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March 2007
State to hear appeal on plan to close W. Broadway
Posted Tuesday, March 20, 2007
By Linda Borg
Journal Staff Writer
PROVIDENCE — The state Department of Education will hold hearings on April 5 and April 6 to consider an appeal by parents to keep the West Broadway Elementary School from closing.
Elliot Krieger, a spokesman for the Education Department, said the quasi-judicial hearings will be run by Paul Pontarelli, a lawyer with the education department, who will listen to testimony, collect evidence and present his findings to Peter McWalters, the commissioner of education.
The commissioner can rule on any matter affecting public education, and McWalters’ legal staff routinely hears appeals from teachers who are fighting termination and parents who are appealing their child’s education plan.
Still, Krieger said, it’s uncommon but not unheard of for the department to get involved in a school closing. The hearing officer can decide, however, that the issue is not within the commissioner’s domain or that the plaintiff has no standing to bring the matter before the department.
“I’m happy that there is going to be an impartial forum and that it will be provided by the state,” said Bryan Principe, one of the parents who filed the appeal.
Parents are asking McWalters to reverse the School Department’s decision to shutter the historic elementary school in Federal Hill. Parents and neighbors say that Supt. Donnie Evans did not present valid reasons why the school should be closed in June and the children moved to Carnevale Elementary School across town in the fall.
Principe and others have argued that Evans made up his mind before informing the public that the school might be closed and said that Evans refused to listen to their repeated pleas to keep West Broadway open.
Parents and neighbors say that West Broadway feels like a family, with teachers who care and staff that is willing to make a difference. They say that the school offers an outstanding education to a diverse community and that it plays an important role in this fast-changing neighborhood.
Evans, however, said the School Department has no choice but to move the students because the building violates the state fire code and the fire marshal would no longer grant the school a variance. State code says kindergarten students and first graders must have a separate stairway, which West Broadway lacks.
Later, Evans said the district needed the West Broadway space to accommodate several hundred students from Central High School and Hanley Career and Technical Center, who need to be temporarily relocated while their schools undergo major renovations.
Evans and members of the School Board have acknowledged that the public communication process was flawed, adding that parents and neighbors should have been involved earlier in the discussion. The School Board did, however, allow the public to air concerns at a series of board meetings, but parents say it was too little, too late.
Public officials have also jumped on the West Broadway bandwagon. Last week, Sen. Paul V. Jabour, D-Providence; City Council member John J. Lombardi; and Rep. Anastasia P. Williams, D-Providence, held a news conference in which they criticized the process and threw their support behind the West Broadway parents.
Back to basics: Music, art will return to schools
Posted Monday, March 19, 2007
By Linda Borg
Journal Staff Writer
PROVIDENCE — Supt. Donnie Evans has developed a broad outline to restore the arts to the city’s elementary and secondary schools, a proposal he hopes will satisfy the state education commissioner.
In December, Education Commissioner Peter McWalters ordered the district to return art and music to the public schools on the grounds that the district was violating the state’s basic education plan. In a strongly worded letter to Evans, McWalters wrote that without meaningful access to arts and music classes, the “Providence public schools will have no prospect of fulfilling the graduation requirements for proficiency in the arts.”
The district submitted its plan by the March 1 deadline set by McWalters, and, according to Evans, the commissioner has asked for more information about the plan to offer fine arts in the high schools.
Evans has offered to make the following changes:
• Appoint Earnest Cox, the assistant principal at the Harrison Street High School, to oversee the department’s music and art programs.
• Convene a fine arts task force by April 1 composed of community representatives, college professors, teachers and friends of the arts. This group will evaluate the current programs, make recommendations to bring the schools into compliance with the commissioner’s order and present a recommendation to Evans by Dec. 1.
In the meantime, the district has entered into an agreement with VH1 Save the Music Foundation to provide instrumental music lessons at specific elementary schools. In 2003, VH1 asked the district to return about $225,000 worth of instruments after the district eliminated the 11 instrumental teaching positions at a number of elementary schools. The cuts in art and music positions were part of millions of dollars worth of budget cuts.
At the time, the foundation told then-Supt. Melody Johnson that cutting these positions would compromise the city’s instrumental-music program and, by doing so, violate its contract with Save the Music. The national foundation’s mission is to make music education accessible to all children in the public schools.
Evans also promised to take the following actions during the 2008-2009 school year:
• Art and music instruction will be provided as a separate subject and vocal and instrumental classes will be offered at every high school. Additional teachers will be hired.
• The district will continue to work with arts organizations such as Save the Music Foundation, which has agreed to provide band instruments to seven elementary schools and two piano keyboard labs to two middle schools. The district is also developing a partnership with a local business, Davis Art Publications.
• Summer art and music camps will be explored as a way to help students gain skills in the arts.
• Schools might offer an extended school day specifically for music and art instruction.
Evans said that his second goal was to hire the staff to provide art and music instruction at all levels. Just how many teachers are needed and how the schedule will be changed to accommodate the inclusion of an arts program has yet to be resolved.
“Right now,” Evans said, “we are making sure that the commissioner’s office has everything it needs.”
Superintendent wants smooth transition to Carnevale
Posted Tuesday, March 13, 2007
By Linda Borg
Journal Staff Writer
PROVIDENCE — Schools Supt. Donnie Evans laid out a detailed plan last night to ensure that students and staff make a smooth transition from West Broadway Elementary School to Carnevale Elementary School across town.
Despite repeated opposition from parents and neighbors, the Providence School Board voted last month to close West Broadway and move its students to the so-called Pell complex, which includes an elementary school and a middle school. Evans recommended the closing after the fire marshal told the School Department that it would no longer allow West Broadway to violate the state fire code, which says that kindergarten and first grade students must have a separate stairway out of the building.
Evans also said he needed the space at West Broadway to temporarily house students from Central High School and the Hanley Career and Technical School while both buildings undergo significant renovations. The superintendent said West Broadway was the only school large enough to accommodate teenagers from both high schools.
In a March 9 memo to school board members, Evans outlined the following actions:
•Organize a task force to develop recommendations for a future elementary school in the West Broadway neighborhood. The committee would include parents, teachers, the principal, neighborhood leaders and central office staff. A similar task force would be formed to address Carnevale Elementary School and the Del Sesto Middle School. Evans will appoint members of both committees by April 2.
• Assign Gary Moroch, director of elementary schools, to supervise the move of West Broadway students to the Pell complex.
• A team including Evans; Moroch; Sharon Contreras, the chief academic officer; Denise Carpenter, director of middle schools and others will visit the Pell complex this week to identify which classrooms and other areas of the building will be used by West Broadway students.
• Develop plans for each school, including schedules for the move and a method of communicating with the public. Evans and Contreras will brief the teachers and staff in each school and the Providence Teachers Union on the plans by March 23.
• Update the school board on March 26.
Evans said that West Broadway parents will receive a copy of this memo today.
Parents and neighbors are up in arms about the West Broadway closing because they say it tears at the fiber of a vibrant neighborhood. They also praised the commitment of the West Broadway faculty and staff, which together has 300 years of experience at the West End school. And they have raised numerous questions about the reasons behind the school’s closing, claiming that the fire code violation could be addressed by building a separate stairway for the younger students at a reasonable cost. West End residents have also questioned the $9 million estimate for the cost of renovating the entire building, a figure compiled by DeJONG, the consultants hired by the city to conduct a sweeping school facilities study.
In other business, Sharon Lloyd Clarke, director of high schools, said the district wants every high school to be accredited by the prestigious New England Association of Schools and Colleges, a voluntary organization whose mission is to evaluate public elementary and secondary schools according to a strict set of standards.
“Accreditation says we are committed to high standards,” she told the school board. “Ninety-five percent of the public schools in New England are accredited by this association. It means that we are willing to subject ourselves to an external evaluation by our peers.”
Colleges take accreditation very seriously, Clarke said. The goal is to have the following high schools accredited by 2010: Providence Academy of International Studies, E³, Central High School, Cooley Health, Science and Technology Academy, Feinstein High School and the high school on Adelaide Avenue, which will open this fall. With the exception of Central High School, none of these schools, which are relatively new, has applied for accreditation before.
In addition, Hope High School and Mount Pleasant High School, which were both placed on NEASC’s warning list some time ago, have applied for full accreditation. NEASC requires every school to undergo a 12-month self-study every 10 years, accompanied by a four-day visit by a team of outside teachers and principals. Schools must then update the association that they are addressing issues in a timely manner.
Classical High School is the only Providence high school to be fully accredited by NEASC; Classical requires students to pass a test before they are admitted.
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