More than 1,000 people packed a forum on school closures at Baltimore Polytechnic Institute last night, hundreds of them Western High School students and alumnae fighting to save their alma mater.
It remains unclear, however, whether the existence of Western, the nation's oldest public girls school, is at risk.
The Baltimore school board voted this month to reduce the school system's operating space by 2.7 million square feet over the next three years, a move that will require closing schools.
FOR THE RECORD - In an article in yesterday's editions about school closings, Bill Bleich, an English teacher at Baltimore Polytechnic Institute, was misidentified.
The move was in response to declining enrollment, deteriorating buildings and state demands to operate more efficiently.
Within days of the board vote, a rumor began to spread that Western would be merged with Poly. Two of the highest-performing schools in the city, Western and Poly are housed in adjacent, deteriorating buildings with space for many more students than are enrolled.
School system officials will not go so far as to say the schools will be left as is. But they insist that a list of schools to be closed or merged does not exist, and they hinted that a Poly-Western merger is highly unlikely.
"For God's sake, Poly is the top high school in the state of Maryland," said Eric Letsinger, the school system's chief operating officer. "Western's got a 100 percent college acceptance rate."
But assurances from administrators did little to ease the anxiety in the crowd last night. Phil Bleich, a Poly English teacher who says the school system should fill its extra space by reducing class sizes, yelled out as an administrator was speaking: "You want us to help cut our own throats."
The purpose of the forum was to discuss the fate of northern city schools, including Western and Poly. The forum was one of four occurring simultaneously around the city to discuss which schools should be closed, which schools should be renovated and where to build schools. Four more public forums are scheduled in other areas of the city tonight.
A second set of forums will be held Dec. 7 and Dec. 8.
In the Poly cafeteria last night, the school system had set up 50 tables for 10 people each to hold small group discussions and fill out questionnaires. But there were hundreds more people than the tables could accommodate, and many lingered in the back, some without questionnaires, unable to hear what was happening.
One was 18-year-old Andrea Jackson, a recent Poly graduate. "It is frustrating," she said. "I came all the way from College Park."
