<body><div><figure><img src="https://img.particlenews.com/image.php?type=thumbnail_580x000&amp;url=1TGp74_1GxnmjpD00" alt="https://img.particlenews.com/image.php?url=1TGp74_1GxnmjpD00" width="1200" height="630" ></figure>Editor's Note: This piece appears in our Columns section and includes commentary and/or analysisThe views expressed in this article do not represent the views of This Week in Worcesterby Cara Berg Powers, Ed.D.,If, like me, you went to the Worcester Public Schools in the 1980s and 90s, chances are pretty high that you had the opportunity to go to a citywide magnet school- schools with extended learning time grants, project-based learning, arts, science, and technology themes, and the explicit goal to break apart the racial and economic isolation that still exists today in many of our neighborhoods. Many of us that went to those magnet schools in the 1990s will remember how often our learning was described as building, “21st century skills.” They weren’t perfect, but they did prepare us for the diverse world we live in as adults. Yet, here we are a quarter into the 21st century, and our kids don’t have the same opportunities. Our schools are as segregated as they were before many of us even began school.Right now, we have a historic opportunity to recommit to that 21st century vision, and prepare Worcester Public School students to lead into that future. With the School Boundary and Quadrant Alignment Project that is currently underway in the Worcester Public Schools, the question of how we organize about 25,000 kids into school buildings and communities is being asked for the first time in most people’s memory. So far, none of the plans that are being considered have proposed more equitable and inclusive schools, schools like the ones many of us grew up with. It’s not too late though- the district and consultants are RIGHT NOW finalizing the scenarios that the school committee will vote on, and <a href="https://www.worcesterschools.org/page/school-boundary-and-quadrant-alignment-project">you can still make your voice heard.</a>To that end, Saturday afternoon about 40 parents, educators, students, and representatives from the Worcester Public Schools gathered in the dimly lit auditorium of Goddard School of Science for the last of what has been months of community listening sessions about the alignment project. Goddard’s 125 year old building, originally home to South High School, is at the center of the major questions about how a district of the size and diversity of Worcester can equitably reimagine how our school buildings and communities will serve all of our kids. Built for a different time and bigger kids, educators have expressed concern about adding additional Pre-K spots to this already stretched school. In addition to the educators from Goddard that shared their concerns, over a dozen parents, educators, and even students from the Worcester Arts Magnet School spoke about their continued concern that moving the magnet program to a different building would harm the program and the results that it has produced. To anyone who has been following this process, this comes as no surprise. In fact, after the first plan recommended moving WAMS in order to accommodate anticipated growth in the neighborhood’s student population, the outcry was so swift and severe, that it was completely scrapped in the second plan.Worcester Arts Middle Schools (WAMS) is an important example today of what could be: the student population at WAMS is a much lower proportion of high need students than the district overall. At about 57%, it’s significantly lower than the district’s 80% average, and about 40% lower than a school like Chandler Elementary, which is about 97%. It’s also almost 20% higher than Flagg Street, which has only about 40% high need students, and only 23% English Language Learners, compared to the District average of over 50%. Which is what a lot of the district looks like- either much higher or lower than the average, WAMS is unique in that it is somewhat in the middle.One of the educators who spoke on Saturday at the community input session explained how this middle is possible: in 1992, WAMS opened as one of WPS’ many district magnet schools, designed to serve a combination of students from Lincoln Village, Burncoat’s single family neighborhood, and citywide open enrollment. To this day, WAMS is one of the most diverse schools in the district, and this mix of students is part of what makes possible the magic that so many students, parents, and educators have fought to defend. What some may not realize is that the same year, 1992, that WAMS opened, so did the Goddard School for Science and Technology, one of several district magnets at the time, that were created, beginning in 1975, to address the racial isolation and concentrated poverty in our incredibly diverse district. In 1990, almost 40% of incoming kindergarten students went to schools outside of their neighborhoods.The marks of these attempts are all over our district. Schools that haven’t operated as magnets in decades still called that, or bearing the name of previous thematic schoolwork that inspired students in the 1990s, like Goddard. Just a few blocks away, Claremont Academy and Woodland Academy share a building that was built in the late 1990s to house and bring together a K-12 citywide magnet, global studies themed, project-based learning school where Woodland Street Community School had once been.As a 2001 graduate of that school, the Accelerated Learning Laboratory, it’s pretty heartbreaking to see the way that prior disinvestment by our school district in the goals of integration, equity, and student-centered learning have been tossed away as the district moved that building back to “neighborhood” status, limiting attendance to those who live within a short distance from the building, and further isolating the high- need students that the school was created to integrate. In 1994, as a kid from Main South, I had access to a more diverse and specialized education because the city decided to invest in my neighborhood and bring kids from all over the city there to learn together. Now, a kid living on the same street I grew up on has far fewer opportunities. Not only is there no longer an integrated, project-based learning school in walking distance, they also don’t have the chance to go to school with kids outside their neighborhood at the comprehensive middle and high school they would have been districted to prior to the magnet opening.One Woodland Academy parent shared her frustrations at a listening session at Vernon Hill School last month, noting that it seemed like schools in single family zoned neighborhoods, closer to the suburbs, have more access to playgrounds and other higher quality facilities. She shared that she had to “armor” her daughter in pants for school because wearing a skirt, she would risk injury from the small pavement lot that students there have to play in.It does not have to be this way. We do not have to continue to accept segregation in our public schools, and the current work the district is doing to rethink school assignment lines and policies is an opportunity to turn the tide. If we keep WAMS, but also keep the rest of the status quo – in which most of our district is neighborhood schools only – it will harm all of our kids and continue to perpetuate the dangerous false idea that we must choose equitable or excellent schools. WAMS parents and educators have called WAMS a model. It can be just that, if we have the courage to care enough about all of our kids to invest in a future that expands all of their horizons. We can commit to a long-term plan to redesignate many of our previous magnet schools, and engage communities in identifying and planning learning themes, like additional art and dual language schools, as well as science and technology, project-based learning, and even civics themed schools. We have a generational opportunity to course correct.Imagine if when you registered your child for kindergarten, you could opt into a lottery not just for WAMS and Worcester Dual Language, but for an assortment of high quality, integrated programs around the city. That whether or not you got into one of these programs didn’t feel existential because by better distributing the needs and bringing community together, <a href="https://www.brownspromise.org/concentrated-poverty">we made it more cost effective and easier to make every school gre</a>at. This is a choice we can make right now. We can ask the district to ensure that at least one of the options they consider to vote on includes a plan to better serve all of our kids. We can and must do better, for all of our future kids. If we truly believe that WAMS is a special school worth saving, let’s rebuild the district that made it possible, starting with at least one themed, elementary school magnet in each quadrant. We don’t have to choose between excellent or equitable schools. We can ensure that all of our kids have access to both. Email your school committee members, the Mayor, and the alignment project consultants, to <a href="https://www.worcesterschools.org/page/school-boundary-and-quadrant-alignment-project">ask them to give equity a chance.</a></div></body>

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Editor's Note: This piece appears in our Columns section and includes commentary and/or analysis. The views expressed in this article do not represent the views of This Week in Worcester. by Cara Berg Powers, Ed.D.,. If, like me, you went to the Worcester Public Schools in the 1980s and 90s,...

To Keep WAMS, Worcester Should Put Magnets Back on the Menu

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Editor's Note: This piece appears in our Columns section and includes commentary and/or analysis. The views expressed in this article do not represent the 

To Keep WAMS, Worcester Should Put Magnets Back on the Menu

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