Public schools, KIPP at odds over taking up space

LYNN – Lynn Public Schools and the local Knowledge Is Power Program charter school are in conflict over the search for new school space, with Superintendent Dr. Catherine C. Latham asking state educators to shelve KIPP?s plan for a 736-student elementary school.?This is an inappropriate time to allow them to expand. We will be competing for the same space,” Latham said Friday.KIPP?s proposal to open a 120-student kindergarten program in 2016 and add first through fourth grades over the next four years is under review by the state Department of Elementary and Secondary Education. Commissioner Mitchell Chester must initially review and sign off on the proposal before it is forwarded to the state Board of Education in December or January.KIPP Executive Director Caleb Dolan said the charter school hopes to find space to lease for an elementary school, perhaps as soon as in a month and a half, and buy or build permanent space for a school after several years.He said KIPP?s educational philosophy includes the belief that a student can succeed if his or her school career starts and ends in a charter school.?All of us, wherever we sit in the educational landscape, realize getting kids earlier helps develop great habits and gives us more time to work with kids and families,” Dolan said.Charter schools are state-approved and receive tax dollars to pay for programs. KIPP opened in Lynn in 2004 and currently educates 850 students in grades 5-12 in a $22 million school opened in the Highlands in 2011.KIPP uses a springtime lottery to select students, in contrast – Latham pointed out – to Lynn schools? policy of admitting all students. That difference underscores, she said, why the Board of Education should put KIPP?s plan “temporarily on hold” until Lynn Public Schools gets a handle on its space needs.?First preference needs to go to Lynn schools for space and buildings,” she said.Nov. 1 school enrollment numbers list 15,418 students attending Lynn schools – an increase of 470 students (3.1 percent) over 2013 enrollment, Latham said. A new Marshall Middle School is under construction but school officials estimate Lynn needs to replace Pickering Middle School and build two new elementary schools.?We need several new schools over the next decade and there is a limited availability for space,” said Mayor Judith Flanagan Kennedy.In a letter explaining its elementary expansion proposal, KIPP states that “…a K-12 pathway will dramatically improve college graduation and life outcomes.”Kennedy said KIPP “does a great job” educating local youth but said the charter school?s timing is bad when it comes to searching for elementary space even as the school department embarks on a similar search.In a letter to the Department of Elementary and Secondary Education opposing KIPP?s proposal, Latham expanded on Kennedy?s point, noting the local school enrollment crunch will worsen next year with the possibility of “double session” schools looming on the horizon.School department enrollment numbers for September through November indicate 41 KIPP students left the Highlands school to enroll in 11 Lynn public schools. Dolan acknowledged that athletic programs not offered by KIPP are among the reasons students leave KIPP, but said the Lynn school has one of the lowest rates of students leaving among Massachusetts charter schools.?We work really hard to keep kids,” he said.