Atlanta Public Schools

Atlanta Public Schools is a school district based in Atlanta, Georgia, United States. APS is run by the Atlanta Board of Education with superintendent Meria Carstarphen. The system has an active enrollment of 54,956 students, attending a total of 103 school sites: 50 elementary schools (three of which operate on a year-round calendar), 15 middle schools, 21 high schools, 4 single gender academies and 13 charter schools. The school system also supports two alternative schools for middle and/or high school students, two community schools, and an adult learning center. The school system owns the license, but does not operate radio station WABE-FM 90.1 (the National Public Radio affiliate) and Public Broadcasting Service (PBS) Public television station WPBA 30.

Governance

The Atlanta Board of Education establishes and approves the policies that govern the Atlanta Public School system. The Board consists of nine members, representing six geographical districts and three "at-large" districts. One person is elected per district to represent the schools in a given district for a four-year term. Under the provisions of the new Board charter, approved by the Georgia Legislature in 2003, Board members elect a new chairman and vice chairman every two years. The day-to-day administration of the school district is the responsibility of the Superintendent, who is appointed by the Board.

School Board members

The School Board consists of:

• District 1 - Leslie Grant
• District 2 - Byron Amos
• District 3 - Matt Westmoreland
• District 4 - Nancy Meister (Vice-Chair)
• District 5 - Steven Lee
• District 6 - Eshe’ Collins
• Seat 7 - Courtney English (Chair)
• Seat 8 - Cynthia Briscoe Brown
• Seat 9 - Jason Esteves

APS Leadership

2014-2015 School Year

• Meria Carstarphen, Ed.D., Superintendent
• Steve Smith, Associate Superintendent
• Karen Waldon, Deputy Superintendent for Curriculum and Instruction
• Chuck Burbridge, Chief Financial Officer
• Sharron Pitts, General Counsel (Interim)
• Larry Hoskins, Deputy Superintendent for Operations
• Alexis Kirijan, Ed.D., Chief Strategy Officer
• Tony Hunter, Chief Information Officer
• Ron Price, Chief Human Resources Officer

Schools

High schools

• The New Schools at Carver
  • Early College
  • School of the Arts
  • School of Health Sciences & Research
  • School of Technology
• Frederick Douglass High School
• Henry W. Grady High School
• Benjamin E. Mays High School
• BEST Academy High School
• Coretta Scott King Young Women's Leadership Academy High School
• North Atlanta High School
• South Atlanta High School
• Maynard H. Jackson High School
• Daniel McLaughlin Therrell High School
• Booker T. Washington High School

Middle schools

• BEST Academy Middle School
• Joseph Emerson Brown Middle School
• Ralph Johnson Bunche Middle School
• Sammye E. Coan Middle School
• Charles Lincoln Harper-Samuel Howard Archer Middle School
• Samuel Martin Inman Middle School
• John Fitzgerald Kennedy Middle School
• Martin Luther King Jr. Middle School
• Coretta Scott King Young Women's Leadership Academy Middle School
• Crawford Williamson Long Middle School
• Walter Leonard Parks Middle School
• Luther Judson Price Middle School
• Willis Sutton Middle School
• Sylvan Hills Middle School
• Jean Childs Young Middle School

Elementary schools

• Adamsville Elementary School
• Beecher Hills Elementary School
• Benteen Elementary School
• Bethune Elementary School
• Bolton Academy
• Boyd Elementary School
• Brandon Elementary School
• Burgess/Peterson Elementary School
• Cascade Elementary School
• Centennial Place Elementary School
• Cleveland Avenue Elementary School
• Connally Elementary School
• Continental Colony Elementary School
• Deerwood Academy
• Dobbs Elementary School
• Dunbar Elementary School
• Fain Elementary School
• Fickett Elementary School
• Finch Elementary School
• Garden Hills Elementary School
• Gideons Elementary School
• Grove Park Intermediate Elementary School
• Heritage Academy
• Hope-Hill Elementary School
• Humphries Elementary School
• Hutchinson Elementary School
• Jackson Elementary School
• Kimberly Elementary School
• M. Agnes Jones Elementary School
• Mary Lin Elementary School
• Miles Elementary School
• Morningside Elementary School
• Oglethorpe Elementary School
• Parkside Elementary School
• Perkerson Elementary School
• Peyton Forest Elementary School
• Rivers Elementary School
• Scott Elementary School
• Slater Elementary School
• Sarah Smith Elementary School
• Springdale Park Elementary School
• D.H. Stanton Elementary School
• F.L. Stanton Elementary School
• Thomasville Heights Elementary School
• Fred A. Toomer Elementary School
• Towns Elementary School
• Usher Elementary School
• Venetian Hills Elementary School
• West Manor Elementary School
• Whitefoord Elementary School
• Woodson Primary Elementary School

Non-traditional schools

• APS/Community Education Partnership (CEP) School
• Alonzo A. Crim Open Campus High School [1]
• West End Academy

Single gender academies

• The B.E.S.T. Academy at Benjamin S. Carson (Business, Engineering, Science, and Technology)
• The Coretta Scott King Young Women's Leadership Academy

Evening school programs

• Adult Literacy Program

Charter schools

• Atlanta Neighborhood Charter School
• Charles R. Drew Charter School
• KIPP West Atlanta Young Scholars Academy
• University Community Academy, an Atlanta Charter School, Inc.
• Imagine Wesley International Academy
• The Kindezi School

Former schools

High schools

• North Fulton High School 1920-1991
• Northside High School 1950-1991
• Henry McNeal Turner High School 1947-1989
• David T. Howard High School 1945 - 1976
• Charles Lincoln Harper High School 1963-1995
• Daniel O'Keefe High School 1947-1973
• Hoke Smith High School 1947-1985
• Franklin D. Roosevelt High School 1947-1985
• Harper-Archer High School 1995-2002
• Samuel Howard Archer High School 1950-1995
• Southwest High School 1950-1981
• Joseph Emerson Brown High School 1947-1992
• Luther Judson Price High School 1954-1987
• Boys High School 1872-1947
• Girls High School 1872-1947
• Technical "Tech" High School 1909-1947
• Tech High Charter School 2004-2012
• West Fulton High School 1947-1992
• Fulton High School 1915-1994
• Walter F. George High School 1959-1995
• William F. Dykes High School 1959-1973
• William A. Bass High School 1948-1987
• Commercial High School 1888-1947
• Sylvan Hills High School 1949-1987
• East Atlanta High School 1959-1988

Middle schools

• Austin T. Walden Middle School
• Marshall Middle School
• Henry McNeal Turner Middle School 1989-2010
• Daniel O'keefe Middle School 1973-1983
• West Fulton Middle School 1992-2004
• Usher Middle School
• Walter Leonard Parks Middle School
• John Fitzgerald Kennedy Middle School
• Sammye E. Coan Middle School

Elementary schools

• Adair Park Elementary School
• Anderson Park Elementary School
• Arkwright Elementary School
• Ben Hill Elementary School
• Blalock Elementary School
• Blair Village Elementary School
• Burgess Elementary School
• John Carey Elementary School
• Capitol View Elementary School
• Center Hill Elementary School
• Chatthoochee Elementary School

. Clark Howell Elementary School

• Collier Heights Elementary School
• Cook Elementary School
• D.F. McClatchey Elementary School
• East Lake Elementary School
• Emma Clarissa Clement Elementary School
• English Avenue Elementary School
• Fountain Elementary School
• Johnathan M Goldsmith Elementary School
• Thomas Jefferson Guice Elementary School
• Joel Chandler Harris Elementary School
• John B Gordon Elementary school
• Harwell Elementary School
• Laura Haygood Elementary School
• Herndon Elementary School
• Home Park Elementary School
• Caroline F. Harper Elementary School
• Evan P.Howell Elementary School
• John F. Faith Elementary was renamed C.D. Hubert 1963
• C.D.Hubert Elementary School renamed Atlanta Tech High In 2004
• EP Johnson Elementary School
• Lakewood Elementary School
• Luckie Street Elementary School
• Minnie S. Howell Elementary School
• Margeret Mitchell Elementary School
• Moreland Ave. Elementary School
• Mount Vernon Elementary School
• North Ave. Elementary School
• Oglethorpe Elementary School
• Peeples Street Grammar School
• Riverside Elementary School
• Slayton Elementary School
• Spring Street Elementary School
• Sylvan Hills Elementary School
• Anne E.West Elementary School
• John P. Whittaker Elementary School
• Fowler St. Elementary School
• Rockdale Elementary School
• Edmond Asa Ware Elementary School
• Walker Street Elementary School
• Waters Elementary School
• White Elementary School

History

Before 1900

Established by ordinance of the Atlanta City Council, the Atlanta Public Schools (APS) opened three grammar schools and two high schools in 1872 to educate the youth of the city. These openings brought the total number of schools offering free education to the city’s children to seven, as the Freedman’s Bureau had established two schools for “Negro” children in 1866.

Integration

On August 30, 1961, nine students â€" Thomas Franklin Welch, Madelyn Patricia Nix, Willie Jean Black, Donita Gaines, Arthur Simmons, Lawrence Jefferson, Mary James McMullen, Martha Ann Holmes and Rosalyn Walton â€" became the first African American students to attend several of APS’s all-white high schools.

On September 8, 1961, in a re-cap, Time Magazine reported: Last week the moral siege of Atlanta (pop. 487,455) ended in spectacular fashion with the smoothest token school integration ever seen in the Deep South. Into four high schools marched nine Negro students without so much as a white catcall. Teachers were soon reporting “no hostility, no demonstrations, the most normal day we’ve ever had.” In the lunchrooms, white children began introducing themselves to Negro children. At Northside High, a biology class was duly impressed when Donita Gaines, a Negro, was the only student able to define the difference between anatomy and physiology. Said she crisply: “Physiology has to do with functions.”

In a later 1964 news story, Time Magazine would say, “The Atlanta decision was a gentle attempt to accelerate one of the South’s best-publicized plans for achieving integration without revolution.”

By May 1961, 300 transfer forms had been given to black students interested in transferring out of their high schools. 132 students actually applied; of those, 10 were chosen and 9 braved the press, onlookers and insults to integrate Atlanta’s all-white high schools.

Madelyn Nix, described in publications as a member of Atlanta’s black middle class, was a student at Booker T. Washington high school and lived with her family on the campus of Morehouse College. She would eventually be assigned to Brown High School. Rebecca Dartt writes about her interview in the book Women Activists in the Fight for Georgia School Desegregation, 1958-1961.

A representative from the board of education, a psychologist, and a lawyer were seated behind a table addressing Nix, who was directly across from them. Part-way through the interview, the psychologist posed the following question to the young student:

“You know Madelyn, you’ll be one of the very few Negro students going to Brown High and we cannot guarantee your safety. How will you conduct yourself, say, if girls are waiting for you in the restroom?”

“They’ll probably say hello and that’s all,” she answered without hesitation. Nix was looking on the bright side, but she wondered how the boys would answer the same question.

Darrt describes Nix’s fellow schoolmate, Tom Welch, as coming from a “solid working-class neighborhood.” His father owned a local service station and had been vocal about wanting a better education for his son. Darrt writes, “Welch, although successful in terms of the black community, wanted more for his son and to move up and out required better education than segregated schools offered.”

In recent years, Georgia State University historian Cliff Kuhn explained the significance of the peaceful desegregation of Atlanta’s schools to WABE reporter Steve Goss during this interview. Brown vs. the Board of Education of Topeka had established the right of African American students to have equal opportunities in education, but it wasn't until 1958, when a group of African American parents challenged the segregated school system in federal court, that integration became a tangible reality for students of color in Atlanta.

Adding to the accolades for the students and the city, President Kennedy publicly congratulated residents during an evening address and asked other cities “to look closely at what Atlanta has done and to meet their responsibility……with courage, tolerance and above all, respect for the law.”

In 2012, Atlanta Public Schools produced a documentary to honor the 50th anniversary of the district's desegregation efforts. In January 1972, in order to settle several Federal discrimination and desegregation lawsuits filed on behalf of minority students,faculty and employees, the Atlanta Public Schools entered into an agreement with the U.S. Department of Justice, with approval and oversight from the U.S. Department of Education, to attempt to desegregate Atlanta Public Schools. In the late1960s and early 1970s, a majority of Atlanta Northside public schools had either token integration, or none at all. Faculty and staff assignments to schools had remained mostly segregated as well. The justice department allowed the school system to create and use a plan consisting of Busing, voluntary and M to M (Minority to Majority) transfers, redrawing attendance zones, closing outdated and underutilized schools,Building several new schools, mandating equal employee opportunity hiring, promotion, training and assignment, along with EEO vendor selection, bidding, contracting,procurement and purchase practices, and converting the school system from a K-7 elementary and 8-12 high school grade system into a middle school 6â€"8 grade program starting with the 1973/74 school year. in addition educational curriculum would be updated to include studies more balanced,inclusive,and diverse,with content culturally and historically significant to minorities. with strict Guidelines and oversight the federal courts agreed not to order and direct system wide mandatory busing for APS. Along with this program for racial balance of APS, the school system's first African American Superintendent, Dr. Alonzo A.Crim, took over leadership of Atlanta Public Schools in August 1973. Crim remained superintendent until retiring in 1988.

Cheating scandal

During the 11-year tenure of former superintendent Beverly Hall, the APS experienced unusually high gains in standardized test scores, such as the Criterion-Referenced Competency Test. In 2009, Hall won the National Superintendent of the Year Award. Around this time, the Atlanta Journal-Constitution began investigating the score increases and suggested evidence of cheating. A state report found a large number of erased answers in an analysis of the 2009 test scores. Tests were administered under much higher scrutiny in 2010, and the scores dropped dramatically. The state of Georgia launched a major investigation as cheating concerns intensified. The investigation's report, published in July 2011, found evidence of a widespread cheating scandal. At least 178 teachers and principals at 44 APS schools were alleged to have corrected students' tests to increase scores, in some cases holding "cheating parties" to revise large quantities of tests. Hall, who had retired in June 2011, expressed regret but denied any prior knowledge of, or participation in, the cheating. The new superintendent, Erroll Davis, demanded the resignation of the 178 APS employees or else they would be fired. The revelation of the scandal left many Atlantans feeling outraged and betrayed, with Mayor Kasim Reed calling it "a dark day for the Atlanta public school system." The scandal also attracted national media coverage.

Notes

References

• Atlanta Public Schools
• Atlanta Top Public Schools List

External links

• Atlanta Public Schools
• Atlanta Public Schools zoning locator
• U.S. Department of Education: Comprehensive School Reform Program