Hope United, a group founded by Brown students and born out of a Swearer Center breaks project, is working to preserve the current schedule and curriculum at Hope High School. This work is in the face of changes proposed by the school district to return Hope to the prior system — when Hope was one of the "worst schools" in the Providence area, said Aaron Regunberg '12, one of the group's founders.
Superintendent Tom Brady is planning to replace the current eight-block schedule instituted in 2005 when, faced with low achievement and safety concerns, Hope chose to reorganize itself into three small schools and change to a block schedule. The school dissolved one of the schools last year due to budget constraints.
Under Brady's plan, which will go into effect this fall, there will be six classes per day, as opposed to the present system where four 90-minute classes meet each day on a rotating cycle.
In a "Save Hope High School" petition addressed to Superintendent Brady, the signatories asserted that the change, "will cut student-teacher advising time, teacher-meeting periods, and the arts and tech programs. These reforms were essential to the increased test scores, decreased drop-out rates and reduced school violence Hope High School has achieved since its turnaround in 2005."
The Providence Journal reported March 26 that while Brady had acknowledged Hope's improvements and successes in a letter to the Rhode Island Board of Regents for Elementary and Secondary Education, he said the school's approach was too expensive.
The 20 to 30 extra teachers required by the current Hope model cost a total of approximately $2.5 million, Brady wrote in the letter, according to the Journal.
During the breaks project in January, a group of Brown students exploring urban education in Providence met with Hope teachers to learn about their model, and to their surprise, heard about the changes and teachers' grievances, Regunberg said.
"Here was a situation where teachers were scared to do anything because they have a lot to lose and we have nothing to lose," Regunberg said. "We were in an ideal situation to help and organize."
"We went right to the Hope students," he said, and Hope United was formed.
With 25 core members, the group has held three meetings thus far and plans to address the School Board in the coming weeks, said Hope High School senior Michael Tillinghast.
The group provides opportunities for Hope students to strategize and devise plans to protest the proposed changes.
The Brown students have been "providing insight into the school board, the meetings, the legalities and everything they know," Tillinghast said.
Right now, getting parents involved and educated is most important, according to Regunberg.
When instituting changes, "the school board is looking at the destructive factors: violence, test scores, dropout rates. All of these things they use to test a school's success," Tillinghast said.
The district has a strong focus on standardization and wants to make every school in the city have the same schedule and curricula, said Regunberg.
While Hope teacher Megan Thoma — who has been notified that her job will no longer exist under the new plan — acknowledged that consistency would enable students to move more easily between schools, she expressed concern that the changes would compromise the school's identity and "allow for less arts integration in the curriculum, which is something we've always prided ourselves on."
While the school's educators have been instrumental in the past years' success, both Regunberg and Tillinghast noted the jobs that will be lost under the reorganization and teachers' hesitancy to work against the superintendent and support Hope United.
However, Thoma said, Hope's teachers "have been extremely vocal up until this point that we don't support the changes." She continued, "It goes against what we initially signed on for."
"It makes it really difficult when your district isn't supporting what you know what is best for your students," Thoma said. "But it is also a financial issue."
Ultimately though, even in the face of challenges, "for the most part, people are very passionate about keeping what we have," said Thoma.
In speaking about Hope United, Regunberg said the goal is to involve all those with a stake in the debate. "We don't want it to be a Brown-led thing, we want it to be a community led thing," he said.
