The School Committee voted Tuesday to move forward with the recommendation to close two schools and re-purpose two others for the 2018-2019 academic year, but with a change. Though the consolidation committee had also recommended putting off
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The School Committee voted Tuesday to move forward with the recommendation to close two schools and re-purpose two others for the 2018-2019 academic year, but with a change.
Though the consolidation committee had also recommended putting off the sixth grade transition to middle schools at the same time as the consolidation, the School Committee amended to make that move happen in 2017-2018. The schools that will be impacted the following year are John Wickes and Randall Holden, which will close, and John Brown Francis and Drum Rock, which will be re-purposed as the city’s early childhood center and an extension of the career and technical center, respectively. Holden students will go to Hoxsie and Sherman schools and Wickes will go to Greenwood, Park, Robertson and Scott Schools.
In addition to the three public hearings that occurred in the past weeks, public comment was held before the vote where community members had one last chance to voice their opinions. Though the period only lasted half an hour, some spoke up to interrupt as committee members discussed the plan. When the vote was cast, the room erupted into chants of “shame on you.”
“They heard public comment at three forums. The public, including teachers and parents and children, was overwhelmingly against consolidating schools at this time,” said Warwick Teacher’s Union President Darlene Netcoh. “They should have proven that those three forums they had were not perfunctory just because RIDE required them. They should have proven to the public that they actually sat and listened to what they had to say because they didn’t, obviously.”
The only School Committee member that dissented was Karen Bachus. She moved to table the vote until after the election, but the motion failed. Before casting her vote as “absolutely not,” she provided an ardent defense of John Brown Francis by reading a lengthy, emotional email from a faculty member in the school.
“This is just so wrongheaded,” she said after the meeting. “Instead of building our schools and making them the best they can be, we’re taking them apart and hurting our city.”
Vice Chair Eugene Nadeau sympathized but cited a population decline and said “decisions have to be made.”
“I have been involved in that school for 45 years, but I’m also saying this. On my street there are 12 houses and not one student. The street before mine has 12 houses and one student. That’s 24 houses in Governor Francis that has one student. It is an older population living there,” he said. “It’s not easy to say which schools to be closed. Nobody likes for a school in their area to be closed because they think so highly of them, but decisions have to be made.”
The closure of Wickes and Holden was slated to save $2,244,900 and avoid the $15,371,730 total cost of renovating the two buildings. That would change under the amended plan, as the sixth grade transition will cost $1,770,000.
Superintendent Philip Thornton supported the consolidation committee’s plan last week. On Wednesday he said he thought the amendment was fair despite the added cost to move to the middle school model.
“I think it’s fine. The original recommendation was essentially cost-neutral. I’m always what I’d say fiscally conservative, which was my first take. But we’re happy to move forward with grade six,” he said. “We have a team in place. Secondary director Bob Littlefield is starting a team this year to talk about the transition, and Lynn Dambruch is going to assist. It’s great. As long as our committee knows it’s a cost, we’re happy to move forward on that.”
Part of the problem is the update of the heating system at Vets, some had said, criticizing the administration for not getting the job finished this summer. However, Thornton said the process had to be delayed because RIDE’s plan for the system was different.
“We now are moving forward working with RIDE to do it in a way that complies with what they want us to do, and it’s going to be a nice system that’s done,” he said before describing how the new system will have 12 rooftop units with ductwork.
Preliminary work on the rooftop units will be done this coming spring, and the first half of the two-phase plan will be finished this coming summer, he said. Thornton said he heard from experts who said the building was too large to complete in one summer, so the most troublesome loop in the gym area will be tackled first before the second phase is finished the following summer.
For the public, the battle seems far from over. Before the meeting, Holden PTA President Sara Shaheen said she wasn’t content to watch her school close.
“That’s something we can continue to fight on. [The consolidation committee] still needs to provide us with further facts,” she said. “They provided us only with information to support what they wanted, and I want information that supports other options.”
SIGNS OF CONTENTION:
Protest signs were available for meeting attendees to pick up. SOLIDARITY:
Community members show support for their schools. CLASS SIZE MATTERS:
Crowds stand to applaud during public comment.
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bendover
How much more money will this cost taxpayers? After the debacle of not closing Gorton and Aldrich in a timely fashion with 50% occupancy for years, (jobs protection at its worst?) why should taxpayers trust you to do the right thing? You people should be in federal court facing gross financial malfeasance and total breach of financial responsibility charges...Those delays cost this city millions. To quote Nadeau, "What a disgrace."
Thursday, October 27, 2016 Report this
ThatGuyInRI
Leadership means making hard decisions.
As parents, we make decisions for our children that may not be popular with our children but have their best interests in mind.
As a school committee, they must make decisions for the school system, students, and tax payers. Closing these schools is obviously unpopular with the parents of the affected students and the teachers - some of whom will certainly lose their jobs, but it is the right decision. It makes no sense whatsoever to keep multiple buildings open at well below capacity.
Full disclosure, my child's school is not being closed and isn't on the potential future chopping block, so it's much easier for me to say this. That being the case, as a resident of Warwick, I don't want to foot the bill to keep open more schools than we need. Closing unneeded schools should allow us to use our resources more effectively and ultimately have a better school system.
A decision of this magnitude is difficult and unpopular, who wants to see their neighborhood elementary school closed? I don't. But it's the right thing to do and I applaud the school committee for making the difficult and right choice.
Friday, October 28, 2016 Report this
WarCitz
@ThatGuyinRI-right on!!!! It takes leadership to make a decision no matter how difficult that may be at times. Any of those that are complaining about or soon will be certainly could not hold the position of leader outside of maybe their classroom of kids. Unfortunately this will mean what I said in an earlier post on the sickout, this is going to lead to open houses without teachers, immediate 3pm ending of department nights, not supporting kids at after school activities and on and on and on until they get what they want. Good for Thorton and School Committee for standing their ground. I am and will most likely be life long resident so I agree we do not need to foot the bill to keep what we do not need open, our governments are bloated as they can be.
I am of the opinion that over the longer term our infrastructure is replaced with modern, state of the art buildings that will hopefully exist for my children's children if they choose to stick around which at this point I am telling them to run away from this city and state.
Time will tell.
Friday, October 28, 2016 Report this
davebarry109
Putting this off for one more year is just pathetic. How much more should taxpayers have to bear? These parents are childish.
Tuesday, November 1, 2016 Report this