School closings

McGuffey Reader from the late 1800s. Image from Robin Dude.

Dorothy Marshak of Community Help in Music Education wrote a post on the Concerned4dcps list that is particularly good, about the current school closings debacle, which she is allowing me to reprint. My response is after.

It seems to me that decisions to close schools should be made on a per case basis. I was surprised at the criteria that I saw used to select the doomed schools: square footage per student? That may be a dominant variable for real estate developers and leasers, but what does it have to do with the needs of students? A spacious older school with an auditorium, computer room, gym, etc will be high on the ax under that criterion.

Also, why is the loss in enrollment between 2002 and 2006 a relevant way of selection? Why should it be assumed that a school that has already lost many students (for whatever reasons) is the one that is most likely to continue losing them? Aside from feeling less than convinced by the criteria selected, I would hope that other viable alternatives could be considered to closing neighborhood schools that have the loyalty of students and parents and are closer than the ½ mile from homes that have been proposed as a reasonable distance for children as young as 4 to walk, possibly without adult accompaniment.

I understand Councilmember Evans is fighting to keep Shaw open on the grounds that it is also the venue for other needed public services. Why would this not be a good argument for keeping many of the other “underpopulated” schools open as well? Why shouldn’t our schools serve as neighborhood centers, as so many of them do, at least in part.

Why couldn’t schools also house health clinics (perhaps shared with students and the community), library branches, other social services that are needed for students, and, in non-school hours, after-school programs (those involving programs like performing arts which require space and sound proofing have difficulty finding space), adult education programs, and space for community meetings (of which there is a real shortage of affordable space). If other organizations sharing the space paid their fair share of upkeep, that should remove the financial argument for closing schools (still being open to possibilities that there are other good grounds for closing particular schools).

Mary Levy demonstrated in her testimony that the cost savings from the closings will be almost half the amount estimated, and in any case are most unlikely to be dedicated to the curriculum enrichment in music, art and PE that has been offered as the main justification for the closing.

Do others feel this suggestion is one they could support?

And I wrote:

Your piece very succinctly argues how the criteria used for the current school closing effort is flawed. I do believe that some schools probably need to close, but that broader criteria, shaped not just by the school system, but by neighborhoods, neighborhood stablization and improvement objectives, etc. And yes, on the total amount of space _in the system_ and the projected enrollments (nationally, it is expected that only 13% of U.S. households will have children).

Most everyone wants to keep their school open, but I think that's not supportable given future enrollment projections.

Sadly one or two good ideas in the closing proposal, that certain schools become K-8 schools (I was at first skeptical of this proposal but have since come around, figuring that it's easier for a good school to add a couple grades and keep students in a high quality education space, than it is to create more separate schools that are good) are lost in the understandable anger that has erupted against the proposal.

Another good idea somewhere, about expanding the Capitol Hill cluster idea (something I have been suggesting since at least 2003), was mentioned and probably won't go anywhere either, etc.

A lot needs to be done to improve the school system, and this particular initiative-- closing a large number of schools wholesale--was not the first place to start or the most important priority at the very beginning.

Instead it will likely doom the effort of school improvement, cause damaging, cascading, and increasing change throughout the system, without necessarily allowing for high quality transformation.

Images of old "Dick and Jane" school books, from the series once published by Scott, Foresman and Company.

Times change and our schools must change too.