Bruce Monroe at Parkview: A Story of Promises Unfulfilled

By Liane Scott, on December 9th, 2011

In 2010, during Michelle Rhee’s tenure as DCPS school chancellor, the District government promised the parents, students and staff of Bruce Monroe Elementary School as well as the surrounding community that if they tore the building down they would rebuild the school on the same spot. Long story short, the building is down but the new one hasn’t been built. All those Bruce Monroe stakeholders are still wondering what’s up? After all, when you say you’re gonna do a thing, integrity demands that you make your best effort.

Despite the ethical challenges facing our elected officials, parents continue to attend and testify at public hearings regarding the school. The latest hearing in which Bruce Monroe was mentioned was in March of 2011. Although Grassroots Media Project radio producer Rachel Estabrook put this audio segment together way back then, I’m just now getting around to posting it. (My apologies. )

Bruce Monroe Follow Up

To join the campaign to rebuild Bruce Monroe contact Daniel del Pielago at (202) 234-9119 ext. 104 or Daniel@empowerdc.org.

In the above audio segment, you will hear a number of parents testify about their continued frustrations over unfulfilled promises and problems with Parkview Elementary, the school their children are now attending. One of those parents is Sequnely Gray, Empower DC’s childcare organizer. She is all too familiar with the Bruce Monroe saga seeing as how three of her children attended Bruce Monroe before it was demolished. I asked her to chronicle a brief history of the organizing efforts of the Parents and Friends of Bruce Monroe. Her response, which I think is an inspiring example of community leadeship in the face of a city hall that , follows:

 

For the past ten years the friends, teachers, parents and staff of Bruce Monroe have fought continuously to insure that our children receive a quality education as well as a beautiful, safe and healthy environment for them to succeed in. In 2008, we were informed by the Washington Post that Bruce Monroe elementary school would be closed for good.

At that moment parents, staff and teachers rallied together with the help of Teaching for Change to advocate for our children’s school. We advocated for closed classrooms and new windows. The parents, staff and community members got together and reached out to some businesses in our community. As a result of our efforts, we received a generous donation of $1 million dollars from Target to build a 21st century, state of the art library and the whole east side of the school remodeled, including new walls and new windows.

Several months later we meet with Ward 1 councilmember Jim Graham, Mayor Adrian Fenty, and newly appointed DC Public Schools Chancellor Michelle Rhee. They each stated that we didn’t need to beg and plead for a new facility for our children because this is what they should have and the only way to get it was to relocate to Parkview Elementary School on Warder Street NW. They promised that a new Bruce Monroe Elementary School would be built by the fall of 2011 under a public/private partnership. The parents were excited to find out that the school would not be closed. We rallied once again, knocking on doors and passing out flyers to make sure the community knew that [even though the old Bruce Monroe would be demolished a new state-of-the-art Bruce Monroe was still going to be built and opened] was still going to be opened.

For the 2008/2009 school year, we relocated to Parkview Elementary on Warder Street NW. The conditions of that building were very poor; poorer than they were at Bruce Monroe. In the summer of 2009, the parents, community members and the staff formed a SIT team to work in partnership with DCPS to develop plans for the rebuild of Bruce Monroe. We meet 2 or 3 times but after that we heard nothing from the city officials. We tried to contact and schedule meetings with Mayor Fenty and Michelle Rhee but we got no response.

While trying to figure out who to talk to next about the rebuild of the school, we decided that we needed help advocating for this property that had been stolen from us and to inform the community of what DC Government was doing behind our backs. With the help of Ms. Dyana Forester, we were connected with Empower DC.

Empower DC held trainings and facilitated meetings with the parents, staff and community members to build leadership and to help . . . → Read More: Bruce Monroe at Parkview: A Story of Promises Unfulfilled

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Who Decides the Fate of Bruce Monroe Elementary School?

By Liane Scott, on November 12th, 2010

Have you ever heard the phrase, “if you’re not at the table, you’re on the menu?” The Parents and Friends of Bruce Monroe Elementary School thought they were at the table when former School Chancellor Michelle Rhee and soon to be former Mayor Adrian Fenty promised that the school would be rebuilt by the fall of 2011. They sent their children off to Parkview Elementary School on Warder Street NW, out of the site of hungry developers and the passing traffic that helps keeps crime on Georgia Avenue at bay.

While test scores dropped and rodents infested the cafeteria, the $20.3 million allegedly put aside to help rebuild the school seemingly disappeared. The city did manage to come up with $2 million to construct an interim-use park on the site, so as not to remind the community that they don’t have the school they were promised. The first request for proposals that the city put out didn’t garner any serious takers now that Georgia Avenue doesn’t look like the developers dream that it was before the recession. And the latest RFP requires that developers submit two proposals, one for a school with commercial elements and one for commercial development only. No school included. Our presumptive mayor Vincent Gray has gone from saying that the promise made to the Bruce Monroe parents was a “cruel joke,” to “we can only afford one school,” meaning either Bruce Monroe or Parkview.

On August 10th, when the city planned to present this new RFP to developers, the Parents and Friends of Bruce Monroe Elementary School, were not invited to the table, as is blatantly clear in the video posted above. But being unwilling to be eaten alive, they showed up in force anyway.

Having community members show up at a meeting that was clearly meant for developers only may help to keep the Bruce Monroe site in the hands of the city’s residents. The Parents and Friends of Bruce Monroe Elementary School are scheduled to meet with Mayor Elect Gray, Ward One Councilmember Jim Graham and Council Chair Kwame Brown on Tuesday November 16. At the Ward One Town Hall meeting, Vince Gray expressed his appreciation for the activism of the Bruce Monroe community and claimed to be an activist himself. Next week will tell us whether he’s also willing to give them a meaningful position at the negotiating table.

To get involved in the Campaign to Rebuild Bruce Monroe, contact Empower DC’s education organizer Daniel Del Pialago at Daniel@empowerdc.org.

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Bruce Monroe Parent Confronts City Council

By Liane Scott, on June 18th, 2010
Isi Interviews Bruce Monroe Mom

Isi Obinna Ugorji Interviews parent Sequnely Gray

In Washington, DC, education is an issue that is complicated and controversial. Common lore holds that the public school system has been dysfunctional for decades and the result is the lowest test scores in the nation. Explanations for this are numerous. Some blame parents or “poor” communities; others blame administrators and teachers, but it’s never been true that all of DC’s public schools are bad.

Bruce Monroe Elementary School, when it was located on Georgia Avenue, regularly met its adequate yearly progress goals and has had an active school community organization the Parents and Friends of Bruce Monroe who worked diligently to raise funds for needed renovations to the forty year old school.

In 2008, only a few DC public schools could match Bruce Monroe’s academic achievement or the level of familial and community support that the school enjoyed. Despite this, school chancellor Michelle Rhee closed the school, ostensibly due to low enrollment, and moved the students to a 94-year-old, low-performing school blocks away from the main thoroughfare of Georgia Avenue. Parents, teachers and students have been fighting the decision ever since.

The audio segment below uses audio recorded on the day of the city council’s public hearing regarding the DCPS budget. DC Public school advocates lobbied the council to hold the hearing on a Saturday morning so that school stakeholders, most of whom work during the week, would be able to attend. Dozens of DC residents testified that day, but only three council members showed up–Vincent Gray who presided, David Catania, there in body if not in spirit, and Jim Graham who showed up about two hours late. The mainstream press was completely nonexistent.

Fortunately, Grassroots Media Project Producer Isi Obinna Ugorji was there, interviewing parents, other stakeholders and advocates. Isi, Grassroots Media Project contributor, Adrienne Lynch and I (the project coordinator) sifted through the audio. The result is the following audio segment.

[audio:http://www.grassrootsdc.org/wp-content/uploads/2013/08/DCPS-Budget-Hearing-Bruce-Monroe.mp3]

A decent article that puts Bruce Monroe into the context of other school closings can be found at the following link – http://foreverdc.com/2010/03/23/three-closed-d-c-schools-wont-reopen-soon/

The Grassroots Media Project is always looking for citizen journalists who can cover issues like this, too often ignored or misrepresented by corporate-owned media. If you are interested in joining our team please contact Liane Scott, the project coordinator at liane@grassrootsdc.org.

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