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Major shakeups planned at 14 Boston schools

E-mail|Link|Comments () November 18, 2009 07:58 PM

By James Vaznis, Globe Staff

Boston school superintendent Carol R. Johnson tonight is revealing the names of 14 schools slated for massive overhauls, reinvention or possible closure, under a plan that would affect more than 6,000 students.

Johnson chose to focus on the schools because of chronically low MCAS scores, and she is delivering the news to the School Committee in the auditorium of one of the affected schools: Orchard Gardens K-8 School in Roxbury, which opened with great fanfare in a newly built facility on Albany Street just a few years ago and has roughly 600 students.

Orchard Gardens is part of the district's much-hyped pilot schools program, which allows administrators to deviate from district-wide curriculum mandates and teacher union rules in hopes of sparking teaching innovations. But Orchard Gardens has long suffered from low test scores and a rotating door of principals. It is one of three pilot schools slated for a dramatic turnaround.

The other two pilot schools are Harbor Middle School in Dorchester -- which specializes in integrating students with severe special needs in regular classrooms and has been planning to add a high school program -- and The English High School in Jamaica Plain. English became a pilot school two years ago as part of a joint effort between the city and the state to bring the school back to its former glory.

"The days of business as usual are over," said Johnson said in a prepared statement issued before the meeting. "If we intend to see all, not just some, of our schools become centers of excellence, we must take bold and swift action. Every student in our city has the right to a high-quality education."

More than half of the schools slated for major shakeups are elementary schools: William Blackstone in the South End, Paul Dever in Dorchester, Ralph Waldo Emerson in Roxbury, Curtis Guild in East Boston, John Holland in Dorchester, John F. Kennedy in Jamaica Plain, Elihu Greenwood in Hyde Park, and William Monroe Trotter in Dorchester -- a school that was once highly sought after by parents but that over the years has slid considerably in academic achievement.

The other schools are the Maurice J. Tobin K-8 school in Roxbury, the Dearborn Middle School in Roxbury, which is overseen by Jose Duarte who until this fall ran The English High, and Odyssey High School in South Boston.

Johnson initially identified Odyssey and the Greenwood for closure last fall but gave the schools a second chance after a groundswell of support from students, parents, and staff.

The schools range in size from 227 students at Emerson to 843 students at English, according to an Oct. 1, 2008, headcount, which is the most recent enrollment data available on the state Department of Elementary and Secondary Education's web site.

Roughly two-thirds of the schools are located in a swath of Roxbury, Dorchester and a few adjacent neighborhoods, which suffer from high rates of poverty, crime, drug abuse, and teenage pregnancy. Johnson has chosen to frame the area in a more hopeful light, dubbing it the "Circle of Promise." She argues it will take a committed partnership between schools, churches, community groups, and local businesses to help children to push through school and break the cycle of poverty.

Johnson said her office will work with the schools on finalizing a turnaround strategy and will hold meetings at each of the schools with staff, parents, and students to solicit their advice. The School Committee, according to a timeline released by the district, is scheduled to vote on the proposal next month. Changes are expected to go into effect by next fall.

The range of options under consideration in Johnson’s plan include major shakeups in a school’s administrative team and teaching staff, extending the school day, or closing a failing school and reopening a new school in its building, a measure the district imposed on at least two schools earlier this year. That is a way the district can expand successful programs and make wholesale changes to teaching staffs.