Houston: shuttering Houston's only full-time dual language program?

[Francis Hult]

Via lgpolicy...

Summing up a school
Wharton Elementary is a high-performing school with community backing.
Why shutter it?


Copyright 2008 Houston Chronicle

Houston Independent School District officials probably reckoned they
made a thrifty choice when they planned to close William Wharton
Elementary. Because many Wharton students come from neighborhoods
outside its zone, administrators must have assumed that shuttering the
school, consolidating its student body with that of a bigger facility,
and perhaps selling the pricey Montrose real estate was a winning
formula.

They failed to do their homework. A small army of Montrose residents
organized to save the school. The residents have spoken out at public
hearings, met with Superintendent Abelardo Saavedra and launched a
tidy new Web site called www.friendsofwharton.org. In the process, the
coalition revealed the central role a healthy school plays for its
community. Wharton, the Montrose activists argue, is not only an
academic success story. It is a catalyst for political participation,
as neighbors return there year after year to vote. With cozy,
mini-Alamo style architecture, it's one of a handful of HISD
elementary schools considered architecturally significant. And it
hosts an Urban Harvest community garden, a neighborhood playground and
a baseball field, which cost the Neartown Little League more than
$400,000.

Full story:
http://www.chron.com/disp/story.mpl/editorial/5839456.html


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