Volunteer Helps Patterson Park Neighborhood

There are many things to like about Baltimore’s Patterson Park neighborhood—the sense of community, the diversity, the proximity to the park itself.  If only it had good schools, community members said.  Then they set out to create one.

For families with young children in southeast Baltimore’s Patterson Park neighborhood, the public-school prospects looked bleak.  Elementary schools in the area were overcrowded and underperforming.  Families who could afford it sent their kids to private schools or simply moved away as their children reached school age.  So when the former St. Elizabeth’s School building went up for sale, community members decided that the three-story schoolhouse overlooking Patterson Park would be the perfect place for a new and better school.  The seed that would grow to become thePattersonParkPublicCharterSchoolhad been planted.

Charter schools are schools that qualify for public funding, but operate independently of the traditional public school system, enabling communities to tailor the curriculum and other programs to their needs.  Two such needs rose to the top.  “We wanted a high-quality public school,” says Stephanie Simms, president of the school’s board.  “And we wanted a school community that reflected the diversity ofPattersonPark, which is one of the city’s most diverse neighborhoods.”

Creating a new school from whole cloth, Simms and other community leaders realized, posed a range of formidable challenges, from renovating the building and hiring teachers to raising money and negotiating any number of different agreements.  “As a community group, we weren’t familiar with much of this,” says Simms.  “We needed legal help.” MVLS connected them with volunteer attorney Ann Cole.

Cole provided help on a number of fronts.  She worked on the school’s application for non-profit status and helped push the application through an IRS bottleneck so the school could qualify for a federal grant.  She negotiated a contract with an organization that will provide day-to-day school management.  She worked on the lease.  “When you’re a grassroots organization starting from the bottom to try to pull everything together, it’s complicated,” says Cole.  “It was my job to make sure that what they wanted was accurately conveyed.”

In mid-summer, fewer than six weeks before the first day of school, there remained a considerable amount of work to be done.  Building renovations were continuing, a professional development retreat for teachers was on the agenda, and other last-minute details needed attention.  But for Simms, the reality that on September 6, the Patterson Park Public Charter School would open its doors for the very first time to more than 300 eager children trumped all those concerns.  “So many of us who’ve worked on this have preschoolers,” says Simms, whose son Cole is two.  “This school will let us stay in the city.  I feel really fantastic.”