Southwestern High School won?t be going anywhere next year.
The Baltimore City Public School Board of Commissioner approved a proposal offered last night by board chairman Brian Morris to keep Southwestern No. 412 and Augusta Fells Savage Institute of Visual Arts at the four-high-school complex at 200 Font Hill Ave.
Southwestern, with just 443 students enrolled this fall, is slated to be closed for good in two years, and Augusta Fells Savage had been scheduled to move into the same building with Lafayette Elementary and Calverton Middle schools. Parents from the K-8 schools vehemently opposed moving the high school students in with the primary school-age children.
“That?s been a concern for some time and prompted the proposal presented,” said Vanessa Pyatt, a Baltimore City schools spokeswoman.
Several parents Tuesday night at the board meeting on North Avenue said they feared that moving the high schools into elementary and middle school buildings could bring gang conflicts from different neighborhoods into their schools.
Two other small high schools at the Southwestern complex, the Renaissance Academy and the Vivian T. Thomas Medical Arts Academy, will move to the Francis M. Woods Alternative High School next year.
Dr. Samuel L. Banks High School is scheduled to be moved next year to Thurgood Marshall middle and high school complex, and parents there also expressed concerns of introducing older students into a population with younger children.
The failure of the school system to close the Southwestern complex completely next fall could jeopardize state education funds tied to reducing unnecessary building space, but city school officials said they believe that won?t be the case.
The city Board of School Commissioners recommended in February the closure of six school buildings by next fall and as part of a comprehensive plan to upgrade the physical plant and academic programs in all of the district?s 171 buildings.
rcassie@baltimoreexaminer
