A former BPS official now living in South Carolina was arraigned in Suffolk Superior Court yesterday on three counts of aggravated rape of a child and charges of posing a child in a state of nudity, possession of child sexual abuse materials and dissemination of materials harmful to a minor, the Suffolk County District Attorney's office reports. Read more.
Across the city this morning, scores of black men lined the entrances to Boston public schools to welcome kids on their first day of school this year, in a program thought up by former state Rep. Carlos Henriquez - after reading about it being done in other cities. Here, kids enter the Dearborn STEM School in Roxbury: Read more.
WBUR reports on the BPS decision to cede much control of the Roxbury STEM school to the operators of the Dudley Street Neighborhood Charter School in an attempt to stave off a state takeover over its standardized-test scores.
One key difference: Unlike other charter schools in the city, admission to the Dearborn will remain based on BPS elementary schools that already feed into the Dearborn and BPS's existing school-choice system.
Parent Imperfect reports on yesterday's meeting over the supposedly temporary educational managers BPS feels compelled to hand the Dearborn off to so it can stave off a state takeover due to poor test scores.
One, he reports, was one of the charter groups that sparked an uproar earlier this year when it seemed like BPS was about to spend $72 million to build a new school that it would then permanently hand over to a charter group. And the other, he says, "is a charter guy from Philly who needs a GPS to get back to South Station." Neither, he says, showed any evidence of experience in running a STEM program.
The Globe reports BPS says it won't file to turn the Dearborn STEM school into an "in district" charter school this year, which means the earliest it can try is 2016.
City Councilor Tito Jackson had some bad news today for Roxbury residents who want to preserve the historic Dearborn school building and move its science-based classes to another location in the neighborhood: State officials told him they would rescind the $36 million grant it awarded Boston for a new school because it's based on a plan calling for tearing down the old building.
City Councilor Tito Jackson (Roxbury) says he will fight efforts by BPS to turn the impending brand-new Dearborn STEM School into a charter school when that would open it up to students across the city, rather than giving Roxbury students preference.
Jackson rejected a request from school officials to lobby state officials to change state charter laws to allow for charters that are not open to kids across the city, not after the council voted to approve seeking and spending money to completely rebuild the school on the assumption it would remain a district school.
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