Faced with some monumental school facility and space decisions, I’ve been thinking a lot lately about the quote that Dr. Nolin has below the signature line in her email:
The secret of change is to focus all of your energy, not on fighting the old, but on building the new.
The emphasis in the quote is on what can come next. It is not about holding on tightly to what was, nor looking at an issue through only a technical, logistical lens but on moving forward with vision.
The administration, under advisement of the School Committee, is charged with setting that vision. The School Committee is charged with protecting that vision using the three roles within our domain - budget, policy and supervision of the Superintendent. All of us are working for the kids that are here today and those who will be here in the future.
Thankfully this time, as our School Committee grapples with these major space decisions, we are not at a place of budgetary crisis like we were the last time that we discussed space (in the spring of 2020). We have time to pause and to reflect. We have time to ask an essential question:
What is the long-term vision for our elementary schools?
We asked this question about our middle schools in the early 2000s before the opening of the new Wilson facility and the 2010s before the opening of the new Kennedy facility, and about our high school (also) in the 2000s before its opening. We need to be asking that question of elementary schools now, and taking our time to answer it.
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Why do we need a vision (and the space to create it) for our elementary schools?
Currently, the district is proposing that there are 3 emergent space needs that need to be decided - potentially as soon as this November - in order to move forward in the formation of the FY23 budget. (See the Superintendent’s comments at meeting mark 3:07 and committee members comments at mark 3:11 and 3:13. Meeting link) The administration is currently viewing these decisions as metaphorical dominoes, with one impacting the next.
While it is true that they are all potentially in the FY23 budget, this metaphor breaks down when it comes to the elementary schools. Putting modulars into the high school or potentially moving the pre-school to another town facility are technical decisions. Any issues related to a potential Johnson closure or re-building at Memorial are first and foremost visionary questions (not just technical questions), as they impact all elementary schools both now and into the future.
To understand this point more, I refer you to our October 4th school committee meeting. There are 5 minutes that are really worth (re-)watching. Mr. Jefferson Wood - teacher and union co-president - begged the School Committee to ask bigger, visionary questions than those about technicalities like space. He implores us to think about vision. (See the 2:59:30 mark of the October 4th meeting.) Mr. Wood eloquently says, “Let’s think about the vision of what we are going to have, rather than the specter of what we are going to lose.”
Put another way, Mr. Wood is asking us to build the new.
Indeed, it is only with a vision for elementary schools that we can answer questions like...
What is the capacity that we want to see in our elementary schools? How big should these class sizes be? Will we still be able to fit all of the kids into 4 elementary schools in 10 years? How do we know?
Have we asked and answered outside the box ideas like...should we be moving 5th grade back to the elementary schools to make our learning more personalized at the critical middle school grades post-COVID?
What impact does a downtown school have on real estate (our tax base) and downtown businesses?
Do we want specific and diverse elementary school programming (language immersion, Montessori, etc.) like neighboring towns have? Will we expand the METCO, Inc. program into the elementary grades?
Please note that the above questions are samples of questions I have heard from community members. I am sure that there are many more and still some that are unknown. A good, deep process will reveal these questions...and where we land with answers. The broader point, though, is that if we only look at the issues before us with a technical lens as “space questions,” then we will never arrive at vision.
In this time of COVID - and in the years post-COVID - we need that vision now more than ever. As a result, I will be imploring my committee members and the administration to take the next six to eight months to define that vision, and to make “space” decisions impacting our elementary schools only after that process concludes.
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Finally, as a Johnson parent, I can imagine that there are some people reading this blog who will mistake my call for a vision for elementary schools as some way to delay the closure of Johnson. There are some who want to stereotype Johnson families as those who are blindly and hysterically clinging onto the past. I saw this on display at the last school committee meeting where my fellow school committee member publicly joked that committee members will need a “police escort” at a community forum that contemplates the closure of Johnson.
If so, you’re missing my point entirely.
The question has never been about “saving” or “closing” a physical building. Instead, the question has always been: what is the vision for elementary schools in this town?
I am convinced that...if we deliberate on and then present a bold vision for elementary schools to the current, past and future families of Memorial, of Lilja, of Ben-Hem, of Brown and lastly, of Johnson...all will feel heard and the vast majority will rally behind that vision. That is the hard and good and right work ahead. That is building the new.