Scrambling to prepare for an influx of thousands of students returning this fall to New Orleans, the Recovery School District has inked agreements to use portable buildings at an old school site in the Lower 9th Ward and use a commercial building as a "welcome school" for late-enrolling students. State Superintendent of Education Paul Pastorek says heavy rains in recent days are causing delays, and he is anxious that contractors won't have time to finish work on all of the portable school buildings needed.
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EARLIER: Two firms have been selected to craft a master plan that will govern the rebuilding of public schools in New Orleans. Concordia, an architecture and planning firm based in New Orleans, and Parsons Corp., a construction management and planning firm based in Pasadena, Calif., will work together to develop a blueprint for school renovation and construction.
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A new report casts an optimistic light on the direction of public education in New Orleans, providing that leaders chart a clear course for improvement, strengthen the state-run Recovery School District, and lure and retain talented educators. Three areas have emerged as key building blocks: ensuring that parents can exercise school choice, offering schools greater control and accountability, and providing professional training to educators.
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Citing scaled-back enrollment projections and intensified work at New Orleans school facilities, Louisiana Superintendent of Education Paul Pastorek says the Recovery School District should have enough space for students at the start of the 2007-08 school year. A new analysis indicates public schools will see 6,000 to 7,000 new students this fall, about half the 13,000 previously projected. That would put total enrollment by August at roughly 33,000 students in the entire public school system; most of the new students are expected to enroll in Recovery District schools. Pastorek believes the system can provide enough classroom space through a combination of renovated buildings and modular campuses.
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As officials in charge of the Recovery School District in New Orleans struggle to open buildings for up to 13,000 new students this fall, vandals who continue to plunder copper tubing and wire from abandoned schools are delaying renovations and raising their cost. Louisiana Superintendent of Education Paul Pastorek has sent letters to police and prosecutors asking them to "vigorously pursue the prosecution of any individual arrested for vandalism and/or theft of school properties."
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Some of the 11 Recovery District schools undergoing renovation in New Orleans may not be ready for the fall semester, and officials can't guarantee that any temporary buildings envisioned for nine other campuses will be finished in time. Louisiana Superintendent of Education Paul Pastorek and his team, including several members of the Louisiana National Guard, are scrambling to find ways to provide classroom space for thousands of students expected to enroll in the fall. Most of the nearly 13,000 new students expected in New Orleans are expected to seek placement in the Recovery District. But the system can count on having enough classroom space for only about 7,000 new students, according to state estimates. That gap has spurred a flurry of emergency activity, including the hiring of a real estate agent who has identified at least seven commercial buildings across the city and a gutted church in eastern New Orleans that could be retrofitted for makeshift classrooms. State officials also may use large parking areas at some of the locations for temporary school buildings.
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New Orleans Recovery School District officials say up to 27 new schools will open by fall. About half a dozen of the schools will be ready before the current school year ends in an effort to keep up with a steady stream of students returning to the city. Those additional campuses, assuming all of them open on time, would increase capacity in the system to about 43,000 by September. Before Hurricane Katrina struck in 2005, the system had about 56,000 students.
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ALSO: In what New Orleans public school officials are describing as a major breakthrough in recovery coordination, the city's Office of Recovery Director Edward Blakely has pledged to offer city properties for new schools and to work cooperatively on a long-range plan. Blakely has met with New Orleans Recovery School District Superintendent Robin Jarvis, representatives of the Orleans Parish School District and Alvarez & Marsal, the recovery consultant to the two school systems.
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