Maya McFadden file photo
At a Career High class about race and America.
New Haven is hustling to find more white, Asian, and suburban kids for three inter-district magnet schools — or else face a potential fine for having too many students enrolled who are Black, Hispanic, and from the city.
NHPS data
Residency and racial breakdowns for 3 "segregated" city schools in need of integration.
Those three “segregated” schools, as defined by the state, are Metropolitan Business Academy, Betsy Ross Arts Magnet School, and Hill Regional Career High School.
During a special online-only meeting on Wednesday, the Board of Education unanimously voted to apply for a $15 million grant from the federal Magnet School Assistance Program (MSAP) to assist efforts to diversify those three schools.
The three schools do not currently comply with one or both of two state “desegregation” requirements for magnet schools, which receive extra money from the state as part of a decades-long effort to build a racially integrated public education system that relies on busing students from town to town.
One such requirement is a “residency standard” that mandates that no more than 75 percent of students at an inter-district magnet school come from a single participating district. Translation: Only three-quarters of students at these schools can live in New Haven.
The other is a “reduced-isolation setting” that requires that no fewer than a combined 25 percent of a magnet school’s students be white or Asian, and not Black or Hispanic.
During the pandemic, the state didn’t enforce these requirements, meaning that New Haven schools weren’t financially punished for being out of step with these magnet-school “desegregation” rules. Those requirements, and associated penalties, could take effect again next school year. However, that means New Haven could be on the financial hook — for a dollar amount the district does not yet know — if it doesn’t find a way to attract more white, Asian, and suburban students to these three schools.
New Haven Public Schools (NHPS) Supervisor of Magnet Grant Programs Michele Bonanno presented the board with data on Wednesday about how far out of compliance each of the three schools are, as well as a five-year plan the district has created to address the issue.
As of Oct. 1, 2023, student enrollment data collected by the state showed the following:
• At Betsy Ross, only 12 percent of students are not Black or Hispanic, well below the state’s 25 percent minimum; that school also includes 70 percent of students who are from New Haven, which is in line with the state’s 75 percent maximum;
• At Career, 11.1 percent of students are not Black or Hispanic, and 75.4 percent are from New Haven;
• At Metro, 13.3 percent of students are not Black or Hispanic, and 75 percent are from New Haven.
Click here to view the presentation and here to read the approved resolution. Last Wednesday’s vote followed an April 22 approval by the school board to pay $75,000 to a consulting group called American Education Solutions to help plan, write, review, edit and revise a drafted MSAP federal grant proposal.
Bonanno said NHPS has received over $100 million of magnet school assistance funding over the past 20 years from the U.S Department of Education for its 15 inter-district magnet schools. Those funds have gone in part to help create new magnet schools in the city, she said.
The $15 million grant application at the center of Wednesday’s meeting is designed to support these three New Haven magnet schools that currently do not meet the state’s residency and/or “reduced-isolation” rules.
To compete for the MSAP pot of funding, NHPS had to create a plan for how it would work to recruit more suburban students. This plan also had to be submitted to the state education commissioner, whose department requires a Corrective Action Plan (CAP) to be established by districts that are out of compliance with residency and racial-integration rules. Such a plan is required before the state releases all relevant funding to inter-district magnet schools.
The plan presented by Bonanno Wednesday included the revising of each of the three school’s themes to offer more rigorous programming and offer distinct career pathways through new or expanded academies.
NHPS
The plan to increase suburban student enrollment is primarily focused on working with committed partners who have already provided the district with letters of support to establish career pathways at the three schools.
The plan proposes splitting Betsy Ross into two career academies: one focused on supporting students’ interests in performing arts, visual arts, and communication, another on supporting students’ interests in media design, special effects, and animation.
Under this same plan, Career’s current pathways for students looking to work in the fields of health and science and business technology would remain. They would be expanded, however, to include pathways for nursing and broader health and science offerings that would give students the chance to obtain EMT, CNA, and phlebotomy certifications. The school would also add a forensic science pathway in partnership with the University of New Haven. And it would partner with Southern Connecticut State University to make available up to 30 college credits before graduation through Career’s business and technology pathway.
Meanwhile, Metropolitan Business Academy would be divided into four new academies that would each enroll up to 25 new freshmen each year. Those academies would respectively focus on business and communication; digital media and technology; law, leadership, and public service; and education and leadership. The educators pathway would provide access for students to prepare for the paraprofessionals test.
Additional plans to attract students of different backgrounds, Bonanno said, would include strengthening current recruitment efforts with increased funding and allowing for the proposed career pathways to be offered to all students at the schools.
If the city’s school district is awarded the $15 million federal grant, those funds would be allocated to addressing the residency concerns at the three schools over the next five years.
That amount would cover getting dedicated magnet resource teachers at each school to support the expanded programming, and hiring a central office internship and workforce development advisor to support seniors in getting internships in their career pathway.
The MASP funding also requires the district to send a team from each school to an annual project directors meeting in Washington, D.C Those costs, as well as project-based learning supplies and equipment and contracts with partners like Yale to certify EMT students, are included in the total.
Board of Education member Matt Wilcox asked how school staff were included in the grant planning process. Bonanno said as soon as the district learned of the funding opportunity, she and Supervisor of College & Career Pathways Dina Natalino began meeting with leadership teams at the schools starting in February. This allowed for the team to work with school leadership to learn about what each school imagines for its pathway themes and expressed interest in specific partners.
When discussing the reduced isolation requirements, Bonanno also informed the board that “the New Haven delegation worked very hard a few years back to waive the financial fine that comes to districts when we are out of compliance.”
The state therefore waived the 75-percent-maximum residency requirement, and associated fines, each school year during the pandemic.
“Currently we could be under the circumstances that if we don’t do something at these schools, we could face financial penalty if the residency standard is not met,” she said.
NHPS spokesperson Justin Harmon said potential future penalty costs would be determined based on the district’s upcoming fall enrollment as of October 1, 2024.
According to Harmon, the guidance provided to the district from the Connecticut State Department of Education (CSDE) stated that the state waived the residency requirement each year during Covid, including for this current 2023 – 2024 school year. “There could be a point when this waiver will not be in place,” Harmon wrote. “CSDE will meet in the next few weeks to discuss the potential waiver for SY 2024 – 25. This could change for SY [School Year] 2024 – 25.”
