At a town hall-style meeting Thursday, parents pressed Cambridge Public Schools Superintendent Dave Murphy for specifics about what might go into the empty school building in East Cambridge.
Around 50 community members, parents and caregivers, and district administrators attended the meeting with Murphy on the vacancy at the former Kennedy Longfellow School. It was hosted at the King Open School. School Committee Members Elizabeth Hudson, Arjun Jaikumar, Luisa de Paula Santos and Mayor Sumbul Siddiqui attended but did not participate in the conversation.
Murphy gave a 40-minute presentation about potential long-term effects of the decision and a range of general options for the building:
- move an existing school
- merge two existing elementary schools into the space
- merge two upper schools
- create a school or Early Learning center
- preserve the building as swing space
- relinquish the building to the city
He then spent an hour answering questions about those options. Murphy almost immediately said he would not recommend using the building as a swing space or relinquishing it to the city.
Options pared away
In response to questions about the building’s infrastructure, Murphy said 158 Spring Street is currently “operational.” “We did not close Kennedy-Longfellow because the infrastructure could not support a school community in the long term,” Murphy said.
Other options were pared away until finally, under questioning from a parent, Murphy expressed a preference for merging two schools or moving an existing school, adding that the building is “too much of a valuable asset.”
“I have some reservations about [creating a new school], because of the unknown implications with respect to the rest of the system,” Murphy added.
The meeting drew a number of parents with children at the Amigos School, the district’s only K-8 school. One idea for the building’s future is to move The Amigos School from its current home in Cambridgeport back to 158 Spring Street, which housed the Amigos program in the late 1990s, before it became a full-fledged school.
“If we were to relocate Amigos to this school or merge with another school and vacate the facility of Amigos, wouldn’t that facility be better adapted to become an early learning center than this massive school?” an Amigos parent asked.
Murphy agreed, acknowledging the “visible inequity around the infrastructure of [some Cambridge] schools.”
Amigos is overcrowded
Parents from Amigos expressed concerns about overcrowding and space issues in its current building, which has more than 400 students. The K-Lo building could hold more than 650 students. Amigos is highly sought after within the district’s controlled choice system, but is not currently a “top three choice” for parents enrolling children in kindergarten, Murphy said.
The controlled choice system in Cambridge, which places students in schools based on family preference and socioeconomic status, will play a factor in the decision about the 158 Spring Street vacancy. “The levels of demand at our schools under the choice policy are heavily concentrated in a subset of our schools, and that’s not healthy from an enrollment perspective in a school choice system,” Murphy said.
Kennedy-Longfellow had a programming focus on “high-need students,” which the district defines as students who are low-income, English Language Learners, or have disabilities. The building’s new programming will need to continue to serve those learners, Murphy said. He added that changes in the physical space would have to bring a “programming benefit.”
Ahern field may not be turf
Ahern Field, the 2.6-acre green space next to the 158 Spring Street building, also came up at Thursday’s meeting.
Since the city announced plans to replace the field’s real grass with artificial turf, several parents have banded together in opposition, citing environmental and health-related concerns. Murphy indicated the decision to use turf may no longer be final.
“Just based on my conversations, I think the city team agrees with you, and I think there will be more conversations about that,” Murphy said.
There will also be more conversations about the building, starting at the School Committee meeting this coming Tuesday, May 19. Murphy said there will also be more engagement sessions with the city and with East Cambridge residents.
Ultimately, the building’s fate is in the hands of the School Committee, after Murphy makes a formal recommendation to the committee. Murphy would not confirm a timeline for the process, but said it will likely be in use again before fall 2028.
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