Parents, officials brace for battle

By Andrew Firestone

Somerville parents have gone a long way towards their goals of solving the education problems of Somerville. While the administration questions the feasibility and rationality of their plan, the community members behind the Somerville Progress Charter School (SPCS) say their cause is right, and it must be implemented.

They’ll get their chance December 14, when the members of the State Board of Education and the Department of Elementary and Secondary Education hold their public hearing here in Somerville to gain public input over the SPCS.

The charter will be oriented towards English-Language Learners, and the school will be built around language-intensive and immersive education and progressive styles of learning. One of the SPCS founder members and spokesperson Selena Fitanides says these methods will help regain what has been lost since bilingual programs were banned statewide in 2002. The application describes several amenities, such as an optional after-school program devoted to ELL learning.

The proposed school will open next September with 180 students, and move over the next several years towards a full enrollment of 425 students. The writing of the application took place over 16 months of research into successful models of urban charter schools in places like New York City and Chicago.

Fitanides characterized SPCS as a grass-roots parent-led organization going up against the city administration, as well as all unionized city workers. She says that the need for the SPCS is there because the Somerville Public Schools (SPS) has not turned around lagging MCAS scores and or successful ELL programs. “[The SPS] are not doing it. Over a decade they have not addressed the problems,” she said.

“Somerville’s aggregate MCAS scores are in the bottom five percent of districts in the state. Now, demographically you would not expect Somerville to be in that position, because Somerville has a very large well-educated middle class percentage of its population,” she said. “It’s not a Fall River. It’s not a Brockton.”

“Residents of Somerville have to ask themselves ‘why is that?,’” she said.

The low test scores make Somerville eligible to have more of its educational funding in the district diverted to charter schools. As of January 2010, the City is allowed to have 18 percent of all district spending on education given to charters, said Fitanides. This stems from a January 2010 bill in the state legislature in a commonwealth funding tactic to pressure local schools into performing better.

However, Fitanides was quick to point out that even if the charter was granted, in February, SPS could stop the loss of funds by bringing their scores above the bottom 10 percent. If the charter school passed, they would never be able to raise enrollment after the SPS test scores rise above the necessary limit.

School Committee chairman Adam Sweeting said he hoped that it would never come to that, as raising test scores before the time period proposed for full build-out, around 2018, would be a difficult proposition, especially with lost funding.

“I worry about the potential impact of losing up to 10 percent of our state aid in education that would go to funding this school,” he said. “This is a potential impact that could lead to some real unfortunate consequences.”

The damage would initially be minimal. Districts with charter schools, when granted, are reimbursed 100 percent the first year, with that percentage reimbursement declining 25 percent each year, but remaining 100 percent for each newly enrolled student. It would only be when the enrollment reaches the proposed 425 that the full $5 million per year would be lost.

“When you count in the reimbursements that come from the state to the city, even at year five, the money going out of the district would be $2.9 million, not $5 million,” she said. “It’s spread out over time. The change is manageable.”

Sweeting said that this loss would still result in cuts, including a school closing. “There are no winners when you close a school,” he said. Fitanides says that the schools most likely to close would be either the West Somerville Community School or the Brown school.

Sweeting added that the particular model of the city and school system in Somerville meant that a loss of any funds would hamper services and make their job more difficult. “We would have to take a look at all of our non-required programs that we do such as our adult education program, a program that serves many low-income and immigrant communities in the city,” he said. “We’d have to look at the SMILE Pre-K. We’re not required to do that, but we’re proud that we do have these things.”

Alan Ball a member of Progress Together for Somerville, a group that opposes the SPCS in favor of the reunification of the Healey School, said that the proposal failed to implement an “educational solution that’s going to positively affect the city for a long-time horizon.” He said that there were deficiencies in the application that failed to properly address ELL concerns.

“We don’t agree with how they effect to rectify that issue,” he said. “There is a robust ELL program, and there is a UNIDOS program,” which specifically targets ELL students in extra-curricular methods

The charter school final application lists a philosophy and method towards educating ELL students, which would be implemented in classes. Because of the nature of progressive education and charter schools, it is possible that these methods might differ greatly in practice to the current ELL programs in Somerville. The methods include assistance from foreign-language speakers in class, as well as more “out-loud” reading.

“We will provide a laboratory for innovative practices that can help [the SPS] with groups of students that they’re having the most difficulty with,” said Fitanides, who said she felt that the charter school would allow for quicker more dynamic changes in teaching method than the SPS provided.

“We can make a decision in a day that it takes the district five years to make,” she said.

“If we’ve already demonstrated that it’s working, that provides leverage to say: ‘no, let’s do this next year. And this is how you do it. This is how you stop it, this is how you run it.’”

Sweeting “speaking for many, many people,” said, “there’s a nearly unanimous opposition to this program among elected officials and educators in the city.”

“The emerging consensus is that the ELL component is actually less than what we’re already doing here in Somerville,” he said.

“I’m also concerned that the proposed school duplicates efforts already underway at the Healey School to create a unified progressive school model,” he said.

The Healey School is currently undergoing reunification, after the Choice program ended in June 2010, though it is aimed towards progressive education. The hot-button issue divided many over perceived class-related issues, and was ended by vote of school committee.

“That is really, really hard work that is going on up there, and the people have put in hundreds and hundreds of hours between the teachers and the staff, community members, even students have been involved,” said Sweeting.

“Why duplicate efforts?”

Fitanides said that the reunification of the Healey had only shown what little could be done in terms of progressive education in the public system. “Anytime one of the parents there wanted to depart too far from what the district generally does, that’s a problem.” Carrie Normand, who has a 5th and 2nd grader at the Healey School and a tri-chair of the school council, said that that was not a fair assessment, and that working within the school system was the best way forward.

“I think that the Healey school since reunification is the progressive school option,” she said, adding that she didn’t think the proposal showed that charter school system would be much different than their own proposals and that there wasn’t enough demand to warrant two progressive schools.”

Fitanides said that she thought the Healey School “ has the potential to begin to make an impact. We fully support what they’re trying to do there but I can tell you there has been wide spread disillusionment with the intransigence of the administration, the lack of leadership there.”

She was referring to the high turnover rate of principals at the school, they’ve seen four over the last five years, and the need for a progressive school to have strong leadership in successfully implementing progressive education.

She also noted that the school would only have 180 seats and that none of the founders’ children would probably get to be in the school as it would be over-subscribed.

“It’s not in our interest to do anything to undermine the district schools, because they are our schools,” she said.

Fitanides said that if this  community oriented proposal did not pass, then it would go before the hearing again the next year. She added that this was a better option for Somerville than for an outside Education Management Organization (EMO) that might be looking to build charter schools. Any charter could be approved by the state in Somerville due to their low-test scores.

“Somerville is a very attractive market because Somerville’s test scores are not in alignment with its demographics,” she said.

“The companies that study these things that are in this business know ‘this is low hanging fruit here, easy pickings Somerville,’” she said. She claimed that she had already received calls from a Connecticut EMO that was interested in implementing a charter school.

“You think you don’t want a charter school? You’re going to get a charter school, and you won’t get any choice,” she said.

“This is a democracy. This is a school that parents will shape, and continue to shape over the years.”