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Date: 6/28/2021
HOLYOKE – The restructuring of the Holyoke Ethnic Studies program was the subject of much scrutiny and conversation during the June 21 Holyoke School Committee meeting.
The School Committee heard comments regarding the issue from students, community members and staff members in the public school system. One resident asked the district to hold off on the decision to eliminate the position until they could speak to ethnic studies scholars in varying communities. She said community members did not feel as though their voices had been heard in decisions made by the district, which made them less likely to participate and be involved.
A letter was read from a student who had been enrolled in the Ethnic Studies Program at the Holyoke High School North campus. She said the curriculum had shown her that she had to “become a co-conspirator and not an ally.” Additionally, she said the curriculum had taught them they had to “fight for my community and my voice as a young Mexican-Puerto Rican woman matters.”
“I had the opportunity to learn about my Puerto Rican and Mexican heritage through the program and was able to connect with my Hispanic identity. I have always felt a disconnect with myself and where I came from, ethnic studies was an outlet where I could explore that side of myself that I never thought would be discovered,” she said. “Ethnic studies taught me knowledge is the key to set one free and ignite change.”
She went on to say the director of the program had ensured that students received an education both in and outside of the classroom. “Taking this role away would decrease the quality of the program as a whole,” she said, and went on to say removing the position was “an injustice” to the student body.
Acting Holyoke Public Schools Receiver Anthony Soto then gave an update on summer school. He said the district would be offering rising first through eighth graders a five-week program that would begin on July 6 and end on Aug. 5. The program, he said, would take place Mondays through Thursdays and would offer both remote and in-person options. Lower elementary grades and students in the Dual Language program would attend the program at the E.N. White School. He said students in upper elementary grades would attend the Lt. Elmer J. McMahon Elementary School and the Holyoke STEM Academy would be running the Generation TEACH program. Additionally, Soto said there would be an Acceleration Academy taking place at the E.N. White School, Holyoke High School, the McMahon School and the William J. Dean Vocational Technical High School.
At the time of the meeting, Soto said 187 students were registered, but they were continuing to do outreach in the community in hopes of increasing that number. The program was “almost 100 hired,” and fully staffed, but he said that should the need to hire more employees increase with the growing number of enrolled students, they would do so.
Soto said there were about 120 high school students confirmed for enrollment in summer school, which would take place on all three campuses and offer both in-person and remote “credit recovery options.” Additionally, an Acceleration Academy would be offered at both the Dean and North campuses. He said enrollment was expected to be closer to “between 250 and 400” by the time the programs began.
He then went on to explain the extended school year program, which would take place with both in-person and remote options. Soto said the program would take place at the Maurice A. Donahue School, the H.B. Lawrence School and the transition academy. He added that there would also be some drop-in therapy services. Soto said at the time of the meeting enrollment was at 300 students, but normally about 400 students participate in the program.
He gave an update about food service within the district and announced that during the summer there would be a mobile food program. Soto said they had worked with community partners to identify spots in the city where a mobile summer meals “food truck” would stop and distribute meals to children in the community. He said they would still have food sites at schools, but the truck would be at a variety of places in the city five days a week, Monday through Friday. The truck will be at Springdale Park from 11 a.m. to 11:15 a.m., at Carlos Vega Park from 11:20 a.m. to 11:35 a.m., at the Toepfert Apartments from 11:40 to 11:55 a.m., at Veteran’s Park from 12 p.m. to 12:15 p.m., at the Churchill Homes Apartments from 12:20 to 12:35 p.m. and at the Beaudoin Village Early Education and Child Care Center from 12:40 p.m. to 12:55 p.m.
“These were all sites around the city that we thought we could reach the most amount of families,” Soto said.
Regular curbside meal pickup will also take place throughout the summer from June 23 to Aug. 20. Soto explained that the district would provide both breakfast and lunch at the Donahue, Lawrence and Morgan Schools Monday through Friday from 11 a.m. to 1 p.m. Soto clarified that it was not just students enrolled in Holyoke Public Schools that qualified for the free meals, but any school-aged child would be able to receive free meals provided by the district.
In an update about sports, Soto said the district planned to host a traditional fall sports season. He said signups were taking place in-person at both the Dr. Marcell R. Kelly School and the STEM Academy. Signups were also taking place via Zoom through the Peck and Donahue Schools, and informational packets were dropped off at the McMahon School, Sullivan School, Blessed Sacrament School, Mater Dolorosa, First Lutheran and the Holyoke Charter School. Soto addressed concerns “around access to sporting programs” now that they were a single school with two high school campuses. He said that to eliminate the transportation barrier the district would be providing a bus to the Holyoke High School North campus for those students who wanted to participate in sports. Additionally, he said wrestling would take place at the Dean campus and there would be a bus to provide transportation from the North campus for students participating in wrestling.
The issue of only hosting sports games at the North campus was also addressed with School Committee member Rebecca Birks stating that she felt as though games should be hosted at both campuses when possible. “One thing I would like to see is some of the home games that can happen at Dean happen there as well. I don’t think they should all just be on the North campus when we have athletes from both schools,” she said. Birks added that they had also just had “a bunch of work” done at the Dean campus and if they were asking students to come together as one campus and one team, she felt it was “the fair and right thing to do.”
Holyoke Public Schools Director of Athletics Melanie Martin said there were a lot of logistics that would need to be worked out if they were to host games at the Dean campus. She said while there were opportunities for a couple of sports such as freshman volleyball and boy’s basketball to take place at the Dean campus, they had concerns about the cost of busing, which she said had continued to increase and logistics of parking “and how people are getting into the gym, where the buses are parking.”
“There’s a lot that goes into it and with it and equipment that would need to be moved down to the Dean campus sporadically for games to be there. As far as the medical support, athletic training, we don’t have that there anymore,” she said. Martin said she wasn’t opposed to the idea, but needed to assess “what can we feasibly do with the limited staff that we have to provide medical coverage for our practices that are going on the same time as the games.”
In an update regarding the ethnic studies program, Soto said ethnic studies had officially been recognized as a department. He also explained that when the program began, a two-to-three-year position had been developed that they now referred to as the director. He said during that time the curriculum for the program had been built and as the program was now officially being recognized as a department it was time to structure as such. Soto thanked those who had spoken on behalf of the program and said he had heard a “sense of fear” that the program would go away or would be cut. However, he said this was not the case and rather the program had been expanded to provide a “sustainable model” so future students would have the opportunity to take the program.
Soto went on to explain that in the wake of the elimination of the position, a department head of ethnic studies position would be created, allowing for more students to take ethnic studies courses during high school. Due to additional responsibilities such as community partnership work and grant oversight, the department head would have “a reduced course loan.” He said the person that had been occupying the position as director had decided to move on for “personal reasons” but pending negotiations had tentatively agreed to come back and work through the transitional and on a consulting basis.
School Committee member Rosalee Tensley Williams spoke in favor of the ethnic studies program and said she’d been happy to hear the update from Soto. Vice Chair of the School Committee Mildred Lefebvre said she had reflected on previous task forces that hadn’t resulted in any change despite presentations and work being done by the members involved. Regarding the ethnic studies program, she said she felt there were “too many people getting involved and taking a piece of something,” rather than having a single person to hold accountable.
“We’re putting a lot on that one person. Now you’re having a consultant, but when will the consultant come in? It’s like having a consultant on the IEP, it’s rare that they’re even used,” she said. Lefebvre said that due to its unique nature and curriculum, she felt as though the program needed someone to give it their full attention. Birks said teachers and department chairs had brought up that their workload was overwhelming. She added that she was “worried about our teachers having a good home-work life balance.” She added that the district was “losing teachers at an accelerated rate” and thought it was not possible for the chair of the department to both teach and take on other responsibilities. When this was done, she said, one of the jobs suffered as they were not able to give it their full attention.
“We’re not going to have this great equity that we rave about,” she said. Birks expressed concern that the district was not being fair to the teachers. She said she felt teachers were being “spread too thin” and that students would suffer as a result of this.
“We don’t need to lose any more great teachers in our district and I think we’re got to start focusing hard on our staff and making sure that they have a good home-work balance to make sure we’re really going to retain good teachers,” she said. “This highlights a lot of problems. This doesn’t highlight just an ethic studies problem. Through the conversations I’ve had it stems from other problems and I just want to make sure we really need to start putting a spotlight on our teachers and what they need to keep and retain them.”
After much discussion, the committee decided to continue to address the topic at their next School Committee meeting on Aug. 16.