The future of Chelsea schools is at stake. For 13 years, Boston University has managed the entire Chelsea school system, a medium-sized school district just north of Boston that, before the university intervened, was swiftly sinking.
Now, with the end of the partnership approaching, Chelsea, widely considered one of the poorest cities in the state, decided to extend the partnership for another five years.
But from this decision came a mix of approval and fear from district administrators and teachers.
Morrie Siegal, chairman of the Chelsea Public School Committee, said the committee unanimously decided to offer BU an extension of the partnership.
‘The first 15 years were so successful, we would want it to continue it as long as possible,’ he said. ‘We’ve made a lot of progress and are continuing to make progress.’
Meanwhile, others say Chelsea needs to learn to rely on itself.
‘I’m not sure another five years are needed,’ said Sherill Boveri, an English teacher at Chelsea High School. ‘Chelsea needs to stand on its own two feet.’
After approaching the university about renewing the contract, the Chelsea City Council approved the agreement in February, sending it to the Massachusetts State Legislature for final approval. Because Chelsea is a public school district and BU is a private institution, the contract needs to be approved by the both the House and Senate.
Pending before the House now, the partnership must be cleared before the current contract expires on June 30. Both Chelsea and BU officials said they are confident it will be approved before the old contract lapses.
A LIKELY TRANSITION
Many within the Chelsea community said the five-year extension would likely be the last and a transition phase for the district. The contract has been renewed once before, in 1997.
As the original partnership blossomed, Siegal said some people in the community wanted a five-year transition program in place for when BU did leave. Now, Siegal said he feels it is about the right time.
‘I have a feeling this is the last extension,’ Siegal said. ‘BU feels like it’s done all it can. They’ve pointed us this way. It’s up to us to carry the ball and run with it.’
Paul Norwicki, a Chelsea city councilor-at-large, said he agrees.
‘For me, these four to five years are an ending phase,’ he said. ‘BU has been a tremendous resource, giving us stability when we didn’t have any.’
But problems still loom for BU and Chelsea. Some of the teachers chafe at some of the administration’s policies and doubt how helpful the partnership has actually been.
‘I had great faith and confidence in BU because I went there,’ said Ferna O’Connor, the head of the Chelsea Teachers Union and a retired teacher. ‘I expected miracles, and the miracles never occurred.’
O’Connor said there have been too many failures in the time BU has managed Chelsea.
‘The kids still can’t read or do math,’ she said. ‘I don’t know why they’re not better prepared.’
She went on to say that even though BU might have made some progress, it was too slow for the amount of time the school has been involved.
But Norwicki disagreed. BU allowed the city council to concentrate on other issues in the city because he said it felt Chelsea education was in safe hands.
‘BU has done a fine job and the school system has improved by leaps and bounds,’ he said.
As an example of BU’s positive impact on the district, Siegal cited the Intergenerational Literacy Program, a program in which Chelsea faculty help immigrant parents learn English so they can be further involved in their children’s school life. It was part of getting parents more involved, he said.
He also said BU helped the school system set up a dental office in Williams Middle School, open to all Chelsea public school students.
‘The university and [Chancellor John] Silber deserve a lot of credit,’ Siegal said. ‘We couldn’t ask for anything more.’
But at the school level, people are still asking for more.
Boveri said promises were made that never came to fruition. The university promised to make improvements that would shrink class sizes to between 15 and 20 students when they came in, she said. Instead, she said she routinely teaches classes of between 30 and 32 students.
She also said while competitive salaries were promised, Chelsea teachers make considerably less than their peers in other cities.
‘As a result, young [teachers] come in, stay for a few years and then move on because of the salary schedule,’ Boveri said. ‘Fifty percent of teachers will retire over the next five years. I find the whole thing scary.’
O’Connor said she fears for the future because of staffing issues.
‘Veteran teachers who have fed and clothed the kids, we’re all retiring now,’ she said. ‘I can’t even imagine what this city will be like.’
Chelsea Superintendent Irene Cornish said she acknowledges these concerns.
‘This is a time of financial constraints,’ she said. ‘Teachers are retiring; we still need to work on parent involvement.’
But the biggest complaint from teachers is not a lack of money or large class sizes it’s the sense that they have no control over the district’s future.
Boveri said she wants Chelsea to allow teachers to be part of the decision making.
‘It’s a very political game,’ she said.
‘There’s all this bureaucracy,’ O’Connor said. ‘There are no intellectual people on our school committee; who makes the decisions I don’t know.’
But committee chairman Siegal said he disagrees.
‘I think [BU] has taken the politics out of the process,’ he said. ‘It’s not who you know; it’s what you know. People know what they’re doing.’
Norwicki said before BU came, seeking an appointed position was like a popularity contest, but most of those problems have been solved.
BU School of Education dean Douglas Sears, who heads BU’s Chelsea Management Team, claimed any politics involved in BU’s management of the district have come from elsewhere.
‘I have criticism of the mainstream media interfering and playing lots of nasty, political games,’ he said. ‘They deliberately spread disinformation.’
Sears also criticized special interest groups within the district for some of BU’s problems in the district.
‘Some groups get hooked on controversy,’ he said. ‘They’re left-over ’60s radicals who never got over it; they keep being troublemakers.’
Sears declined to mention names because he said he was not interested in fighting.
PLANS FOR THE FUTURE
Instead, Sears said he is more concerned with the future.
‘There are three goals: achievement, achievement and achievement,’ he said.
O’Connor fine-tuned the definition of achievement. She said she still hopes to get students’ Massachusetts Comprehensive Assessment System scores up, after the district was for the first time not listed as a failing school in the most recent round of MCAS scores.
‘I have great expectations for these kids,’ she said. ‘To me, not failing doesn’t mean you’re achieving.’
Sears agreed that raising the MCAS scores is a main priority in the coming years.
‘We’re not at all where we want to be,’ he said. ‘We’re concentrating on basics. There will be some cuts and that’s painful, but it’s driven by the state budget, and it’s not as bad as Boston.
‘We’re game for crazy things; we have a sense of mission,’ he added. ‘The central administration believes in right and wrong, good and evil and the value of individual human lives.’
Boveri said there are significant improvements which must be made.
‘We need a lower class size and supportive before- and after-school programs,’ Boveri said. ‘I don’t know if the city will be able to take it on. But when you’ve touched the lives of kids in Chelsea, you’ve done something.’