Fall River Tansey school parents concerned over school possibly becoming early learning center, possibly changing school choice in the city

Parents are expressing concerns that a city school may be turned into a pre-k center.

At a Thursday Special/Alternative Education and Early Childhood Subcommittee meeting, among the topics discussed was expanding the city’s pre-k program.

One of the potential solutions brought up by the committee was Spencer Borden absorbing Tansey students as the numbers don’t warrant both elementary schools servicing the Highland neighborhood zone. In addition, students attending schools out of their neighborhood zone would need to transfer to a school in their neighborhood to make the numbers work at Spencer Borden.

Another option would be for the city to continue to look for additional space instead of repurposing other facilities.

One of the issues in front of the School Committee is that pre-k can only be on the ground and first floors due to safety regulations, leaving expansion limited at the early learning center on 2501 South Main Street, the former Atlantis Charter School.

Tansey parents are voicing their concern that they don’t want their children to be moved from the school stating it is one of, if not the best, elementary school in the city. They are also sounding an alarm to other parents that the move could remove school choice.

One of those parents is Ashley Rego-Rivera.

“As a member of the Tansey community, we have recently found out that the school committee had a subcommittee meeting to propose Tansey elementary school to close down and for it to become a pre-k-based school only. This is extremely detrimental to not only the staff but to the students at Tansey who have built and created these relationships over the years. They are planning on sending these children to various schools come this September (also all other children who aren’t in their district school). According to the meeting, they stated that parents basically don’t have a say when it comes to the outcome of this proposal or their children’s learning. They are looking at the children as numbers and not taking the well-being of the children into consideration. They are planning to move children who have been at a school for years and moving them to new schools. Instead of taking these children away from these schools, why not create new schools or use this money to fix one of the many schools you have closed down in the past years. Intergrading preschool into these public schools can also help elevate the number of students needing pre-k. Also, childcare centers do have slots open! They do not have staffing. This is another issue.”

Also discussed at Thursday’s meeting was Stone Therapeutic School students being moved to 2501 South Main above the early learning center.

The committee acknowledged that hard decisions are going to have to be made.

The matter is scheduled to be discussed at Monday’s School Committee meeting at 5:30 p.m. in the Durfee High School Auditorium.