Can Boston Provide A Good Education In Dilapidated Buildings?

As Boston Public School students attended their first week of school in 90-degree weather, the city’s aging school buildings came into focus. Boston’s buildings are old. About two-thirds of the city’s 127 schools were constructed before World War II, and fewer than half of those have been renovated.

Most don’t have air conditioning, and many need new ventilation systems, according to city documents. The water fountains in many of the older schools are shut off, due to lead pipes carrying the water.

Under a campaign called “BuildBPS,” Mayor Marty Walsh has pledged to spend $1 billion to revamp Boston’s schools, so that “our kids go to a school that looks like a school that you would see in the suburbs and actually better than that.”

Walsh points to the new Dearborn STEM Academy, the first school built in Boston in 15 years, as an example of what he wants. The $73-million brick and glass building in Dorchester, tricked out with state-of-the-art labs and a makers’ space with 3D printers and welding equipment, was designed to prepare students for careers in computer science, graphic design and engineering.

The Dearborn was “set up for education,” Walsh said at the school’s ribbon-cutting ceremony in late August. “This is 21^st century learning in here, the way the classrooms, the labs and the space is laid out.”

Research shows that Walsh may be right, that buildings do make a difference in education, but not just because of technological upgrades. Boston may help its students succeed by addressing needs that are far more fundamental, if less glamorous. By providing fresh air and natural light, and clean, safe working facilities, Boston might help boost students' achievement.

Survey Says

Mary Battenfeld has had children in Boston Public Schools for the last 20 years and wants the district to renovate buildings, but worries that the city’s priorities are off.

“I’m particularly worried that there may be too much focus on technology and so-called 21^st century education,” Battenfeld said. “What my kids ask for is, ‘Fix the bathrooms.’”

Three-quarters of parents, teachers, students and staff who the city surveyed in 2016 said they were troubled by the district’s restrooms. For sake of comparison, a little more than half were disappointed with the district’s technology offerings. More than 80 percent rated teaching in the district to be good or excellent.

So what’s wrong with the restrooms?

“They have holes in them, they have mice. They smell. There aren’t enough of them,” Battenfeld said.

The city took steps to address these concerns last year, according to Walsh’s chief of education, Rahn Dorsey. The city merged its public facilities department with the school district’s facilities management team when it was understood that other city properties were better maintained, according to Dorsey.

“This will allow us to get to more of the ceiling tiles, more of the bathrooms, more of the systems and the architecture,” Dorsey said. “And improve our ability to make sure that those very things that parents are concerned about get done in a more effective manner going forward.”

Battenfeld said she hasn’t noticed any improved maintenance yet and the chronic disrepair sends a bad message to kids.

“It does make them feel less valued,” Battenfeld said. “And it’s hard to argue that it’s not the case. If you compare a school in Brookline and its facilities to a school in Boston, what are we telling our children? That we value children in Brookline more than we value children in Boston.”

The Learning Case For New Buildings

Academic research suggests that the physical conditions inside a building do affect children. Studies in New Haven, Conn. showed significant increases in reading scores for elementary and middle school students after they entered a newly-constructed school. Reading scores were flat before construction, but started to rise during the first year in the building and continued to increase for at least the next six years, according to the study by Yale University economists.

Studies of the impact of a $19 billion school building project in Los Angeles Unified School District showed gains in reading and math scores when students went from dilapidated, overcrowded buildings to new, less-crowded ones. The study by University of California at Berkeley economists showed a 5 percent increase in reading scores, equivalent to gains associated with a 10 percent decrease in class size, or nine more instructional days. Math scores improved by 10 percent, equal to a 20 percent reduction in class size or 14 more instructional days.

Determining the exact cause of the gains is difficult, because there could be a number of factors affecting children’s performance, according to Jeff Vincent, director of public infrastructure Initiatives at the Center for Cities and Schools at the University of California, Berkeley.

“If you go from a very dismal environment that does have bad lighting, and has bad indoor air quality, the thermal comfort is either too hot or too cold,” Vincent said. “It has a lot of impacts on everything from your ability to hear or concentrate to just the way you feel about your school, or how others even care about you or your education.”

Lack Of Investment

Under former president Barack Obama, the U.S. Department of Education’s Office for Civil Rights urged districts to invest in their buildings, noting in a 2014 “Dear Colleague Letter” that, “Too often, school districts with higher enrollments of students of color invest thousands of dollars less per student in their facilities than those districts with predominantly white enrollments.”

“While conditions have improved in some districts,” the letter continues,“ older buildings with inadequate or poorly maintained heating, ventilation and air conditioning (HVAC) systems still are more likely to house schools attended mostly by students of color, who in many instances are also low-income students.”

In Boston, Walsh is promising to significantly increase infrastructure investment. His $1 billion commitment is more than double the capital spent on BPS facilities over the last decade, according to city documents. New buildings in Massachusetts can cost anywhere from $100 million to $300 million, according to Dorsey, Walsh’s education advisor. At that cost, it’s hard to imagine the district could cover everything it wants to do with $1 billion.

Dorsey said the city has focused on certain goals when talking about BuildBPS over the last two years.

“I think we’ve tried to talk about it very comprehensively,” Dorsey said. “But I would agree that we have emphasized making sure that the learning experience and the student support experience that we want to create is really aligned for a vision around making sure that students are ready for the next phases of their lives.”

Dorsey said that the priorities for new buildings and renovations include “improving and maintaining air quality,” “adequate” sunlight and ventilation, a kitchen to prepare fresh foods, and air conditioning.

Our coverage of K through 12 education is made possible with support from the Nellie Mae Education Foundation.