Sentinel
& Enterprise
Experts hail Leominster
High’s small schools transformation
By Crystal C. Bozek
Friday, September
16, 2005—LEOMINSTER -- High School principal Dr. William Hart
would agree that with great risk comes great rewards.
Just
two weeks into the school year, educational experts from across the
country are hailing Leominster High School's comprehensive transition
from a 1,900-student school to five small schools -- each holding under
400 students and 25 teachers -- as a future model for others to follow.
"I am very
pleased and proud to tell you we had the smoothest opening we had in
at least the six years I've been principal," Hart said Thursday.
"We want students to feel people know who they are and are very
interested in their future."
Hart, along with
Superintendent of Schools Marilyn Fratturelli, city officials, educators
and students, celebrated the new small schools initiative Thursday afternoon
at the Center for Technical Education's Appleseeds Restaurant.
Many city residents
might have just started hearing about the high school's transformation
last year.
But this change
has actually been five years in the making, starting with research and
growing into a successful freshman academy and a small schools pilot
programs.
The core of the
small schools initiative comes from an even larger, less-publicized
change the high school has undertaken -- deciding to teach around "The
common principles," a Ten Commandments of sorts for education reform.
Some principles
include "less is more"; "depth over coverage"; and
"goals apply to all students."
Education reform
experts offered many encouraging words to Hart and other Leominster
educators.
"I'm confident
this is a school people all over the country will visit," proclaimed
Louis Cohen, executive director of the Coalition of Essential Schools.
The Coalition of
Essential Schools uses the "common principles," and have given
a considerable amount of grant money toward Leominster High School's
transition. The Center for Collaborative Education (CCE) also helped
the high school, working to manage the shift.
"In past decades,
we've allowed just some of our students to do very well. Some is no
longer OK; it's not good enough," CCE executive director Dan French
said, pushing the small schools program.
School Committee
vice-chairwoman Donna DiNinno has seen the high school both big and
small through her children.
She said her daughter,
now a senior in School 4, finds the building has become a warmer and
friendlier place.
"My college-aged
son, while he got a great education here, he was one of the honors students,
so he had access to a host of courses offered," she said. "But
being such a large high school, it didn't always feel personal. ...
So I'm just thrilled to see things come together so smoothly."
Education officials
weren't the only ones praising the new system.
"I was kind
of skeptical at first. I was transferred into the pilot small schools
program," senior Niki DeSimini, 17, said. "But our teachers
knew us better. I enjoyed it. ... Any big changes? School is school."
Seventeen-year-old
Marissa Monteiro, also a senior, said her one worry was being separated
from friends.
"It's not that
we're so isolated you don't see someone from another school," she
said.
Hart said both students
are teachers have been pleasantly surprised by the new system.
"It's great
to see students working together, instead of lined up in rows, reading
textbooks, and being graded on memorizing," he said.
