Superintendent Offers New Merger Plan

With only two weeks left before the Cambridge school committee is set to vote on the consolidation of several of the city’s 15 elementary schools, Superintendent of Schools Bobbie J. D’Alessandro presented two new merger plans yesterday morning and resurrected one from last spring.

But school committee members last night suggested that the upcoming vote may not result in any mergers.

D’Alessandro’s new plans, announced to a morning meeting of principals and parent representatives, come in the wake of a series of merger proposals that have sparked protest from parents and teachers.

The school system has entered turmoil over the past few months as picketing crowds have spoken out against merger plans and the school committee has decided not to renew—and potentially even “buy out”—D’Alessandro’s employment.

But fewer swords were drawn at yesterday morning’s meeting, the second in a series responding to a school committee mandate that D’Alessandro include parents and administrators in discussions of merger plans.

“We have to bite the bullet,” said Fitzgerald School Principal Chris Augusta-Scott. “There’s no easy way out.”

Yesterday’s most dramatic proposal, which would create middle schools in grades 6-8 instead of the current K-8 system, saw light for the first time since it was promptly rejected by the committee last spring.

D’Alessandro’s new “hybrid” plan, which Augusta-Scott said the majority of principals endorsed, also builds on the middle school model, creating two 6-8 programs while allowing four schools to remain K-8.

As another new option, D’Alessandro proposed maintaining K-8 school system-wide, but merges the King and King Open Schools and the Peabody and Fitzgerald Schools. This plan is a modification of a one presented last month, which itself is still on the table.

The merger proposals are aimed at reducing the district’s growing number of empty seats and addressing a budget deficit of $2.6 million.

Peabody parents and administrators said they questioned the merging of the Peabody School, which tops the district on standardized tests, with the Fitzgerald School, which the state recently identified as not making “adequate yearly progress” for the past two years.

“The concept of taking a successful school and merging it is a very bitter pill to swallow,” said Peabody School Principal Ellen Varella.

The new plans presented yesterday morning caused roughly 100 parents and teachers to turn out to last night’s school committee meeting to protest the proposed merging of the Peabody and Fitzgerald schools.

But several committee members said they were ready to abandon merger plans altogether at last night’s committee meeting.

“I find it difficult to just before a vote bring in new sets of schools,” said committee member Alice L. Turkel.

While some committee members said they would consider a plan creating middle schools, a few said they would never adopt such a plan.

“I can’t support middle schools or a hybrid plan,” Turkel said. “I don’t believe that we have large community support behind it.”

Repeating past concerns with D’Alessandro’s merger plans, several committee members said they didn’t see the educational value in the plans.

“If you can tell me why it’s about excellent instruction in every classroom, go for it,” said Mayor Michael A. Sullivan.

—Staff writer Claire A. Pasternack can be reached at cpastern@fas.harvard.edu.