An ongoing realignment of city schools will result in another closure as district officials notified staffers at the NorthSTAR program this week that it is shutting down.
NorthSTAR serves students with behavioral struggles, often including those who are trying to complete high school credits.
The decision to eliminate the program at the end of this school year follows a recent announcement that LyncX Academy, a place for students on long-term suspension, will close next Friday.
Both add to a plan to close 11 schools and five buildings beginning this fall. As part of that plan NorthSTAR was to relocate as the Oakman Street building where it currently resides north of downtown is being returned to the City of Rochester.
In an email to school board members, Superintendent Carmine Peluso cited low attendance rates and the cost of maintaining teaching staff as reasons for the closures. Between both programs there are about 40 students and 60 staff members, Peluso wrote on Jan. 9. NorthSTAR is by far the larger of the two.
“Eliminating these programs is, for many of us, looking as if we're taking away something that's necessary,” school board member Camille Simmons said on Wednesday.
“I understand the nuances and the technical pieces, but these are still human lives,” she said. “And I want to know what we're going to do can make them whole.”
The city school district’s website describes NorthSTAR as a therapeutic, mental health educational program designed for high school students with significant social and mental health needs. But the attendance rate was 40%, according to Peluso.
NorthSTAR's currently has 32 students enrolled and 44 staff members with 17.5 certified teachers, according to the district.
"This program is not servicing our students and not maximizing the use of our staff," Peluso wrote to school board members. "The NorthSTAR program will not be represented in the 24-25 budget."
Teachers and staff at NorthSTAR were told of the decision in a meeting with district representatives on Tuesday.
Teachers union representatives were not included in that meeting, Rochester Teachers Assocation President Adam Urbanski said. He said he was informed a week or two ago that NorthSTAR may be closing, but was unaware of that meeting until after the fact. He raised similar concerns as Simmons.
“This all exists within the context of already inadequate number of programs and alternative educational sites for students who need additional services, social emotional services, instructional services, individualized services,” Urbanski said.
As an alternative to LyncX Academy, starting Jan 29, students will pivot to virtual instruction with teachers, home-bound instruction, or night school offerings, Peluso wrote in his email to school board members. He added: “We will continue to use restorative programming to support youth transitioning back to the classroom.”
Simmons said she’s concerned that the proposed changes ultimately won’t benefit students.
“There's been a push for the reduction of suspensions and long-term suspensions that can be harmful, too, and I get that. I support that.” Simmons said. “But I don't want us hiding kids in ISS (in school suspension) rooms under the guise that we're not long-term suspending them.”
As for NorthSTAR students, the superintendent wrote that: “the special education department is working on a better service model for these students.”
The district’s school reconfiguration plan that the school board voted on in October had established that NorthSTAR students would move to the Franklin campus. The district released a statement Wednesday afternoon stating that, "when evaluating where to move the program, it became clear NorthStar was not achieving the outcomes it was designed to achieve."
It was not immediately clear how the district plans to accommodate the affected students starting next school year.
“That's our over-age and under-credited populations and children that just need that extra push and that opportunity to finish getting an education and moving into the next stage of life,” Simmons said about NorthSTAR. “And so being able to be part of that program gives them that foundation that they may not have gotten in the actual school community.”
