Looks like Smith School is heading towards becoming a charter school. Possibly Arthur Academy. Good for those parents. They will save their school, have more say in it's continued successes and will build a shinning example for the district as they do more with less.

Good luck and have a great Smith Charter School 2005-2006 school year!

I agree. But the thing that is most distressing to me is the dead, stale sense of retreat, of retrenchment, of tail-chasing and rehashing and more than anything else -- of reaction, rather than action, that I fear is driving these decisions.

Where's our "Portland vision"? I get no sense of any goal, or glow, out of PPS except, something like "maybe if we do this we can just squeak by"

Is that really the best we can do for our kids and our city? A sort of sad count-down, scratching off more and more schools, as more and more families choose to settle elsewhere, as there is less and less reason for them to settle here?

The "young creatives" we rightly boast of luring here today, will be having babies before they know it. Then, they'll be thinking schools. They aren't living in Portland because they really would rather be in Tigard. To lose them at the height of their productive capacity all because there is no longer a decent school in walking distance of their home would be a pitiful waste of our future.

Even more important, where is the conversation around how we will we nurture healthy family life in our city if we continue to close down the very institutions that support this? A neighborhood school is one of the most democratic opportunities a community can create. When we do them right, there are few things that work better.

PPS wants to talk about demographic projections. I'll give you a demographic projection -- PPS's own projections of enrollement at Forest Park Elementary -- widely, wildly, underestimated. Why? Well, it was a development of expensive condo's and houses on small lots, everything families are supposedly fleeing Portland to escape. So, very few kids, right? I just saw a landuse app for 2 MORE portable classrooms, to add to the ones they've already had to install. PPS built a great, state of the art neighborhood elementary school, and the families came...

We need to think about that, and then start thinking about how we can think forward, not backward, about our schools, and our city's future. Because this IS about our city's future. And closing our best schools, and dumping kids from failing middle schools into a failing, "No Child Left Behind" High School, is not going to take us where we need to go.

I went to Edwards Elementary School for K-2 and 5th grades back in the late 70’s and early 80’s-trust me it hurts for it being shut down; but I see why it is being closed down:

1) Low enrollment 2) No Library 3) No Cafeteria 4) No Auditorium

What other schools should be closed or merged? Alternatively, services being cut totally out?

I say that you can have all six elementary schools back, but for that no sports or after school programs in the high schools.

Which one would have passed the tested with the community at large?

This mess is from a decade long event in the making because of being under a Republican legislative branch, legislative tax expenditure spree, Measure 5 and Portland giving up some extra tax revenue for high-end development projects.

It is not Dr Philip’s fault on inheriting a school district that is on live support. It is not current school board members fault for the lack of revenue that is coming in the coffers of the school district.

Yes, there should have been a better public vetting process for which schools to close or services to be eliminated.

Do not shot the messenger at all for now, especially that the daunting cuts might be yet too come if the legislative branches and the Governor cannot agree on the monies that should go to the schools.

Re. the future: We ought to accept the possibility that what we are seeing now is an autopsy.

The web of legal and regulatory rules we created surrounding and "protecting" public education has smothered the system.

We followed a road of good intentions. And now, even with the system's failure, the corpse refuses to be buried because the big economic and political players - the rule makers - have their stakes locked up and are locked-down against change. Thus Oregon lags in charters, compared to the U.S.

But this also explains why (and how) Smith will survive as a neighborhood school. That's the future. Don't fight it ... embrace it.

While I understand and agree that there are merits in a community school, the reality is that the number of students attending the school will determine the funding in the present and future. If the numbers are low, the school is at a disadvantage when it comes time to look at the budget for educational funding in light of across-the-board cutbacks nation-wide and state-wide. This is the crux of why Edwards closed.

No one that I know in the education circles I work in is going around saying that Edwards was closed due to “low test scores” or that it was due to an “academic disadvantage”. Edwards has proven itself to be successful in raising student benchmarks. The central issue surrounding Edwards as my peers and I understand it is an issue of student enrollment.

I understand your perspective to be one that understands “the District is in a terrible financial situation for reasons that are not the District's fault.” Therefore, I am confused when you state that ”the District has embarked what is essentially an experiment in school choice. You see, the District has to answer to the initiatives set forth on the national and state levels. We shouldn’t blame the Portland Public School District for passing the No Child Left Behind Act which basically demands that schools develop competitive programs and that school districts allow for more school choice. (I’m keeping out the Acts stance on testing as it doesn’t apply in this scenario.) It’s important to acknowledge that this national policy is what led to your main issue as I understand it.

You state that one of the reasons the District cited for closing Edwards (too few students from the Edwards neighborhood actually attending the school) may actually have been a direct result of District policy. The kids who didn’t go to Edwards were attending magnet programs elsewhere. In other words, the reason for the closure of Edwards (and of Smith and Richmond) may have been brought about by District policy.

This is, in essence, blaming the District for the No Child Left Behind Act. Our local District has an obligation to address the state and national standards set forth and determined by the No Child Left Behind Act. The District does not have a choice -- they have to allow for the development of competitive schools with specialized programming (arts, science, language, vocational) that in turn allow parents to choose where and how their child receives an education.

Because numerous magnet programs have proved to be hugely successful in the past, it has become a ‘best practice’ model in developing those choices today. So, if this is an “experiment”, its not the Districts experiment, it’s the Nations experiment. The District is just following National directives and, in such a way (developing magnet models) that has proven itself in the past.

As I said, I do appreciate the value and merits in your arguments for ‘community schools’ -- just as you see value and merit in ‘magnet schools’ – however – I feel compelled to point out that real values you site as the benefits in community schools do exist in magnet schools.

You state that ”While there is real value in a concentrated language immersion or arts program, there is also value in learning with and playing with people who might differ from you in a variety of ways. Neighborhood schools do not sort kids and their families by narrow focus, but rather ask people to come together and create a rag-tag community based on the best interest of all of the children, regardless of their interests or background.”

Children will still be ”learning with and playing with people who might differ from you in a variety of ways”; and inherent in magnet models is the way that ”people come together and create a community based on the best interest of all of the children”

Cultural diversity does exist in a magnet school and the the shared interests of those involved are likened to the same interests found in a community school, the mindset that “we’re all here, or in this together now” – wherever that ‘here’ may be and however it is “we” find ourselves having arrived there. That, in my mind, is how a "community" is born.

Ramon, ... what we are seeing now is an autopsy.

Your statement is valid, but a little premature.

The worse has yet to come if the city, county and state can not stop the hemorrhaging in the schools very soon.

Any stable funding for schools that get started now, locally or at the state level; will not showing potential positive results until 2007 or later.

So the question is if there is a huge spike of newcomers with children, 3 years or later; in these areas that have schools closed now and next year, how is the City and the District going to deal with that?

We all seem willing to believe that recent actions taken by Phillips and the school board are really about fiscal accountability or student achievement (as was pointed out at several of the meetings, they can't seem to agree on the real reason). From my view, I don't think either are true. Savings from closing schools are pennies to the dollar in the PPS budget and by every analysis including Phillips' will not save money for at least a year and probably longer. As floated here previously, there are a lot of other ways to save money including with the spending habits of the superintendent and the board. And no one has made the student achievement argument stick as a valid reason but quite to the contrary.

I see a very ambitious, media savy, superindent who is looking to get lots of good personal press and political clout quickly. Sounds like this is her MO every place she's been. And we've got a bunch of school board members concerned about their images, their political ambitions or of their husband. I felt very sorry for all the parents and students who showed up at Monday night's board meeting and expected a sincere dialogue about the closures. Instead we got to listen to each board member read their prepared statements justifying their actions and reminding us of all the great things they've done. It was an insult.

Unfortunately, we are going to have to live with the damage being done long after Phillips and this school board have flown the coop. I've never been a supporter of charter schools but now I say "Go Smith."

Because of magnet schools’ increasing popularity, to be a neighborhood school today is to be a “poor stepchild” of the district.

Bravo Leslie and Wendy for this excellent post! You have hit the nail on the head. The district does not appear to "get" that for many families, the "regular" neighborhood school IS our first choice--that walking to school matters, knowing your neighbors matters, a child's sense of belonging in their community matters.

The boutique focus option programs are never questioned about their size or efficiency or costs, while neighborhood schools go up on the chopping block. Focus options are placed in neighborhood schools and the neighborhood program is allowed to wither. The District apparently has decided that focus options are the way to keep middle class parents in public schools. I totally agree with Leslie and Wendy-- we are moving toward a two-tiered system with big, consolidated "neighborhood" schools and an elite system of magnet programs that the richer kids get driven to.

The number of magnet/special focus schools in Portland far pre-date No Child Left Behind. The No Child Left Behind Act was passed in 2001; the magnet program in the Portland Public School District began with Jefferson High School in the 1970s.

I didnt claim that all of Portland's magnet schools or Jefferson, specifically, came into existance 'after' the No Child Left Behind Act was passed. I stated that the success of various and numerous magnet schools in the past is the model being used in our present day to meet the No Child Left Behind mandates. You are correct in stating that Jefferson wasnt imposed on the district back in the 70's. It was, indeed, an experiment in educational reform. However, in the present day the success of such models throughout the country are being revisited and that revisitation is imposed on the District now due to the No Child Left Behind Act.

Ruth states that "The district does not appear to "get" that for many families, the "regular" neighborhood school IS our first choice"

While that may be true for many families, there are more parents choosing to relocate their children to magnet schools and/or private schools. If your argument held up for the Majority of the parents choosing their neighborhood schools -- then I daresay we wouldnt be having this discussion in regards to Edwards and its closure due to low enrollment.

I am the parent of an Edwards student. When looking for a school a few years ago, I visited Abernethy and had a conversation with a parent that I will never forget. She said something like "Never underestimate the value of a neighborhood school. I volunteer here and today I showed up a half hour early by mistake so I am running home to have a cup of tea now. Having a neighborhood school is worth at least as much as any of the fancy programs in a specialty school." I am grateful to her to this day for helping me clarify that. (I only wish we had bought a house closer to Abernethy so that we could easily walk there, too!) I picked Edwards because it was small and that suited my daughter (and most 5 year olds I think) and had a good academic record. I learned to work with the year round calendar. I will miss our walks to school and hanging out on the playground under the maples after school. I doubt our family will choose Abernethy.
Now about this post: "I went to Edwards Elementary School for K-2 and 5th grades back in the late 70’s and early 80’s-trust me it hurts for it being shut down; but I see why it is being closed down:

1) Low enrollment 2) No Library 3) No Cafeteria 4) No Auditorium"

After being through 2 rounds of closures, and meeting parents from Meek, Brooklyn,Whitaker, Rieke, Applegate, Tubman, and Kenton I know that when the district wants to close you, they will portray your school in a certain way.

Edwards does have an auditorium/cafeteria/gym. We call it the multi-purpose room. Our kids play outside in the park and garden that we share with the city. It is a MODEL of simple, multi-function facility. Every time I hear someone say that we don't have a gym, it feels to me like someone coming from a giant McMansion in the West Hills and sneering at my house, asking me how I could possilby live without a master bath, or 2 cars. I love my simple house and my simple school. It fits. We share the bathroom and are a closer family for it! And at Edwards we use every square inch of space in that building and are a great community for it. And we do have a LOVELY library/media room. They must have built it after you left. It looks out on the park, there is a reading area that sometimes turns into a small auditorium like space for groups of up to 40.
We have stable enrollment DESPITE being in the paper annually for closure. PPS painted a similar picture of Meek 2 years ago. The spin was they only had 110 students. They had 110 neighborhood students The reality was they had 275 including some of the most disabled students in the district, a Head Start program and many transfer students. I know the district is flailing economically, but their heavy-handed decisions with NO real input from the community, do not bode well for the future. There are many more cuts to come, they warn us but if they continue to exclude the community WHO THEY WORK FOR in their major decisions they will never recover. I am glad to be working with Neighborhood Schools Alliance to work on a city wide solution. I think it is our only chance. A. Edwards parent

Leslie said

However, with the diminishing resources left to PPS, I fear that we will end up with a two-tier system: well-off, educated parents who transfer their kids to the highest performing magnet schools and poor kids left to their neighborhood schools.

I have to correct her on one point: under the current transfer system, children who come from a household that qualifies for free/reduced lunch actually have an advantage in the lottery.

It's one of three variables (in general - some schools have additional acceptance criteria) that influence your ability to get in the school of your choice: having a sibling in the school you're choosing and coming from a school targeted by No Child Left Behind are the other two variables (or were as of last year when we went through the transfer lottery system - I don't believe that's changed.)

While I am a strong supporter of neighborhood schools in general, I caution people from making assumptions about the makeup and mix of a typical magnet school - including assuming that only well-to-do parents (or educated parents, for that matter) can (or do) choose to send their child to one.

My daughter now attends a magnet elementary school. And there are families (or students) who take mass transit (I'm one of them) in order to ensure their children have the opportunity to attend this school, for example - or other schools. I see them on the buses every day. The school population is incredibly diverse on every level, despite the fact that over 70% are transfer students.

And at our (former) neighborhood elementary school, located in an established, seemingly well-to-do neighborhood? Several of the families that chose not to send their children there didn't choose another public school program - they chose private school instead.

So - fight to keep neighborhood schools strong if that's your mission. But please don't make assumptions about what you perceive the current (or future) makeup of magnet school populations to be, or those who choose to send their children to magnet schools. You need us on your side, not alienated by characterizations that may be perceived as divisive - not to mention inaccurate.

It is not Dr Philip’s fault on inheriting a school district that is on live support. It is not current school board members fault for the lack of revenue that is coming in the coffers of the school district.

You're right (except no one said it was). I don't blame Superintendent Phillips for the financial situation, I blame her (and the District) for cooking the books to justify an amazingly flawed response to said situation. This Board and the personnel who report to them have to make a series of unpleasant choices. But that doesn't excuse them from obeying their own policies in order to create a logical plan.

Phillips made the decision to close these schools for political reasons. Performance? Where do you go from exceptional? Of course there's always room for improvement, but our teachers and kids worked hard to increase their test scores over the last few years.

Declining enrollment? Smith is projected to increase by nearly 30% over the next 10 years. Moreover, their so-called declining enrollment figures are just plain deceitful.

According to the Enrollment Trends update (distributed 1 hour before the vote) Smith neighborhood has only experienced two new units of construction in each of the last four years (8 total). That will come as big news to the people living in the TWENTY new houses on the 8800 blocks of 49th and 50th avenues. Now these are not too tough to find as Smith is on the 8900 block of 52nd. Yep, 20 new houses within 2 blocks of the school are not included in the baseline data that informs the trend forecast. Neither are the three new homes on 61st, the two new ones on 57th, and the one under construction on Garden Home Road.

In fact, the only decline in Smith's population was this year's 19 student loss to the new Hayhurst Focus Option school that opened less than 1 mile from Smith. It seems obvious that if you apply enough leeches you're going to lose blood. I think it is testament to our school, its teachers and parents that more didn't go to Hayhurst.

Well it must be to save money then. $300,000 according the School Closure Report (also delivered 1 hour before the vote). Except their own "Scatter report" shows them losing at least 40 students out of the district (to private schools or neighboring school districts). At $5000 a head, that's a loss of $200,000 just from attrition. Now add in the costs of busing 100+ students who can now walk to Smith at $50,000 per bus and you've eaten up almost all the savings Phillips et al have projected.

At Smith, parents and neighbors are going to try and put together a charter to keep our kids in a high-performing neighborhood school. If the District deigns to grant us a charter, I know that it won't be the same Smith Elementary my child now enjoys. He's already lost one friend, who will leave for private school tomorrow. He will likely lose more classmates to the schools the district has assigned.

I have to say, I work in the public arena, and have gotten pretty used to being screwed by the right-wingers who are driving so much of federal and state policy. But when supposedly progressive Portland sticks it to us on such patently false grounds, the pain goes a lot deeper.

The real pity is that by forcing through these decisions, Phillips erodes the political support necessary to effect the real tax and spending reforms that the state so desparately needs. Our precinct passed the ITAX by 63%. Rejected the repeal by 57%. With the disenchantment that is rife in our community right now, I doubt we'd get 50% for either.

And the spiral continues. Will the last one out of Portland please turn out the lights?

Leslie said: for the past 30 years, the District has embarked what is essentially an experiment in school choice. From my perspective, it's gotten to the point where those of us who want to put our kids in our local school are considered by some to be putting them at an academic disadvantage.

This experiment has implications for kids, families, neighborhoods and the city at large...

Leslie, I agree with you in many ways (and I think we may have gone to the same unpopular high school). As a product of the Portland Public School system, all in neighborhood schools, a track coach, and a parent, I share your feelings about the magnet system. Sure, it's wonderful to have choice, and to be able to select an academic program that fits your child. But it's so often used as a means to an end rather than an end in itself. Anyone who's involved in PIL athletics knows that certain schools use the magnet program as a recruiting tool - in case anyone wonders why Benson has been the state track champions for dozens of years running, wonder no longer. In other cases, magnet are used so that parents can opt out of troubled neighborhood schools.

And it's not just the school system that suffers from the endless school switching, but the whole city, as more and more parents drive their kids to school (when I was in 1st grade, 65% of Portland students walked to school - now it's 10%) and opt for private alternatives. Our traffic, pollution and livability take a hit, as well.

Now I'm about to put my child in a preschool whose parents almost always keep their kids out of the public school system. But that's not what I want in the future for my son. Will I be robbing him of the "best" friends? Or giving him a better sense of community? I hate feeling as if I'm a bad parent because I want him to attend his neighborhood school (which will be Grout), when so many of my friends are opting for charter schools or risking the lottery for Atkinson.

And it's not just the school system that suffers from the endless school switching, but the whole city, as more and more parents drive their kids to school (when I was in 1st grade, 65% of Portland students walked to school - now it's 10%) and opt for private alternatives. Our traffic, pollution and livability take a hit, as well.

It's the parents and the national policy (No Child Left Behind Act) -- not the school district -- that makes these choices in the end -- which is my point. Stop Condemening Phillips and look to your neighbors in the 'community school districts' instead.

The "Edwards enrollment increase" is an interesting argument, except that (as I understand it) only about 15% of Edwards students are within its community. In other words, it truly is a magnet school, not generally attracting its neighbors. So there may be lots of houses built in the area, but little reason to think those people would choose Edwards.

If I'm wrong on that number (I heard 30 of 200), please advise of the correct number.

How did this become an argument between magnet and neighborhood school's advocates? We're letting our tails get twisted, if we go down that dead-end.

The point of the original post was the value of choice. It is a pride of our district that we have these choices. We need to support them all, not bleed the best ones, in hopes that a last minute transfusion will save another one that's now failing.

For a variety of reasons which have been covered pretty thoroughly here, the majority of parents still choose their neighborhood schools. And transportation barriers alone will ensure that if we let these schools fall we WILL be setting up two-tiered, class-based school system. One even more divided than what we have now. As a society it is in our entirely self-centered self-interest to make our neighborhood schools the best they can be.

Edwards does operate, functionally, as a magnet. That's inevitable given the year-round schedule. For, that schedule is just not practical for most families. But, what's wrong with that? At the most basic - it operates at a lower than average-per-pupil cost, and produces excellent results and provides one more choice for PPS parents. As long as its cost structure remains low, and its results remain high - who cares if they aren't completely full? It costs less to educate those kids there, than elsewhere, and the parents are happy and there is another "choice" within our system. All to the good. PPS should ballyhoo it to the skies, not shut it down.

Imposing that year-round magnet model on Abernethy, which is a truly neighborhood school, will not have such a happy result. The end product of this "innovation" will be a net loss of current and future students to the district and a loss to our vibrant, child-friendly, neighborhood. All to the bad.

It's poorly thought-out, and as now envisioned, will not fail to have negative consequences.

And, again I ask, where is the passion, the vision, the excitement in this proposal? I know the district is bleeding, but these are our kids we're talking about. We should not give up trying to find GOOD solutions, exciting, and innovative solutions.

How about putting in a few MORE “Edwards’” around town? Or, maybe start a “sister-schools” program? At any rate, start with the presumption that a small school with lower than average costs and higher than average performance is better, on all counts, than a large school with higher than average costs and lower than average achievement. We dump the later, before we dump the first. As a rule.

That would at least be a start.

Leslie and Wendy have articulated, I think, one of the toughest choices facing progressive-minded Portlanders with children today: how best to educate our children in a competitive world with a shrinking pie, while at the same time maintaining our progressive community values. You only have to read the comments to understand how torn and passionate we all are about this issue.

While I agree with much of what Leslie and Wendy put forth, I must take issue with one of their premises. PPS did not create the "problem" of school choice. If it is indeed a problem, we all created it by demanding choices in every aspect of our lives, from the coffee and beer we drink to the kind of schools we send our kids. Do you know anybody who still drinks their Folgers black or their Hamms out of the can?

Every one of us who has a kid of school age knows the gut-wrenching difficulty of choosing the right school for your own unique (and brilliant) kid. Where can I get full-day kindergarten, preferably with a calculus option? What are the test scores at a particular school? Is that school diverse enough--but not so diverse so as to bring the test scores down? Will they immerse my kid in (choose one or more): the language of my family, the language of the county I like to vacation in, art/music/dance, sports, math and science, environmental activism...the list is as long as our own passions are deep.

Whether PPS promotes choice or not we will all demand it for our own special kids. I suspect that most of the magnet programs which are demonized in this piece were once devised and advocted for by passionate Portland parents at one time or another. I suspect even neighborood schools like Edwards and Smith have some special magnet services for which parents have advocated. (And let's not forget that Abernathy was kept alive during a time of low enrollment by that magnet school called the Environmental School.)

I know that is case for the Spanish language program our daughter attended at Atkinson. The district did not dream up this program. The parents demanded it, raised money for it and supported it. We chose to send our daughter there to take advantage of a wonderful cultural diversity and language immersion program unavailable at our own neighborhood white bread school. While we lost some community in our own neighborhood we gained additional community in a more diverse neighborhood across town. Our daughter gained the invaluable experience of going to school with many kids of a different culture, a different (dare I say it) class, and kids recently immigrated to our country. This is not an experience I had in the sixties in my white neighborhood school. The modest tuition we paid for this privelege was to drive our kid across town every day. We would do it again.

So, we all make choices in our complicated lives nowadays. A school for our kids is only one--albeit one of the most important--we face in an increasingly complicated world. Whether we choose to live in a neighborhood with a school we like, choose to start a charter (read private) school in our neighborhood, choose to send our kid to an established exclusive private school, choose to send our kid to a special program at another school, choose to home school, or choose to flee to the burbs, we all make choices of how to best educate our kids. Nowadays we really cannot choose to default by making no choice.