So Much for the RSD Master Plan
As I mentioned in my Monday email, the state-run Recovery School District has been pulling demolition permits for schools all over town. This is not entirely news.
What is news is that they are supposed to be engaging in a Master Planning process involving the public simultaneously. Tell me, how can the RSD engage the public in a plan if they’re not telling the public what’s going on?
RSD pulled a demo permit on three buildings at Phyllis Wheatley Elementary School at 2300 Dumaine today. This brings to 23 the list of schools with demolition permits pulled by RSD:
- 3929 Erato (Florence J Chester Elementary School, 2 buildings)
- 1901 N Galvez (Valena C Jones Elementary School, 3 buildings)
- 2518 Arts (John A. Shaw Elementary School, 2 buildings)
- 3240 Law St (Johnson C. Lockett Elementary School, 3 buildings)
- 5300 Law St (Lawless High School, 6 buildings)
- 2401 St Maurice St (Hardin Elementary School, 5 buildings)
- 3059 Higgins (G.W. Carver High School, 3 buildings)
- 6026 Paris (Lake Area Middle School, 6 buildings, this was previously announced)
- 1200 Whitney (L.B. Landry High School, 5 buildings)
- 6519 Virgilian (Ray Abrams Elementary School, 4 buildings)
- 1456 Gardena (Bienville Elementary School, 3 buildings)
- 2401 Humanity (Stuart R. Bradley Elementary School, at least one building)
- 1700 Pratt (Edward Hynes Elementary, at least one building)
- 6101 Chatham (Jean Gordon School, 6 buldings)
- 4348 Reynes (Barbara Jordan Elementary School, 7 buildings)
- 6701 Curran (Mildred Osborne Elementary School, 3 buildings)
- 10200 Curran (Little Woods Elementary School, 5 buildings)
- 7701 Grant (Ernest N. Morial Elementary School, 3 buildings)
- 4617 Mirabeau (Parkview Fundamental Magnet School, 6 buildings)
- 4801 Maid Marion (Sherwood Forest School, 4 buildings)
- 3800 Cadillac (Vorice Jackson Water Elementary School, 8 buildings)
- 5700 Wisner (John F. Kennedy High School, 5 buildings)
- 2300 Dumaine (Phyllis Wheatley Elementary School, 3 buildings)
When combined with two other demolitions announced in this November 5, 2007 CityBusiness article:
http://www.neworleanscitybusiness.com/PDFIssues/11-05-2007.pdf
Marion Abramson High School (5552 Read Blvd)
Mary D. Coghill Elementary School (5500 Piety)
That’s 25 schools to be taken down with hardly any public notice. One would think demolition of 25 schools would be important to a Master Planning effort.
I can’t find any evidence that the RSD master planning effort has moved past the first public meeting. Here’s the website meant to keep citizens informed (it supposedly launched November 5):
It hasn’t been updated since the announcement of the first meeting on November 17th. It says “Full Web Site Coming Soon.”
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Is this a way of being able to boast about better test scores By getting rid of all of these schools, I suppose (low performing schools), the Recovery School District rather than finding a better way to educate to raise test scores — will allow the RSD to be able to say they have made progress in test scores using the new schools….
Why not keep these schools, develop a teaching strategy that will make sure a child of normal intelligence can learn rebuilt where they are, and beautify the school and the areas around them.
Some of the schools that are reopened still, in my opinion, do not reflect a sincere desire to provide a clean, litter free environment — for example, Sophie Wright, the fences are still rusted, window units sticking out from the windows, no pressure washing of the building, no fresh paint on the building, there are no plants or flowers planted around the building, the building looks dingy…
What is the RSD trying to do?
Education is a serious matter.
RSD has completely ignored the history of our schools and are taking the easy way out, “tear them down” and to hell with the people who once went there and their feelings about their neighborhood schools…
I thought smaller class sizes (should be)was an important issue. Tearing down these schools will cause the new schools to take on a larger population – larger class sizes and back to the problem of teachers not being able to reach/teach effectively….
I oppose the demolition of Johnson C. Lockett and Valena C. Jones because of their historical significance to the neighborhoods in which they are located.
Sincerely,
Aletha Duncan
Almost all of the cited demolitions are not demolitions of schools, but rather of the old portable classrooms on site. OPSB had been planning for years to phase out the portables and Katrina speeded up the process. Many of the portables were knocked off the foundations by the storm. For example, Jones School is not being demolished, only the old portables behind the school.
I spent several months earlier this year working across the street from the Johnson C. Lockett School. The cement front wall of the main building is collapsing, and the cost of trying to renovate it will be substantially higher than tearing it down and building a new one in its place. As far as the history of the school goes–I can’t speak to that, I don’t know. But an unsafe building is an unsafe building, history or not. If a new school can be built in its place, and the demographics of the neighborhood support that, there should be no reason not to.
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