To the editor:
The leading problems facing Lawrence's K-6 schools are:
- Overcrowded schools on the growing periphery.
- A budget crunch for operating expenses (but not capital investment), imposed by state funding cuts and levy limits.
- Adverse impacts of school closing on central city neighborhoods.
- Underperformance of some students in central city schools.
In response, the Lawrence School Board plans to close several central-city schools. Their stated rationale is very strange.
The board can't say closing schools will generate funds for building schools on the periphery (because operating funds are separate from capital funds). The board can't say closing schools will much reduce operating expenses (it might even increase them). The board certainly can't say closing schools will have benign impacts on central-city neighborhoods.
The board's only clear reason for closing schools is to improve the performance of central city students. These students will be bused to newer, larger, "more equal" schools with better facilities. That may improve learning, or so they were advised by their consultants " who happen to specialize in building schools.
Studies by educators who aren't architects tend to show disadvantaged students are best served by small schools and nearby schools. Students are not likely to be helped by busing them to larger and more distant schools, no matter how beautiful the new facilities. Moreover, people who actually use central city schools support preservation, even if Lawrence can't afford to make them "equal."
David Burress,
Lawrence
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