Superintendent spurned efforts to restructure Asbury Park schools
Posted by the Asbury Park Press on 12/5/06
The Dec. 3 editorial "End segregation in N.J. schools" concentrates
its verbal firepower on what you call "one of the state's most
dysfunctional" school systems, Asbury Park. However, I congratulate
you on a thoughtful and appropriately harsh contribution to finding
an appropriate solution. You suggest a plan to distribute the
children from Asbury Park into other schools. You even recommend that
one or more of the city's schools be turned into magnet or specialty
schools.
The sad fact is that had now-suspended Superintendent of Schools
Antonio Lewis followed the direction expressed by the board majority
more than two years ago, our district would be well on its way to a
much-needed restructuring. Back in 2004, the board majority knew that
the district was both largely dysfunctional and unstable, especially
on the secondary level. We asked the superintendent, newly returned
to the district after a failed attempt to dismiss him, to put the
district on a trajectory to a newly structured educational model.
The greatest stability, improvement and hope for the district lay at
the elementary level, and the greatest problem was at the Middle
School, both as a concept and a reality. We wanted the district to
return to a K-8 model, with three "neighborhood" elementary schools
Thurgood Marshall, Bangs and Bradley and one district-wide
elementary school to be housed in the current Middle School building.
The district-wide elementary school would then be established as a
Board of Education-run non-traditional charter school, with unique
rules and programs that might appeal to parents throughout the city.
For example, uniforms might be a requirement there, as opposed to the
other elementary buildings, and rigorous performing arts or
math/science programs could act as magnets.
It was even demonstrated to the superintendent how that might be
accomplished over a three-year period with a minimum of disruption to
the educational process. Unfortunately, the only things we got were
lip service from the administration and green-wrapped indifference
from the state.
The second phase in the "restructuring that never happened" would
have addressed the inadequacies at the high school level, mainly
through regionalization. Consider that even a district as small as
Rumson has within its borders two school systems. There, the effect,
if not the intent, was to further segregation, both by race and class.
With the right incentives and prodding from the state, Asbury Park
and Neptune, historically joined at the hip, could carve out a shared
high school system. Both the impressive, new, taxpayer-funded Neptune
High School facilities and the exquisite 1925 Asbury Park High School
building, campus and stadium could all be put to great educational
use. Within a newly restructured high school system, there could be
both a Neptune-Asbury West High School and an Asbury-Neptune East
High School, each magnificent buildings with unique programs to
attract students from both communities.
Although I am a member of the Asbury Park Board of Education, I do
not and cannot speak for the school board. I can tell you, however,
that we have been struggling to overcome years, maybe decades, of
inertia and business as usual. It was with sadness that our acting
superintendent, Kathy McDavid, reported at a parent meeting last week
that other superintendents have made it clear they will fight any
regionalization with Asbury Park. That may be sad, but it is not at
all surprising.
It will be up to the state to finally stop turning a blind eye to the
de facto segregation in Asbury Park, exacerbated by misguided worship
of home rule throughout New Jersey.
Frank D'Alessandro
ASBURY PARK
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