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This report is created by Ken Ducote and Rose Drill-Peterson on behalf of the Eastbank Collaborative of Charter Schools 

 

The Recovery School District has issued a Request for Applications for an operator to establish a school on the current campus of John McDonogh HS. The RFA was issued effective November 20, 2014. 

 The latest RSD capital projects status report does not give a schedule for the school's reopening after construction. However, given the extent of the necessary repairs, it is probable that the reopening would be in about two years. Designs for the renovation are apparently on hold until the type of program chosen for the campus is known. 

The timeline outlined in the RFA is as follows:
  • Letters of Interest due by December 8, 2014
  • Full Applications due by December 22, 2014
  • Review Committee Interviews between December 23, 2014, and January 16, 2015
  • Selection made by RSD by January 31, 2015
Criteria for selection include the following:
  • Operator performance, experience, and capacity (60 %)
    • Track record of success
    • Likelihood of achieving similar success at McDonogh
  •  Citywide needs (20%)
    • Must not increase high school capacity
    • Must be open enrollment, participate in OneApp, and provide free transportation
  • Community support (20%)
    • Able to demonstrate support from parents and/or community stakeholders 
At its November 12, 2014, Committee of the Whole Meeting at the Landry-Walker HS, the State Board of Elementary and Secondary Education voted 5 to 2 for RSD to issue an RFA for operators for the McDonogh campus using a process similar the one being used by RSD to reassign the Reed HS campus. This item was not actually on the BESE agenda, which listed only a status report on the issue
 
Opponents to the vote, including two BESE members and a group of persons from the community and the McDonogh Steering Committee, urged a delay because Orleans' BESE member Kira Orange Jones was not present to discuss the matter and because OPSB's Ad Hoc Committee was holding open community meetings to discuss the school's future. They also expressed opinions that OPSB, and not RSD, should decide the disposition of the now-vacant campus.
 
RSD staff and BESE members favorable to the vote said that OPSB had only asked for the building back and had not developed a plan for what they proposed to do with the campus. They stated that OPSB could make a proposal in response to the RFA for RSD to consider. 

 

***This email is created by Ken Ducote and Rose Drill-Peterson on behalf of the Eastbank Collaborative of Charter Schools and is not an official correspondence from the Orleans Parish School Board***
 
This service is made possible by support from the Louisiana Association of Public Charter Schools and funding from the
Robert Reily Family Trust and the Smith/Cooper Foundation