might stand a better chance of making our case. It is hard to Watch such juvenile behavior Dog the forum.
I think the NBEA should sponsor a conference in September to highlight these issues. late afternoon showing of the movie Inconvenient Superman. Two keynote speakers with knowledge on failure of imaginary "reform". Panel discussion etc.
Great suggestion!
As long as there's an "us vs. them" mentality surrounding education issues in New Bedford, no real progress will be made. As it stands today, a lot of energy is being expended to win political skirmishes. Dialogue is marked by insulting comments from both sides, making meaningful progress more difficult to achieve.
Those outside of the school system need to be more respectful of everyone is the school system. Individuals and groups in the community all-too-often fail to include teachers in their initial discussions about ways to impact student performance in New Bedford. Recent initiatives spearheaded by UIA and the Education Roundtable are examples of how failing to include a group as fundamentally important to education as teachers can result in weak proposals and strong opposition.
To put it in better perspective, the leaders of these outside groups would do well to consider how they would react to a similar incursion on their "turf." How would a local church feel if the teachers union planned, announced and publicly advocated significant changes in how a local Catholic church served the needs of its parishoners without any input from the priest and laity? How would the Community Foundation feel if the NBEA launched a public campaign aimed at removing the foundation's top management so they could bring in someone new who would run the Community Foundation in a manner more agreeable to the teachers union?
Empathy can hold great power for those capable of it. We need more poeple to use it.
As long as we, as a community, are fighting over what to do to make things better, we will inevitably continue to flounder. We have to find a way to get the acrimony behind us and begin working together. We have to be inclusive of all stakeholders from day one on any new initiative. We need to respect each other.
I should be receiving a copy of the DVD "The Inconvenient Truth Behind Searching for Superman" this week (hopefully), and will keep people posted as to when and where the film will be screened, so that both parents and educators will have the chance to view the film and make an informed decision about the future of New Bedford schools, especially Roosevelt Middle and Gomes Elementary. I don't think we should wait until September though, as time is of the essence.
instead of wasting time and money on these so called "innovative schools", why doesn't the administration just hire more art, music and pe teacher? That way EVERY child in this city would have art , music and PE once a week for an hour. Teachers-especially in the elementary level would have ample planning time instead of hardly any. This is a no brainer! Equality across the board-not just in innovative schools-if you want to call them that!
Instead of wasting money and precious time with these innovative schools which have not been proven to be successful, why not reinstate the much needed administrators whose positions were cut two years ago at the High school? The housemasters cannot do that job alone and have posirive results! The student population has changed dramatically and the students are coming into the high school with too many academic and behavior problems!
If we went back to the BASICS in the curriculum including respect, accountability, and responsibility instead of all the latest STUFF, maybe the high school would be in better shape. Take a look at the middle school principals( with the exception of one) and you can see why we're in the mess we're in.
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