School Without Walls High School
HSA General Meeting Notes
December 17, 2012
Jean Boland, HSA President, opened the meeting at 6:40 pm by welcoming everyone who came. She noted that this meeting was to discuss the status of the merger between School Without Walls High School and Francis-Stevens. Jean welcomed John Davis, Chief of Schools at DC Public Schools, to the meeting.
Jean began by providing a recap of the past year’s activities regarding the merger:
• About a year ago, the SWW community learned about the proposal to merge SWW High School with Francis-Stevens, a K-8 school. The proposal would merge the two schools and high school students would attend classes at F-S, which is approximately a mile from SWW. Parents, students, and other members of the SWW High School community were concerned about the proposal. In February 2013, over 250 people attended a town hall meeting at SWW discussing the impact – benefits and deficits – of the proposal. After these discussions, approximately 75% of the community opposed splitting the high school community in order for some students to attend classes at FS.
• As a result of concerns raised by the SWW community, DCPS agreed that no students would attend classes at FS this school year and created a task force to examine the issues and make recommendations to DCPS.
• The task force was chaired by Jennifer Smith, currently Senior Director for Sustainability and Growth at Flamboyen Foundation and formerly the principal of the Capitol Hill Cluster School. SWW members were: parents Jean Boland, Ed Lazere (chairman of the LSAT), Melissa Mehring, Linwood Jolly and teachers Carlton Ackerman and Kiehl Christie. FS was represented by an equal number of parents and teachers. The task force was asked to address:
o Physical location of high school students at FS
o Merged budget between the two schools
o Shared leadership and administration of the two campuses
o Enrollment levels at SWW
The task force began meeting biweekly in July to discuss and work through all the issues. The guiding principle for the SWWHS members was: did the proposal enhance the education and development of the high school students? On the issues the task force was asked to address:
o Physical location. The task force considered the various permutations of moving departments, moving a single grade, moving select teachers. The task force learned that 75% of all classes at SWWHS this school year are made up of students of two or more grades. Moving select teachers to FS could isolate those teachers and make student interaction before and after school more difficult. In addition, the impact on students participating in clubs, sports, and needing teacher consultations was considered . The task force considered the feasibility of running shuttles but couldn’t find an expert to help cost the option out. They noted it was likely to be expensive and could cut into instructional time since the current schedule permits only 3 minutes between classes and FS is a mile away from SWWHS. The task force also learned that FS was slated for a major renovation in two years which would be disruptive if SWWHS students were taking classes at that location. As a result, the task force concluded that it didn’t make sense to recommend that any SWWHS students take classes at FS.
o Administration and support. The task force found a lot of issues in this area. Some shared personnel were never seen by one of the schools (for various reasons). Issues were found when top administration didn’t have sufficient time to devote in one area or another. They believed that there were issues with a lack of clarity and that leadership was stretched thin. As a result of the experiences of both school task force members, the group concluded that each school needed its own dedicated leadership.
o Budget. DCPS made a decision to separate the two schools’ budgets so that option did not need to be addressed.
o Enrollment. This was only a SWWHS issue and the issue is, “what is the right size for SWWHS?” The task force concluded that much more analysis was needed on this issue and that all options from space at GW to moving the school outright to a larger location should be considered.
On November 7, the task force issued a letter to Chief of Schools Davis recommending:
1) No students from SWWHS take classes at FS
2) Agreeing with the decision to split the budget for the two schools,
3) Each school needs its own dedicated leadership, and
4) Develop an enrollment plan for SWWHS that takes into consideration other options for space (besides FS), school growth, retention of teachers and students, and overall school programing.
• Ed Lazere, chairman of the LSAT and member of the task force, added that from his perspective, a goal from DCPS was to increase enrollment at SWWHS. He also noted that the merger has resulted in some improvements at FS, including increased enrollment, enthusiastic new teaching staff and greater parent involvement,
• Melissa Mehring, parent representative on the task force, added that one of the issues on high school students attending classes a mile away was a loss of instructional time. She noted that currently there is three minutes between classes. The working g group was concerned about the impact on students who had physical limitations. Melissa also observed that task force members still haven’t heard what DCPS believes to be the benefits of the merger to current high school students.
• Jean Boland introduced John Davis.
• Mr. Davis thanked the members of the task force for their very thorough and thoughtful work. He said that the genesis of the proposal was the school closure discussion occurring last school year. The FS community put together a proposal that included a merger. That proposal, coupled with a principal who had experience running a K-12 campus, plus a good school in SWWHS and space at FS led to the merger decision. Mr. Davis noted that the movement of the high school students to FS garnered the most discussion. He observed that the tension, as he reviewed the recommendations from the task force, is that he looks at the school district as a whole. He said that he doesn’t want SWWHS to get so big that it loses its culture and identity; but if more students can go to a high performing school that it is a benefit. Mr. Davis then took questions and observations from the attendees.
Q: Is the goal to increase enrollment and move students to FS?
A: No decision has been made, no recommendation has been made to the Chancellor.
Q: Every year we struggle with enrollment. Why not target enrollment growth – maybe the whole school should move to a bigger location?
A: Appreciate that – 585 enrollment now, don’t know of any further enrollment increases.
Q: What recommendations can you agree to?
A: We are still debating the issues.
Q: Not opposed to growing the school, but am opposed to splitting the school. Any consideration to moving the school to a bigger location?
A: Understand your comment but no plan on enrollment, no overall goal.
Q: Quality seats at Walls need to be increased.
A: Walls is not the only quality school.
Q: Will you make changes that impact students? What is your timeline?
A: Haven’t made that decision. Wanted to make the decision in November, but can’t give a date for the decision.
Several questions/comments about the negative effect of splitting schools with parents observing that the Oyster/Adams split hasn’t worked very well. Concerns that this could negatively change SWWHS.
One parent observed that there were several problematic issues and that this proposal felt like a very temporary solution:
■ No goal on size,
■ The school system is a year away from the school boundaries discussion which could solve some of the FS enrollment issues,
■ If the goal is to grow SWWHS, then the school community needs to know what the target is.
Another parent observed that there didn’t seem to be any benefits – the school seemed to need to be larger but the students shouldn’t be split between campuses. Why not make a deal with GW for more space by giving them space elsewhere in the city in decommissioned school property.
Q: Given that this has been going on for a year, it seems like we don’t know what DCPS wants. Logistically, this doesn’t make sense.
A: If there is space that is close, we need to wrestle with this if it’s a benefit.
Q: How will you make this decision?
A: I am asking whether we can mitigate the challenges that were brought up and can we put more students there?
Comment: Seems like there is a political reason for this decision and Walls students get screwed.
Q: What is the benefit to the 9th grade students?
A: Sometimes there isn’t a benefit. Sometimes you can’t say what’s in it for me. But I don’t want students not to benefit.
Q: Thinks this is just a dog and pony show and that DCPS will make a decision in April when it is too late for anyone to do anything about it.
A: Can only say that we have to see how it works out.
Q: Concerned about the decision making process. DCPS has a history of saying nothing of substance and then at the last minute will plop something down. When we will know?
Q: How would the obstacles be overcome?
A: We haven’t made a decision yet.
Q: What is the timeline for making a decision?
Task force member Melissa Mehring commented that, in her opinion, FS didn’t care how they kept their school open but that they weren’t wedded to high school students in their school and that the FS members of the task force and the SWWHS members had a unanimous set of recommendations. She noted that the Chancellor has talked about creating a comprehensive plan for high schools. Why isn’t SWWHS part of that plan? What are the ramifications to growing this school? Are Banneker and McKinley high schools at capacity?
Q: When will the final decision be made?
A: March/April is too late. January is too late. Want to have the decision soon.
Jean thanked Mr. Davis for coming to discuss this issue with the SWWHS community. The meeting was adjourned at 7:50pm.
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