The School Site Council (SSC), the governing body of the Curley, met in a special session on January 6th to hear Principal Grassa’s budget presentation for the 2015/16 school year.
The full draft minutes of the meeting are found here.
As many community members already know, the Curley has gone through some very difficult budget cuts in the past few years. Unfortunately we heard that the enrollment projections we have been given means are slated to lose three (3) more positions next year, though members of the SSC have already begun the process of fighting to reinstate some of these positions. A slight consolation to this trend is that the enrollment projections for the coming year are not as dour as they have been in past years.
The Somewhat Good News
We are projected to have an enrollment of 857 students, and will include the creation of a new 3rd grade class to account for the “bubble” of enrollment we have as that grade makes it way through the school. The budget is slated to be in positive territory for the first time in years. Principal Grassa has been able to finance several needed programs, including the modest yearly BPS contribution to our music program – which is mainly funded through the School Parent Council (SPC) and the Community Music Center of Boston, as well as through a continuing grant from Edvestors. In addition, valuable after-school programs have also found a little bit of funding relief, and for the first time in ages, we have a somewhat more comfortable supply budget! We are able to also finance over a multi-year agreement the purchase of 4 Chromebook carts, a total of 114 Chromebooks. These new computers will augment our existing 2 Chromebook carts as well as the MacBook Pro cart we acquired several years ago.
The Bad News
Unfortunately, as mentioned above, the news in not all positive. BPS’ enrollment projections have projected us to lose a total of 3 more positions this year. We are projected to lose the teacher and para-professional in the K2 Sheltered English Instruction (SEI) class. We are also facing the loss of our 7th/8th grade Social and Academy Remediation (SAR) class.
In the case of the SAR class, our Curley teacher Ms. Holder has announced her retirement at the end of the school year, and most the students in the class are almost all about to finish 8th grade. We nonetheless hope the enrollment picture will work itself our favorably that we are able to staff that class.
In the case of the K2 SEI class, members of the SSC are of course rather upset, especially given the fact that our K1 SEI class was eliminated last year. We have already contacted the Network D Superintendent Cheryl Watson-Harris, Dr. Eileen De Los Reyes, the Deputy Superintendent of Academics, and BPS staff who work in with enrollment projection data, to rectify the situation. We strongly feel that this decision is not only wrong in that there are current students who are part of our community who will need SEI services next year, but in a larger sense, we feel BPS is unwittingly contributing to a segregation of our neighborhood. We believe we must oppose what we believe to be a decision made to eliminate the entire SEI from the Curley.
The School Committee Has Already Heard From Us!
In true Curley fashion (!) the Boston School Committee already knows the specifics of the situation. One of the SSC’s parent Co-Chairs, wearing our distinctive Curley T-Shirt, testified at the School Committee meeting this past Wednesday, January 14th.
That testimony is here – and covers in details all the reasons members of the Curley community feel particularly aggrieved at what we see as a second methodical step to the elimination of our entire SEI strand. Members of the enrollment projections team will attend the next SSC meeting to go through the projections on February 10th at 5:30pm. We hope many Curley community members read the above testimony and attend to express support for the SEI program in general, and the K2 SEI class in particular.
Extended Learning Time
At the time of the last SSC meeting, the proposal to extend the school day in a number of BPS schools by a further 40 minutes was yet to be voted on by the Boston Teachers Union. That vote did place on January 14th, and passed overwhelmingly. In the hopes of its passing, the SSC pre-emptively voted on January 6th unanimously to ask BPS to be considered as one of the first schools to be given the extra 40 minutes of time if the BTU ratified the proposal. Furthermore, Principal Grassa asked teacher Olivia Peters, and parents Aleah Gerena and Anneta Argyres to join her in a meeting at the Curley later on January 15th to learn more of the proposal.
We will discuss the implications for our community at the next SSC meeting.
For more information on the School Site Council, visit the SSC page.
