Urgent- Signatures needed by September 1, 2016!
Among the 55,000 students in the Boston Public Schools, none are more at risk than the 400 children of the McKinley Schools, a special education program for students who have emotional struggles. These incredibly deserving students, who are in danger of not succeeding academically and socially, are being marginalized once again. This is because despite the need for the very best possible academic/social circumstances for these important children, they are being uprooted from all of their safe, central locations, including the flagship McKinley South End Academy and Elementary Schools located at 90 Warren Ave., which is being torn down and rebuilt into a $100 million state of the art facility to accommodate an already high achieving school.
Where are the McKinley schools being moved after a long and exhaustive search for an appropriate location that was kept totally secret from McKinley’s students, parents, and staff? At this point, nowhere more specific than mentioned in our recent, very first communication from BPS that said we will be placed in an undetermined, “retrofitted” building. Once again, special education students are being relegated to the proverbial basement as it was decades ago, likely put into a substandard school in a place that will be difficult to reach by the T and disconnected from the community partnerships that were developed over decades.
The importance of centrally located schools cannot be overstated. McKinley students, who have no “choice” where to attend, come from every corner of the city. Here are just a few of the reasons McKinley needs to stay in the South End and central locations. First and foremost, the current locations are in safe, neutral places that allow students, many of whom have have dangerous conflicts in their neighborhoods, to learn and grow without added stress. This keeps kids in school and focused on their work and personal growth. In the area of transportation, most students are bused from all over Boston so centrality is key to making these trips reasonable for the students. Also, vital partnerships with community organizations, including those with the Haley House, Trinity Church, Mel King’s Fab Lab program, Sole Train, ICA Boston, Huntington Theater, Wediko Children Services, and many more that are in walking distance will be disrupted or ended. This is no small matter for many classes who use these partnerships, including some who have been on over 100 field trips to just the Huntington Theater and ICA over the last decade at no cost to the students and virtually none to the Boston Public Schools.
While it is certain that there has been much discussion of this plan elsewhere, it has not included those who will most be affected - the students and staff at McKinley. As a community, the McKinley “family” calls for the halt to the plan to demolish their facilities and a restart of the planning process with the inclusion of the hard-working students, the invested parents, and the dedicated staff who together work to positively change the trajectory of the lives of the wonderful students of the McKinley Schools. These at risk children deserve no less, so please join us in fighting for social justice and the recognition that all students matter, including those at McKinley, and help fight to keep us in our current locations.
About McKinley: McKinley is substantially separate Boston Public School with a focus on emotional, behavioral, and learning needs. McKinley provides a highly structured behavioral management system and intensive clinical supports for 400 students with emotional or behavioral special education needs. The mission of the McKinley Schools is to provide a highly structured therapeutic, educational setting to support the behavioral, emotional, academic, and vocational growth necessary for each student to meet high standards and to return to a less restrictive Boston Public School setting as soon as possible.
