Parents and educators pleaded with city officials Tuesday to reconsider a plan to shutter a South Bronx middle school in New York City’s signature turnaround program.
J.H.S. 145 Arturo Toscanini is one of 86 struggling schools that have been offered social services and extra academic support as part of Mayor Bill de Blasio’s Renewal program — but members of the J.H.S. 145 community said the city shortchanged the school.
“We need teachers qualified to serve our [English Language Learner] students,” parent Annagine Lewis told members of the city’s Panel for Education Policy on Tuesday, after waiting over two hours to comment on an item that wasn’t officially on the agenda. “All we got was empty promises.”
Several people — parents, alumni, educators, and elected officials — voiced versions of that argument: that the city had neglected a school it had promised to infuse with resources and then abruptly moved to close it.
J.H.S. 145 is one of nine Renewal schools the city is planning to close or merge next year, and several speakers — some of whom were bussed to the meeting by the United Federation of Teachers — asked the city to postpone a March 22 vote to close the school.
Though J.H.S. 145 is in the city’s turnaround program, initially billed as a three-year initiative designed to rehabilitate struggling schools rather than close them, de Blasio indicated some schools could still be shuttered.
When education officials first announced the plan to close J.H.S. 145 in January, they cited enrollment numbers and test scores. Eight percent of students at J.H.S. 145 were proficient in reading last year, according to state tests, and fewer than 4 percent were proficient in math. Just 287 students attend the middle school, down from 368 three years ago.
“The superintendent’s recommendation for closure was based on careful analysis of the school’s leadership, classroom instruction and the school’s ability to leverage Renewal School resources,” an education official wrote in an email. “We believe that there are stronger school options in this community that will better meet the needs of students and families.”
English teacher Jim Donohue said the city’s decision to close the school runs counter to the Renewal program’s philosophy.
“De Blasio’s own words were that we’re finally going to give schools that have been neglected in the inner city the resources they need,” Donohue said in an interview. “Instead of extra resources, we’ve struggled to get the basic resources to survive.”
Multiple people at Tuesday’s meeting said the city never appropriately staffed J.H.S. 145, whose student population is almost entirely comprised of black and Hispanic students from low-income families. Nearly half the students are English learners, city figures show, and while the school is supposed to offer “transitional bilingual education,” there is just one bilingual teacher and one ESL teacher.
Craig Moss, a technology teacher at the school, said he regularly relies on students to translate. “I have two classes of ELL speakers and I don’t speak Spanish,” he said, adding that the school has not had stable leadership, rotating through three principals in five years.
Education department officials acknowledged that it has been “hard to staff” bilingual positions in the building, but disputed the argument that the school had not been offered adequate support. The school received funding to add two “teacher leader” positions, additional teacher training, the official said, and supports for high-need students, including mental health services and vision screenings.
A hearing to solicit input from the community about the closure plan is scheduled at J.H.S. 145 on March 6.