Sentinel
& Enterprise
Museum school may
follow Boston pilot schools’ model
By Kyle Alspach
Tuesday, January
24, 2006 - FITCHBURG -- The Museum Partnership School may become
the first school in the country to follow the Boston pilot schools model,
which advocates say has improved student learning since starting in
1995. The model gives school officials more control over things like
curriculum, spending, schedule and other matters.
Converting the Museum
Partnership School to the model was a major reason for a $600,000 grant
from the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, a spokesperson said Monday.
"We are very
enthusiastic about the work with the pilot schools in Boston,"
said foundation spokesperson Barbara Semedo. "We think they provide
for a good investment for us."
Semedo said Fitchburg
would join a network of more than a dozen pilot schools in Boston.
The $600,000 grant
will be used to help the school become an independent entity this fall,
and expand in the future to include high-school grades. The school is
now part of B.F. Brown Middle School.
The grant was secured
by the Center for Collaborative Education, a Roxbury-based non-profit
that has worked with pilot schools.
Dan French, the
center's executive director, said the pilot-schools model has improved
student learning in Boston -- and should in Fitchburg as well.
"When you give
control to the people who are working with students each and every day,
they have a greater investment in their work," French said.
Allowing the school
to control its own schedules and curriculum could mean, for instance,
that the school's teachers may opt to have a longer day.
Chad Radock, president
of the Fitchburg Teachers Association, said the teachers are "very
excited about it."
"A lot of teachers
feel they don't have enough time during the day to work with the kids,"
Radock said.
The school could
potentially stay open an hour longer each day -- until 3:30, Radock
said.
But Radock noted
that the union has yet to negotiate the terms of the agreement.
The potential change
would only affect the Museum Partnership School, he said.
The school is a
collaboration between the city's public school district and the Fitchburg
Art Museum.
The school's teachers
emphasize art in teaching traditional academic subjects.
(c) 2006 Sentinel
& Enterprise. All rights reserved.
