NJ Education Report

Assemblyman Reed Gusciora (D-Mercer/Hunterdon) is making headlines with his comment that “I know if Gov. Christie took 10 minutes out of his schedule to walk the halls of Trenton Central High School he would shut it down in a heartbeat.”

 In an editorial in the Trenton Times he writes,

When visiting Trenton Central High School (TCHS), I found mold-infested walls, crumbling ceilings and warped classroom floors. The roof leaks so badly that garbage pails are set up to collect rainwater. The water triggers fire alarms through the faulty electrical systems, which send students and staff to stand out in the rain. In the basement cafeteria, the ventilation system cannot be turned on due to concerns about asbestos. The main office must be sectioned off due to crumbling ceilings and walls. Most recently, the auditorium was closed after structural defects were found, barring student assemblies, concerts and plays for the near future. The school is not equipped to provide a 21st-century learning environment.

Gusciora’s ire is appropriately aimed at the School Development Authority, which is supposed to fund school building maintenance in Abbott districts which lack a tax base to support improvements through local referenda. Three years ago Marc Larkins, the CEO of the SDA, toured Trenton Central High and agreed with the urgency to make repairs. He told students and teachers,  “You need [the repairs]. There’s no question about that. The only question is, where does the money come from?” (The SDA’s budget is about $2 billion.)

There is another possibility for providing an escape hatch for the kids stuck in Trenton Central, where, according to the DOE’s most recent data, 65% of 11th and 12th graders fail the high school proficiency test in math and the graduation rate is 59%.   Trenton is one of the three districts in the state authorized to permit charter operators to open up to four new schools in order to provide options for students and families under the auspices of the Urban Hope Act. (The other two cities are Camden, which has moved forward with this plan, and Newark, which already hosts some of the state’s highest-achieving alternative charter schools.)

The process for proceeding with the Urban Hope Act requires a competent mayor. No luck there. Trenton  Mayor Tony Mack is under indictment on six counts of federal corruption charges.The city, encircled by high-achieving school districts, as Gusciora points out,is besieged by violence: 160 shooting victims just this year.

Yet the 2012 Urban Hope Act offers an escape hatch for Trenton’s high school kids. Gusciora voted for it, as did most of the Statehouse. Maybe that’s his point.