To the editor:
There is no one-size-fits-all model in public education. We believe this is particularly important for somewhere as vibrant and diverse as the City of Lynn, where children and families are fortunate to have various public education options available to them. From the traditional district schools, to KIPP Academy Lynn (a charter public school, open to all students), to Lynn Vocational Technical Institute, families have the ability to decide what they believe is the right public education option for their child. We take our responsibility as one of those options very seriously at KIPP Academy Lynn, and we are eager to provide a high-quality public education to more of the children and families in our community who are interested in our program.
KIPP Academy has been a part of the Lynn community since 2004, beginning as a 5th-8th grade campus and expanding later to include 9th-12th grades before becoming a fully realized K-12 district in 2019. Across those 20 years, we have considered it an honor to work alongside and in partnership with Lynn Public Schools to educate the children of Lynn: 95% of KIPP Academy Lynn students reside in Lynn; 88% identify as children of color; 31% of students who joined our school this year are multilingual learners; and 67% report that English is not the primary language spoken at home. Our children are the children of Lynn, and we are privileged to be considered an integral part of the Lynn public education system.
Families who decide that KIPP Academy Lynn is the best public education option for them, enroll their children through an unbiased, public lottery. This is the same process utilized by every charter public school in Massachusetts. Each charter public school’s enrollment is capped at a set number of students by the state. Enrollment cannot exceed that number, even if there are more children and families eager to attend the school. KIPP Academy Lynn consistently enrolls the maximum number of students allowable under our current charter. In 2024-2025, KIPP Academy Lynn received 2,024 student applications. Of those, it was able to accept 191 – or less than one in every 10 hopeful students. The current waitlist sits at nearly 1,700 students, with some families having waited as long as seven years for the opportunity for their child to attend our school. This reality played a large part in our decision to apply to expand our enrollment capacity, as we believe the students and families of Lynn deserve access to every opportunity that is aligned with their interests and desires for their children.
The reasons families enroll their students in KIPP Academy Lynn are many. Families have cited the success of our postsecondary supports, which provide KIPP Lynn graduates with direct support through their first two years post-graduation. This has helped contribute to KIPP alumni graduating college at rates three times their peers across the country. Others have said they value KIPP’s commitment to family partnership. We believe deeply in co-authorship – working side-by-side with families to support and plan for each student’s school experience – and we use that to inform everything we do. Many more families say it is the identity-affirming environment and the way in which students are seen, loved, and heard at KIPP Lynn that makes it the right school for them. Throughout their K-12 experience, we work to ensure KIPP Lynn families experience all of the above and more.
For all of these reasons, we made the decision to apply to the Board of Elementary and Secondary Education to amend our charter in order to allow more students the opportunity to attend our school through a 7-year staged expansion, with the goal of being fully enrolled by 2032-2033. We did so with the support of our families and staff, and after conversations with community partners and leaders. We did not make this decision lightly, and we will not treat our responsibility lightly if we are afforded the opportunity to expand.
We know there is no more important decision for a family than where their child – their most precious gift – learns and grows. KIPP Academy is not the only option, but has been an important option for thousands of families in Lynn for two decades. We look forward to continuing to be a part of that decision for even more Lynn students and families in the years ahead.
Signed,
Rhonda “Nikki” Barnes, Executive Director of KIPP Massachusetts; and Stephanie Pierre-Louis, KIPP Massachusetts Board Chair.
