EDUCATION | BY TIM LOUIS MACALUSO
Schools modernization project is in trouble Since work began in 2006, the Rochester school district’s $1.2 billion project to overhaul and modernize its buildings has been scaled up and whittled down. It’s gone through four superintendents and three mayors. Design plans have been started, stopped, changed, and started again. Undoubtedly the biggest challenge in a construction project this size is keeping it from becoming silage for political and financial mayhem. Rochester may not have succeeded in that goal. It came out last week that there’s an FBI investigation into the project’s $325 million first phase, and there are growing differences of opinion about whether the second phase should be postponed as a result. A delay would have multiple ramifications, but it’s fair to say that most of the misfortune would be borne by the people who the project is supposed to help: city students and their families. “It took seven years and four superintendents to get the first phase going,” says Rochester schools Superintendent Bolgen Vargas. “I’m hoping this doesn’t take another seven years.” State legislation authorizing the project’s second phase has been drafted, but not submitted. And with only days left in the current legislative session, time is running out. Indications that the project was in trouble surfaced shortly after Mayor Lovely Warren took office earlier this year. Internal audits of the project’s first phase raised serious questions about costs and supervision. Warren and other city officials charged the Rochester Joint Schools Construction Board with shoddy oversight. And City Council President Loretta Scott asked the State Comptroller’s Office to investigate whether the project was meeting compliance standards for hiring women and minority contractors. The comptroller’s office did not pursue the matter, and it’s not clear what exactly the FBI is investigating.
School board President Van White says it would be prudent to temporarily put the legislation for phase two of the project on hold. (The school board has no involvement with the schools modernization project.) “We should at least know what’s gone wrong so we don’t repeat those mistakes,” he says. But Vargas says a delay would cause serious problems for the district. “I can’t be left in limbo here,” he says. “I do respect the concerns that others may have, but we need to move forward for the sake of our students, our families, and this city.” According to the district’s website, there are nine city schools in the project’s first phase that are in various stages of construction. Some, such as School 58 and School 28, are expanding with major additions. Construction on others such as School 50 is complete. And there are more than 20 schools slated for major renovations in the second phase of the project. Some schools will straddle multiple stages of construction before all of the work is completed. The entire project consists of four phases. Delaying the second phase would undoubtedly drive costs up; costs have increased dramatically since the project began. Delaying
Construction on School 50, an elementary school on Seneca Avenue, is complete. An addition with modernized classrooms, music rooms, and science labs was put on the building during the first phase of the district’s facilities modernization project. PHOTO BY MARK CHAMBERLIN
would also open the door to yet more costly design changes. For example, School 16, while not originally part of phase two, was added after aggressive lobbying by residents. And a delay would create a logistical nightmare for district administrators, parents, and students since many students are attending school in alternative locations while their home schools are being renovated. But more than anything else, Vargas says, the modernization program is critical to keeping students and families in the city by providing schools that are modern, clean, and designed to support math, science, music, art, and sports. Since the district has become the principal source of meals for many city students, modernizing kitchens and food preparation areas is long overdue, he says.
EDUCATION | BY TIM LOUIS MACALUSO
Vargas wants All City High extended Rochester schools Superintendent Bolgen Vargas says he wants to continue offering All City High as an alternative for students who need it. The school primarily serves overage students who don’t have enough credits to graduate. “What do you do with students who are entering ninth grade when they are 15, 16, 17, and 18, and sometimes older?” Vargas says. “These are often students who are reading at a much lower level. This is the only district that I know of that doesn’t 6 CITY
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have some kind of non-traditional school for these kids.” Technically, All City is not a school; it’s a program that Vargas created in 2010 as a way of re-engaging students enrolled in schools that were being phased out: Edison, Franklin, and Jefferson. Vargas says that as those schools were closing, many of the students were either drifting or dropping out. “Those students were slowly losing all of their services,” he says. “They were losing
administrative help, losing counselors, and losing supportive teachers.” Vargas says the number of pupils enrolled at All City turned out to be much lower than originally anticipated — about 800 students. Many of the students who district officials thought would go to All City turned out to be “phantom” pupils. Many were not attending school in Rochester anymore. Some weren’t even living in New York, but their home schools had lost track of them. Vargas says that 351 All City students have graduated, and that the program, which
And even Vargas’s strategy to improve student achievement through expanded learning would be undermined with another delay, he says. Many students are now in school for longer hours, and will attend school during the summer months. “I’ve insisted that we have air conditioning in those buildings because our kids need it during the summer months,” he says. Most city schools do not have air conditioning. Vargas says that one of his main goals as superintendent is to increase stability in the district. The district’s parents have had to cope with a school environment that has been in a state of constant flux for years, he says. “I have to give our students more stability,” he says. “You do that through building renovations that protect the interests of our students.”
was supposed to be temporary, works. But with changes imminent at East High and several other schools, he says, the district continues to need an alternative school. “We still have so many kids that are overage and under-credited,” he says. Some principals are not pleased with the way All City operates. Students who attend All City are technically still enrolled in their home schools. Their success or failure reflects on their home schools’ records even though they do not receive instruction there. The school board would have to approve any plan for All City to continue to operate. Board President Van White says he wants to see more data showing the effectiveness of the program.