ST. LOUIS 鈥 Two kindergartners snipped a green ribbon Friday, marking the start of their academic careers and a unique partnership between St. Louis Public Schools and the KIPP charter school organization.
The kindergartners, Jayden Brooks and Ayden Abu, will attend KIPP Victory Academy when it opens next month in the city鈥檚 West End. KIPP Victory will be the second school in St. Louis to be operated by the high-performing charter school organization, the Knowledge Is Power Program.
The focus of KIPP is preparing children to finish college. Students have longer days and school years. They are overwhelmingly from low-income and minority families. Yet they are expected to perform at the same levels as peers in more affluent schools. They often demonstrate multiple years of academic growth over nine months.
鈥淲ith patience and with hard work, we can do many more great things for children,鈥 said Kelly Garrett, executive director of KIPP St. Louis.
People are also reading…
Parents outside the school said they were looking for this kind of school 鈥 one that requires students to work hard and parents to be involved.
鈥淭his was the seventh school we looked at,鈥 said Ruth Gary with her kindergarten-aged son, Jeffery. 鈥淎ll the others didn鈥檛 fit.鈥
Gary was among 100 parents, teachers and elected officials attending the ceremony Friday.
KIPP organizers have long expressed their intent to create a cluster of schools in St. Louis, where nearly 19,000 children lack access to a quality education, according to a recent study.
In 2009, KIPP opened the high-performing KIPP Inspire middle school in Fox Park. On Aug. 7, KIPP Victory will open with 200 kindergartners and first-graders. Plans call for adding one grade level each year through fourth grade. In 2015, a middle school will take root inside the same building, beginning with fifth grade. The non-profit also plans to open a second elementary school in the south side of the city that fall, though a location has not been determined.
The school is opening inside the district-owned Mitchell School, 955 Arcade Avenue, that closed in 2008 and quickly became an eyesore with graffiti, broken glass and water damage.
When students enter next month, they will see gleaming white tile floors, freshly painted walls and colorful college banners.
鈥淲hen they show up it is our responsibility to make sure they have the best. The best of everything,鈥 said Tiara Abu, school leader.
Students will come from every ZIP code in the city. But the greatest concentration will be from the streets surrounding the school, Abu said, just north of Delmar Boulevard and near Goodfellow Boulevard.
Missouri Treasurer Clint Zweifel told the crowd that nothing transforms lives like a quality education. He announced that all 200 students at Victory would be getting a Missouri college savings account with $50 already deposited. The donation comes from Maxine Clark, founder of Build-A-Bear Workshop, and her husband, Bob Fox, the founder of NewSpace Inc. and of Casa de Salud.
鈥淲e know that the mere presence of these college savings accounts are going to positively impact a child鈥檚 decision to go to college,鈥 Zweifel said.
Mayor Francis Slay and U.S. Sen. Claire McCaskill applauded the collaboration that led to KIPP Victory.
Last summer, KIPP鈥檚 Garrett and St. Louis schools Superintendent Kelvin Adams announced they鈥檇 forged a partnership, indicating a thaw between the district and charter schools.
The agreement gives KIPP free access to the Mitchell building, and possibly other vacant buildings for future schools. In return, all attendance, enrollment and test score data for KIPP Victory will be reflected in the data of the district, potentially strengthening its struggling performance. To continue using the buildings, KIPP schools would need to meet certain performance standards.
KIPP will continue to operate autonomously of the school system, as all tuition-free public charter schools do. Washington University is the sponsor.
鈥淔or many years there was St. Louis Public Schools. For many years there were the charter public schools,鈥 said Rick Sullivan, president of the governing board that oversees the school district. 鈥淲hat we鈥檝e done is create this: a charter school that鈥檚 a part of, and a partner with, St. Louis Public Schools. I hope this is the first of many, not just with KIPP, but with other high-quality charter schools.鈥
Last month, Adams said a similar partnership was in the works.