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Riverview Gardens superintendent tries to woo students still in limbo

This article first appeared in the St. Louis Beacon: Even though classes start Monday for the Riverview Gardens School District, as of Friday morning Micah Pope hadn’t gotten in to any of the districts where she wanted to transfer. So her mother planned to keep the eighth-grader home rather than have her go back to a school she thinks is inadequate.

The problem, Patrice Bryant says, is transportation. Even though Micah was accepted at Ferguson-Florissant, Bryant says she has no way to get her daughter there. The two districts where Riverview Gardens is providing transportation – Mehlville and Kirkwood – had said they have more applications than they have space available, and Micah was shut out of the lotteries there.

Still, Bryant said Friday morning, she planned to keep Micah home rather than have her start back to Riverview Gardens because she has little faith that anything has changed despite promises of improvements and a new spirits at the unaccredited districts.

“They’ve been saying that ever since they became unaccredited,” Bryant said as she mingled with a dozen or so others at a rally called by the Children’s Education Alliance of Missouri.

She said that while her daughter has made some progress in her education, “I taught her at home. For the most part, I feel like the teachers have just been interested in passing students along.”

Later in the day, though, Bryant found out that Micah had been accepted into Mehlville. So her personal situation had been solved, but the general problem remained of longtime Riverview Gardens students who didn't want to return. 

That kind of attitude clearly frustrates Scott Spurgeon, who took over as superintendent in Riverview Gardens on July 1. A few weeks earlier, the Missouri Supreme Court unanimously upheld the law that allows students living in unaccredited districts to transfer to accredited ones, so one of Spurgeon’s first tasks was trying to persuade families to give the district another chance.

In an interview at the district’s headquarters Friday morning, as he prepared for a convocation designed to build enthusiasm for the new school year, Spurgeon said he understands that parents have only one chance to give their kids a good education.

But, he said, “we’re asking parents to give us the opportunity to change their thoughts and feelings about the Riverview Gardens School District. I really believe there is a new spirit her. More than anything, it’s the message of hope and the belief that we can restore academic honor to all of our schools.”

To those parents like Bryant, who say they have heard such a message before, Spurgeon responded:

“There’s not one thing I can do to change anything in the past. But there are things we can do to change the future, and it starts with hope and the belief we are going to come out of this stronger than ever before.”

A district spokeswoman said that about 100 transfer applications from Riverview Gardens families have been rescinded as the process moved forward.

As far as the financial burden that the transfers will place on the district, Spurgeon said he is doing everything he can to balance the district’s budget while making cuts that do not directly affect student achievement.

“We’re staying as far away from the classroom as possible” while looking for places to reduce spending, he said.

He noted that the district’s big goal is to win back provisional accreditation, starting with the categories that the state will consider with the introduction of a new evaluation system this fall.

Will he be able to achieve that goal in his first year as superintendent?

“Absolutely,” Spurgeon said.

Keeping that pledge would be good news to Eric Bridges, father of a ninth-grade boy who also was shut out of the lotteries to win a transfer slot at Mehlville and Kirkwood. Asked why he doesn’t want his son to go to Riverview Gardens schools, Bridges said: 

“All I know is that I keep hearing horror stories. His mother and I are scared to death to send him to Riverview.

“No matter what you do, you’re stuck. Being an education prisoner of the Riverview Gardens School District is not fun.”

When he learned of the failure to place his son in either Mehlville or Kirkwood, Bridges said he sat down with two lists: One was all the districts that still had space available for ninth-grade transfers. The other was made up of criteria that he considers important for school success, like academic achievement, class size and curriculum.

“Test scores were huge,” Bridges said. “I put a lot of emphasis on that.”

His conclusion was that he would like his son to transfer to Lindbergh. But by the time he reached that answer, spaces there had been filled, Bridges said.

So with classes beginning next week, he said, his son remains in limbo.

“He’s in the system to be transferred,” Bridges said, “but he has no place to transfer. We can’t afford transportation. We have looked over our budget every way till Sunday, and we can’t afford it.” 

How did his son feel about all of this? 

“He was beyond upset,” Bridges said. “He asked what’s the point of doing all of this hard work to learn when it all comes down to random chance. He was inconsolable.”

He has heard Spurgeon’s pleas to Riverview Gardens parents to give the district another chance, but he says he can’t risk his son’s future like that.

“Three years from now,” Bridges said, “after they show some progress, they can say this is the new Riverview Gardens. But he’s not the first person to come in here and say that. He’s a new superintendent, but we still have the same old system.”

The more immediate answer, he said, would be for the district to designate more places where they would pay for students to transfer.

“If they would open up another district or two,” Bridges said, “that would solve all these problems.”

Kate Casas, state director for the Children’s Education Alliance, said that while talks proceed on another possible solution – having Mehlville help find a solution  for Riverview students who need transportation– the threat of possible legal action remains on hold. But she couldn’t say how long that situation might last or precisely what action would make the difference.

“They never promised more spaces,” she said of Mehlville. “They said they wanted to find a solution that was best for all kids.”

She said discussions with lawyers continue, and her organization is talking about the issue with the American Civil Liberties Union of Eastern Missouri, which also has raised the possibility of legal action.

In any case, Casas told the parents at Friday morning’s rally that they need to keep focusing on the goal of getting the best education for their children.

“Thanks for sticking with us and fighting for your kids,” she said. “We’ll all get through this together.”

Dale Singer began his career in professional journalism in 1969 by talking his way into a summer vacation replacement job at the now-defunct United Press International bureau in St. Louis; he later joined UPI full-time in 1972. Eight years later, he moved to the Post-Dispatch, where for the next 28-plus years he was a business reporter and editor, a Metro reporter specializing in education, assistant editor of the Editorial Page for 10 years and finally news editor of the newspaper's website. In September of 2008, he joined the staff of the Beacon, where he reported primarily on education. In addition to practicing journalism, Dale has been an adjunct professor at University College at Washington U. He and his wife live in west St. Louis County with their spoiled Bichon, Teddy. They have two adult daughters, who have followed them into the word business as a communications manager and a website editor, and three grandchildren. Dale reported for St. Louis Public Radio from 2013 to 2016.