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Boston Herald

Payzant aims to transform Dot High and other schools
by Ed Hayward
Thursday, December 5, 2002

Boston's 150-year-old Dorchester High School would be reorganized and renamed as part of a sweeping school overhaul plan unveiled by Superintendent Thomas W. Payzant that could affect 4,700 of the city's students.

According to the plan, presented to the Boston School Committee last night, troubled Dorchester High would cease to exist, instead emerging as the Dorchester Education Complex, home to three small, separate high schools.

``Dorchester deserves better,'' Payzant said in an interview yesterday.

For years, advocates have slammed the school department because Dot High's successful programs were overwhelmed by policies that made the school a dumping ground for court-involved teens and disciplinary castoffs from other schools.

The plan foreshadows a major overhaul of the city's student assignment plan and its busing program, which costs nearly $60 million a year.

But Payzant's plan is too radical for some parents who have students at the R.G. Shaw Middle School in West Roxbury, which would be shut down and turned into the home of the Patrick Lyndon School, now split between its West Roxbury campus and modular classrooms at a nearby site.

``They went behind our backs,'' charged Karen Kast-McBride, who said she and other Shaw parents only learned specifics of the plan Tuesday night. ``They started talking about this a week ago. We say: `Wait a minute. This is our school and our community.' ''

The plan calls for shifting a number of special programs from their current sites to buildings now used for other schools and programs.

Through a combination of new schools slated to open in September, the creation of new programs to serve high-risk student groups, and the conversion of existing big schools into several ``small learning communities,'' Payzant said the city can serve the same number of students better for approximately the same costs, maybe cheaper.

``The bottom line is we're going to be dealing with the same kids,'' Payzant said.

In addition, officials expect the opening of three newly built schools in September combined with the reorganization could lead to the conversion of some middle schools to elementary schools and the creation of more K-8 schools as well as some schools for grades 6 through 12.

Officials expect many of the students from Roxbury and Dorchester who attend the Shaw to choose to attend the new schools in their neighborhoods.

Moving the upper grades of the Lyndon, a successful kindergarten through eighth grade pilot school, would eliminate $250,000 spent annually on the modular classrooms and reduce some transportation costs, Payzant said.

``It doesn't make sense, when you've got a solution to bring a lower and upper school together, save $250,000 a year, cut transportation costs and put kids in new schools, not to take advantage of all those things as you think of the entire system,'' Payzant said.

But Kast-McBride isn't so sure parents will choose the big new schools over the Shaw, which was just removed from the state's list of schools found to ``need improvement.''

``The problem is that most of the parents at the Shaw want to keep the Shaw,'' Kast-McBride said. ``Some of us with younger children plan for our children to go to the Shaw because it is a good school. We don't want them in a school with 750 to 1,200 kids. That's where kids get lost.''

The goal for Dorchester High is to anchor its academic programs with the TechBoston Academy, a pilot high school that opened in September offering a combination of high technology training and college-preparatory academics.

Two other small high schools would be created as well, following the model used at South Boston High School, which is now three separate 300-student high schools.

John Leonard, the chief academic officer at Dorchester High, said forsaking a 150-year name is a necessary trade-off if parents want the school to better serve its students.

The high school is the least chosen in the city and its empty seats are filled each fall with students who have re-entered the system or returned from stays in juvenile hall or expulsions.

``We've known we needed radical steps,'' Leonard said. ``We know we don't have the muscle to do radical things to fix this school. It needs to come from outside. There is great teaching that takes place here. But we're up against things like student assignment that is just burying us.''

Payzant's proposal includes three new schools for high-risk students: those with discipline problems, recent immigrants and freshmen who have been held back twice, respectively.