This doesn't work if school enrollments aren't comprised of neighborhood populations
Source: This Toronto gym teacher is cycling around his school’s neighbourhood dressed as the school mascot to encourage kids to dance and stay fit," Toronto StarGym teacher Patrick Murtaugh, dressed as the Regal Road Junior Public School mascot, cycles around the neighbourhood. The goal is to have students join him for a short dance party, at a distance, and remind them of the importance of physical activity.
Many school districts have open enrollment or programs for allowing students to enroll in schools outside their neighborhoods. That's not a bad policy as that allows students to enroll in special programs or better schools, if their neighborhood schools are suboptimal.
OTOH, that disconnects schools from local communities and neighborhoods, and in terms of "fight or flight" and school improvement, diminishes the amount of local social, community, and organizational capital that can be brought to bear on school improvement.
Past blog entries about neighborhood-based elementary schools as building blocks of neighborhoods and neighborhood-focused planning:
-- "The bilingual Key Elementary School in Arlington County as another example of the "upsidedownness" of community planning," 2018
-- "One way in which community planning is completely backwards," 2011
-- "Missing the most important point about Clifton School closure in Fairfax County," 2011
-- "Rethinking community planning around maintaining neighborhood civic assets and anchors," 2011
Labels: neighborhood planning, public education/K-12, urban design/placemaking
posted by Richard Layman @ 12:54 PM&Permanent Link
5 Comments:
Oh how cute.
This works for places with great neighborhood schools. Think of it more as a result of a strong community not as a result of a neighborhood school. I have my doubts this would occur in areas where many of the teachers live far away from the community because it is unaffordable or unsafe. Also that was Canada, they are waaaaay nicer than we Americans.
Or Utah? Check out the photo gallery for this story:
https://www.deseret.com/utah/2020/4/8/21213612/springville-librarians-going-above-and-beyond-to-serve-patrons-during-coronavirus-outbreak
although I don't think you can fully disconnect the two. Strong communities probably have strong schools. Weak schools are definitely a result in part of weak communities, or situations where the schools are disconnected from the neighborhood.
The DC house is 1.5 blocks from a charter school, which when it first opened, would invite people in the area to stuff. They don't make that effort any more but they did place their playground in the front of the building and it is open to the community.
Whittier Elementary is about 5 blocks away (in fact the person who owned the house before us had taught there for decades) and Coolidge High School is 6 blocks away. But they aren't all that connected to the immediate community.
When I first got involved in stuff and then learned about the Project for Public Spaces, I had the idea that the PPS workshop "How to Turn A Place Around" could be done by schools as a way to better connect to the neighborhood around it. I thought about doing it for JO Wilson Elementary, but I never moved the idea forward.
I've also written about the idea that schools could be community centers more.
You've probably seen the entryway of the Marie Reed Learning Center on 18th St. in Adams Morgan and the way it connects to the street, with a kind of small square there.
Many of the schools in Salt Lake have benches as part of the entryway areas. I definitely don't recall that from DC, excepting MRLC.
Schools (ex. the principal) could decide to close themselves off from the community too for "safety" and "liability" reasons. Those were reasons presented at times at community meetings of why X school gated off their playground or athletic fields.
And there are other things that would disconnect a school from the community, the rise of childless households. One of the many things I got out of our The Triangle Known as Truxton Circle exhibit was the stark change in demographics. Fewer children, fewer women at home caring for kids or having them, means fewer people in the neighborhood with a functional & legit relationship and history with the school.
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