BPS delay of grade reshuffle buys some families one more year to find a new school

Boston Public Schools will postpone the elimination of the seventh and eighth grades at the pre-K-8 Gardner Pilot Academy in Brighton by a year, according to a letter district officials sent to families on Monday.

The postponement is due, in part, to an immediate leave of absence by the school principal, BPS Chief of Schools and Accountability Drew Echelson said in the letter.

Given the change in school leadership and the need for some families to choose a new school, “the district thought it best to postpone the change in grade configuration until the 2025-2026 school year,” Echelson wrote.

The principal, Erica Herman, has headed the Gardner since 2005. No reason was provided for her leave of absence and Herman could not be reached for comment.

Monday’s announcement temporarily halted the grade changes announced by BPS earlier this month, which had caught many families off guard.

But it only provided temporary respite to parents like Rosa Ramos, whose sixth grader will still need to find a new school when she enters eighth grade in fall 2025.

“It would be better if the district gave students the opportunity to complete seventh and eighth grade,” Ramos said.

The Gardner was one of three Boston schools set to drop Grade 7 and 8 starting next year. Planned changes to the two other impacted schools — Haley Pilot School in Roslindale and Edison K-8 in Brighton — are still expected to go forward as planned, said BPS spokesman Max Baker.

The grade reconfigurations reflect efforts by the district to simplify the pathways by which students move through elementary, middle and high school.

A 2019 BPS plan underscored the importance of limiting the number of student transitions and proposed redesigning most district schools with a single point of changeover after sixth grade. The Boston School Committee approved the plan, effectively signing off on future grade reconfigurations at schools like the Gardner.

BPS officials have explained the need for these changes by citing decreasing enrollment in middle school and rising demand for pre-K seats across the district. The Gardner has a waitlist for its pre-K class while neighboring Brighton High School has open seats in Grade 7 and 8, according to Baker.

Grade adjustments allow the district to re-concentrate resources and provide “more robust programming,” including substantially separate classrooms for pre-K students with disabilities in Allston-Brighton, Baker said, adding that BPS has made similar grade adjustments to over 40 schools within the last five years.

But the threat of grade eliminations has touched a nerve with some Gardner parents who said they are frustrated with a lack of their input — or clear contingency plans.

Research shows that changing schools too often can negatively impact a student’s academic outcomes and increase the likelihood of dropping out. The impact is more pronounced for English language learners, students from a low socioeconomic background and those with disabilities.

A heated community meeting about the Gardner grade changes run by district officials two weeks ago left some parents so frustrated they stormed out of the gymnasium.

Parent after parent approached the microphone to ask district officials why they were removing the school’s upper grades and what supports would be available to help their children transition to a new school.

Momo Shinzawa, the parent of a sixth grader at the Gardner, noted that the school’s governing board — comprised of teachers, parents and other community members — was not consulted in the decision.

A Google doc shared with WBUR lists many of the questions and concerns parents raised, including the timing of the move, decision-making that went behind it and how rising seventh and eighth graders would be re-assigned to a new school.

District officials said impacted students would receive priority registration for school seats elsewhere.

But families say district support is falling short.

Carroll Blake, chairman of the school’s governing board, said he thinks family frustration is rooted in a seeming lack of concern. Parents want assurance from the district that their kids will get through this disruption unscathed.

But, he added, the district has not been clear on what can be done to reduce the impact on their kids.

“I think people are asking for help, and what they're getting [from the district] is data,” he said, referring to the enrollment projections cited by BPS officials.

And for some Gardner students, this wouldn’t be the first time they will need to soon uproot from their neighborhood school.

Ronda Dorson said her now seventh-grader, Ronald, attended the former K-8 Jackson Mann School in Allston through the fifth grade. But when the district permanently closed the school in 2022, Ronald moved to the Gardner, along with 35 of his peers.

Now that BPS is delaying the elimination of the upper grades, Ronald can finish out his eighth grade year at the Gardner. But when Dorson first heard of the anticipated move, she felt a blow.

“Here we go again,” Dorson said. “I'm tired. I'm aggravated. Because it's like, okay, now where's he gonna go?”

What Dorson finds most worrying is her son’s growing apathy to the impermanence of a “home” school. Now that Ronald has been told to change schools twice, he fears the same thing will happen at his next one. That has shaken his faith in the system.

Dorson expressed relief at the recent postponement, adding it gives her family more time to pick a high school.