To Frank Whorley, the advantages of keeping children in one school from kindergarten through eighth grade seem clear.
"I like the fact that you ... could get to know every child, and know them well," said the former principal of Mount Royal Elementary/Middle School in Baltimore.
When children leave elementary school for larger, often more distant middle schools, parents can feel more removed from their education. But Whorley kept in touch with parents easily at his combined school, sometimes engaging them in informal chats as they accompanied a child to class.
Whorley, now director of middle school improvement in the city, will have a hand in creating at least four more combined schools as part of a new overhaul of middle-grade education.
School officials have tentatively identified the four elementaries that would be enlarged: Pimlico in Northwest Baltimore, and Steuart Hill, Franklin Square and North Bend in West Baltimore.
But how far the city should move in reducing the number of separate middle schools is being debated. Proponents of separate middle schools say they can work well, and the reform plan announced Tuesday is intended to improve the performance of all children from sixth to eighth grade, regardless of the school they attend.
That plan would raise academic standards in all middle schools; create magnet, or citywide, middle schools for math and science and the humanities; and provide more challenges for gifted students.
The plan was unveiled the same day as the latest standardized reading and math scores for sixth- and seventh-graders were released, which showed little improvement over last year's disappointing results. About 75 percent of the students scored below the national average.
Many of the top-performing schools were combined schools, including Roland Park, Woodhome, Ashburton and Francis Scott Key.
Not surprisingly, that kind of school is popular among parents in many neighborhoods.
There are now 18 kindergarten-through-eighth-grade schools, and 30 middle schools. On Wednesday, the state school board gave Edison Schools, a for-profit company that has a contract to run three elementaries, permission to add a sixth grade.
Although city school officials have tentatively identified the four elementaries to be enlarged, the list might change because of a decision to close other schools. Pimlico, for example, is now expected to take students from one of those schools, raising questions about its capacity to handle more grades.
