Upcoming Fundraiser to benefit the students of the Nathan Bishop Middle School

Please click on the flyer to enlarge

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The Word on the Street…

We’ve been contacted by a parent who had a number of questions about the academic programs at Nathan Bishop.

We’ve heard about the “word on the street”, and this post is intended to clarify, to the best of our ability, the state of academics at Nathan Bishop. Ultimately, we would strongly advocate that parents come to the building, talk to the Principal, Guidance staff, and teachers, and form their own opinions.

Nathan Bishop just graduated its first full three year class of students since reopening. To say this was a pioneering group of students is an understatement. They entered a building that had just been extensively remodeled, with a teaching and support staff that was only 33% hired, and into a program that had not existed several months earlier. Readers of this blog will note that extensive administrative and community involvement went into formulating what the “new” Nathan Bishop would be. Again, if there are questions, talk to the parents of recent graduates… Most everyone left the building on “promotion day” with wide smiles on their faces.

Providence Public Schools at this time continues to only designate Nathanael Greene as having an “Advanced Academic Program”. For years, this was the best public middle school option for parents with motivated, academically talented children. There are 104 seats per year, and your child is either “all in” or “all out” of the advanced core classrooms.  Over the years discussions were held at the School Department about expanding the Advanced Academic programming to other middle schools, but entropy prevailed.

The opportunity to re-open Nathan Bishop allowed the planners of the academic programming to come up with an “a la carte” advanced programming concept. Unlike Nathanael Greene, your child might be advanced in math and average in English, and would participate in classes geared to their academic level.

There never was “tracking” at Nathan Bishop (except for a separate Math track that parallels the Math program at Nathanael Greene (7th grade algebra and 8th grade geometry)). Instead, the school administrators and guidance counselors made an effort to group students by ability, such that the teachers could differentiate instruction between the stronger and weaker students. Core concepts were taught, and enriched material or advanced goals were provided to the kids that could benefit from them. This coming year, another option for an enriched core math program is being discussed, which won’t shortchange kids by jumping ahead too quickly.

Over the past two years more and more high performing kids have been coming into the school. The administrators and faculty at Bishop see this as an opportunity to expand advanced level instruction to a larger group of students. Their goal is to meet the school department standards and mandates, and then to supplement and exceed them for appropriate students.

Nathan Bishop benefits from the involvement of a number of community organizations, including the Gamm Theater, and PASA, the Providence After School Alliance. Dedicated teachers have organized theatrical presentations (including Shakespeare), talent shows, and a Science Olympiad team. In fact, the Nathan Bishop team placed 2nd in the state-wide Science Olympiad 2 years ago, and 4th this past year… not bad for a school new to the competition!

And don’t forget the beauty of having this dedicated faculty in your own neighborhood school. While many of our children attended Nathanael Greene, and had great experiences, there was something wonderful about our kids at Bishop being able to walk or ride their bikes to school, and develop a large cadre of friends in the neighborhood, with whom they could spontaneously get together with after school, rather than having to rely on “play dates” to get back and forth across town. The value is outstanding. You have paid for it. What is private school tuition this year? $26K? More?

Every school has a few “warts”, and Bishop is no exception. The strength of any public school comes from a principal, faculty, parents, and students that are strong supporters  of the academic mission, the student body, and the school culture. Nathan Bishop has this, and will benefit from further investment by East Side parents.

Many of the ESPEC steering committee members have had, have, or will have students in the building. We’re happy to answer any questions we can, but feel that the best information will come from taking a tour of the building and talking to the Principal and other faculty members. You can call the school about a tour, or attend the Open House in the Fall (see links below). You have to take that first step though. Many of your neighbors have, and with few exceptions, were happy they did.

A few pertinent links:

http://www.nathanbishoppto.org/

http://providenceschools.org/middle-schools/bishop

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_nzrIBjDidI

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5xHKrxTgJVE

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Upcoming dates for Kindergarten Registration

Providence schools has posted a schedule on-line and instructions for registering your child for kindergarten. These can be found at:

 

http://www.providenceschools.org/media/159414/registration dates for new kindergarten students.pdf

 

Note that if you are seriously interested in your child attending your neighborhood Providence Public school, you stand the most chance of getting your child into the school if you apply when your child enters Kindergarten. Once seats are filled, regardless of whether a child is from the neighborhood or outside the neighborhood, the only way to get your child into your neighborhood school (eg. in first grade) will be to fill seats empty by attrition.

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Nathan Bishop PTO Fundraiser at Mills Tavern Tuesday November 15, 2011

Please come support our school and our PTO at the Mills Tavern Fundraiser!
Tuesday, November 15, 2011 | 7:00 pm – 9:00 pm | 101 North Main Street

$25 Per Person suggested donation         Hors D’oeuvres & Drink Ticket Included

Tickets will also be available at the door.

The money raised from this event will go directly toward enrichment for students at Nathan Bishop Middle School.  Your support will help promote teaching and learning by providing critical educational materials and opportunities for both students and teachers.

For information e-mail: nciniglio@gmail.com

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It is…. but it isn’t…

Headline in today’s Projo:

“Providence superintendent says new teacher hiring process is intact”

Story is found at this link:

http://www.projo.com/ri/providence/content/lusi_on_contract_10-02-11_9OQL33B_v16.693f1.html

According to today’s Projo, “Supt. Susan Lusi says the new teachers’ contract does not dismantle the district’s new hiring process nor does it allow seniority to once again be the dominant factor in assigning teachers to classrooms.”

The article then goes on to describe all of the ways the system goes around or negates the criterion-based hiring (CBH) process that was introduced three years ago, and allows seniority to be a dominant factor.

The intent of this process was to hire teachers based upon certification, performance and merit. Of course seniority might play a role, but it was not the deciding factor. Principals and a committee of peers would interview candidates, and choose the best candidate for the position. HR was to be sure that candidates were appropriately vetted for the position.

We and others have been very concerned that the new collective bargaining agreement with the PTU undermines this process… and now we hear this from the Superintendent herself.

In the article, Sup’t Lusi describes the matching process which occurs in January or February. This basically shuts down CBH to deal with displaced teachers. After “speed-dating”, Principals and teachers submit their rank order lists to a “match” system. What the article doesn’t mention is that in this system (at least as done this year), you have to rank EVERY teacher who is applying for a job, even the ones you would not want. The article also does not mention that if there are not enough positions available for displaced teachers, they potentially can “bump” junior teachers based on seniority.

“Lusi concedes that the contract does give some priority to seniority…” The interview process not only gives an additional 10 points to senior teachers based on years of teaching, but also states that at least 5 of the interviews must be given to teachers based on seniority, and a minimum of 7 applicants (if they exist) must be invited to apply. Given that this process is time-consuming, how many Principals are going to go out of their way to identify and interview an additional 5 or 10 junior teachers and give them a chance to interview?

Lusi also states “I personally would like to see the criterion-based hiring process last longer but not forever,” Lusi said. “The goal over time is to have more and more teachers placed via this process.” Does this statement make sense? If the goal is to see teachers placed by this process, why not advance the process, streamline the process, support the process, and not it allow to be undercut?

According to the article, she also stated that there was nothing to prohibit external candidates from applying for these jobs. Yet, if there is a pool of displaced individuals, and they are prioritized in several ways based on seniority, AND the contract has a no layoff provision, how would an outside candidate ever get a foot in the door?  Lusi also faults the school department for not doing a better job of evaluating teachers and terminating ineffective staff, or managing people who go out on leave. Yet, there still is no evaluation process in place. The processes that were put forth by RIAFT and RIDE have a several year timeline before a teacher who is identified as ineffective can ultimately be dismissed.  And when the school department was assessed several years ago, Human Resources was identified as a department in need of serious review and repair. Has that happened to date? We have a lot of faith in Spencer Dickinson as an individual, but how much support does he have?

And probably the most important question of all: How far does this contract go in improving the overall educational experience for our kids? We’re not holding our breath…

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Reflections on change and “Institutional Memory”

I came across an article in the Projo the other day.

Entitled “Providence’s School Management Team Dispersing”, it details the “exodus” of five of six top managers of the Providence School Department, including Tom Brady, Sharon Contreras, Stefanie Federico, Matthew Clarkin, and Kim Rose. The details can be found at the following link:

http://www.projo.com/ri/providence/content/providence_exodus_06-27-11_NIOPV5N_v17.3e699.html

Jack Jennings, president of the Center on Educational Policy, is quoted as stating, “It could set back a district for years in terms of the loss of valued leadership, institutional memory and just people who know how to get things done.”

Warren Simmons, executive director of the Annenberg Institute for School Reform at Brown University, is quoted as saying that too much emphasis is placed on the superintendent as school savior, the superhero who rides into town and saves the day (lack of “” per the article).

Around the same time, I received an email message from a friend, attaching a news article link and telling me that “we dodged a bullet.”

The article was about a new superintendent being chosen to lead Cumberland’s Schools.

http://breezepapers.com/2011/06/28/cl/thornton-tapped-to-lead-cumberland-schools

This was very important to me not because of who was chosen, but who was not… my child’s middle school Principal, Michael Lazzareschi.

http://www.projo.com/news/content/CUMBERLAND_SUPERINTENDENT_06-21-11_A9OOSQQ_v41.3ad31.html

So this got me thinking…

It has always been clear that dynamic, charismatic leaders can make something good into something great. Even better than making something great is leaving behind a structure or framework to continue that level of greatness.

We are all very dismayed by the turmoil at 797 Westminster. I’m sure Carleton Jones and Paula Shannon are doing their best to hold things together until Susan Lusi arrives. The concerns that have been aired about how difficult it may be to hire a management team have some truth to them… it is frightening to think about our school system trying to move forward without a strong central office. All the groundwork that has been laid over the past few years (aligned instruction, curriculum development, criterion based hiring) may be lost in the shuffle over school closings, teacher firings, endless court cases, and now this leadership drain.

Frankly I was also very frightened about the prospect of losing our wonderful middle school principal.

But the comment about institutional memory got me thinking…

Institutional memory in the Providence School system is alive and well, and resides in the form of committed parents, teachers, and school administrators. For the moment, I’d like to focus on the parents.

It was institutional memory that recently led some parents to protest the reassignment of the Vartan Gregorian Principal without any parental engagement. My wife and I (as parents) have served on several Principal selection committees at several schools over the years. This decision was a fait accompli, foisted upon the Principal and school community without any outreach to or involvement of the parents.

It was institutional memory that recently led the Martin Luther King PTO to protest the recision of the plan to place an Assistant Principal in their school. We all remember that the number of administrators in a school was usually based upon the number of students, and MLK will likely top 600 children this coming year as it receives students from some of the elementary schools which have been closed.

RIDE and PPSD are both struggling to come up with a teacher evaluation plan. And yet, it is institutional memory that allows any active parent in school building to know who the ineffective teachers in that building are (at Classical, for example, they are the teachers whose students (sometimes the brightest) year after year are getting tutors to help comprehend the material that is so poorly taught in class). Why is systematizing an evaluation process so difficult?

Active PTOs support numerous school events throughout the year, year after year (another form of institutional memory). Some go so far as to bring in supplemental programming, or provide support to teachers whose classroom needs are unmet by the limited school department budget.

Even among our School Board, consider the institutional memory possessed by Ms. Crain, Mr. Touray, Ms. Sanchez, Mr. Oliveira, Mr. Wise, Mr. Lalli, and Mr. Gould (before his departure) as either parents of children who attend or have attended PPSD schools, or as individuals who went to our schools themselves. No matter what side you take about the school closings and teacher firings, you have to appreciate that the Board made impossible decisions within a ridiculous time constraint. The Board members took their fiduciary and educational responsibilities seriously, and have served the City honorably. The Mayor recently appointed an education task force, many members of which also possess significant amounts of institutional memory. Hopefully this task force will work alongside the School Board, and not attempt to supplant it.

The loss of our Principal at Nathan Bishop would have been devastating. And yet, our Principal has set our ship on a smooth course. Along with a strong PTO (which came together before the school reopened) and dedicated teachers, he has established a strong esprit de corps and culture within the school. If he leaves at some point, of course we would want another dedicated, dynamic principal, but the groundwork for a great school has been laid.

So, what is the point here? Yes, the school department needs strong central leadership. But the existing and incoming leadership needs to recognize the resources that already exist here. No, parents cannot write curricula, or establish pedagogy, but we can play a role in helping to determine the direction in which our school system should move. Although parental engagement has been slowly improving, it is still often unidirectional, and trivializes the participation of parents in the process of governance. I’m sure teachers and administrators hate to consider this, but parents are both the purchasers (as taxpayers) and consumers (as parents of school children) of school department services, and have every right to work as partners with the administration to support and improve our schools.

Along with a change in leadership, there needs to be a change in the attitude toward parental engagement. Parents are a source of institutional memory for the Providence school system, and must be allowed to work alongside administrators toward the common goal of making our schools high achieving facilities that benefit all children, and are the schools of choice for Providence residents.

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Arts Night at Nathan Bishop Middle School

NATHAN BISHOP MIDDLE SCHOOL

ARTS NIGHT

THURSDAY, MAY 19TH 2011

5-9 PM

We are part of Providence’s Gallery Night , so you can take the free Art Bus from downtown!
For information on parking and more, go to: http://www.gallerynight.info/galleries.html.
If you are not going to other galleries that night, you can park at school, of course.

NB’s Arts Night will showcase artwork created this school year by
over 300 sixth, seventh, and eighth grade students. Featured are selections from
Breathing as Drawing, Transforming Portraits, Typeface Design Posters, Word
Portraits, Our Own Dinner Party, Design Challenges, Where I’m Going sculptures,
Character Cards, Exercises in Perspective, Mythological Creature sculptures,
Narrative Ceramic Tiles, ceramic Drinking Vessels, and wire exercises in
Structure and Form, and Festival Ballet-inspired cut-out silhouettes.

There will be intermittent performances throughout the night by students,
including classical, hip-hop and break dance; violin, cello, drums, piano, vocals,
and other instrumentals.  A special performance by Nathan Bishop’s Build Up
the Beat group is scheduled as well.

Nathan Bishop’s Destination Imagination team won an invitation to the Global Finals! They collaborated on an Invention Challenge that includes storytelling, performance, music, and structural engineering. A table will be set up by the nurse’s office to gather support for their upcoming trip to Knoxville, TN where they will compete against other invention teams. Buy raffle tickets to win great prizes! Drawing at 8PM.
The NB Story Project student crew will be conducting interviews in the
principal’s conference room.  Project students interview our alumni and learn
about the diverse neighborhoods and individual life stories that are vibrantly
woven together through our school community.  We will exhibit some interview
materials, and interview alumni in attendance between 5-7pm!

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Thanks to our Teachers during Teacher Appreciation Week

Wonderful Teacher

With a special gift for learning
And with a heart that deeply cares,
You add a lot of love
To everything you share,
And even though
You mean a lot,
You’ll never know how much,
For you helped
To change the world
Through every life you touched.
You sparked the creativity
In the students whom you taught,
And helped them strive for goals
That could not be bought,
You are such a special teacher
That no words can truly tell
However much you’re valued
For the work you do so well.
– Author Unknown

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A plea for accuracy and working toward better schools in Providence

I’ve recently come across two articles in the Projo that suggest that finger-pointing is once again occurring as parents in Providence try to support their public schools.

In an article about West End Schools, I found the following comments:

http://www.projo.com/ri/providence/content/providence_parents_mad_03-18-11_CHN2F0R_v12.108d586.html

““We deserve to have a Vartan Gregorian Elementary School here,” said one parent. “We deserve the same quality schools that they have on the East Side.””

“Thursday, several residents said the neighborhood’s stability would be seriously undermined if the School Department fails to create high-quality schools as it has on the East Side, which boasts a newly renovated Nathan Bishop Middle School and two high-achieving elementary schools.”

In an article about a Parent Forum held yesterday at the John Hope Settlement house, I found the following statements:

http://www.projo.com/education/content/school_forum_03-20-11_9UN3K3T_v7.194500f.html

•XX XX, a parent, talked about making improvements to all city schools, not just East Side schools.

XX said later that schools like the Vartan Gregorian Elementary School in Fox Point have more resources, more programs, than schools in other neighborhoods.

To set the record straight, I offer the following:

First, regarding Vartan Gregorian. Vartan was all but unknown to East Siders 10 years ago. What it did have was Site-Based management (which several schools throughout the city had), a visionary principal, and a dedicated cadre of teachers. The PTO was all but non-existent. East Siders started to learn about this school, and as more decided to send their children to the school, the PTO grew, and worked in a collaborative fashion with the teachers and Principal. If you see a wonderful school, it reflects the communal interest and investment in the school, and NOT anything in particular offered by the Providence Public School district.

Martin Luther King has always had a small cadre of dedicated East Side parents. King also had a wonderful principal, and dedicated teachers. Over the past five years, as interest in public education has grown, so has the involvement of the community in the school. Again, this school does not receive a dime more per child from the school district than any other school in the city.

Nathan Bishop was a school in chaos. The SALT surveys dating back to 2002 had detailed a failure of leadership and education. The school had been all but abandoned. When the city choose to close this school, a small group of East Siders, realizing that this was the ONLY Middle School in the neighborhood (e.g. on this side of numerous highways), and that a continuum of public education was important for our children, banded together to fight for the reopening of the school. That this happened at all was really a matter of timing. The national recession started shortly after the renovation occurred.

To the comment that the City is only making improvements in the East Side schools, I offer the following facts. Vartan Gregorian was built in 1954. Martin Luther King was built in 1959. Neither has undergone ANY significant improvements. Yes, $35 million was spent to renovate Nathan Bishop, but this was the FIRST SERIOUS MONEY SPENT ON THE EAST SIDE SINCE 1959. In fact, ALL of the Providence Public School district’s efforts over the past 10 years went to building schools in other neighborhoods:

Alvarez                         Built 2007

Bailey                            Built 2000

Carnevale                    Built 1999

Central                         $40 Million Renovation 2008

Cooley                          Built 2004

Delsesto                       Built 1998

E-Cubed                       Built 2004

Fortes                           Renovated recently

Lima                             Built 2002

PAIS                              Built 2004

PCTA/Hanley             Built 2009 $90 Million

Woods                           Built 2004

Young                            Built 2004

Today I attended the Rhode Island Music Educators Association All-State concert at Veteran’s Memorial Auditorium. Over 90 schools from throughout the state were represented. Hundreds of children participated. As best I could tell from looking at the program, three (yes, three) were from Providence Public schools. These children participated not because they received support from their schools, but because their parents found a way to get them represented.

SO, instead of parents finger-pointing at each other or sniping about other schools in Providence, perhaps we should all work together to support the following goals:

1. A PTO in every school.

2. Community and neighborhood engagement for every school

3. A funding formula that adequately supports all of the children in Providence, and helps to provide them with the resources that children in other schools in Rhode Island have.

4. A union and school district that considers and includes the involvement of parents (who in fact pay for and consume the services) in decision-making.

I would also make a plea to journalists to fact-check their quotations rather than just printing them verbatim. While these types of comments may make for good press, they can be self-sustaining, are divisive, and accomplish nothing toward building a better community for our families and children.

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Blood Drive at Nathan Bishop Middle School

The Rhode Island Blood Center is conducting a

Blood Drive at the Nathan Bishop Middle School

on Friday, March 18, 2011, from 8:30 AM – 3:30 PM.

 

All members of the community are welcome to participate.

 

Location:

Nathan Bishop Middle School Gymnasium

101 Session Street

Providence, RI 02906

 

Give Hope. Give Life. Give Blood.

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ESPEC supports our school communities and adamantly opposes “bumping”

Text of an email message sent today to Linda Borg, education writer for the Providence Journal:

Hi Linda;

Once again, parents (and students) have been left in the dark. It is obvious that the School Department is not going to let 1900 teachers go. These lay-off notices maximize the School Department’s flexibility in dealing with transformational reform and upcoming budgetary mandates, but where does that leave our school communities?

Parents are very worried that lay-offs could trigger seniority-based “bumping”. We were given the promise of criterion-based hiring, and have watched as teachers were assigned positions based on certification, performance, and merit, rather than seniority. We have been building stronger school communities over the past 1-2 years. ESPEC is completely opposed to bumping, whereby teachers who receive lay-off notices are permitted to “bump” less senior teachers (many of whom were specifically hired to fill positions because of their qualifications and “fit” for the position) and take their jobs.

We are disheartened that the needs of students and school communities may be trumped by inability to fix a process that has been broken for years. Criterion-based hiring is now beholden to a court ordered mediation process. We have been left in the dark as to when that process will come to a conclusion, or what the results will be.

We ask the School Department, School Board and the new Taveras Administration to issue a clear statement that teacher lay-offs and reassignments will be made based on the needs of the students, and not on the seniority of teachers. Parents demand protection for their students and school communities. We cannot go back to a seniority based “bumping” process. Providence’s new criterion-based hiring policy hires teachers according to their qualifications and best fit for the students. Providence should adopt a criterion-based lay-off and reassignment policy. Hiring and dismissal decisions should always be based on our students’ best interests.

The ESPEC Steering Committee

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Annual Nathan Bishop PTO and Alumni Fundraiser

Annual Nathan Bishop PTO and Alumni Fundraiser

TONIGHT!
Tuesday, February 08 from 07:00 PM to 9:00 PM

Location:
Mill’s Tavern
101 North Main St. Providence, RI 02903

Please join us for our Second Annual Fundraiser to provide support for school programs such as the Science Olympiad, the Basketball team, Battle of the Books and others.
Hors d’oeuvres will be served. A free glass of wine or beer for the first 120 to rsvp.
Suggested donation is $25 or more (but any donation, big or small, is acceptable and most appreciated).
Send your payment to the school or mail to:
Attn. NB PTO “Mill’s Tavern”
Nathan Bishop Middle School
101 Sessions St.
Providence, RI 02906
checks payable to NB PTO

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Nathan Bishop featured in East Side Monthly article

Many thanks to Barry Fain and the staff at the East Side Monthly for their wonderful article highlighting the first year of the New Nathan Bishop Middle School.

See the whole article at:
http://www.providenceonline.com/eastsidemonthly/pdf_downloads/
cover_story/ESM_1209_Cover_Story.pdf

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ESPEC represents at JCC/Miriam 5k

The annual 5K race hosted by the Jewish Community Center and Miriam Hospital was held on September 7th. ESPEC sponsored a team, and sold “Future Nathan Bishop Parent” and “Future Nathan Bishop Student” shirts.  Here are a few photos.  [If you would like one of these shirts, contact Karina Wood at KarinaWood(Insert@here)cox.net],.

(L-R) Karina Wood, Michelle McKenzie, Harlan Rich, Cliff Wood, Sam Zurier

The Wood Family

Kim Rohm (R), Karina Wood, and friends

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Our Latest Update

In cases you missed it, below is an email sent to the ESPEC mailing list on July 8th

1. Nathan Bishop Renovation.  Renovations to the Nathan Bishop building are well-underway.  The most obvious evidence of progress has been the removal of the exterior staircases, but work goes on inside as well.  Our latest information is that work is substantially on schedule.  Demolition and asbestos abatement will continue during the summer, and late summer and early fall will see the start of new construction, installation of fixtures, and so on. We are waiting for word on an official groundbreaking ceremony.

2.  Nathan Bishop Principal Search. The advertisement for the principal position at Bishop has been posted on the Providence Schools website. The ad lists the opening date f8or applications as June 30th, and states that the position is open until filled.  The person hired as principal will participate in the planning as it goes forward over the next year (see below).  Interviews are likely to begin the week of July 28th, and the selection should be made by the end of the summer.  The Superintendent’s Nathan Bishop Committee (which includes some ESPEC members) will be represented on the interview committee.  We had hoped that the principal could be hired full-time in the Fall of 2008 (and paid to help plan the school during the coming year), but budget considerations apparently preclude this.  At this point, we are encouraging the School Department to allocate some funds to allow the incoming principal to serve on a part-time consulting basis on the Planning Committee, but we do not know if this can happen.

The job advertisement has an attached “white paper” that describes in some detail the vision for the school.  We strongly encourage prospective parents and others interested in the success of the New Nathan Bishop to read this document.  Here is a link to the ad and the white paper.

Of special note:  The principal position description reiterates the School Department’s commitment to the principle that the school will open one grade at a time, with the first 6th grade class to enter in the Fall of 2009.  ESPEC has regarded this particular feature of the proposal as essential to the establishment of a culture of academic excellence at Bishop, so we are glad that it is part of the advertisement.

3. Our Next Public Meeting.  At our May public meeting detailing the final design for Bishop, ESPEC announced plans for a June meeting focusing on the academic program and school leadership.  Unfortunately, we have not felt that we have gained enough concrete information to justify holding this meeting at the present time. (Please see details immediately below).  We now plan to hold this meeting in September or October.

4. Nathan Bishop Steering Committee.
The Superintendent’s Nathan Bishop Steering Committee continues to meet; the most recent meeting being last week. In the near future, the committee will be reconstituted as the Planning Committee, with a more significant contingent of education policy experts and Providence Public School faculty and staff.  That committee will be engaged in working out the details of the academic program and, most significantly, writing the site-based management plan for the school.  Since such a plan typically takes six months to complete.  We had hoped the Planning Committee would start meeting this summer, but we have been told that this is not possible.  We are disappointed that the process will be delayed, and we intend to continue pressing a message to the School Department that progress must be made by January so that parents will know enough about the New Nathan Bishop’s program to include the school as a choice for their children in the Fall of 2009.  More generally, we remain firmly committed to making the New Nathan Bishop a model school for both families in the neighborhood and for the Providence Public Schools as a whole, and we may need to engage the neighborhood’s help in advocating for this standard.  If anyone is interested in helping to advocate, or in serving on the Planning Committee, please reply to this email and we will try to get you involved.

5.  Anti-Bumping Legislation.  Following the public meeting last Fall, at which many members of the community expressed great concern about the “bumping” of junior but highly effective teachers, The ESPEC steering committee submitted a proposal for legislation to Senator Rhoda Perry and Representative Gordon Fox,  each of whom introduced legislation in their respective chambers.  Senator Perry’s bill, which was the stronger of the two, was heard by the Senate Education Committee. ESPEC Steering Committee members and other interested parents testified in support of the legislation. The Fox bill, which was co-sponsored by Rep. Edith Ajello, was heard by the House Committee on Health, Education and Welfare. That bill drew the support of the Rhode Island Department of Education, the Rhode Island Association of School Committees, and the Providence School Department.  It was, however, opposed by the Rhode Island chapter of the National Education Association, the American Federation of Teachers, and the Providence Teachers’ Union.  In the last days of the legislative session, both bills failed to make it out of committee.  While we did not achieve the result we desired, we learned some important lessons about the legislative process this year, and the door is open next year to picking up where we have left off.  If anyone is interested in helping in next year’s legislative effort, please indicate so in a reply email.

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Notes on the Recent Nathan Bishop Meeting

Sam Zurier was kind enough to write up his notes of the recent meeting regarding Nathan Bishop’s progress with regard to renovations.

On Wednesday, May 7, the New Nathan Bishop’s architect, Scott Dunlap of AI3, made a presentation about the progress of the school. Around 65 interested neighborhood members attended.

AI3 has completed its plans, and the City has hired a contractor with whom AI3 has prior experience. Work is scheduled to begin this month and completion is projected for mid-July, 2009.

Although the building will retain its shell and be renovated, Mr. Dunlap emphasized that the project amounts to a total gutting of the building’s interior, through which “no surface will be untouched.” The renovation will make the New Nathan Bishop a “high performance school,” which means it will achieve a series of performance standrasd for energy efficiency, non-toxic materials, water recycling, limited construction waste, efficient use of daylight and so forth. The building also will incorporate a number of technological advances, including integrated whiteboards, streaming videos, full screen internet displays, and wi-fi access.

The exterior of the school is also scheduled for improvements. There is a new entrance that is expected to be more “welcoming”. The brickwork will be cleaned and landscaping will be added.

Mr. Dunlap discussed the improvements planned for the school’s common areas. The libarary/media center will be a focal point in the front, central part of the building, occupying two levels. The auditorium will not restore the retractable curtain from the building’s early days (a maintenance burden), but will have an integrated control booth and a restored coffer ceiling and moldings. The gymnasiums will have more usable space as the balconies will be removed. It will be brighter with the addition of skylights. There will be a security system to permit public access to these common areas after school.

In order to encourage calmer students, the classrooms will be arranged in “pods” so that circulation around the building is greatly reduced. On a similar note, each classroom will have its own water fountain and sink to reduce student trips to the hall. The cafeteria will retain its prior limited space, but new materials and surfaces will help it to be brighter than before. There also are plans to control construction noise and disruption, although a certain amount is inevitable given the precise schedule. The contractor will be liable for actual damages (not liquidated damages) in the event of delay.

It will be up to the School Department to maintain the building after it opens. The new regulations issued by the Rhode Island Department of Education require districts to allocate 2.5% of construction cost each year for maintenance, but this will be a challenge for Providence.

ESPEC plans to hold another community meeting in around two months to discuss the program that will be offered inside this new building.

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Tomorrow: Meeting on Bishop Construction Plans

Public Meeting
to review final architectural & construction plans for the
New Nathan Bishop
Wednesday, May 7th, 2008
7 p.m. at Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Elementary School, 35 Camp St.

Two years after the closing of Nathan Bishop Middle School was announced, renovation work is about to begin to create the new Nathan Bishop! We expect the construction contract to be awarded by May 1, and work to begin immediately thereafter.

At our request, and with the assistance of Councilman Cliff Wood, the City of Providence has invited the project architects, Architectural Involutions (AI3), to present their final plans to the community. We expect them to be joined by the the project manager and a representative from the company that is awarded the contract.

There will be an opportunity to ask questions about both the design and the construction plans & timetable.

We had hoped to hold the meeting at Bishop itself, but it now appears that work will already have begun and that space won’t be available. We have confirmed the availability of the King school, but are awaiting final confirmation that this location will be suitable for the presentation. Watch for updates here.

Please save the date, and join us on May 7th

We are planning a second public meeting, mostly likely in June, on progress in planning the academic program and school leadership & governance at Bishop.

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More Art!

Many thanks to Nancy Safian, the Program Manager of RISD’s “Project Open Door” for passing along the information below. Note that this is a high school program, but they are interested in working with 8th graders. Wouldn’t it be wonderful to have this at Nathan Bishop when it opens?

I am on your mailing list and I wanted to point you to a web site run by Project Open Door, RISD’s free after school art and design program for teens from Providence (and RI). The programs goals are to help art and design students develop high quality portfolios in preparation for art college. The program is led by graduate and undergraduate RISD students and professional artist educators. Project Open Door currently works with high schoolers only, but we have considered working with 8th graders as they transition to high school. The program is directed by Dr. Paul Sproll, Head of the Department of Art + Design Education.

Currently Project Open Door provides school-based free after school art enrichment classes at Hope High and Feinstein High School. Any students from the city’s public schools a interested in continuing their art and design training are invited to attend this program free of charge.

Here is the web link. It contains art learning opportunities for students: http://risd.digication.com/projectopendoor

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Nathan Bishop Outreach Committee Formed

A sub-committee of the ESPEC steering committee is being formed to reach out to parents of prospective attendees of the new Nathan Bishop. Co-chairs are Kim Rohm, a parent and PTO member at King Elementary and Karina Wood, PTO president at Vartan Gregorian.

Karina and Kim will be looking for others who can help with this commitee’s work. 
Twenty-five people attended our February meeting for prospective parents at Dr. ML King Jr. Elementary. They, as well as others who have contacted us but could not attend the meeting, can expect to receive emails from the committee soon.

You can add your name to the list by emailing me.

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Nathan Bishop Bidders’ Conference

Yesterday morning, the pre-bid conference for contractors was held at Nathan Bishop. Diane McAleer, long-time immediate neighbor of Bishop and active member of the Superintendent’s Nathan Bishop Committee, reports 35 to 40 cars and trucks arrived, which seems to indicate a good level of interest. Potential contractors and sub-contractors, many carrying blueprints, toured the school and took pictures. As noted below, bids are due April 14th.

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