Davidson middle and elementary school students hang out on the Davidson Village Green on a Friday afternoon in March 2011. (Emma Boraks/DavidsonNews.net)
Next Friday, June 10, is the last day of classes for Charlotte Mecklenburg Schools, and the end of an era Davidson IB Middle School on South Street. As the school prepares to shut its doors, families, alumni, students and staff are planning one last “Walk to the Green” on Thursday, June 9. They’ll have a ceremony to remember the school and take note of its closing.
While CMS is closing the Davidson IB building, its International Baccalaureate Middle Years program is moving to become a school-within-a-school at J.M. Alexander Middle School, on N.C. 115 in Huntersville. Davidson IB Principal Jo Karney will become principal of the combined school.
Dr. Karney already has become a regular presence at Alexander, and families from both schools have begun building community with joint activities, such as the April work day to spruce up Alexander’s campus. [See DavidsonNews.net, “Davidson IB and Alexander come together at work day.”]
[For a nice weekend article about how the two schools have come together, see writer Tommy Tomlinson’s “Starting with a clean slate, together” in the May 28, 2011, Charlotte Observer.]
SCHOOL UP FOR LEASE
Davidson IB Middle School on South Street. (David Boraks/DavidsonNews.net)
The Davidson IB building, which once housed Davidson Elementary School, is among 11 schools CMS is putting up for lease at the end of this school year.
As DavidsonNews.net reported last week, the Town of Davidson and two other bidders are seeking CMS approval to lease the building once it closes.
The town would house its Parks & Recreation department and programs on the 251 South St. site, if it’s selected. Town officials also are talking to other potential partners, including Davidson United Methodist Church. Besides the town, the two other bidders are: Lake Norman Christian School, and a group called The Guardian Alliance.
WALK TO THE GREEN
Davidson IB Middle School students hang out on the Village Green on a Friday in March. (Emma Boraks/DavidsonNews.net)
One of the IB School’s traditions in recent years has been for students to spend Friday afternoons on and around the Davidson Village Green, only a couple of blocks’ walk from the school. The students also snack at the Soda Shop and Summit Coffee, shop at the Village Store and Main Street Books, and patronize the CVS.
Friday afternoons downtown could be different after the school closes, and some members of the school community want to mark the end of the tradition next week week.
The June 9 “Walk to the Green” will begin at 2 p.m. Alumni, friends, and families of the school are invited to join students and staff at the picnic tables behind the school at 1:45 p.m., for the 2 p.m. walk. Bring a note card with a memory, dedication, or poem to leave in the Memory Box. After a brief ceremony, the group will return to the school Media Center for lemonade and cookies.
GRADUATION
Meanwhile, Davidson IB Middle will send off its final graduating class with a ceremony at the school on Friday, June 10, at 10 a.m. The ceremony includes awards and a reception afterward.
‘Tis the end of an era….
This story links to Tommy Tomlinson’s column about the new-found cooperative spirit between Davidson IB Middle School and Alexander Middle School. The column is heartwarming, and the narrative of racially-anxious suburban parents overcoming their fear of a predominantly Black school makes a good story.
But is it true? Tommy uncritically repeats the argument of school board member Rhonda Lennon, that Davidson IB parents were driven by racial prejudice when they sought to keep the program in Davidson. Before this gets enshrined as history, let’s check the facts.
Davidson IB is much more diverse than the alternative for Davidson and Cornelius families. In 2010, DIB was 45% minority; the home school for these towns, Bailey Middle, was 76% white. If Davidson parents were afraid of people of color, wouldn’t they be sending their kids to Bailey? Some of us sent our kids to Davidson IB because it was the most diverse school environment available to us.
Davidson IB also has more geographic diversity than surrounding schools. Only about a fifth of DIB’s students are from Davidson; most of the other 80% come from 23 feeder elementary schools around the county. Children from Davidson were admitted to DIB through a lottery; Davidson kids have never been guaranteed a seat at DIB. And bear in mind: it wasn’t only Davidson residents who argued for keeping the school in Davidson.
Another way to determine whether Davidson IB parents are, in fact, racially motivated in their school choice is to look at where DIB students go for high school. Their options are stark: They can attend Hough High, 77% white, or North Meck, which is 65% minority. If Ms Lennon is right, the DIB eighth graders who live in the north county should be flocking to Hough. How can we explain, then, the fact that nearly all the DIB eighth graders from who live in Davidson will be going to North Meck next year? (That was true for last year’s DIB eighth graders, too.)
The real reason DIB parents and students are sorry to leave Davidson is that there is something magical about attending middle school in a real town. The appeal of suburban subdivisions is, frankly, lost on people who are old enough to want a little independence but too young to drive. A small town like Davidson fits them just right.
That’s why the Friday afternoons on the village green Tomlinson wrote about were so wonderful. The children loved being together in a place that managed to be safe without adults hovering everywhere. What parent wouldn’t want her middle school child to have access to a soda shop, a hot dog cart, an ice cream parlor, a pick-up game and a public library after school?
Our elected officials tell us we can’t afford this for our children. Our school is closing, and our library may close, too. The children who flourished at DIB and on Main Street will be herded into cars and buses and driven to a new school next year.
And that new school will be great. The teachers at Alexander will be warm and hardworking, the principal will be amazing, the kids will be exactly who they ought to be. But that school will not be in a town that can give children on the cusp of adolescence a taste of freedom.
That’s what we’re losing by closing Davidson IB – not the racially-segregated suburban utopia Rhonda Lennon wants you to imagine, but place where a diverse community of middle school kids could thrive and grow together, embraced within a town that knew and cared for them. That’s the real story, and I hope it won’t be forgotten.