Marblehead welcomes METCO students for new school year

MARBLEHEAD – Marblehead’s METCO program began its 40th year with a new director, Kristina Kyles-Houston, and 72 students at five local schools.Marblehead is the furthest north of all the METCO program towns. METCO transports Boston children to area towns in a voluntary desegregation program.This year Marblehead has four METCO first graders at the Bell School and 10 second graders and three third graders at the Bell and Coffin schools.The Marblehead Village School (Grades 4-6) has 12 students, the Marblehead Veterans Middle School (Grades 7-8) has nine and Marblehead High School has 34.Each of the program’s eight high school seniors has passed the MCAS exam, a requirement for graduation. In addition, five of the students were on the list to play football, four to play tennis, four in music programs and one in the drama program.Kyles-Houston, the former private sector CEO of a company called Houston Academics which helped high school students to find their best college match, said she is hard at work to increase communication with schools, parents and community supporters to synchronize student support services and make the host family program more effective.Host families are Marblehead school families that help METCO students adjust to the community where they spend most of their day, and Kyles-Houston said the program needs more of them.Marblehead High Principal John Ziergiebel said the METCO students have “an immense inspirational impact on our school.””They give back much more than we give to them,” he said when he and Kyles-Houston appeared at a recent School Committee meeting.