Robert Poole Middle School no longer exists, but it was dealt a posthumous slap by the Maryland State Board of Education.

Even though it was already closed, it was one of 10 Baltimore schools placed on "probationary status," because it was deemed to be dangerous. Five other schools received a more damaging designation -- "persistently dangerous."

States are required to maintain a list of persistently dangerous schools under the No Child Left Behind Act. Under that law, parents of students attending a persistently dangerous school can demand a transfer to another school.

A persistently dangerous school is defined as one in which 2 percent or more of students have received a suspension of 10 days or have been expelled in the past three years.

Poole was given "probationary status," because it only reached 2 percent in the past two years, said Bill Reinhard, a spokesman for the Maryland State Department of Education.

But for Poole, the designation is moot. The last class finished eighth grade this past spring.

Next year, the school building, located on West 36th Street near Falls Road, will be used only by the Academy of College and Career Exploration, with which Robert Poole shared a building for the past two years. The academy is a magnet high school.

All middle school students will attend Hampden Elementary and Middle School in the fall.

Hampden Elementary, at 3608 Chestnut Ave., was expanded into a middle school to fulfill a state mandate for the city school system to reduce its operating space.

Officials say it's not uncommon for schools that no longer are operating to be named as dangerous schools. Thurgood Marshall Middle School and the Liberal Arts Academy-Walbrook campus, both long closed, were dropped from the list this year.

Allen Hicks, former president of the Hampden Community Council, said there's been a sense in the community that Poole Middle was not doing well and was dangerous.

"From anecdotal information, most of the parents who sent their kids there were concerned (that it was dangerous), and the parents who didn't send their kids there thought it was," Hicks said.

Lisa Meyers, chairman of the Hampden Community Council's education committee, said the community is pleased that Poole Middle is closed.

"Robert Poole is no longer in existence, so this should not be an issue any longer," she said. "Our children are up at Hampden Elementary Middle School and progressing quite well."

---

user comments (1)

user loveteec says...

Amazing. I am in the Robert Poole Middle School Class of '89. I do not write this with a sense of pride, unless I consider it prideful in a demented sense that I "survived" the experience of going to school there for three, long years without going mad or simply dropping out. I experienced a small, personal slice of hell from attending Robert Poole; the student body (chockful of misguided, disrespecful, unrepentant juveniles), the mostly jaded faculty, a school board that turned a blind eye for quite some time and the racial tension made for a very...interesting form of academia. That is, if one can even call it academia. You see, I was one of the "good" children; that is, I was one of the students who actually went to school to learn, to grow, to get an education, and who actually gave a crap about being there. I believe I comprised 15% of the student body. The other 85% weren't concerned with any of these things; they were concerned with raising hell and doing just enough to get by. You would think that 85% would soon be identified and either rehabilitated or removed. For the most part, neither happened. And chaos was eminent in the halls and classrooms daily as a result. I used to blame the faculty. Now, I see they had a very large problem on thier hands that they were ill-equipped to handle. They didn't have enough staff or enough resources to do what most of the parents of the delinquent portion of the student body should have been doing for their children since birth: disciplining them. So at the school, soft punishment was often given to "problem" students not because faculty and administration didn't care, but because they probably knew that ultimately the same children would return and cause the same problems. And frankly, why fail them year-after-year (and have to deal with them year-after-year) when you can pass them, ship them off to high school, and not have to bother with them anymore? I am glad that the State of Maryland finally realized that Robert Poole needed a major overhaul or condemnation. I am just sad that it took the state so long to come to that conclusion, at the expense of a lot of youth who were cheated out of a full, well-rounded education, through no fault of their own. And I also fear for the schools these children will be "pushed out" to. The apple doesn't fall far from the tree and statistically, and I fear the offspring of the original initiators of the problem will simply continue a sad legacy.

Posted 1:17 AM, 01.02.09

• Permalink